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 ant denies that no part of said warrants or orders has heen paid. Defendant denies any knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to whether the plaintiff is now the legal owner or holder of said warrants or orders; and the defendant denies that the same are now due or payable, or that there is due from defendant to plaintiff thereon the sum of twenty-one hundred and forty-six and 74-100 dollars, with interest thereon, or any other sum. For a second and further answer and defense to the complaint in this action, the defendant alleges that the two warrants mentioned in the complaint were issued by the director and clerk of defendant for building a school house, and furnishing materials for the same; that the assessed valuation of all property, both real and personal, in school district No. 39, Barnes county, territory of Dakota, in the year A. D. 1882, and at the time said warrants were issued, was eighteen thousand seven hundred and ten dollars; that each of said warrants exceeded one per cent. on the taxable property in said district; that each of said warrants exceeded one and one-half per cent. on the taxable property in said district; that the school board of said district was never directed or authorized by any district meeting in said district to incur an indebtedness for which said warrants were issued, and the incurring of said indebtedness was never ratified or sanctioned in any way by any district meeting in said district, but, on the contrary, at a district meeting in said district, held on the third day of May, A. D. 1882, a motion was made, seconded, and carried to raise eight hundred dollars for building a school house, and no direction was ever given to the school board to expend any greater amount for such purpose; that the defendant has no title to the land upon which the school house for which said warrants were issued is situated, and no proceedings were ever instituted for the purpose of acquiring title to the same, or to acquire the right to build said school house thereon.”

A bill of exceptions was allowed and signed, which, among other things, shows that the case came on for trial before the district court at the June term in 1888, and a jury was waived. Also the following: “The attorneys for the plaintiff and defendant agreed by written stipulation as to the evidence in the case,