WILLIAMSON v. WILSON. 437

the sheriff dies at any time after he has levied the execution, and
before he has brought the money into court or satisfied the plain-
tiff, that the personal property so taken in execution would pass to
bis executor or administrator as parcel of his estate, which should
be kept separate, and applied exclusively in satisfaction of the claim
for which it had been taken.

But the act of 1813, ch. 102, s. 1, has provided somewhat dif-
ferentiy for this matter, by declaring, that where it appears by the
return of the late sheriff, that the real or personal property so taken
by him had not been sold, the court may, on motion, order a vendi-
tioni exponas to the new sheriff, upon which the property, which
had been so seized, may be taken wherever found, and sold as
upon the original execution.

This provision, however, extends only to cases where it appears
by the return, that the property taken in execution specifically
remains unsold; and therefore, where it does not so appear, or
where the sheriff had made sale and died before the money was
brought in or paid to the plaintiff, there, as the property or money
in his hands had passed to his personal representatives, they must
be held liable to the plaintiff for whose benefit the execution
issued. And although no action can be maintained against the
executor of a sheriff grounded on the misfeasance or breach of
duty of his testator, yet the plaintiff may recover of the executor
of the sheriff, in an action of debt, any money which he had levied
under a fieri facias and had not paid over.(s) In Maryland the
plaintiff would be allowed to recover his debt by a suit upon the
sheriff's bond, and then the sureties who had thus been compelled
to pay the debt would have a right to take the pjace of the plaintiff
as against the representatives of the sheriff.

Upon analogous principles, on the death of a receiver appointed
by this court, it appears to be clear, that in so far as he had a mere
duty to perform, like that of a sheriff in safely keeping his prison-
ers, nothing could devolve upon his representatives; but that where
he bad acquired a qualified interest in personal property as a bailee,
tnd which it was his duty to keep apart from his own, and account
for; and where he had, in obedience to an order, sold and con-
verted property into money, such property and money must he con-
sidered as having rightfully passed into the bands of his personal
representatives, as the only, or the most sure means of saving

(f) Clerk v. Withers, 6 Mod. 299; Adairr. Shaw, 1 Scho.& Lefr. 265.