Glenn and Kennedy vs. Fowler.-1836. had the benefit of an argument on the part of the appellees; but they have been compelled in obedience to the imperative rules of law to decide the case without such advantage. They do not find it to be necessary, however, to express an opinion upon several points presented by the appellants' counsel, and it is their purpose to avoid the decision of any matter not immediately demanding their notice. The great purpose and object of a court of equity, in assuming jurisdiction to restrain proceedings at law, is to afford a more plain, adequate, and complete remedy for the wrong complained of than the party can have at law. 1 Story Com. 53. The rule which confers the chancery jurisdiction in such a case is as well established and as much entitled to observance as the rule which clothes the same tribunal with jurisdiction, in cases of fraud, accident, or of trust, but both are rules of general and not universal application. One of the excepted cases is, where a statute has made provision for all the circumstances of a particular case; no relief in equity can be afforded in such case, although the provisions of the statute may conflict with the notions of natural justice and equity entertained by a court of Chancery. 3 Black Com. 432. Fonbl. B. 1, ch. 1 sec. 3. The material grounds assumed in this bill and on which the injunction is asked are, that the appointment of the appellants to be permanent trustees has been irregularly made, on the recommendation of those who ought not to have been regarded by the commissioners of insolvent debtors as creditors; that the court of law could not order a restitution of the property replevied till their next session; and that the trust created by the deed to Fowler, one of the appellees, would in the interim be obstructed to the prejudice of the cestui que trusts. The several acts of assembly erecting the system which exists in Baltimore, in relation to insolvent debtors, has in the first instance invested the commissioners with the sole and exclusive jurisdiction upon the subject of appointing a permanent trustee. Over the exercise of that power the Glenn and Kennedy vs. Fowler.-1836. chancery court can exert no control to supervise or reverse their appointment for any pretented error of judgment. The positive provisions of the statute are imperative. The chancery court can claim no jurisdiction then on that ground. The proceedings in the action of replevin, so far as relates. to the possession of the property involved in the suit, are regulated with exact minuteness by the acts of assembly. A bond is required before the plaintiff is permitted to remove the property from the possession of the party holding it. The very object and purpose of the bond is to protect the rightful possessor against all loss or damage he may sustain by reason of the interruption to his possession. 6 Gill and John. 453. 3 Gill and John. 247. The court at the return of the writ is commanded to entertain the question of possession as a preliminary question, independent entirely of the title, and to return the property to the defendant in replevin, unless it shall appear that his possession was forcibly or fraudulently obtained, or that the possession first being in the plaintiff was got or retained by the defendant, without proper authority or right derived from plaintiff. The whole matter of fraud may, on that preliminary inquiry, be investigated as fully as in a court of Chancery, and the relief administered is precisely what is here claimed; that is, by awarding the possession of the property. The sole advantage then, which the applicant to a court of Chancery can expect, is to have that relief afforded him, a few weeks sooner than it would be, in the court of law, to which by the express terms of the statute the investigation and decision of the matter is confided, and where too, full indemnity is secured for any intermediate injury by the replevin bond. We do not think that the delay in a case like this is such a defect of ample and complete remedy as the rule contemplates. If it did it would be difficult to say in what case the court of Chancery might not interpose its prompt aid to adjust disputed questions on the ground of defect in the courts of law. The occasion did not exist in the case, upon which courts of equity have sometimes interposed to prohibit proceedings Marshall's Lessee vs. Greenfield.-1836. at law, on the ground that having possessed itself of the general subject, by an application for its aid, to compel a disclosure, or for the exercise of some other admitted jurisdiction, it will dispose of the whole matter and thus avoid a multiplicity of suits. No disclosure is sought; and so far from being intended to restrain a court of law from exercising jurisdiction over a subject previously depending in chancery, thereby making unnecessary litigation, it proposes by the means of a second suit to be prosecuted in chancery, to arrest the party plaintiff in his then pending suit at law, in which the complainant in chancery could have had the very same relief asked by his bill. There are doubtless great difficulties in prescribing the precise boundary at which to limit the interposition of a court of equity, to restrain the assertion of doubtful rights, in a manner to produce irreparable injury or to preserve property more effectually, while it is the subject of litigation, or to afford a more perfect and appropriate remedy. Yet we do not doubt that it would be an extension of its jurisdiction, not authorized by principle or authority, to apply it to a case like the present, where the party can have at law a remedy as effectual and complete, as clear and as certain as in a court of equity. Mit. Ple. 123. The order and injunction is therefore reversed with costs. ORDER REVERSED. MARSHALL'S LESSEE US. GREENFIELD.-December, 1836. Any informality in the proceedings of a sheriff upon an execution, are examinable on motion, upon its return. A judicial sale, made by a sheriff, for the purpose of carrying into effect the judgment of a competent tribunal, is a proceeding which the law regards with favour, and although it will not give effect to an instrument or paper, executed by such officer, if its terms are unmeaning, or so entirely vague as to make it uncertain what was intended; yet every reasonable intend Marshall's Lessee vs. Greenfield.-1836. ment will be made to secure bona fide purchasers, and to effectuate the object, which it was the duty, and as the law presumes, the design of the officer to accomplish. The presumption in such a case is, at least, as proper and strong as in the case of a grantee claiming against a grantor, when the utmost effect is given to the terms of the grant, ut res magis valeat quam pereat. In an action of ejectment by a party claiming under a sheriff's sale, the following description, in the schedule of the property sold, was held to be sufficient: "To one, of land, called and known by the name of Indian Creek, with Addition,' containing 217 acres, more or less." APPEAL from St. Mary's county court. This was an action of ejectment, brought by the lessee of Hanson and Henry Marshall against Sarah Greenfield, for a tract of land called "Indian Creek with Addition." The declaration was filed on the 6th of July, 1830, and counted on a demise from the 31st December, 1829, for ten years. Sarah Greenfield appeared, pleaded not guilty, and took defence on warrant. Issue was joined on this plea. A warrant of resurvey was issued, and plots returned. At the trial of the cause it appeared, that in an action of debt, instituted on the 18th July, 1809, by Thomas Marshall and John Forbes against Thomas Greenfield, the plaintiffs recovered judgment in St. Mary's county court, on the 8th of August, 1809, with a stay for twelve months; and that the docket and all the original papers and proceedings in the said cause, were burnt in the court-house of the said county. The plaintiff then gave in evidence the following extract of docket entries of fi. fa. Marshall and Forbes VS. Extract of record of fieri facias. The schedule mentioned in the above return is as follows: "The schedule of property of Thomas Greenfield, taken by a writ of fi. fa. to satisfy a debt due Marshall and Forbes, after being duly summoned and sworn by the sheriff, this 17th April, 1812. To one-of land, called and known by the Marshall's Lessee vs. Greenfield.-1836. name of "Indian Creek with Addition," containing 217 acres, more or less, for $2,170 JOSEPH GOUGH, Sheriff, WILLIAM ESTEP, JOSHUA ESTEP. Test, JOSEPH HARRIS, Clerk. The plaintiff first proved by the said clerk, that it was a true copy, taken of the original entries of the said judgment and papers, in the said judgment of Forbes and Marshall vs. Thomas Greenfield, before the burning of the said court-house; and then proved, that the said John Forbes departed this life ten or fifteen years past, and that Thomas Marshall survived, but died before the institution of the suit in this case, leaving the plaintiffs his only heirs at law; and that the defendant was the wife of the said Thomas Greenfield, who died in possession of the lands in controversy, and that the said defendant has continued in the possession of the said lands since the said Greenfield's death. The defendant then prayed the court to instruct the jury, that the levy on the said land, so as aforesaid made by the said Joseph Gough, as sheriff, was void for uncertainty, and that the said sale was void; which said instructions the court (Stephen, Ch. J. and Key, A. J.) gave to the jury. The plaintiff excepted, and the verdict being for the defendant, the present appeal was prosecuted. The cause was submitted by the counsel on notes, to BUCHANAN, Ch. J. and ARCHER, DORSEY, CHAMBERS and SPENCE, Judges of this court. MCMAHON, for the appellant: The plaintiff claims the land in controvery under a sheriff's sale, upon a judgment obtained against Thomas Greenfield, the husband of the defendant, at the suit of Marshall and Forbes. The proceedings in the action in which this judgment was obtained, down to the fi. fa. the schedule of the property seized under it, and the sale of the property levied upon, were all proved by sworn copies, in conformity to the |