Tue recently-issued Reports of the n pal local Marine Insurance Comies -must-be highly ertisfactory to shareholders and other interested parties, Tt, cannot, however, but be somewhat galling, to the Home Offices to find that notwithstanding all their efforts in the of, reducing rates of premium, they are unable to compete with those established in the East. Yot the reasons do not lie.far below the surface. There is no small advantage, in the first instance, in.being on the spot. The Directors and Secretaries of the local companies are naturally conversant with the re. quiremonta of Eastern trade in a manner and to an extent that their colleagues London cannot be, It is to their interest to support local objects and enterprises, and their, opportunities of forming an opinion of such matters are both numerous and favourable, The increased knowledge of the seas which now prevails lessens. the risks to be eu-countered; the existence of a growing system of telegraphy places greater facilities for precuutiou in their bai the expansion of trade in general brings them a wider scope for operations; and the admirable meteorological scheme at prosout, in course of, execution under the auspices of the Shanghai Geveral Chamber of Commerce will prove an additional advantage to them in the fature, Besides all this, there are other considerations which tend to make them popular, and enhance the advantages they possess over the Companies at home. Their policy is, in most cases, characterised by the prompt and liberal settlement of claims. There is no unnecessary and vexatious cavilling at petty oversighta, and clerical slips, should such creep into the filling-up of an insurance form, as long as it is evident that they are really oversights and slips. The business is conducted on an inexpensive scale, and by an efficient and well-paid staff, which. presents in this respect a striking contrast to the gorgeous offices and.poorly-remunerated clerks om-ployed by the companies at home, There. is also something to be credited to the fact that the pleasure of receiving dividend-warrants for hard cash is considerably greater than that experienced bythe bare deduction of 10% digoount-on premium-payments; a consideration too trivial, some may think, for notice in a serious article, but which is nevertheless founded upon a very natural human feeling.
The. case of Morris and Ca. versus the Union Iasnrance Society of Canton, however, constitutes an unpleasant break in the feeling of confidence and harmony. which has hitherto prevailed between the local underwriters and the public, It is a case in which there was no possible dispute as to the bond fide intention of the assured to keep themselves covered, avd the. principle from which it aroso.was one on which the plaintiffs had conducted their business for years, The Judgment was delivered with unusual promptitude and decision. It does not attempt to deal with either the evidence adduced as to the meaning for the policy in dispute, or with the argoments addressed to the Court by the plaintifis, We do not think it necessary to go over the merits of the case in detail, as these are doubtless familiar enough to our readers; but there are certain fenteres in the Judgment to which we may be permitted to invite their attontion, We do not quarrel with prompt decisions, so long as such promptitude does not involve a asty or superficial view of the subject in dispute. But while it is a great evil that suitors should be condemned to any long delay in obtaining the decision of a judge, too much precipitation, on the other band, leads to even greater delay by an appeal, besides very much increasing the costs of litigation, In the present instance, the decision of the question at issue is described in the Jadgment as turning upon the terms of the policy alone, whereas the plaintiffs contend that it turns in reality upon the actual relative situation of the underwriters and the assured at the until the loss; and the Judgment fails time of the commencement of the risk,
to show why that contention is ausound. Agnin, the Judge remarks,—" The do. fendants contend that the policy was an insurance of any freight up to the amount named [Tls. 3,307.50] which might be earned on the round voyage from Kuchinotzu to Tientsin and back to Kucbinotza, and that the premium thereon was one per cent. The plaintiffs however say that this is not so; that the policy was in reality not one policy, but two policies, and that the premia likewise ate not one but two, namely, per cent. on Tia, 3307.50 on one voyage from KuchinotzatoTientsin, and 4 per cent, ow engaged freight of Tls. 8,307.50 on a subsequent voyage from Kuchinotzn to Tientsin." Now auloss we misunderstood the remarks of the Connsel for the plaintifis in his summing-up, the interpretation of the plaintiffs' case by the Court, as stated in the Judgment, is inaccurate. It seems clear that what the plaintiffs really insisted on was that the policy was equivalent to two policies on freight, amounting to Tls. 3,307.00,—one from Kuchinotzn to Tientsin, and another from Tientsin to Kuchinotzn; and this is what the policy most certainly does state. From Kucbinotzn the terminus a quo, to Kuchinotzn the terminus ad quern, the plaintiffs contended that the underwriters were liable to them for any freight up to T's. 3,307.50 at risk daring that voyage. If any freight, to be earned by the plaintiffs, was at risk between Tientsin and Kuchinotzu, the plaintiffs contended that they had put themselves into a position to earn it; and their view of the case was undoubtedly anpported by the evidence of Mr, Herbert S. Morris, Seoretary of the North-China Insurance Ca., who gave it as his opinion that they most certainly bad freight at risk' during that voyage, and had most certainly insured it by this policy. Mr. Guld-smith, of the China raders' Ca,, who was called as a witness for the defen. dants, agreed with Mr, Morris that freight contracted for could be insured, but thought that the policy in this instance did not do so. When pressed, however, to explain why, he failed to lay down any intelligible principle while Mr. Moore, the Agent forthe defendants, maintained that, both Mr, Morris and Mr. Goldsmith, were.wrong, Here Mr. Moore takes up rather a hazardous position. He, distinctly laid it down as a principle that a policy on freight does not cover chartered freight. Now on this head we have only.to invite attention to the following articles from the newest edition ut Arnould on Marine Insurance. On page 84 we read— a It was laid down by Lord Kenyon, at Nisi Prius, that freight could not' be insured for part of the intended voyage but this position, unjustified by pringinle, was subsequently overruled by llenborough and the Court of Bhig's Bench, and it is now quite clear that freight, like any other subject, may be insured either for part or the whole of a voyage, or of the time over which it is likely to extend.
6 Freight must be insured ea quinine in the policy, cither by inserting the words on freight in the margin, or appending them tothe instrument. Such a policy would cover not only freight in its strictest, accoptation, but the chartered hire of the vessel, the increased value to the owner frorh'car-tinge of his goods on his own ship, and, we have very little doubt, payments made in advance on account of either the first or the second of these classes of freight.
The, witnesses for the defence did not seem familiar with these maxims, of marine insurance; but if Arnould is to be considered a higher authority than Mr. Moore, we think his ruling on, the subject should not be disregarded. If, again,.auy farther, evidence were required to show the bond fide intention of the plaintiffs to cover themselves, we have itin the second policy, from Kuchinotza to Tientsin, which, incon. junction with the first, fully covered the second trip of the America, with hor second loud of coal.
Now the main idea of the Judgment we are reviewing la that, by the policy, the defendants undertook to make good to the plaintiffs any loss of freight they might suffer on the voyage specified; and the plaintiffs contended that they had lost this freight of Tis, 3,807.50 on that voyage. It is. not for us. tu. decide between the evidence offered. by the three insurance-agenta_who. were examined, or the authorities that wore quoted on either side, although the clear and decided opinion of 80 experienced an underwriter as Mr. Herbert Morris should, we think, have, been allowed more weight. It is only a Tittle regrettable that rather more time was not taken to decide a question, of such general importance to the. public, A less hasty judgment might haye.done-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.