Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 1).pdf/491

 J.C. Barr. Whom were these words intended and understood to bind? Had Barr authority to bind such persons by such an agreement? Is there any conflict on these points? T.C. Power, one of the defendants, was examined or the trial, and testified that three steamers named “Helena,” “Butte,” and “Benton” together constituted and were known as the “Benton Line” on the Missouri river during the season of 1880; that he and John W. Power were part owners of all of these steamers, and that they were run during that season “for the benefit of the owners in every point and place.” John C. Barr testified that he was in 1880 general agent for the “Benton Line,” and that T. C. Power and John W. Power, with others, authorized him to bind them by signing the words “Benton Line” to contracts of this character; that he intended to sign for the three steamers named constituting the Benton Line when he signed the words “Benton Line” to the contract in question. Barr was defendants’ own witness. T. C. Power testified that Barr was general agent of the Benton Line in 1880. I. P. Baker, one of defendants’ own witnesses, on direct examination was asked this question by defendants’ counsel: “When I speak of who constituted the Benton Line I refer to the Benton Line, whose name, or the name of which, is subscribed to the contract here. Now, who constituted that line?” To which inquiry he made the following reply: “Thesteamer Butte and her owners, the steamer Helena and her owners, and the steamer Benton and her owners. They constituted the Benton Line. The boats operated jointly constituted the Benton Line.” This brief review of some of the evidence discloses that there was no controversy as to certain facts, and these facts were that the owners of these three steamers were operating them jointly under the name “Benton Line” during the season of 1880 on the Missouri river; that John C. Bart was their general agent, authorized to bind them by such a contract as the one made with plaintiff, and that he signed this contract for fhe purpose of binding this association of boats and owners. It is undisputed that this freight was transported by the Eclipse for and in the place of one of these steamers—the Butte. The unavailing efforts of the defendants to show that there was another enterprise at that time conducted under