from the highway in its course the question arose as to whether or not the railroad com pany could exercise the right of eminent do main. The court quotes from Harvey v. Aurora & Geneva R. R. Co., 174 Ill. 95, 54 N. E. 163, to the effect that a street railroad is a road constructed on a street or highway for the purpose of conveying passengers liv ing upon or having business on such street or highway; that its main object is to accom modate street travel; that though it may di verge from the street or highway where the confirmation of surface or the position of streams make it necessary, yet it may not like a steam railway, locate its route across the country, without reference to the accom modation of local travel along the highways in order to reduce time and distance for passengers traveling from city to city or town to town. The court then says: "So far as the street railroads are authorized to travel through the country districts, it is upon the theory that they will be of benefit to the rural inhabitants, and not that only those living ¡n towns, where regular stations shall be maintained, shall be the beneficiaries. As was said in the Harvey Case, supra, they are presumed to follow the highways, mak ing all the stops necessary for the accommo dation of the people living along the high ways. The fact that they have adopted electricity as their power, instead of the horse or dummy, cannot enlarge their powers or lessen or change their duties. If the country districts are so sparsely settled that the traffic along them will not support such roads following them, then their con struction is not a public necessity, and the power of eminent domain, upon the theory that they are to exercise a public function, cannot be called into action in their behalf. If they seek to travel across the country as do steam railroads, disregarding highways and disregarding the interests and conven iences of the country people, let them or ganize under the law regulating steam rail roads, and be subject to the regulations or the statute and the burdens cast upon such railroads. On the other hand, if they wish
to avoid these burdens and to avail them selves of the greater freedom and the right to burden the highways, then they must be willing to observe and perform the duties that they owe to the public as such." ESTOPPEL. (SIGN- ING INSTKUMENT AS WITNESS.) SUPREME COURT OF LOUISIANA.
In Brian v. Bonvillain, 35 Southern Re porter 632, the court holds that a person may be estopped by signing as a witness an act in which third persons contract with each other and with referenc« to rights in which he has an interest. FRAUDULENT CONVEYANCES. (INNOCENT MOTIVE.) SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
Matthews v. Thompson, 71 Northeastern Reporter 93, involved the validity of a con veyance by an insolvent, made without mo tive to defraud. A husband conveyed to his wife practically all of his property on con sideration of love and affection, being at the time, to the knowledge of both parties, in solvent. The conveyance was in trust with power to sell and apply the proceeds to the payment of taxes and of such other debts and personal expenses of the grantor as it might seem judicious to the grantee to pay, and on the grantor's death to sell any part of the property then remaining unsold and dis tribute the net proceeds among the persons and in the manner and proportions desig nated in the grantor's will, and in default of such will, among the persons who would have inherited the premises had the grantor died seized thereof intestate. In other words, no provision was made for the payment of the grantor's debts except such as the gran tee might elect to pay. The court says that the mere fact that a conveyance is voluntary, especially if it is founded on a consideration of love and affection, as in the case of a gift from a husband to his wife, or from a parent to his child, does not necessarily render it fraudulent against creditors. But on the other hand it is generally, if not universally held, that freedom from moral turpitude, and
