taken in The rule that preference depends on priority of intimation is Assignation subject to the exception that an assignee cannot found on his knowledge notice to the Company as giving him a preference over a prior of prior right. assignee who has given no notice, if he transacts in the knowledge of, or even if he has reason to suspect the existence of, the prior equitable right. The principle of the exception is well established in England both in the case of sales and mortgages (Fisher on Mortgages, 5th Ed., p. 505 et seq.), and is illustrated by many cases on assignations of life policies (e.g., Dearle v. Hall, 1830, 3 Russ. 1; Spencer v. Clarke, 1878, 9 Ch. D. 137; Newman v. Newman, 1885, 28 Ch. D. 674). In Scotland the principle is equally well established in the case of absolute dispositions, both of moveables (Marshall v. Hynd, 1826, 6 S. 384), and of heritage (Petrie v. Forsyth, 1874, 2 R. 214; Stoddart v. Dalzell, 1876, 4 R. 436; Moncrieff v. Lawrie, 1896, 23 R. 577); and while there is no decision applying to dispositions or assignations in security, there seems to be no good reason for excluding them from the application of the principle, at any rate where both the competing rights are obtained as part of new transactions. On the other hand, it may be doubted whether the principle would be extended to the case of already existing creditors obtaining competing assignations in security. Vigilantibus non dormientibus jura subveniunt: and there seems to be no more equitable ground for depriving a creditor of an advantage obtained over another by the completion of a security right, than there would be for depriving him of an advantage obtained by the use of diligence. While delivery of the policy is not necessary in either country Delivery of to complete the right of the assignee, it is in all cases expedient to policy expedient. obtain delivery. If this is not done questions may arise with the insurers, who often make it a condition of payment that the policy shall be delivered up, or (in England) with depositees in security, or in either country with law agents, who may establish liens by possession of the document. VIII. CONFLICT OF LAWS. The rule that the validity of an assignation executed in a country different from that where the policy is issued and is payable, will be determined by the law of the place where the contract is made, is illustrated by various cases. Thus in Lee v. Abdy and Others, 1886, 17 Q.B.D. 309, where a policy granted by an 24 Assignations of Life Policies and Legal Decisions thereon. English Insurance Company in favour of a person domiciled in Cape Colony had been assigned by the assured to his wife in Cape Colony, according to the law of which State the assignation was void, it was held, in a question with the Company, that the law of Cape Colony applied, and that the Company were not liable to pay to the assignee. So in Scottish Provident Institution v. Cohen & Company, 1888, 16 R., 112, a domiciled Scotsman obtained a loan in England from a domiciled Englishman, and in security thereof delivered to the latter a policy of insurance over his own life with a Scotch Company. The borrower thereafter died and the lender gave notice to the Insurance Company. The borrower's estates were then sequestrated, and a competition for the proceeds of the policy arose between the trustee in the bankruptcy and the pledgee of the policy. According to the law of Scotland the latter would have had no right, because he held no assignation, but it was decided that as the policy was pledged in England, the rights of the holder fell to be determined according to the law of England, which permits a security to be constituted by pledge, and the pledgee was accordingly preferred. Again in Scottish Provident Institution v. Robinson and Newett, 1892, 29 S.L.R., 733, a domiciled Irishman who had a policy from a Scotch Company first pledged it with a creditor in Ireland and then executed an assignation in favour of another creditor. When he took the assignation, the second creditor was aware of the previous deposit. In a competition for the proceeds of the policy in Scotland it was held that Irish law must be applied, and the depository, who would have had no rights according to Scots law, was preferred. In like manner with regard to the construction of the policy itself, the law applicable is that of the place where the contract is inade and is to be performed; and that is usually the domicile of the Company. Thus in Parken v. Royal Exchange Assurance Coy., 1846, 8 D. 365, where a policy had been issued to a Scotchman by an English Company through Edinburgh agents, who had no independent power to conclude contracts, it was held, in an action brought in Scotland, at the instance of an English assignee, that the contract was regulated by the law of England, according to which, differing from the law of Scotland, no interest was due on the sum assured. ON THE SIGNIFICANCE OF URINARY ABNORMALITIES, AND PARTICU- By A. RABAGLIATI, M.A., M.D., Medical Adviser to the Friends' Provident Institution. A Paper read before the Insurance Institute of Yorkshire, 5th March, 1906. He THE letter handed to me which defined the subject with which my paper was to deal, referred to the intermittence of both albuminuria and glycosuria. The writer wants to know not only the significance of these conditions, but asks, in addition, why they should be present at some times and not at others in the persons of those applying for Life Assurance Policies? wants to know why they are intermittent. I hope to deal with this interesting question; in fact, I am eager to do so, because, as it happens, it has for a long time presented itself to my own mind when dealing with the predisposing causes of disease in general. I will at the present stage say only this, that its significance arises mainly from the view we take as to the causation of disease, and that the view which I take of disease, and which therefore must colour the opinions put before this Society, is that disease is a conservative process of nature adapted to the preservation of life, and that abnormalities therefore indicate efforts made by nature to restore the body from disease to health. It was natural, probably, that a layman, in the letter referred to, should speak of albuminuria and glycosuria as kidney affections. But we shall soon be compelled to see that even if we are able to consider albuminuria as indicative of kidney disease, and more or less synonymous with nephritis or inflammation of one or both kidneys, we certainly cannot, if we would understand glycosuria and its significance to life and health, view it as pointing specially to disease of the kidneys, for I think we shall find ourselves compelled to admit that it is usually significant of something very much more general in the body than that; and further, it will appear that if we are to associate glycosuria with the constant affection of any particular organs, its presence may rather be taken as indicative of some affection of the liver or pancreas and nervous system, than of the renal organs. I think myself, and am rather anxious to press this view on this meeting, that even when we have by common consent to deal with the existence of inflammation of an important organ in the body, as, for example, nephritis or bronchitis or pneumonia, we get a better and a fuller view of it and of its significance if we view it as a local mark of a general condition of body, than if we more narrowly consider it as a local inflammation simply. For it seems to me that we should always keep before us the consideration that had the body been sound and healthy, the local inflammation would not probably have occurred. That, for example, nephritis has occurred and has shown itself by the presence of albuminuria, is a sign that the state of the general health of the applicant coming before us has become impaired. Of course, this kind of consideration will sway us more if we find inflammation of important organs than if it affects less important ones. But as the kidneys are not only important but even vital organs, we must not for a moment fail to let ourselves be affected by this consideration when we find nephritis present. I shall not be expected to go into questions of pathology as if I were addressing a medical society, but the mere mention of some of the conditions in which albuminuria is found will raise to every mind, I think, the view that in some of its aspects at least it is indicative of general disease, even if we consider it as what it is a local inflammation of the kidneys also. The view of disease in general which I am putting before you for consideration, while it applies to all diseases (even a common "cold" or the taking of a chill" coming under the same heading), is particularly applicable to affections discoverable by examination of the urine, because the function of the kidneys is essentially an eliminative one. That is, their office is to separate from the blood the ash or waste left over after the maintenance of the bodily heat has been effected by oxidation, and the nutrition of the body has been effected by absorption.* If then we find materials in the urine which ought not to be there, the question forces itself on us-How did they get there? The presence of albumin in the urine may be considered, from an Insurance point of view at least, as suggestive of the existence of disease of the kidneys. As such we must look upon it as grave. There are some forms of albuminuria which are described by some as physiological, as distinguished from those thought to be pathological. I believe that the chief feature which distinguishes these two forms is the longer or shorter duration of the time during which the albuminuria persists. If it is temporary and intermittent, even if recurrent, obviously we shall be able to think less seriously of it than if it is more persistent or entirely persistent—that is, than if it is never absent, or if it is, as the term has it, chronic. But I do not think that in any case can we be justified in refraining from viewing its presence as more or less grave, and requiring anxious consideration from the point of view particularly of the Assurance Company whom for the moment we may represent. If we were acting as the medical adviser of the patient our point of view would be somewhat different, but I am not dealing with that at present; for the present, the question is:—Is this life safely insurable at ordinary rates by the Office who, for the moment, are entrusting its financial interests to our skilled opinion? and if not at ordinary rates, is the life insurable at extra rates? and, if so, at what rates? Not to attempt to go too technically into the pathological causes of albuminuria, I may yet say that its presence is found in three well-recognised states of the kidney. The first may be called inflammation of the organs one or both. The tubes . only may be affected, or the proper intimate structure of the organ also, its parenchyma. The difference between these two would be exemplified by the differences better known perhaps to laymen as that between bronchitis and pneumonia; and as bronchitis is as a rule less grave than pneumonia, the inflammation of the lung lining membrane less serious than that of *Note.-I allow this expression to stand, because it appears in the paper as I read it; but there is very strong reason to believe that neither the heat of the Were I body nor its mechanical energy comes from oxidation of food at all. writing the passage now, I should say, "the ash or waste eliminated by the body "when it has acted as the medium of the transmission of any of the phases of "energy, either, for example, thermo-dynamic or erg-dynamic."-A.R. |