J. 2 Metcalf's R. 469. Now used as the name of the clause, which is literally translated in the modern precedents. The words per quod occur in a similar connection in the form of the old Latin writs of trespass. Reg. Orig. 95.

PER QUOD CONSORTIUM AMISIT. L. Lat. In old pleading. Whereby he lost the company or society (of his wife.) A phrase used in the old declarations in actions of trespass by a husband, for beating or ill using his wife, descriptive of the special damage he had sustained. 3 Bl. Com. 140. Cro. Jac. 501, 538. Hale's Anal. sect. xl.

PER QUOD SERVITIUM AMISIT. L. Lat. In old pleading. Whereby he lost the service (of his servant.) A phrase used in the old declarations in actions of trespass by a master, for beating or ill using his servant, descriptive of the special damage he had himself sustained. 3 Bl. Com. 142. 9 Co. 113 a. Hale's Anal. sect. xl.

PER SALTUM. Lat. By a leap or bound; by a sudden movement; passing over certain proceedings. "The parties have proceeded per saltum." Lord Ellenborough, 8 East, 511.

PER SE. By itself; of itself. per se. 3 Pickering's R. 257.

Fraud

PER SERVITIUM. L. Lat. By the service. Per servitia debita; by the services due. Per servitia antehac consueta; by the services hitherto accustomed. Bacon's Arg. Low's case of Tenures; Works, iv. 236, 238.

PER STIRPES. Lat. By stocks or roots; as representatives of stocks; in right of stocks. A term of the civil law, extensively used in the modern English and American law, to denote that mode of the distribution and descent of intestate's estates, where the parties entitled take the shares which their stocks, (such as a father) if living, would have taken. 2 Bl. Com. 217, 218. 2 Kent's Com. 425. 4 Id. 390-392. See Stirps, Stirpes, Per capila.

PER TOTAM CURIAM. L. Lat. By the whole court. A common phrase in the old reports.

PER TOUT LE COURT. L. Fr. By all the court. Yearb. P. 3 Hen. VI. 20. PER UNIVERSITATEM. Lat. In the civil law. By the whole or entirety; as a whole; in general. A term applied. to the acquisition of entire estates, as disVOL. II.

PER VIVAM VOCEM. L. Lat. In old English law. By the living voice; the same with vivâ voce. Bract. fol. 95.

PER, (by,) CUI, (to whom,) and POST, (after.) L. Lat. In old practice. Words used as descriptive of the different forms of writs of entries, according to the degrees. in which they were brought. 3 Bl. Com. 181. See Entry, Writ of.

PERA. L. Lat. In old Scotch law. A satchel; a poke, budget or bag for provisions. 1 Pitc. Cr. Trials, part 2, p. 17.

PERAMBULATIO. L. Lat. In old English law. Perambulation; a perambulation. Fleta, lib. 4, c. 15, § 1.

PERAMBULATION. [Lat. perambulatio, from perambulare, from per, through, and ambulare, to walk.] A walking through, about or over; a going round a place to settle its boundaries, or for other purposes. See De perambulatione facienda. Sir William Blackstone has given at length the form of a perambulation of a forest, from the Rolls of 29 Edw. I. Bl. Mag. Cart. Introd. cviii. note. The perambulation was made before justices assigned for the purpose, in presence of the foresters and verderors, by the oath of twenty-four men, who traced the boundaries of the forest minutely by metes and bounds; and their perambulation was afterwards enrolled of record.

PERAMONT. L. Fr. Above. Kelham. See Paramount.

PERAVAILE. L. Fr. Below. Peravale de son molin; below his mill. Yearb.

M. 7 Edw. III. 37. "The defendant challenged touts peravaile." Dyer, 25. PERCENNARIUS. L. Lat. In old English law. A parcener; one of several commoners. Fleta, lib. 4, c. 24, § 11.

PERCEPTURA. L. Lat. In old records. A wear; a place in a river made up with banks, dams, &c. for the better convenience of preserving and taking fish. Paroch. Ant. 120. Cowell.

PERCH. [L. Lat. pertica.] A measure of land containing five yards and a half, or sixteen feet and a half in length; other wise called a rod or pole. Cowell. 1 N. Y. Rev. Stat. [607,] 617, § 6. Originally of no fixed length. Spelman, voc. Pertica.

PERCLOSE, Perclos. L. Fr. In old practice. The latter part or conclusion, (of a writ, plea or indictment.) Yearb. M. 7 Hen. VI. 18. 1 Leon. 109. 3 Id. 230. PERCUTERE. Lat. In old English law. To strike. Fleta, lib. 2, c. 1, § 4. Percutere duellum; to strike the duel; to engage or join in the combat. Bract. fol.

139.

Percussit; (he) struck. Fleta, ub. sup. An essential word in old indictments. 5 Co. 122 a, Long's case. 11 Mod. 229. PERDONARE, Pardonare. L. Lat. In old English law. To pardon. Bract. fol. 127. See Pardonare.

Perdonavimus; we have pardoned. An emphatic word in the old charters of pardon. Reg. Orig. 310. Dyer, 34.

Perdonatio. A pardoning; a pardon. Carta perdonationis; a charter of pardon. See Reg. Orig. 308-312 b.

PERDRE. L. Fr. To lose. Pert; loses. Fet Assaver, § 45. Perdu; lost. Id. § 46.

PERDUELLIO. Lat. [from perduellis, an open enemy.] In the civil law. Treason; the crime of open hostility against the state or prince; whatever was attempted directly against the being or safety of the republic, or of the prince, or his ministers. Calv. Lex. Inst. 3. 1.5. Hallifax, Anal. b. 3, c. 12, num. 20. Heinecc. Elem. Jur. Civ. lib. 4, tit. 18, § 1341.

PEREGRINATIO. Lat. In old English law. Pilgrimage. Fleta, lib. 6, c. 8, $ 1.

PEREMPTORIUS. Lat. [from perimere, to destroy; to take away or defeat entirely.] In the civil law. That which destroys or defeats, not for a time, but forever. Exceptions were so called because

they operated as a perpetual bar to the action, and entirely destroyed the foundation of it; (perpetuæ et peremptoriæ sunt, quæ semper agentibus obstant, et semper rem de qua agitur perimunt.) Inst. 4. 13. 9. The term exceptio peremptoria, was taken from the civil law by Bracton, and hence the English peremptory, as applied to a defendant's plea. Bract. fol. 240, 399 b. Fleta, lib. 6, c. 36, § 3.

PEREMPTORY. [from Lat. peremp torius, q. v.] Literally and radically, that which destroys, (quod perimit,) or wholly and at once defeats; as a peremptory plea, (q. v.)

That which disposes of a matter at once, and without delay; that which admits of no delay or argument; absolute; imperative; decisive; final. As a peremptory mandamus or rule, (qq. v.)

That which requires no cause to be shown; arbitrary; capricious; as a peremp tory challenge, (q. v.)

PEREMPTORY CHALLENGE. In criminal practice. A species of challenge which a prisoner is allowed to have against a certain number of jurors, without showing any cause. See Challenge peremptory. PEREMPTORY EXCEPTION. pleading having the legal effect of a general demurrer. 1 Texas R. 364.

A

In

PEREMPTORY MANDAMUS. practice. A writ of mandamus which absolutely requires an act to be done, without any alternative of showing cause against it. Usually granted on the return of an alternative mandamus, where such return is found insufficient in law or false in fact. 3 Steph. Com. 683, 694. 2 Burr. Pr. 180.

PEREMPTORY PLEA. In practice. A plea founded upon matter which tends to impeach the plaintiff's right of action itself, or goes to destroy the ground of action entirely; a plea in bar of the action.* Steph. Pl. 46. Id. Appendix, Note (19.) 3 Steph. Com. 576.

PEREMPTORY RULE. In practice. An absolute rule; a rule without any condition or alternative of showing cause. See Absolute rule.

PERENTER, Perentre. L. Fr. Between. Litt. sect. 58.

PERFECT. In practice. To complete in form of law. To perfect bail is to justify after exception, so as to render them absolute. 1 Burr. Pr. 110. To perfect judgment is to enter it on record, and to file and docket the record. Id. 263.

PERGAMENUM.

L. Lat. In old practice. Parchment. In pergameno scribi fecit. 1 And. 54.

PERICULOSUS. Lat. [from periculum, danger.] Dangerous; perilous. Periculosum est res novas et inusitatas inducere. It is perilous or hazardous to introduce new and untried things. Co. Litt. 379 a. New inventions (though of a learned judge in his own profession,) are full of inconvenience. Id. ibid.

Periculosum existimo quod bonorum virorum non comprobatur exemplo. I think that dangerous which is not warranted or approved by the example of good men. 9 Co. 97 b, Sir George Reynel's case.

PERICULUM. Lat. In the civil law. Peril; danger; hazard; risk. Dig. 18. 6. Cod. 4. 48. Fleta, lib. 2, c. 58, § 8.

Periculum rei venditæ, nondum traditæ, est emptoris. The risk of an article sold, but not yet delivered, is the buyer's. When the contract of sale has been rendered binding by giving earnest, or by part payment, or part delivery, or by a compliance with the requisitions of the statute of frauds, the property, and with it the risk, attaches to the purchaser. 2 Kent's Com. 498, 499. This maxim is taken from the civil law, though it is differently applied, and is thus expressed in the Institutes: Periculum rei vendita statim ad emptorem pertinet, tametsi adhuc ea res emptori tradita non sit; the risk of a thing sold immediately attaches to the buyer, although the article itself be not yet delivered to him. Inst. 3. 24. 3. In the Digests, the rule was thus expressed: Perfecta emtione, periculum ad emtorem respiciet. Dig. 18. 6. 8. In the Code, post perfectam venditionem, omne commodum et incommodum quod rei vendita contingit, ad emtorem pertinet. Cod. 4. 48.

PERILS OF THE SEA, (or SEAS.) In maritime and insurance law. Natural accidents peculiar to the sea, which do not happen by the intervention of man, nor are to be prevented by human prudence. 3 Kent's Com. 216. Piracy, however, is a peril of the seas. Id. ibid. 1 Phillips on Ins. 648. Under perils of the sea are comprehended those of the winds, waves, lightning, rocks, shoals, running foul of

PERINDE VALERE. L. Lat. (To be equally valid.) In English ecclesiastical law. The name of a writ of dispensation granted to a clerk that being defective in his capacity to a benefice or other ecclesiastical function, was, de facto, admitted to it. So called from the emphatic words of the Latin form, the faculty being declared to be equally effectual to the party dispensed with, as if he had been actually capable of the thing for which he was dispensed with, at the time of his admission. Stat. 25 Hen. VIII. c. 21. Cowell.

PERIOD. A space of time; any portion of complete time.

"The word period has its etymological meaning, but it also has a distinctive signification, according to the subject with which it may be used in connection. It may mean any portion of complete time, from a thousand years or less to the period of a day; and when used to designate an act to be done or to be begun, though its completion may take an uncertain time, as for instance the act of exportation, it must mean the day on which the exportation commences, or it would be an unmeaning and useless word in its connection in the statute." Wayne, J. 20 Howard's R. 579.

PERJURIUM. Lat. [from perjurare, to forswear; from per and jurare, to swear.] In civil and old English law. Perjury; the breach of an oath; the making a false oath. Cum contigerit quod juratores falsum fecerint sacramentum et ita commiserint perjurium; when it shall happen that the jurors make a false oath, and so commit perjury. Bract. fol. 288 b. Fleta defines it to be a lie, confirmed by an oath; (mendacium cum juramento firmatum.) Fleta, lib. 5, c. 22, § 3; lib. 2, c. 1, § 20.

PERJURY. [from Lat. perjurium, q. v.] In criminal law. False swearing; the making a false oath; the breach of an oath. Anciently called oath-breach, or oath