Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/214

 MARTIN V. FULLINOB. 207 �lings, and afterwards, upon his removal, to the defendant, Abby Fullings, the widow of the testator. �While the said Edward B. Fullings was administering the estate of his father, as executor, a controversy arose in the orphans' court of the county of Essex, between him and some of the representatives of the estate, in regard to the own- ership of the 12 railroad bonds in suit. The executor claimed them as his individual property, asserting that they had been transferred to him by his father in his life-time, ia payment of certain advances made by him, while the oppos- ing party contended that they should be acoounted for as assets of the estate. The orphans' court decided that they belonged to the estate. Pending the litigation the assignee in bankruptcy brought this suit, claiming that they were the property of Edward Fullings at the time of the filing of his bankruptcy petition, and had been fraudulently omitted from bis schedule and withheld from him as assignee. �Two questions are thus presented : First, as to the owner- ship of the bonds when the bankruptcy proceedings com- menced; second, whether the assignee is barred from bring- ing suit by the statute of limitations. �1. As to the first, the evidence shows that the bankrupt obtained these bonds in the month of May, 1865, from one John M. Springs, in payment of moneys due to%im from a former partnership of Fullings, Springs & Co., of which he was a member and a large creditor. �Previous to filing the petition in bankruptcy, to-wit, on the twenty-first of December, 1867, Fullings left 10 of the bonds in the hands of Emerson Coleman, in the city of New York, subject to his ovm order. Coleman says he knows of no pur- pose for which they were deposited with him, except to be after- wards called for by Fullings. The remaining two had been pledged by the bankrupt, with two of his creditors in New York, as collateral security for the payment of debts due to them respectively. Through the instrumentality of Coleman ■these debts were subsequently paid by Fullings, and the bonds surrendered by the credîtors to Coleman. On the twenty- ûîih of February, 1869, the whole 12 were delivered by ����