Commercia Belli

Compacts entered into by belligerent nations to secure a temporary and limited peace. 1 Kent, Comm. 159. Contracts made between citizens of hostile nations in time of war. 1 Kent, Comm. 104.

Agreements entered into by belligerents, either in time of peace to take effect in the event of war, or during the war itself, by which arrangement is made for non-hostile Intercourse. They may take the form of armistices, truces, capitulations, cartels, i ducts, safeguards. 1 Kent 159; 2 See separate titles. Contracts between citizens of one b< ent and those of another, or between < itizens of one belligerent and the other belligerent They may take the form of ransom bills (<]. v.), bills of exchange drawn by prisoners of war, or receipts for requisitions. 1 Kent 104. collecting information as to the financial standing, ability, and credit of persons engaged in business and reporting the same to subscribers or to customers applying and paying therefor. "They have become vast and extensive factors in modern commercial transactions for furnishing information to retail jobbers as well as to wholesale merchants. The courts are bound to know judicially that no vendor of goods at wholesale can be regarded as a prudent business man if he sells to a retail dealer, upon a credit, without first informing himself through these mediums of information of the financial standing of the customer, and the credit to which he is fairly entitled;" Furry v. O'Connor, 1 Ind. App. 573, 28 N. E. 103. See also Eaton, Cole & Burnham Co. v. Avery, 83 N. Y. 31, 38 Am'. Rep. 389; Holmes v. Harrington, 20 Mo. App. 661. How far the agency may contract against its own negligence. An exception is made to some extent in favor of such agencies to the rule against stipulations by a person against liability for his own negligence. The agency usually contracts that their agents shall be considered as the agents of their patrons, and that they shall not be liable for the negligence of their agents. Where in an action upon such a contract the plaintiff contended that under it the agency was protected only against gross and not against ordinary negligence, it was held otherwise; Duncan v. Dun, 7 W. N. C. (Pa.) 246, Fed. Cas. No. 4,134. Under a contract that the actual correctness of the information was in no manner guaranteed, the agency was not liable for loss occasioned to a subscriber by the wilful and fraudulent act of a sub-agent in furnishing false information; Dun v. Bank, 58 Fed. 174, 7 C. C. A. 152, 23 L. R. A. 687, reversing City Nat. Bank v. Dun, 51 Fed. 160. Where the inquiry was made concerning a grocer and the agency reported concerning the wrong person, who had the same name and was a grocer and saloon keeper, the plaintiff could not recover from the agency the value of goods sold on the strength of the report, the evidence being held to show that there was not such gross negligence as would render the agency liable; Xiques v. Bradstreet Co., 70 Hun 334, 24 N. Y. Supp. 48; but such a contract does not protect the agency from an error made in the publication of its books of reference giving the financial responsibility of merchants and others, and upon which a subscriber of the agency relied in selling goods and suffered a loss, and in such case it is unnecessary to thus establish the insolvency of the purchaser by suit before suing the agency; Crew v. Bradstreet Co., 134 Pa. 161, 19 Atl. 500, 7

Lat.

In international law. War contracts. Contracts or conventions made between the subjects of two powers at war with each other; such as ransom bills, contracts made by prisoners of war for subsistence, and the like. 1 Kent's Com, 104, 105, 169. A truce is also a convention of this kind. Id. 159.