Edmonds v. Webb

COOPER, C.

This action was brought by plaintiff for the purpose of recovering two thousand four hundred dollars damages, alleged to have been caused by the defendant’s wrongful entry upon the premises described in the complaint and converting the crops thereon to his own use. The premises had been leased by defendant to plaintiff, and the entry complained of was during the continuance of the lease. The case was tried before the court without a jury, findings filed, and judgment

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ordered for plaintiff for the sum of nine hundred and seventy-three dollars and fifty-two cents. There is no appeal from the judgment. The defendant made a motion for a new trial, which was denied, and this appeal is from the order denying defendant’s said motion.

The only contention of defendant’s counsel is the insufficiency of the evidence to sustain certain of the findings. It is contended with much apparent earnestness that finding Ho. 4 is not sustained by the evidence. The finding is as to some of the covenants of a verbal lease entered into between plaintiff and defendant, and, among other matters, it is found: “That plaintiff agreed to plough, harrow, and otherwise prepare said land for crops aforesaid; .... to cultivate the same in a husbandlike manner, according to the usual course of husbandry practiced in the neighborhood; to care for and protect said crop until maturity; .... to deliver to defendant one-fourth of the crops produced on said land; .... also one-fourth of the straw and stubble; .... to all of which defendant also agreed.”

The court in findings 1, 2, and 3, which are not challenged, found that plaintiff and defendant entered into a written lease in June, 1894, for one year. That the said written lease contained a covenant that it might he extended at its expiration for ■two years longer, that after its expiration the plaintiff continued to occupy the premises subject to its terms until about the first day of March, 1897, when the plaintiff and defendant entered into a verbal lease for the period of one year from the first day of September, 1897, and then in finding 4 the court found the terms of the lease. The written lease was introduced in evidence, and it contains substantially the covenants found by. the court in finding 4. The plaintiff in his testimony, in speaking of the verbal lease, said: “The terms of the verbal agreement was the same as the lease. Ho change only in the division of the pasture.” The defendant testified: “At the expiration of that lease [spealdng of the written lease] he wanted to continue it for two years, and it was agreed that he should under the same terms and conditions of the lease. After that two years expired he wanted to continue for another year, and I continued it for another year under the same terms and conditions.”