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274 WILLIAMS' CASK.
sum which should be allowed Dorsey for the legacy purchased by
him, involves a question which has not been adjudicated by this
tribunal. Should he be allowed what he proves he has paid for
it ? We think not. By the contract he was not to pay the lega-
cies; it was Smith's business to disencumber the land. And, if
he is made to suffer by the purchase, he has no person to blame
but himself. When Smith refused to exonerate the land in viola-
tion of his contract, he subjected himself to the legal consequences
of such an act; but it would be a most inequitable consequence
of such refusal to say, that Dorsey was thereby constituted his
agent, with unrestricted powers to make the purchase; such a
result would have placed him at Dorsey's mercy. But equity
demands, that having purchased the legacy he should be entitled
to a credit, as against Smithy for the legacy at its fair value, from
the date of the purchase, 17th February, 1817.'
'By what rule is its value to be estimated ? The Chancellor, in
his decree, has adopted that value which was ascertained by the
auditor by a reference to Doctor Halley's table of observations,
which have been used in England for the purpose of ascertaining
the value of life annuities, and reversionary interests. These
tables are framed upon long and accurate observations on the bills
of mortality in England, and in other places; and may not be an
unsafe guide for the purpose in the region or latitude for which
they were calculated. But the probability of the duration of
human life, cannot be the same in every latitude and climate. In
the one it may be prolonged to the greatest age, in the other ab-
breviated to what, in a more healthy region, would be considered
as but a middle age; and even, indeed, in the same district of
country the chance for the duration of life is by no means the
same. Thus would tables, suited for the lowlands of Louisiana,
furnish any index of the duration of human life in the highlands
of Maryland ? And, even in our own state, could any dependence
be placed in the calculation of the Take of an annuity, or of a
reversion expectant upon a life, which would say, that as great a
probability existed for the duration of human life amid the marshes
of the Chesapeake Bay, as in the mountains of Allegany ? These
observations will be found to be verified by an examination of Dr.
Halley's tables, as suited to different parts of England, and to
places on the continent. Whether these tables, upon which the
Chancellor's decree is founded, are suitable to this state, could
only be told by a long series of observations here, which not
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