Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 8.djvu/114

98 98 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. to the plaintiff, without showing a direct consideration moving from him or a privity of contract between him and the defendant." This decision of Judge Metcalf with respect to the general rule has been approved in Massachusetts, and Judge Gray (now a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States) said in a later case,^ " The general rule of law is that a person who is not a party to a simple contract, and from whom no consideration moves, cannot sue on the contract; and consequently a promise made by one person to another for the benefit of a third, who is a stranger to the considera- tion, will not support an action by the latter. And the recent decisions in this commonwealth and in England have tended to uphold the rule and narrow the exceptions to it." It will be seen by examining the earlier cases that most of them do fall within the classes suggested by Judge Metcalf, or else are cases in which the promise was really made to the plaintiff through a person acting in his behalf; and if there has been uncertainty in the early English cases, all that depart from the general rule have been distinctly overruled in England.^ One of the early cases in Massachusetts was Felton v. Dickin- son,^ in 1813. A master in taking a boy into his service agreed with the father to pay the boy a certain sum of money at the end of his term, and it was held that the son was entitkd to an action for the money. The court said, " It is clear that the father had the son's advantage in view," and it may be added that the service for which the money was promised was performed by the boy. Another case was Arnold v. Lyman,* and here a debtor of the plaintiff had conveyed property to the defendant upon a written agreement that he should pay money to the plaintiff. This was a case of property received by the de- fendant, and a substitution of the plaintiff as creditor in the place of the person who conveyed the property. Hall v. Marston^ was a case where a bill of exchange was sent from abroad to the defendant with instructions to pay a certain part of the proceeds to the plaintiff, and it was held that the plaintiff might bring an action. Brewer v. Dyer^ was a case in which the defendant 1 Exchange Bank of St. Louis v. Rice, 107 Mass. 37 (1871). 2 Tweddle v. Atkinson, i B. & S. 393. 8 ID Mass. 287. 6 17 Mass. 575; Williams v. Everett. The English case below referred to was cited and distinguished. 6 7 Cash. 337.
 * 17 Mass. 400 (1821).