Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“ The allegations by which the claimant attempts to avoid his contract making time of the essence, that the damages were difficult cult to prove, and that therefore they should be fixed at $20 a day, are too speculative to do more than emphasize the necessity for the liquidation. There is no element of deception or exorbitance, and although the case seems a hard one, we see no ground upon which the claimant can escape from the terms to which he has agreed. ”

“ But the ground of the recommendation does not appear to have been an incorrect interpretation of the contract; on the contrary, it is alleged that the liquidated damages were withheld by Captain Brown; and if his interpretation had been wrong, it is hard to see how it would have bound his superior on whose sanction the recommendation depended for effect. The suggestion that it was the duty of the Chief Engineer to give his sanction in the absence of fraud finds no support in the words used. The claimant must abide by the words. ”

“ Those words tend also to support the contention of the government that 'supervene' means come into being in the course of the work, as in the case of strikes, epidemics, etc., and not merely be discovered to have existed and still to exist. ”