Lindenberger v. Beall. 6 W. last day of grace, after a demand upon the acceptor on the same day, (and Saturday, in this case, was the last day of grace, the next day being Sunday,) was sufficient to charge the drawer; and that the notice in this case given to the drawer, by putting the same into the post-office, was good. Judgment affirmed. LINDENBERGER et al. v. BEALL. 6 W. 104. After demand upon the maker of a note, on the third day of grace, notice to the indorser on the same day, is sufficient by the general law merchant. Evidence of a letter, containing notice, having been put into the post-office, directed to the indorser, at his place of residence, is sufficient proof of the notice to be left to the jury, and it is unnecessary to give notice to the defendant to produce the letter before such evidence can be admitted. ERROR to the circuit court for the District of Columbia. Assumpsit against the defendant, (Beall,) as indorser of a promissory note, drawn by one Tunis Craven, dated at Baltimore, October 22, 1811, in favor of the defendant, and by him indorsed to the plaintiffs, for $191.17, negotiable at the Bank of Washington, payable six months after date. At the trial, the note was given in evidence, and the handwriting of the drawer and indorser admitted. The plaintiffs further proved, by a notary, that the note was by him demanded of the drawer, on Saturday, the 25th of April, 1812, being the day on which it became payable, that is, the last day of grace. And not being paid, notice of the non-payment thereof was inclosed in a letter addressed to the defendant, at the city of Washington, and put into the post-office at Georgetown. The notary testified that he had no recollection of these *facts, [*105] and only knew them from his notarial book, and the protest made out at the time; by which it appeared that a demand was then made of the drawer, and the protest made, and notice sent; and from its being his invariable practice to give notice either personally, or by letter, to the indorsers, on the same day. Nor did he then recollect that he addressed the letter to the defendant in Washington, but he presumed from his book, and protest, and his uniform practice, that if he did not know where the defendant lived, (which was probably the case when he received the note,) he inquired, and ascertained his residence, and addressed it properly. Upon which evidence the defendant's counsel prayed the court to instruct the jury that the above proof of notice was insufficient to charge the defendant as indorser of said note, and that the plaintiffs were not entitled to recover. Which opinion the court gave. The plaintiff's counsel excepted to the opinion. A verdict and judgment thereon was Mechanics' Bank of Alexandria v. Withers. 6 W. rendered for the defendant by the court below, and the cause was brought by writ of error to this court. Key, for the plaintiff, was stopped by the court. Jones and Law, for the defendant. [ *106 ] *The court were unanimously of opinion, that after demand of the maker on the third day of grace, notice to the indorser on the same day was sufficient, by the general law merchant; and that evidence of the letter containing notice having been put into the post-office, directed to the defendant, at his place of residence, was sufficient proof of the notice to be left to the jury, and that it was unnecessary to give notice to the defendant to produce the letter before such evidence could be admitted. Judgment reversed. 10 P. 572. THE MECHANICS' BANK OF ALEXANDRIA v. WITHERS. 6 W. 106. The circuit court for the District of Columbia has authority to adjourn to a distant day, and the adjourned session is considered as the same term. Where the regular term began on the 3d Monday in April, and the court continued to sit, de die in diem, until the 16th of May, when it adjourned to the 4th Monday of June; held, that a defendant, against whom an office judgment had been entered on the 16th of May, had a right, under the laws and practice of Virginia, to appear at the adjourned session, and have the default set aside, on giving special bail, and pleading issuably. [*107 ] *Lee and Swann, for the plaintiff in error. Taylor, for the defendant in error. MARSHALL, C. J., delivered the opinion of the court. This is a writ of error to a judgment rendered by the circuit court for the District of Columbia, sitting in Alexandria, in an action of debt; and the case depends on the laws of Virginia, as they stood when jurisdiction over the district was first exercised by congress. By the law of Virginia, the proceedings, until an issue is made up in a cause, are taken in the clerk's office, at monthly rules, and judgments by default become final on the last day of the succeeding term, till which day the defendant in any such action has a legal right to set the judgment aside, and to plead to issue. The circuit court held its regular session in April, 1818, and continued to sit regularly till the 16th day of May, when it adjourned to the fourth Monday of Mechanics' Bank of Alexandria v. Withers. 6 W. the following June. The clerk, considering the day on which the court adjourned as the last day of the term, and the judgments at the rules as having, on that day, become final, issued an execution on one of these judgments, which had been obtained by the plaintiffs, against Cave Withers and his common bail. When the court met in June, the defendant appeared, and on motion was allowed to set aside the office judgment, give special bail, and plead to issue. The execution was consequently quashed. In the course of the term, judgment was confessed by the defendant for the [108] sum claimed in the declaration, and a writ of error was then sued out, the object of which was to reverse the last judgment, and set aside all proceedings subsequent to the 16th of May, on the idea that the judgment rendered at the rules became final on that day. The sole question in the cause is, whether the adjournment from the 16th of May to the fourth Monday in June, was a continuation of the April term, or constituted a distinct term? to vary said There being nothing in any act of congress which prevents the courts of the district from exercising a power common to all courts, that of adjourning to a distant day, the adjournment on the 16th of May to the fourth Monday in June, would be a continuance of the same term, unless a special act of congress,1 expressly enabling the courts of the district to hold adjourned sessions, may be supposed the law of the case. That act is in these words: "And the Courts are hereby invested with the same power of holding adjourned sessions that is exercised by the courts of Maryland." These words do not, in themselves, purport to vary the character of the session. They do not make the adjourned session a distinct session. They were probably inserted from abundant caution, and are to be ascribed to an apprehension that courts did not possess the power to adjourn to a distant day until they should be enabled so to a legislative act. But this act, affirming a preëxisting power, ought not to be construed to vary the nature of that power, unless words are employed which manifest such intention. [109] In this act there are no such words, unless they are found do by in the reference to the courts of Maryland. But on inquiry, we find that, in Maryland, an "adjourned session" is considered as the same. session with that at which the adjournment was made. Since, then, the term at which this conditional or office judgment was to become final was still continuing when it was set aside, and the defendant permitted to plead to the declaration, there was no error in that proceeding. Judgment affirmed. Hopkins v. Lee. 6 W. HOPKINS v. LEE. 6 W. 109. A judgment or decree of a court of competent jurisdiction is conclusive wherever the same matter is again brought in controversy. But the rule does not apply to points which come only collaterally under consideration, or are only incidentally considered, or can only be argumentatively inferred from the decree. When a matter of fact has been found by a master in chancery, and his report confirmed, it is conclusive evidence of that fact in another suit between the same parties. In an action at law by the vendee, against the vendor, for a breach of the contract, in not delivering the thing sold, the proper measure of damages is the price of the thing sold at the time of the breach. This rule applies to the sale of real as well as personal property. ERROR to the circuit court for the District of Columbia. This was an action of covenant, brought by the defend[110] ant in error, Lee, against the plaintiff in error, Hopkins, to recover damages for not conveying certain tracts of military lands, which the plaintiff in error had agreed to convey, upon the defendant in error relieving a certain incumbrance held by one. Rawleigh Colston, upon an estate called Hill and Dale, and which Lee had previously granted and sold to Hopkins, and for which the military lands in question were to be received in part payment. The declaration set forth the covenant, and averred that Lee had completely removed the incumbrance from Hill and Dale. The defendant below pleaded, 1. That he had not completely removed the incumbrance; and, 2. That he (the defendant below) had never been required by Lee to convey the military lands to him; and on these pleas issues were joined. Upon the trial, Lee, in order to prove the incumbrance in question was removed, offered in evidence to the jury a record of the proceeding in chancery, on a bill filed against him in the circuit court, by Hopkins. The bill stated that on the 23d of January, 1807, the date of the agreement on which the present action at law was brought, Hopkins purchased of Lee the estate of Hill and Dale, for which he agreed to pay $18,000, namely, $10,000 in military lands, at settled prices, and to give his bond for the residue, payable in April, 1809. That Lee, in pursuance of this agreement, selected certain military lands in the bill mentioned. That at the time of the purchase of Hill and Dale, it was mortgaged to Colston for a large sum, which Lee had promised to discharge, but had failed so to do, in consequence of which Hopkins [ *111 ] had paid off the * mortgage himself. The bill then claimed a large sum of money from Lee, for having removed this incumbrance, and prayed that the defendant might be decreed to pay it, or in default thereof that the claimant might be authorized, by a decree of chancery, to sell the military lands, which he considered as Hopkins v. Lee. 6 W. a pledge remaining in his hands, and out of the proceeds thereof to pay himself. On the coming in of Lee's answer, denying several of the allegations of the bill, the cause was referred to a master, who made a report, stating a balance of $427.77, due from Hopkins to Lee. This report was not excepted to, and the court, after referring to it, proceeded to decree the payment of the balance. To this testimony the defendant in the present action objected, so far as respected the reading of the master's report, and the decretal order thereon; but the objection was overruled by the court below, and the evidence admitted. The counsel for the plaintiff in error then prayed the court to instruct the jury, that in the assessment of damages, they should take the price of the military lands as agreed upon by the parties in the articles of agreement upon which the action was brought, as the measure of damages for the breach of covenant. But the court refused to give this instruction, and directed the jury to take the price of the lands, at the time they ought to have been conveyed, as the measure of damages. To this instruction the plaintiff in error excepted; and a verdict and judgment thereon being rendered for the plaintiff below, the cause was brought by writ of error to this court. Pinkney and Swann, for the plaintiff in error. Jones and Lee, for the defendant in error. [* 113 ] * LIVINGSTON, J., delivered the opinion of the court. The first question which this court has to consider is, whether the proceedings in chancery were properly admitted in evidence in the court below. It is not denied, as a general rule, that a fact which has been directly tried and decided by a court of competent jurisdiction, cannot be contested again between the same parties, in the same or any other court. Hence, a verdict and judgment of a court of record or a decree in chancery, although not binding on strangers, puts an end to all further controversy concerning the points thus decided between the parties to such suit. In this there is and ought to be no difference between a verdict and judgment *in a court of [*114] common law and a decree of a court of equity. They both stand on the same footing, and may be offered in evidence under the same limitations; and it would be difficult to assign a reason why it should be otherwise. The rule has found its way into every system of jurisprudence, not only from its obvious fitness and propriety, but because without it an end could never be put to litigation. It |