GEORGE BLACKIE v RICHARD and ANDREW MILLAR (Court of Session)

Andrew Millar was bound as apprentice to George Blackie, and Richard Millar was one of the cautioners. The testing clause of his indenture was in the following terms:—‘In witness whereof, these presents are written on this and the two preceding pages of stamped paper, by Andrew Millar, the within-designed apprentice, day, month, and year of God respectively above written, before these witnesses, George Hutton, clock and watchmaker in Musselburgh, presently in the employment of the said George Blackie, and James Wightman, vintner in Edinburgh.’

The apprentice having deserted his service, Blackie gave a charge to him and his cautioner for implement of the indenture, and for L.5 penalty for alleged breach of contract.

The Lord Ordinary pronounced the following interlocutor: ‘In respect that, by the act 1681, it is not requisite that the attesting clause shall contain the narrative that the deed has been subscribed by the parties, and that the actual subscription attested by witnesses, designed in said clause, supplies the defect in the narrative that it was subscribed; repels the reasons of suspension; finds the letters orderly proceeded; and decerns,’ &c.

The Lords were much moved by the authority of the case of Gordon v . Murray, 21st June 1765, and upon that ground chiefly adhered to the judgment of the Lord Ordinary, in so far as it repelled the reason of suspension founded on the informality of the writing; and remitted to his Lordship to hear parties farther upon the other reasons.

The Lord Justice-Clerk .—I concur with Lord Alloway, and on the same grounds. The case of Gordon is precisely the same as the present.