Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/436

 424 FEDERAL REPOnTSU. �words "so remaining in possession," in thc latter part of the section, refer to the "possession * * * for the space of flve years, " previously mentioned. If this be not so, then those words have nothing to rest on, and are meaningless. But they are not meaningless, They perform an important office, and make the five years' possession qualify the whole section. �In the re vision o" 'he statutcs of Missouri, in 1835, the ■words "as aforesaid," italicized in the clause in brackets, ■were omitted; and in Miller v. Bascom, 28 Mo. 352, it was contended that a verbal conditional -sale of chattels was a "reservation or remainder, " in favor of a vendor, and void as against the creditors and purchasers of the vendee, with- out reference to the period of Lis possession. But the court held otherwise, and declared the act, notwithstanding the omission of these words, had no operation in such cases, unless the possession of the chattels had continued in the vendee for five years. �And everywhere, and always, it has been held that the possession in ail the cases of bailment, trust, condition or reservation embraced by the section must bave been contin- ued for five years before the owner's rights are affected. �In the enrolled act there is a comma after the word "lender," and not a semicolon, as in the printed statute. Punctuation marks are no part of the English language, and connot be admitted to control the proper sense of words used; but they are sometimes used in such a way as to lead to a misinterpretation of a statute on a casual reading, and such is the tendency of the erroneous punctuation in this section. �Conceding, but not deeiding, that this section embraces conditional sales, still the defence based on it must fail, be- cause the possession of the vendees, under the conditional eales in these cases, was less than a year. ����