MeKIM v. THOMPSON. 171

The committee, in all the views in which they have been able to
consider this subject, find themselves compelled to adopt the con-
clusion, that the prayer of the petitioner ought not to be granted.
They therefore recommend the adoption of the following reso-
lution :

"Resolved^ That the petitioner have leave to withdraw his
petition."

"Mr. Claude moved to strike out the report, and the question was
put and determined in the negative. The question was then put,
Will the Senate concur in the report and assent to the resolution?
Determined in the affirmative, "(r)

2d May, 1825.—BLAND, Chancellor.—In this case the defend-
ant. Hugh Thompson, by his counsel, on the 11th of April last,
moved the court to grant an appeal from its order of the 12th of
February last* and thereupon filed and offered an appeal bond for
the approbation of the Chancellor. The motion was permitted to
lay over until the plaintiffs could he heard; after which their coun-
sel appeared, and asked to be allowed further time to 'reply, in
writing, to the defendant's motion, which was granted; and on the
28th of the last month, a written argument, on the part of the
plaintiffs, in opposition to the motion, was accordingly submitted
to the Chancellor. The parties having been thus heard, the motion
has been deliberately and maturely considered.

The Chancellor took some pains, after a very careful research
into all the authorities within his reach, to explain the reasons and
grounds on which he founded the order of the 12th of February
last. The greater part of the debatable ground, occupied in the
discussion of the motion for that order, was as to its foundation,—
as to the kind of admissions, or state of things which would war-
rant its being made. The court was, therefore, explicit upon that
subject. But, whether such an order was interlocutory or final—
a "decretal order" or not, was neither mentioned in argument, nor
considered by the court. The investigation of the nature of the
basis of such an order being a matter of much importance, was
however, made with great care; because, upon its being ascer-
tained, whether that basis was solid and uniform, or loose and
shifting, depended the very interesting question presented in that
argument—whether such orders were likely to be attended with
good or ill consequences; or whether they were, or were not capa-

(r) The Chancellor's case, post 595.