Page:United States v. Samperyac.pdf/2

Rh  Rh   true, without proof, after a decree pro confesso; which, in its effect, is like a judgment by nil dicit at law.
 * 1) But where the allegations are so defective or vague, that a precise decree cannot be rendered upon them, proof must necessarily be adduced before a decree can be made.
 * 2) A refusal to deny, where a party is legally bound to speak, is equivalent to an admission of the charges against him. Vhat is admitted need not be proved.
 * 3) The general denial of allegations, by one uninformed as to their truth, will not be sufficient to dissolve an injunction.
 * 4) A bill of review will be barred by the lapse of a reasonable time, after discovery of the new matter; but what shall be considered reasonable time, depends upon the sound discretion of the chancellor, under all the circumstances of the case.
 * 5) Fraud, deduced from circumstances, may be suﬁicient to outweigh positive proof to the contrary.
 * 6) Startling frauds and forgeries proved and commented on.
 * 7) Judgments and decrees are not assignable at law, so as to vest the legal title in the assignee, and the latter takes only an equitable interest; which is subject to every equity and charge which attached to them in the hands of the assignor.
 * 8) A purchaser for a valuable consideration without notice, must be clothed with the legal title, and not a mere equity, in order to protect himself.
 * 9) No one can occupy the attitude of an innocent purchaser, under a forged claim and conveyance.
 * 10) Construction of the act of Congress of the 8th May, 1830, 4 Stat. 399; and held not to require the observance of all the technical rules in the ordinary course of chancery practice on a bill of review, under that act.
 * 11) Almost every law providing a new remedy, affects causes of action existing at the time the law is passed; but such a law is not for that reason invalid.
 * 12) It is incontestable, that a grantee can convey no better title than he possesses, and hence, those who come in under a void grant acquire nothing.

February, 1831.—Bill of review in chancery, determined before Benjamin Johnson, Thomas P. Eskridge, James Woodson Bates, and Edward Cross, judges of the Superior Court of theUnited States for the Territory of Arkansas.

Bernardo Samperyac, under the act of Congress of the 26th of May, 1824, (7 Laws U. S. 300) entitled "An Act enabling the claimants to lands within the limits of the State of Missouri and Territory of Arkansas to institute proceedings to try the validity of their claims," by R. C. Oden, his solicitor, filed his bill against the United States, in the office of the clerk of