Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/588

 580 fSDKBAIi BEPOBTEB. �and that defendants, knowing his condition, fraudulently worried and bewildered him, by artful language and constant offers and proposais, until they finally induced him to make the trade. The bill prays for a rescission of the contract and a retum of the property, or judgment for its value. �There is much conflict in the evidence in relation to the value of the property included in the trade, the valuation of plaintifE's property by the ■witnesses running from $650 to $1,4:00, and of the defendant's carriage from $250 to $800, but the weight of evidence warrants the conclusion that the prop- erty which defendants received from the plaintiff was worth, at a fair cash valuation, $750, exclusive of the mortgage for $150, and that on a like scale of cash valuation the carriage ■which plaintiff received from the defendants was not worth at most over $400. In other words, the plaintiff agreed to pay for the carriage more than twice its value in this or any other market, and this disparity in the value of the property given and received does not disclose the extent of the plaintifif's improvidence and folly in making the trade, for the only use plaintiff had for the carriage, and the use to which he expected to put it, so far as he had any comprehension on the subject, was that of a public hack or carriage to carry passengers in and aboutHot Springs. Its age and construction rendered it imfit for such service on the rough and rooky roads of that region, and at that place and to the plaintiff it was worth but little more than the amount of the mortgage lien re- tained upon it by the defendants. �The evidence as to the mental condition of the plaintiflf at the time he made this contract is voluminous and somewhat conflicting, but the weight of evidence establishes these facts: That the plaintiff, for some years preceding the making of this trade, had been first a stage driver, and afterwards a mail contracter and proprietor of horses and mail coaches, and that for some months immediately preceding the trade he had been at Eot Springs engaged in keeping hacks and other vehicles and teams for carrying persons and hauling freights for hire. In the conduct of this business he em- ployed two or more teamsters, and was unusually diligent ��� �