merchandise

goods, wares, and chattels of every description and includes merchandise the importation of which is prohibited." 4 U. S. C., Tit/27, § 46.

A term including all those things which merchants sell, either wholesale or retail; as, dry goods, hardware, groceries, drugs, etc. It is usually applied to personal chattels only, and to those which are not required for food or immediate support, but such as remain after having been used, or which are used only by a slow consumption. See Pardessus, n. 8; Dig. 13, 3, 1; 19, 4, 1; 60. 16, 66; U. S. v. One Hundred Twelve Casks of Sugar, 8 Pet. (U. S.) 277, 8 L Ed. 944; Sewall v. Allen, 6 Wend. (N. Y.) 335. It may be and often is used as the synonym of “goods,” “wares” and “commodities.” If used in an insurance policy to describe the goods of a merchant it may very properly be limited to goods intended for sale. If used for the same purpose to describe the goods of a painter, it may be held to cover property intended for use, and not for ^ale; Hartwell v. Ins. Co., 84 Me. 524, 24 Atl. 954. Mere evidences of value, as bank-bills, are not nierchandise. “The fact that a thing is sometimes bought and sold does not make it merchandise.” Story, J., Citizens’ Bank V. Steamboat Co., 2 Story 16, Fed. Cas. No. 2,730; 2 Parsons, Contr. 331. “Goods, wares, merchandise,” has been held to embrace animate, as well as inanimate, property, as oxen; Weston v. Mc Dowell, 20 Mich. 353; or horses; U. S. v. One Sorrel Horse, 22 Vt. 655, Fed. Cas. No. 15,- 953. “Merchandise” may include a curricle; Anth. N. P. 157; or shares in a joint-stock company; Pray v. Mitchell, 60 Me. 430; or horses and trucks; The Garden City, 26 Fed. 766. See Stock. MERCHANT (Lat. mercator, merso). A man who trafiicks or carries on trade with foreign countries, or who exports and imports goods and sells them by wholesale. Webster, Diet.; Lex Mercatoria 23. These are known by the name of shipping-merchants. See Com. Dig. Merchant (A); Dy. 27911); Bacon, Abr. Merchant. One whose business it is to buy and sell merchandise: this applies to all persons who habitually trade in merchandise. Thomson V. Hopper, 1 W. & S. (Pa.) 469; 2 Salk. 445. One who Is engaged in the purchase and sale of goods; a trafficker; a trader. Crater V. Deemer, 4 Pa. Co. Ct. Rep. 378. A person engaged in buying and selling merchandise at a fixed place of business, which business is conducted in his name, and who during the time he claims to be engaged as a merchant does not engage in the performance of any manual labor except U. S., 193 U. S. 617, 24 Sup. Ct 517, 48 L. Bd. 772. Merchants, In the statute of limitations, means not merely those trading beyond sea, as formerly held; 1 Chanc. Oas. 152; Thomson V. Hopper, 1 W. & S. (Pa.) 469; but whether it Includes Uommon retail tradesmen, re; 4 Scott N. R. 819; 2 Parsons, Contr. 369, 370. See, also. Spring v. Gray, 6 Pet. (U. S.) 161, 8 L. Ed. 352; Anderson v. Com., 9 Bush (Ky.) 569. The term has been held to Include: an ice-dealer; Kansas City v. Vlndquest, 36 Mo. App. 584; a hotel-keeper; 12 Duv. 107; a banker; Brown v. Pike, 34 La. Ann. 576; the keeper of a boarding stable; 17 Bankr. Rep. 73; and a saloon-keeper; id. 102; but not a brewer; L. R. 7 Ex. 127; a commercial traveller or drummer; Ex parte Taylor, 58 Miss. 478, 38 Am. Rep. 336; City of Kansas V. Collins, 34 Kan. 434, 8 Pac. 865; the superintendent and treasurer of a steamboat corporation; In re Merritt, 7 Fed. 853; a theatrical manager; In re Duff, 4 Fed. 519; or a speculator in stocks; L. R. 2 Ch. 466; Ex parte Conant, 77 Me. 275, 52 Am. Rep. 759; a farmer; Lansdale v. Brashear, 3 T. B. Monr. (Ky.) 330; a druggist; Anderson v. Com., 9 Bush (Ky.) 569; or the principal of a, boarding school who provides the students with clothes and books; State v. Smith, 5 Humph. (Tenn.) 394. According to an old authority, there were four species of merchants: namely, merchant adventurers, merchants dormant, merchant travellers, and merchant residents; 2 Brownl. 99. See, generally, 9 Salk. 445; Bacon, Abr.; Comyns, Dig.; 1 Bla. Com. 75, 260; 1 Pardessus, Droit Comm. n. 78; 2 Show. 326; Bracton 334.

All commodities which merchants usually buy and sell, whether at wholesale or retail; wares and commodities such as are ordinarily the objects of trade and commerce. But the term is never understood as Including real estate, and is rarely applied to provisions such as are purchased day by day, or to such other articles as are required for immediate consumption. See Passaic Mfg. Co. v. Hoffman, 2 Daly (N. Y.) 512; Hein v. O'Co.nnor (Tex. App.) 15 S. W. 414; Elliott v. Swartwout, 10 Pet. 137, 9 L. Ed. 373; Pickett v. State, 60 Ala. 78; The Marine City (D. Ct) 6 Fed. 415.

— Merchandise marhs aet, 1862. The statute 25 & 26 Viet. c. 88, designed to prevent the fraudulent marking of merchandise and the fraudulent sale of merchandise falsely marked.

All commodities which merchants usually buy and sell, whether at wholesale or retail; wares and commodities such as are ordinarily the objects of trade and commerce. But the term is never understood as including real estate, and is rarely applied to provisions such as are purchased day by day, or to such other articles as are required for immediate consumption.

A comprehensive general term for all those things which persons in trade usually keep for sale. The word is not capable of exact definition, being collective. In most uses it signifies personal chattels, the product of artisanship or manufactures, as distinguished from land, live animals, agricultural produce in its original condition, and evidences of debt; but in special connections may have a more comprehensive meaning. The consideration that a thing is sometimes bought and sold does not render it merchandise: it should be a usual subject of trade. In the earlier duty laws of the United States, the expression, goods, wares, and merchandise, was scrupulously used to comprehend all subjects of duty collectively. But in the revised statutes merchandise alone is used as the equivalent of goods, wares, and merchandise. Merchandise, in a common count for goods sold and delivered, embraces animate as well as inanimate property. Weston v. Mc Dowell, 20 Mich. 353. Horses brought from a foreign country into the United States for the purpose as included in the term "merchandise," in the act of 1821 regarding imports. But when brought in as the mere instruments of prosecuting a temporary journey or visit, they are not within the purview of the act United States v. One Sorrel Horse, 22 Vt. 655. " Merchandise " seems not to have any fixed and technical legal signification, but comprehends whatever is usually bought and sold, what merchants commonly trade in. A policy of insurance taken out upon " grain and other merchandise " contained in certain warehouses ought not to be construed as embracing disused fixtures of the business, although the insurers would willingly have sold them had a purchaser appeared, but should he confined to grain and stuffs somewhat similar, in whicii the insurers ordinarily dealt. Kent v. Liverpool & London Ins. Co., 26 Ind. 294. A policy on " merchandise " will cover a "curricle." Duplanty u. Com. Ins. Co., Anth. 114. A policy upon merchandise such as is usually kept in country stores, is not void because hardware, china, and glass-ware, looking-glasses, &c., were not specifically mentioned; whether the articles were such as are usually kept iu country stores is for the jury to determine. Franklin, &c. Ins. Co. K. Updegraff, 48 Pa. Si. 350. A charter power to run a steamboat for the " transportation of merchandise " does not authorize. carrying bank-notes. Banknotes are not merchandise. That term is usually, if not universally, limited to things that are ordinarily the subjects of commerce and trafiic. The fact that a thing is sometimes bought and sold is no proof that it is merchandise. And the word properly signifies specific articles having a sensible intrinsic value, bulk, weight, or measure in themselves, and not things which are merely evidences of debt. Citizens' Bank v. Nantucket Steamboat Co., 2 Story, 16, 53. The sale of shares in a joint-stock company is a transfer of " merchandise," within the statute of frauds. Pray v. Mitchell, 60 Me. 430. The expression goods, wares, and merchandise, in the statute of frauds, includes shares of stock in a corporation. Kne v. Hornsby, 2 Mo. App. 61.,