Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/322

 310 FEDERAL REPORTER. �These remarks are as applicable to bills for setting aside a settlement on the ground of fraud and conceaJment as they are to bills for opening a stated account. They are strongJ;' applicable to the present case. The complainant, in bis bill, in order to obviais the objection of lapse of time, places him- self on the ground that he did not discover the fraud prac- ticed on him until December, 1870, wheii the assignee in bankruptcy of Prewitt filed bis bill to set aside the marriage settlement, and made the complainant a party to it. And yet, after this, he waits nine years longer before filing bis bill j and now, at the end of twelve and a half years after the trans- action tôok place, after the death of the parties and witnesses, and ail the changes that are consequent upon the lapse of time, he cornes into court and asks its equitable relief. �The allegation that he did not discover the fraud until 1870, (even if it could avail,) as migbt be expected after this long delay, is only sustained by the complainant's own testi- mony. Mr. Walker testifies that he does not know when Chapman first leamed of the pendency of the first suit^ (bronght by Lile,) but his recollection is that he knew of it before the commencement of the second suit, (by the assignee.) Mr. Bibb, one of the firm of Bradley, Wilson & Co., being examined as a witness in reference to the settlement with Chapman, denies that any suit was pending on the subject of the marriage settlement, or that he made any representations in regard to it. What else but the utmost vagueness of rec- oUeotion could be expected, even in thoae who participated ia the transaction, after the lapse of so many years ? The com- plainant himself is responsible for this state of things. He admits that he waited nine yeare after discovering the alleged fraud before taking any steps to substantiate it, or to procure the redresB to which it entitled him. His excuse is that the question of the validity of the marriage settlement was pend- ing and undecided in the courts during that period, and be could not be expected to prooeedin the assertion of his rights until that question was settled. This plea cannot avail the complainant. The fraud -whiçh he alleges was practiced on him did not depend on the decision which the courts migbt ����