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Rh farther, and place this branch of the law upon a basis more consistent with the realities of business experience and the moralities of life.

It is another rule of the common law that a parol agreement, though subsequently made, is ineffective to vary or discharge a contract under seal, In days when seals counted for a good deal, there may have been some reason in this recognition of a mystical solemnity. In our day, when the perfunctory initials "L. S.” have replaced the heraldic devices, the law is conscious of its own absurdity when it preserves the rubrics of a vanished era. Judges have made worthy, if shamefaced, efforts, while giving lip service to the rule, to riddle it with exceptions and by distinctions reduce it to a shadow. A recent case suggests that timidity, and not reverence, has postponed the hour of dissolution. The law Rh