The determination of this question by the Royal Audience in favour of the pious establishments, was unquestionably conformable to the admitted principle of respondentia; and the reversal of it by the council of the Indies is a sufficient proof of the unsettled state of mercantile law in Spain, on a point which seems elsewhere generally and definitively adjusted.

The liability of the respondentia lenders seems to be so ill defined, that even in case of nearly total loss, their full demand is awarded them, the loss thus falling on the borrower, instead (on the received respondentia principle) of the lenders being entitled only to the proportion of what is saved; for the premium of twenty-five per cent. which they receive, may be presumed adequate to the interest and insurance on such a voyage.

It ought not, under these circumstances, to create wonder that the merchant adventurers borrowing from these establishments should, with a view to their own protection, take due care that a partial shall, by one means or other, be converted into a total loss.

There is one peculiarity in the principle of these loans which forms a feature in the transaction distinct from common respondentia, inasmuch as that the latter is limited to that bottom on which the adventure began, while in the former the lender follows the goods until they are sold and returned, though by some other bottom; but his liability and forbearance of his principal and premium is limited to three years. In respect to this limitation, it is even conformable to our terms of respondentia, which allow a monthly per centage in proportion to the first period of twenty months on which the premium is calculated, but which per centage can only be demanded to the extent in all of thirty-six months, including the original twenty, provided the voyage should be prolonged so much; the common interest of five per cent. only upon the aggregate amount afterwards attaching, and all marine risk ceasing.

THE END.

T. DAVISON, Lombard-street,
Whitefriars, London.

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