Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/841

 ■ROSBNTHAL î;.,BAKK DIB GABTENLAÙBB. 829 �per cent., înstead of 10, which libellant refused to do. The money not being paid, and before the vessel went to sea, she ■was libelled in this suit. The master, who was examined before leaving port, denied having purchased anything of the libellant. His deposition was taken before the libellant and his man testified, and claimants have had no opportunity to examine him in respect to the alleged conversations testified to by them. The proof on the part of the libellant is from the testimony of the libellant himself and his man. �Assuming the truthfulness of the libellant's witnesses, it is plain that the goods are not proved to be necessaries furnished to the vessel, and on its credit, for which the maritime law gives a lien. Necessary clothing for seamen may, of course, be as much necessary for the ship and for the successfnl prosecution of the voyage as food for the crew. But such is not proved in respect to the clothing furnished by the libel- lant. It appears by the declarations of the master testified to that the vessel had completed her voyage and was heredis- charging her cargo. Nothing appears with certainty as to any further voyage, except that she was here to be chartered for another voyage, but that she had not yet been chartered. Whether these seamen had shipped on terms binding them to serve on such further voyage or 'not is not shown. It is not, therefore, proved that they were any part of her crew in such sense that the f urnishing of clothing to them could in any way be the furnishing of necessaries to the ship. Moreover, the proof falls short of establishing the essential fact that the sailors really needed the clothing. No safe inference of that fact can be drawn from the cireumstance that upon the solic- itation of the libellant they said they needed the clothing; and the improper and illpgal agreement of the master, in stip- ulating for a percentage on the bills to be paid to himself, takes from the cireumstance of his assenting to their being supplied any possible inference that might be otherwise drawn therefrom, that what the master has himself ordered in the due course of his employment, being within the class of proper ship's supplies, should prima fade, as against the ownere, be deemed necessaries. ����