Howe Grain & Mercantile Co. v. Taylor
Howe Grain & Mercantile Co. v. Taylor
Opinion of the Court
The action was brought In the county court of Nueces county by I. M. Taylor against appellant for $450 as damages for the breach of a contract between them for the sale and delivery by appellant to ap-pellee of three car loads of cane seed. Plaintiff recovered judgment for $370.
Appellant duly filed its plea of privilege, and did nothing to waive it, unless as will be explained. While pending appellee took the deposition of one Crouch. When the September term came, at which the cause was tried, a jury had been called for by appellant, and the case stood on the jury docket. Counsel entered into an agreement that the plea should be taken up and tried by the court without a jury upon the facts that had been agreed upon prior to a trial before the jury on the merits; and the court was informed by counsel of this agreement, and before the court had reached this case, and before the plea of privilege had been passed upon, appellant filed a motion to quash the aforesaid deposition. The court overruled the motion to quash. Afterwards, and before announcement of ready, appellee came in with a motion to overrule and hold of no effect the plea of privilege, upon the ground that the filing and prosecuting of said motion to quash the deposition constituted an appearance of defendant for all purposes, inasmuch as in said motion to quash defendant attacked the deposition on the ground that the witness had failed to answer cross-interrogatories that had been propounded to the witness by defendant,. which said cross interrogatory or interrogatories did not seek to bring out testimony or facts seeking to establish or having reference to the plea of privilege, but were addressed to the merits of the case. The court sustained the motion, overruled the plea, and defendant excepted.
The bill of exception shows, and it is conceded, that an agreement was entered *657 Into to submit tbe plea of privilege to tbe court, without a jury, upon certain facts wbicb bad been agreed upon by tbe parties. Tbe record shows what these agreed facts were, consisting in large part of the correspondence between tbe parties; tbe agreement concluding as follows: “Tbe purpose of this agreement is to establish tbe fact that tbe foregoing transactions actually took place between tbe plaintiff and defendant. Objections at tbe trial of tbe case to tbe admissibility of tbe letters, telegrams, or parts of both, on other grounds, are not waived or precluded.” The deposition of Crouch formed no part of tbe testimony upon wbicb the plea was to be submitted, though it may have, as is claimed, contained matter relevant to that issue.. .
Tbe whole contention of tbe assignment is that appellant did not waive the plea by moving tbe court to suppress tbe deposition for tbe reason that to a certain extent tbe deposition contained matter relevant to tbe issue of venue. Appellant, having agreed to the testimony upon which the plea should be submitted, which was exclusive of tbe said deposition, is not in a position to claim that his action in moving to strike out tbe deposition was merely for tbe purposes of said plea¡ and hence was no waiver of tbe plea. Tbe motion to quash tbe deposition was clearly not in behalf of the plea, but for the purposes of the cause generally, and, by invoking tbe court’s action upon it at that time and for such purpose, appellant submitted itself to tbe court’s jurisdiction.
Tbe assignments 1 and 2 are therefore overruled.
The evidence was to the effect that on December 20, 1910, appellants wrote three letters booking appellee’s order for three car loads' of recleaned red top cane seed, stating the terms. On December 22, 1910, appellee answered by wire: “We accept cane seed per your confirmation of twentieth. Is this satisfactory?” The answer was: “All right send Dallas exchange immediately to margin.” This closed a contract for the ear loads of reeleaned red top cane seed. There is no dispute in the evidence of the fact that that description of seed is not required to be free from Johnson grass seed. What was to be sent by Dallas exchange was the sum of $350, advance payment on the contract. On December 23d, the day after the contract had been closed, appellee wrote the 1-Iowe Grain Company, stating that it had that morning mailed the latter New York exchange for $350 “margin to cover your request.” The letter was of some length, giving, among other things, shipping instructions, and contained this expression: “We have all this seed sold at a nice profit, and trust that you will see that we get nice recleaned seed, free from Johnson grass, and hope that you will make a nice profit for yourselves.” On December 26th the Howe Grain Company wrote appellee: “Your several favors of the 23rd received and we return herewith your New York exchange for $350.00. Our price to you, $2.45, was correct on the average cane seed. As to the point of destination, it would be immaterial whether Georgetown, Yorktown, Bastrop or Beeville. We notice, however, that you introduce another new feature and call for seed free from Johnson grass. Now then, there was nothing said about Johnson grass in our quotations and not at any other time, and we therefore cancel the orders. This is final. Yours truly, The Howe Grain Co., per J. A. Hughes, Mgr.” On December 28th appellee replied by letter acknowledging receipt of said letter of the 26th, stating: “Now, Mr. Hughes, we have all three cars sold just in the same manner we bought them from you or as per your confirmations sent us dated Dee. 29th. This is entirely satisfactory to us and we are relying on you to ship us this seed to the letter as your confirmations read regarding price and quality; that is recleaned cane seed in even weight bags. That is all we require and we did not say that you had to ship seed free from Johnson grass, but simply mentioned this to you so you could advise your shippers, and these things should be appreciated by you instead of being turned down flat with such treatment as we have been receiving from you, etc. Kindly let this be final and ship us these seed as we have them sold and are depending on you to fill these orders-for us.” On December 29th appellant wrote: “Yours 27th received and carefully noted. We return again the exchange for $350.00 and beg to advise that, as already stated, wé have canceled the sale. We gave you a fair chance at the business, but we do not like to have new features introduced, and have a perfect right, as we understand trade rules, to cancel the sale. This ends the matter so far as we are concerned.” It appears that *658 on tlie morning'of the 23d the New York draft for $350 was mailed. Not until the 26th was it returned, and then with a letter announcing that defendant canceled the contract upon another stated ground. A second time this exchange was returned without complaint as to its character. The New York exchange was undoubtedly satisfactory, substantial compliance with that feature of the trade, and we overrule all contentions based upon that matter.
We overrule the twenty-third assignment, as the paragraph of the charge complained of was correct. It related to the measure of damages.
Judgment affirmed.
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