bered by him in his will. In 1802 he was consul-general at St. Domingo, and afterward consul-general at Algiers and commissioner to conclude a peace with Tripoli. He discharged this latter duty in 1805 in a manner which gave umbrage to Gen. Eaton, who in concert with Hamet Caramelli, the deposed bey, had gained important advantages over the reigning Tripolitan sovereign. It was thought that to accept terms of peace at this juncture was to throw away the fruits of hardly earned success; but Mr. Lear's conduct was approved by his government, though much blamed by a portion of the public. He returned shortly after to the United States, and at the time of his death was employed in Washington as accountant of the war department.

LEARCHUS, a Greek sculptor of Rhegium, in southern Italy, who flourished probably between 700 and 650 B. C. He belongs to the semi-mythical Dædalian period, and the accounts of him are so vague and confused that he may be considered almost a mythical personage. Pausanias mentions a statue of Jupiter, attributed to him, in the brazen house at Sparta, which was considered the most ancient work of the kind. It was made of hammered pieces of brass riveted together.

LEASE, in law, the contract whereby one party (the lessor or landlord) transfers to another party (the lessee or tenant) the use and possession of real estate. The word is sometimes used also to designate a contract for the letting and hiring of personal property. No certain words or forms are necessary for this purpose; but a lease must describe the premises to be demised with an accuracy that is sufficient for certain identification; and there are words which, being usually employed, have now a very definite meaning, as house, farm, land, and the like. Any inaccuracies or uncertainties as to names, dimensions, locations, amounts, or terms, may be explained if the other parts of the instrument suffice to make them certain. As a general rule, they may be explained by evidence outside of the contract, provided this evidence neither varies nor contradicts the written contract. If the uncertainties cannot thus be cured, they may be rejected, if they leave behind them a good and sufficient instrument. Generally, any thing, whether real or personal, which is hired to be used, carries with it all the appurtenances and accompaniments already connected with it, and proper or necessary for that use of it. We will in this article consider: 1, the right and obligation of the lessor; 2, those of the lessee; and 3, some special rules of law applicable to leases. If the lease be under seal, there is an implied covenant of good title in the lessor, and in all leases there is one of quiet enjoyment by the lessee. If the lease contain an express covenant of renewal, on reasonable terms, which do not imply perpetuity, the law enforces them. But a lease for 6 years, with a covenant to renew "on the same terms," means the same terms excepting

the covenant to renew, which will be omitted; for otherwise this covenant to renew would amount to a perpetuity, which the law prohibits. An important practical rule is, that the landlord is under no obligation to repair the premises, without an express covenant to that effect; and it seems to be the decidedly prevailing rule, that the uninhabitableness of the premises is no defence against a claim of rent. Even where the landlord covenants that the premises are in good repair and that he will keep them so, it has been held that the tenant must still pay his rent, however out of repair the premises may be, and seek his compensation by claiming damages from the lessor; but this is not certain. In England the law is very severe against the tenant, not permitting him to vacate the lease unless for some positive and actual wrong doing of the landlord, and not obliging the landlord to inform the lessee of objections or defects, however serious and incompatible with use. But we doubt whether this be law here.-The tenant is bound to pay his rent as agreed on, but not to pay the taxes unless the lease so specifies; but this may be inferred from an agreement that the lessee shall pay his rent "free from taxes and charges," or "a net rent," or any similar phraseology. In general, if the lease does not contain a clause giving the lessor a right to reënter and oust the lessee on his failure to pay rent, the lessor has no such right. And if there be such a clause (as is commonly the case in American leases), the law is exceedingly exact and punctilious as to the exercise of this right of reentry. That is, to justify it, a demand must be made for the rent due, and of the precise sum, on the precise day when it is due, at a convenient hour before sunset, and at the very place where it is payable if one be specified, or otherwise at some accessible, conspicuous, and noticeable place on the premises. Without express agreement, a tenant is not bound to make repairs. It has been sometimes held, however, that he was bound to make such repairs as his own use of the house causes to become necessary, or such as are called for by some accident and are required to prevent the premises from becoming untenantable. Generally, an outgoing tenant should leave the premises wind and water tight, but is not bound to any ornamental repair, unless his covenants require this of him. If the tenant agrees to make repairs, and to leave the premises in good repair, he is not justified in not doing so by the fact that the premises were not in good repair when he took them. If, with no obligation on his part to repair, he chooses to repair, the lessor is not bound to repay him unless he promises so to do. It is important to know, that if a lease contains a covenant on the part of the lessee to keep the premises in repair, and to return them in good repair, he must not only repair if injured by a fire, but rebuild if the house is burned down, unless it be done by the act of God or of the public enemy. And if there be no such clause, although the lessee is

not bound to rebuild, he is bound (by a prevailing but not universal rule) to continue to pay rent during the lease. Hence the best and most carefully prepared leases in recent times provide expressly (and all leases should), that if the premises shall be made untenantable by fire, in whole or in part, the rent shall cease or abate proportionably until repair or rebuilding; and the clause requiring repair and a return of the premises in good condition contains the exception, "unless in case of injury by fire or other unavoidable accident." In the absence of express covenants, the tenant is not bound to rebuild a house burned down through his own negligence or that of his servants. The tenant of a farm is bound, without express covenants, to manage and cultivate the same in such wise as good husbandry and the usage of the neighborhood require; and for any wide departure from this he would be responsible in damages. A tenant may assign and transfer, if he do not covenant otherwise, the whole or any part of his lease. Technically, if he transfers the whole, it is an assignment; if less than the whole, it is under leasing. If therefore he covenants, as is commonly done, "not to assign, transfer, or set over" the lease, this does not restrain him from under leasing any part of it; and to prevent this, the words " or any part of it" should be added. If there be this covenant, and the lessee breaks it by assigning or underletting the premises, this only gives the lessor a claim for damages, but does not cancel the lease, nor permit the lessor to enter and oust the tenant, without an express covenant to that effect. -A tenant cannot defend against his landlord's claim for rent, by denying or contesting his title to the premises, unless the tenant can show that the landlord caused the tenant to accept the lease by a fraud upon him. But it was always held that a landlord forfeited his rent, and authorized the tenant to cancel the lease, by his expulsion of the tenant from the premises; and now it seems to be law, at least in the United States, that the lease is cancelled and all right to rent lost by any violent outrage or indecency on the part of the landlord, or any intentional and material interference with the tenant's proper use and enjoyment of the premises. (For the right of an outgoing tenant of a farm or garden to his crops, see EMBLEMENTS; for his right to remove any thing he has added to the premises, see FIXTURES.)-The lease may be for the life of either the lessor or the lessee or any other person, and then the lessee has a freehold, which is considered in the law as real estate. Or it may be for any term of years, and then it is a chattel only, although a real chattel; for the law regards a lease determinable at a time certain, however distant that time, as a less estate than one for the life of any person, however old or feeble he might be. Where a terrant, with consent of the landlord, enters into possession, without any express bargain, he is a tenant at will.

To avoid some technical incidents of this tenancy, there grew up in England a custom,

which the law soon sanctioned, of considering such an estate as a tenancy "from year to year." This kind of tenancy was not transferred to this country with all its English incidents; but something like it exists here. The one essential principle is, that a tenancy at will may be determined by the will of either party, but only after reasonable notice given by the party intending to terminate the tenancy. There is no uniformity either of rule or usage as to what this notice should be. In some instances, a notice of 6 months may still be necessary, as it is in England. One of 3 months is more frequently sufficient; and in some states the notice must be equal to the interval between the periods of payment of rent. The rule is given in most of our states by statute, but depends in some upon adjudication or usage. Generally, the notice should cover the whole of the interval between payments. Thus, if the rent is paid quarterly, and 3 months' notice is sufficient, and the notice is given in the middle of a quarter, it takes effect at the end of the next quarter. No particular form of notice is necessary; but there must be reasonable certainty in the description of the parties, of the premises, of the purpose, and of the time. If a tenant for years holds over after the determination of his lease, he is technically a tenant on sufferance; and a tenant on sufferance is not a tenant at will. But by the prevailing rule of this country, such a person, if the lessor do not object to his holding over, is a tenant at will, holding upon all the terms and conditions of the expired lease which have not necessarily expired with it; that is, for example, he pays the same rent, at the same time.-If the lessor sells and transfers all his estate, the tenant now owes rent to the purchaser. If he sells a part only, there must be an apportionment of rent. How this rent is to be apportioned is not determined by any universal rule. If the premises were divided into aliquot parts, as halves, thirds, quarters, or the like, the rent would be divided in the same way. Where this is not so, the apportionment is not governed by mere quantity, but by value; and this is a question of fact for a jury, and not of law for the court. So if the lessor die in the midst of the term, the rent is apportioned accordingly. If the lessor and his assignee agree as to the apportionment, the lessee is bound by it, because it is of no interest to him whether he pays to one or another.-As to the remedy of the lessor for rent due, in some states the law of distress for rent remains. (See DISTRESS.) Where it does not, the lessor has only the same remedy he would have for any other debt of the same amount.-There are, in most of our states, provisions resembling those of the statute of frauds, which determine what leases may be oral, and what must be in writing. So also it is generally provided that leases of a certain length (most frequently 7 years) should be recorded in the registry of deeds.

LEATHER (Sax. lether, from lithe, lither, soft, flexible), a material produced from the

fibrous portion of the skins of various animals by subjecting them to processes of tanning and currying or other operations, the effect of which, by the chemical changes induced, is to cause the skins, without alteration of shape, to become soft and flexible or hard according to the sort of leather desired, and to lose their tendency to putrefy. From the most remote periods leather has been prepared for clothing and various useful and ornamental articles. The Hebrews ornamented it by giving it bright colors, as appears by the mention in Exodus of rams' skins dyed red; and they employed it after the manner of the Egyptians, from whom they probably derived their knowledge of working it, for vessels to contain water and a multitude of other uses. The paintings and sculptures of Thebes, described by Wilkinson in his "Ancient Egyptians," represent many of the methods of working leather practised by this people as very similar to those of the present time. Figures of men are seen currying, stretching, and working it, employing the semicircular knife like that of modern curriers, and the awl, a stone for polishing the leather, and other implements such as shoemakers now use. In their shops a prepared skin was suspended as the emblem of their trade, together with ready-made shoes and other articles in leather. For covering harps, shields, &c., their leather was ornamented by embossing and coloring. For strong cords it was cut into thongs and twisted like ropes; and it was also used in the form of straps. The method of removing the hair from the skins now practised by the Arabs, and probably the same then employed, is noticed, together with the modern methods of effecting this part of the preparation of leather, in the article HIDES. For tanning they used the pods of the sont or acacia, the acanthus of Strabo and other writers, and probably also the bark and wood of the rhus oxyacanthoides, and the bark of the acacia seal, both natives of the desert. Of the methods of preparing the leather used by the Romans no accounts are preserved; and the processes of the middle ages also are lost. The Saracens, it is recorded, used alum, the efficacy of which for preserving skins is well understood. The Kalmucks at the present time make use of a solution of alum and of statice root, and also of sour milk, in preparing the skins of sheep and other animals. From the largest species of sea carp they have from remote times prepared garments which are nearly water proof, making use of sour milk, or some astringent, with which the skins, first dried and cleaned, are dressed 3 times a day, after which they are finished by exposure for several days to a dense smoke. The Britons exported skins in early times, but afterward, as Fosbroke states, learned the art of tanning, and carried it on in establishments of great extent erected on the banks of the streams. Many rude nations now prepare leather by methods of their own. In both North and South America the dried skins, after being cleaned from the hair, are placed in earthen

vessels with the powdered brains and some water, and heated to about 95° F. The cerebrous matter forms a lather, which thoroughly cleans the skins and makes them pliable. After remaining immersed for some time they are taken out and stretched tightly in a frame, in which state they are rubbed with a smooth stone in order to expel the water and fat. Sometimes after this they are also smoked, by which they are made to better resist the action of water. In the Pacific countries of North America leather is skilfully tanned by the natives, who employ some of the vegetable productions of the country for the purpose. Leather dressing and the working of leather in Japan and Hindostan are considered as the most degrading of all pursuits; the class that practises them is tabooed, and others are contaminated by communication with any of its members. In civilized countries the leather interest ranks among the principal departments of industry. In Great Britain McCulloch places it next to iron, cotton, and wool, while others consider it as equally important with cotton. In the use of boots and shoes alone it is supposed that the consumption amounts to an annual average of 88. to each person, which would give for a population of 21,000,000 the sum of £8,400,000. In addition to this, the consumption in harness, gloves, bookbinding, and other uses is supposed to amount to quite as much more. In the United States the use of leather in proportion to the population is probably as large as in Great Britain. In France it is stated that about 3,000,000 skins are annually converted into leather, of which about 2,032,000 are of calves, 857,000 of oxen and cows, and 111,000 of horses, the total value of which is over $7,000,000. Leather making in the United States was practised upon a very small scale up to the beginning of the present century; but since the introduction of improvements, which began in Massachusetts in 1803, such as the application of water power to many of the processes, and subsequently of steam power, and also of ingenious machines, as those for splitting, shaving, graining, and finishing the leather, the manufacture has become of immense importance, and is conducted in establishments of great extent. By the census of 1850 the total value of the product of leather in the United States was estimated at $32,861,796, not including that of some 6,000,000 skins of sheep, goats, and other small animals. Of this sum the only states that produced more than $1,000,000 were: New York, $9,804,000; Pennsylvania, $5,275,492; Massachusetts, $3,519,123; Ohio, $1,964,591; Maine, $1,620,636'; and Maryland, $1,103,139. The total amount of capital invested in the manufacture was $18,900,557, and the value of the raw material was $19,613,237. The great market of the country for all sorts of leather is New York. The import trade in hides is chiefly directed to this city, as also the great bulk of the domestic production of leather. Boston also has imported largely from South America and the Pacific

are generally of inferior quality. Sheep skins are sometimes split, and the upper or grain side tanned with sumach and dyed to imitate morocco, which is used for pocket-books and other purposes requiring little wear, while the under side is prepared with alum, making a white leather; this is however more commonly made from lambs' skins. The latter also furnish a delicate leather largely employed for gloves as a substitute for kid, but they must be taken from animals not more than a month old. Such skins are imported into England to the number of about 1,400,000 annually. Morocco is prepared from goat skins, the best for this purpose being obtained from Switzerland. Those known as Tampico skins from Mexico are also excellent. Mogadore skins produce a black morocco, known as black or Spanish leather, so called because originally brought from Spain, where the Moors carried its manufacture to great perfection. The finest kid skins for gloves are of young animals that have not begun to graze. The leather known in the United States as buckskin or wash leather is prepared from deer skins. It is largely used for gloves, and its softness renders it a good material for rubbing polished surfaces of metal or of brass. That of the chamois goat is still softer. In parts of Europe, as Scotland, hogs' skins are tanned, and make a light but tough and durable leather, which is used for the seats of saddles and parts of harness. On the continent the skins are dressed with the hair on for covering trunks, knapsacks, &c. A very strong leather for its weight is made of seal skins, properly tanned. It is used for the legs of riding and hunting boots, and in England a black enamelled leather is prepared from it for ladies' shoes. In Louisiana the manufacture of leather from alligator skins has been recently commenced; and in Canada a new source of leather has been found in the skins of a species of whale which is taken in the St. Lawrence river. In February, 1860, specimens of leather from this source were exhibited before the polytechnic association of the American institute of New York, which were considered as combining in a remarkable degree the qualities of softness and extraordinary strength. In a paper read at the same time the fish is described as the white whale, once very common in the lower part of the St. Lawrence river, and still so in the rivers emptying into Hudson's bay. The skin is highly valued for the various sorts of excellent leather made from it.-The methods of preparing skins for tanning are noticed in the article HIDES; and a part of the final process of finishing leather is described in that on CURRYING. In the latter operation it is customary in the United States to employ gum tragacanth for finishing the leather, to which it gives a drier and harder, though no better finish than is obtained by the ordinary size and tallow. In the coloring on the grain the usual practice is, after the grease has been carefully "slicked" off with the tool called a slicker, to brush the leather over with a warm ammoniacal liquor, called

"sig," which is stale urine. Immediately after this an application of some ferruginous liquor, as of copperas, is made, followed by another of oil, the oil striking in as the water evaporates. Tanning is a chemical operation in which the tough product leather, which resists the action of moisture and the tendency to putrefy common to soft animal matters, is obtained by causing the fibrous portion of the skin, called the corium or true skin, to enter into combination with the astringent vegetable substance, tannin. The corium is the inner layer of the skin, and is known as the gelatinous tissue, though it is perhaps only made gelatinous by the action of dilute acids or alkalies or of boiling water. It readily putrefies when exposed to moisture, but when combined with tannin becomes insoluble in cold water, and without changing its form constitutes the durable compound, leather. At first this is porous, and lacks the softness and flexibility which it is the object of the currying process to impart; but unless the chemical process has been thoroughly effected, the leather can never become firm and compact, resisting the penetration of water. Its quality is judged of by this property, and by the degree of homogeneousness of texture and uniformity of color it possesses. The color should be a brown, of shade varying with the kind of tanning material employed. Skins injured in being removed from the animal, by being exposed too long to the depilatory process, or by being tanned in muddy water, or with poor qualities of bark that contain foreign substances, can never make good leather. The black color is produced upon the surface of leather by simply washing it with a solution of copperas (sulphate of iron). By the action of this salt with the tannin it comes in contact with, a tanno-gallate of iron is produced of permanent black or reddish black color. Leather is improved by keeping it a certain period, not exceeding two years, before it is used; but kept longer than this, it is apt to become dry, and should then be stored in damp cellars. The soles of boots and shoes are made more durable by keeping them for some time after they are made up. Leather becomes excessively compact by being long subjected to heavy pressure of a column of water. The Cornish miners eagerly seek for the pieces of sole leather that have been used for packing of the mining pumps, and use them for soles as the most durable material they can obtain. The principal source of tannin is the bark of trees, the vegetable principle being deposited by the sap chiefly in the inner portion of the outer bark, and the outer portion of the inner bark or liber. It is most abundant in bark at the time of the greatest flow of the sap; consequently the spring bark must be most productive, and that of the winter the least so. Oak bark was formerly regarded as the only sort suitable for affording tannin; and that obtained from the English oaks was particularly famous for producing leather of great strength. After being dried, broken up, and ground to coarse