TYSON VS. WATTS. 17

part was to explore for the purpose of ascertaining the mineral
wealth of the farm. There can be no doubt, I think, that the
defendant never would have entered into this contract if he had
believed that the working of the mines was not secured by it,
and that whether they should be worked or not depended upon
the discretion of the party with whom he was contracting. The
contract, therefore, it seems to me, is deficient in that recip-
rocity of obligation, without which, a court of equity will not de-
cree a specific performance. It appears to me difficult to main-
tain, that the defendant could have obtained a decree against
Petherick for the specific execution of this contract to the ex-
tent which he clearly had in view in entering into it—that is,
to compel Petherick to work as well as to explore the minerals,
even though the title of the defendant to the farm had been
entirely unincumbered. And if this is the case—that is, if there
is a want of mutuality in the remedies as well as the rights of
the parties to the contract, it would be inequitable, as said by
Lord Redesdale in Sch. & Lef. 18, to decree a specific perform-
ance at the suit of him who is not bound; as if the rule were
different, he might enforce or avoid the contract, according as
his interest might incline him the one way or the other. It is
much better in such cases of inequality of obligation, to refuse
a specific performance, and leave the plaintiff to seek his com-
pensation, if he has sustained damage, by an action at law;

because if equity acts at all, it must, as Chancellor Kent says,
"act ex vigore) and carry the contract into execution with un-
mitigated severity."

The contract in this case, though varying of course in terms,
and in some respects perhaps, in substance, from the contract
in the case of Geiger vs. Green, decided by the Court of Ap-
peals, yet in other, and in some very essential, particulars, it
very much resembles that case. In that case the contract gave
the complainant the privilege of digging and removing ore from
the farm of the defendant, at twenty-five cents per ton, for the
privilege of the ground—leave also to build a house on said
land, the workmanship to cost $100—the materials to be got
on the land of the defendant at the expense of the plaintiff.
2*