Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 6.djvu/428

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416 FEDERAL REPORTER. �commerce, and was thought to be broad enough to include stocks and shares in incorporated companies; but I have found no case in which it bas been held to be synonymous with "goods." Indeed, in the case of the Citizens' Bank v. The Nantucket Steam-hoat Co. 2 fitory, 16, it was held that the tenn "merchandise" did not apply to mere evidences of value, such as notes, bills, checks, policies of insurance, and bills of lading, but only to articles having an intrinsic value in bulk, weight, or measure, and which are bought and sold; and in the course of his opinion Mr. Justice Story remarks that no case can be found in which it bas been held that a bequest of merchandise would include bank bills. "A sale of ail the goods and merchandise in a certain shop would never be pre- sumed as intended to include the personal wearing apparel of the owner, although at the time it might be deposited there." The libel in this case was for the loss of bank bills, and the learned justice held that while there was authority for the proposition that bank bills might be included in the general words "goods, wares, and merchandise," they could not be considered as "merchandise." The word certainly conveys to the ordinary mind the idea of personal property used by merchants in the course of trade, and is usually, if not uni- versaUy, applied to property which bas not yet reached the hands of the consumer. In common parlance, it certainly is not applied to the wearing apparel or to other personal effects, and I do not feel at liberty to give it a broader signification simply because the reason of the rule exempting the owners of the vessel from loss by fire would seem to extend to cases of baggage as well as property in transit to a market. The exceptions must be overruled. ��� �