Morrison Waite

“ If the trial court has doubts about the good faith of an offer of testimony, it can insist on the production of the witness, and upon some attempt to make the proof, before it rejects the offer; but if it does reject it, and allows a bill of exceptions which shows that the offer was actually made and refused, and there is nothing else in the record to indicate bad faith, an appellate court must assume that the proof could have been made, and govern itself accordingly. ”

“ Here the offer was to prove actual notice, not only to the plaintiff when he bought, but to every other buyer and holder of the bonds from the time they left the hands of Metz, pending the suit, until they came to him. Certainly, if these facts had been established, the defense of the county, under its fourth plea, would have been sustained; and this, whether an injunction had been granted at the time the bonds were delivered by Metz or not. The defense does not rest on the preliminary injunction, but on the final decree by which the rights of the parties were fixed and determined. ”

“ The county then offered in evidence, after due proof of execution, a bond executed by the railroad company to Metz on the twenty-first of September, 1871, to indemnify him 'against all damages, costs, expenses, etc., which the said Metz, as trustee of the county of Scotland, aforesaid, * * * may incur by reason of certain injunction suits now pending in the Scotland county circuit court, or by reason of any petition for injunction which may be filed before Judge E. V. WILSON, in Clark county, Missouri, on September 22, 1871.' This was objected to, and the objection sustained. ”