Roger B. Taney

“ It is evident that a loss must be sustained either by the plaintiff or defendant in error by the failure of the Commonwealth Bank. We see no ground for maintaining that there is any superior equity on the side of the New England Bank. It contributed to give to the corporation which has proved insolvent credit with the plaintiff in error, by the notes and bills which it placed in its hands to be sent to Washington for collection, endorsed in such a form as to make them prima facie the property of the Commonwealth Bank, and enabled it to deal with them as if it were the real owner. ”

“ The question, whether the balances were usually suffered to lie for a time on account of negotiable paper actually deposited or expected to be received, and which formed the consideration on which the defence rested, is not perhaps as distinctly stated as it might have been in the hypothetical instruction requested by the plaintiff in error. ”

“ But we think it is fairly to be inferred from the language used in the prayer, by which the defence is put upon the ground that the paper transmitted was treated by the parties as the property of each other ”