Edward H. Rogers and Charles G. Gardner, for appellant. Charles S. Hamilton, for appellee.

RORABACK, J. On September 21, 1907, Ley & Co., electrical contractors, were constructing a conduit on Chapel street in New Haven under a contract with the United Illuminating Company for the purpose of laying its underground system of wiring in said highway, and for that purpose had caused an excavation to be made on Chapel street. On September 21st, an automobile owned by the plaintiff and driven by him personally came through Temple street in a southerly direction, and ran into this excavation, causing the injuries described in the complaint. This automobile had been purchased by the plaintiff on July 27, 1906, of one Holcomb. Prior to July 27, the plaintiff had owned another automobile which was duly registered by the Secretary of State, pursuant to the statute then in force. The plaintiff had not made application to the Secretary of State for registration of the automobile last purchased until September 21, 1907, when he mailed his application, inclosing his check for registration fee, at the post office in New Haven, to the Secretary of State, by whom it was received September 23, 1907. On September 28, 1907, a certificate of registration for the automobile driven by the plaintiff at the time of the accident was issued by the Secretary of State as provided for by law. The registration mark displayed by the plaintiff at the time of the accident bore the number which had been assigned to him as the owner of another automobile owned by him, and which had been disposed of prior to the accident. The reasons of appeal relied upon are that the court erred in refusing to charge as requested and in the charge as given.

The defendant requested the court to instruct the jury as follows: "The burden of proof is on the plaintiff to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that at the time of the accident he had the authority of the state of Connecticut to use his machine on the highways of the state, and if the plaintiff does not prove that he had such authority and license he cannot recover, and your verdict should be for the defendant. If at the time of the accident the plaintiff did not have the authority of the state of Connecticut to use his automobile described in the complaint on the highways of the state, he cannot recover, and your verdict should be for the defendant." The court declined to give these rulings, but instructed the jury that the plaintiff's failure to register would not of itself bar his right to recover, since the law does not provide that one who fails to register his automobile cannot make use of it upon the highway. "The failure of the plaintiff to register his automobile cannot be held to tend to prove contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff, unless you find that such con

uted to the accident upon which this case is founded-that is, unless you find it to have been the cause, or one of the causes, of this accident; and no such claim-that is, that this did directly contribute to the accidentis made in this case as I understand the contention of counsel."

The statute relative to automobiles then in force (Pub. Acts 1907, pp. 821-822, c. 221, § 2) provides for the registering of automobiles and the placing of numbers on machines so registered. The penalty to any person having failed to register or display his number was not more than $100, or imprisonment not more than 30 days, or both. The plaintiff was violating the statute relating to the registration of automobiles, but that fact does not relieve the defendant. This statute imposed an obligation upon the plaintiff to register his automobile, and for its violation prescribed a penalty. The statute goes no further, and it cannot be held that the right to maintain an action for damages resulting from the omission of the defendant to perform a public duty is taken away because the person injured was at the time his injuries were sustained disobeying a statute law which in no way contributed to the accident.

A traveler with an unregistered and unnumbered automobile is not made a trespasser upon the street, neither did it necessarily follow that the property which he owned is outside of legal protection when injured by the unlawful act of another. "There is some real and more apparent conflict of opinion in the many cases treating of the relation between an illegal act and a coincident injury. In doing an unlawful act a person does not necessarily put himself outside the protection of the law. He is not barred of redress for an injury suffered by himself, nor liable for an injury suffered by another, merely because he is a lawbreaker. In actions to recover for injuries not intentionally inflicted, but resulting from a breach of duty which another owes to the party injured-commonly classed as actions for negligence the fact that the plaintiff or defendant at the time of the injury was a lawbreaker may possibly be relevant as an incidental circumstance, but is otherwise immaterial unless the act of violating the law is in itself a breach of duty to the party injured in respect to the injury suffered." Monroe v. Hartford Street Ry. Co., 76 Conn. 206, 56 Atl. 500. The registration of the plaintiff's machine was of no consequence to the defendant. His failure to register and display his number in no way contributed to cause the injury. The accident would have happened if the law in this respect had been fully observed. The plaintiff's unlawful act was not the act of using the street, but in making a lawful use of it without having his automobile registered and marked as required by law. The statute contains no prohibition against using an unlicensed and unnumbered automobile upon the highways and streets of

In submitting the case to the jury the court directed them in returning their verdict to answer certain interrogatories prepared by the court. These interrogatories, with the answers to them, returned with a verdict for the plaintiff for $75, were as follows:

"Q. 1. Do the jury find that on December 1, 1908, the plaintiff had the title to the place in dispute? Ans. Yes; by adverse possession. "Q. 2. Do the jury find that on December 1, 1908, the plaintiff was in the actual exclusive possession of the place in dispute? Ans. Yes.

"Q. 3. Do the jury find that on December 1. 1908, the defendant had the title to the place in dispute? Ans. No.

"Q. 4. Do the jury find that on December 1. 1908, any person other than the plaintiff was in the exclusive possession of the place in dispute? Ans. No."

One of the numerous reasons of appeal is that the court erred in requiring the jury to answer these interrogatories. The action of the trial court in so doing is fully sustained by the recent decision of this court in Freedman v. N. Y., N. H. & H. R. R. Co., 81 Conn. 601, 71 Atl. 901.

Other reasons of appeal relate to a ruling upon a question of evidence; to refusals of the court to charge as requested; to portions of the charge as given; and to the denial of the defendant's motion to set aside the verdict as against the evidence. From an examination of the questions thus sought to be raised it becomes quite apparent that the charge of the trial court, that neither party had proved a paper title, and that the case must turn upon the question of title by adverse possession, and the answers returned by the jury to the interrogatories submitted to them, render a discussion of most of the reasons of appeal entirely unnecessary.

First. The evidence, the admission of which is complained of, was evidence offered in proof of the plaintiff's title by deed. But the plaintiff could not have been harmed by its admission for the reason that the court very clearly told the jury that as a matter of law the plaintiff had failed to prove such a title; and the jury found by their answer to the first interrogatory that the plaintiff's title was by adverse possession.

For the same reasons, other claimed errors in refusing to charge as requested by the defendant upon the question of the plaintiff's paper or record title were equally harmless to the defendant.

court that the defendant's claimed paper title was defective. As we have said, the jury found by the answer to the first interrogatory that the plaintiff had acquired title by adverse possession. The plaintiff claimed title by adverse possession, by reason of the adverse occupation of the land by his father from 1878, under a deed from the town of Fairfield, which deed the court held failed to prove title, since it was not shown that the town had any title, and by reason of a distribution to himself in 1907 of his father's estate, and by quitclaim from the other distributees. The defendant claimed title by deed, under a conveyance to himself in March, 1901, from one Dikeman, who claimed by distribution of the estate of his mother. who died in 1900, and who, it was claimed. took title as the daughter and heir of one Barnum. The court held that the deed to the defendant in 1901 did not constitute sufficient proof of title in the defendant, because, among other reasons, there was no proof that the land in dispute was ever distributed to the mother of the defendant's grantor. if the trial court had held that the mother of the defendant's grantor acquired all the title her father had in the land in dispute, that would not have helped the defendant's case, since the jury by their answer have found that the plaintiff and his grantors have held adversely for a period of fifteen years. Whether the deed to the defendant of 1901 was given after the plaintiff's grantor had acquired a title by adverse possession, or before that time, when the defendant's grantor was ousted of possession, the defendant took nothing by his deed. Section 4042, Gen. St. 1902.

But,

It is also immaterial whether or not the court properly instructed the jury as to what facts regarding his own and the defendant's possession and title at the time of the alleged trespass it was necessary for the plaintiff to prove in order to maintain this action, since the jury in finding that the plaintiff on December 1, 1908, had a title by adverse possession, and was then in the actual and exclusive possession of the land in dispute. found sufficient facts to enable the plaintiff to maintain the action.

The charge to the jury that a verdict for the plaintiff should be only for the cost of the foundation and the sills thrown down, as presumably that would be the measure of the expense of replacing them, does not appear to have been incorrect, and appears to have been favorable to the defendant. The court afterwards called attention to the defendant's claim that the damages were slight, and left the question of damages to the jury upon all the evidence.

As the court in its charge limited the damages recoverable to the cost of replacing the foundation walls and sills, the ruling upon the defendant's demurrer to paragraph 5 of

There is no occasion for discussing the 200 pages of evidence before us. The court properly instructed the jury upon the question of acquiring title by adverse possession, and left the question of fact to the jury. We concur with the conclusion of the trial judge that a new trial ought not to be granted upon the ground that the verdict was against the evidence.

PRENTICE, J. The facts found establish beyond question that this plaintiff wife is, and since the commencement of the action has been, poor and unable to support herself. Do they also establish that the defendant, her husband, has neglected to provide for her support within the intent and meaning of section 2499 of the General Statutes of 1902, as amended by chapter 22, p. 599, Pub. Acts

BELDEN v. BELDEN.

This question and another as to whether or not the amount of the allowance made was justified by the statute are the two substantial questions presented by the appeal.

The defendant asserts that he has always

17, 1909.)

1. HUSBAND AND WIFE (§ 283*)-SEPARATE MAINTENANCE-OFFER TO SUPPORT-SUFFI

CIENCY.

Under Gen. St. 1902, § 2499, as amended by Acts 1907, p. 599, c. 22, which provides that a wife unable to support herself, and having a husband who is able to provide support, may bring a complaint against him in the superior court, which court may order the payment of such sum as may be reasonable and necessary to be paid to the wife, a proffer of support by the husband under circumstances in which not even the physical and material necessities of the wife have the promise of being supplied is not such support as the statute contemplates. [Ed. Note. For other cases, see Husband and Wife, Cent. Dig. §§ 1062, 1067; Dec. Dig. § 283.*]

2. HUSBAND AND WIFE (§ 2982*)-ACTION FOR SUPPORT-INQUIRIES BY TRIAL COURT. In an action by a wife against her husband under Gen. St. 1902, § 2499, as amended by Acts 1907, p. 599, c. 22, the court was justified in attempting to discover from defendant whether he held out any promise for any change from the former intolerable conditions, and, having found that the expressed willingness to support his wife at his home held out no prospect of provision for her support under reasonable conditions, it properly held that defendant had been, and was, failing to support his wife within the meaning of the statute.

[Ed. Note. For other cases, see Husband and Wife, Cent. Dig. § 1091; Dec. Dig. § 2982.*] 3. HUSBAND AND WIFE (§ 298*)-ACTION FOR SUPPORT MEASURE OF CONTRIBUTION-REASONABLY PROPER SUPPORT.

wife at his home, that he is now willing to do so, and that her failure to enjoy this provision and support has resulted and now results from her own fault, in that she has been and is unwilling to remain a member of the household which he maintains. The record discloses that during the latter portion of the time when she continued to be a part of that household there was such disregard of her necessities, and that she was subjected to such indignities, humiliating treatment, and personal abuse that her life there was rendered unendurable. The story in its details is one which offends against all the decencies and proprieties of life between man and wife, and involves not only privation and physical hardship, but such offendings against that which a true woman holds most dear that no such woman could reasonably be asked to endure them. A proffer of support under such conditions is not one which the law countenances or recognizes. Condon v. Pomroy-Grace, 73 Conn. 607, 48 Atl. 756, 53 L. R. A. 696, presented a case involving the duty of a child to support her parent wherein conditions analagous in some ways to those in this case were under review as to their bearing upon the matter of support. It was Contended on behalf of the defendant in that case that a willingness on her part to furnish a support for the mother in the daughter's home which should be suitable and satisfactory as far as the mother's physical comfort and material surroundings were concerned

stances.

[Ed. Note. For other cases, see Husband and Wife, Cent. Dig. § 1093; Dec. Dig. § 298.*]

Appeal from Superior Court, New Haven County; George W. Wheeler, Judge.

Action by Alida Belden against Charles G. Belden. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Stiles Judson and Theodore E. Rogers, for appellant. William Kennedy, for appellee.

the daughter's home might have a bearing upon the determination of the latter's neglect within the meaning of the statute, it was only one element, and not conclusive; that the law did not force a parent to become the unhappy prisoner of a thankless child as the only alternative of starvation; and that a house, however comfortable and luxurious as to its material appointments, where one is subjected to treatment which renders life unendurable, is not a suitable home even for an aged pauper. This lan