"In the remaining English case, a contract made in London between two English mercantile houses, by which one agreed to sell to the other 20,000 tons of Algerian esparto, to be shipped by a French company at an Algerian port on board vessels furnished by the purchasers at London, and to be paid for by them in London on arrival, was held to be an English contract, governed by English law; notwithstanding that the shipment of the goods in Algiers had been prevented by vis major, which, by the law of France in force there, excused the seller from performing the contract. Jacobs vs. Credit Lyonnais, 12 Q. B. D., 589.

"That result was reached by applying the general rule, expressed by Denman, J., in these words: 'The general rule is, that where a contract is made in England between merchants carrying on business here, as this is, but to be performed elsewhere, the construction of the contract, and all its incidents, are to be governed by the law of the country where the contract is made, unless there is something to show that the intention of the parties was that the law of the country where the contract is to be performed should prevail;' and summed up by the Court of Appeal, consisting of Brett, M. R., and Bowen, L. J., as follows: The broad rule is that the law of a country where a contract is made presumably governs the nature, the obligation and the interpretation of it, unless the contrary appears to be the express intention of the parties.' 12 Q. B. D., 596, 597, 600.

"This court has not heretofore had occasion to consider by what law contracts like those now before us should be expounded. But it has often affirmed and acted on the general rule, that contracts are to be governed, as to their nature, their validity and their interpretation, by the law of the place where they were made, unless the contracting parties clearly appear to have had some other law in view. Cox vs. United States, 6 Pet., 172; Scudder vs. Union Bank, 91 U. S., 406; Pritchard vs. Norton, 106 U. S., 124; Lamar vs. Micou, 114 U. S., 218; Watts vs. Camors, 115 U. S., 353, 362.

"The opinion in Watts vs. Camors, just cited, may require a word or two of explanation. It was there contested whether, in a charter party made at New Orleans between an English owner and an American charterer of an English ship for a voyage from New Orleans to a port on the continent of Europe, a clause regulating the amount payable in case of any breach of the contract was to be considered as liquidating the damages, or as a penalty only. Such was the question of which the court said that if it depended upon the intent of the parties, and consequently upon the law which they must be presumed to have had in view, they 'must be presumed to look to the general maritime law of the two countries, and not to the local law of the State in which the contract is signed.' The choice there was not between the American and the English law, but between the statutes and decisions of the State of Louisiana, and a rule of the maritime law common to the United States and England.

"Some reliance was placed by the appellant upon the following observations of Mr. Justice Story, sitting in the Circuit Court:

"'If a contract is to be performed, partly in one country and partly in another country, it admits of a double aspect, nay, it has a double operation, and is, as to the particular parts, to be interpreted distinctively; that is, according to the laws of the country where the particular parts are to be performed or executed. This would be clearly seen in the case of a bill of lading of goods, deliverable in portions or parts at ports in different countries. Indeed, in cases of contracts of affreightment and shipment, it must often happen that the contract looks to different portions of it to be performed in different countries; some portions at the home port, some at the foreign port, and some at the return port.' 'The goods here were deliverable in Philadelphia; and what would be an effectual delivery thereof, in the sense of the law (which is sometimes a nice question), would, beyond question, be settled by the law of Pennsylvania. But to what extent the owners of the schooner are liable to the shippers for a non-fulfilment of a contract of shipment of the master - whether they incur an absolute or a limited liability, must depend upon the nature and extent of the authority which the owners gave him, and this is to be measured by the law of Massachusetts/ where the ship and her owners belonged. Pope vs. Nickerson, 3 Story, 465, 484, 485.

"But in that case the last point stated was the only one in judgment; and the previous remarks evidently had regard to such distinct obligations included in the contract of affreightment as are to be performed in a particular port - for instance, what would be an effectual delivery, so as to terminate the liability of the carrier, which, in the absence of express stipulation on that subject, is ordinarily governed by the law or usage of the port of discharge. Robertson vs. Jackson, 2 C. B., 412; Lloyd vs. Guibert, L. R. 1 Q. B., 115, 126; S. C. 6 B. & S., 100, 137.

"In Morgan vs. New Orleans, etc, Railroad, 2 Woods, 244, a contract made in New York, by a person residing there, with a railroad corporation having its principal office there but deriving its powers from the laws of other states, for the conveyance of interests in railroads and steamboat lines, the delivery of property and the building of a railroad in those states, and which, therefore, might be performed partly in New York, and must be performed partly in the other states, was held by Mr. Justice Bradley, so far as concerned the right of one party to have the contract rescinded on account of nonperformance by the other party, to be governed by the law of New York, and not by either of the diverse laws of the other states in which parts of the contract were to be performed.

"In Hale vs. New Jersey Steam Navigation Co., 15 Conn., 538, 546, goods were shipped at New York for Providence in Rhode Island or Boston in Massachusetts, on a steamboat employed in the business of transportation between New York and Providence; and an exemption, claimed by the carrier under a public notice, was disallowed by the Supreme Court of Connecticut, because by the then law of New York the liability of a common carrier could not be limited by such a notice. Chief Justice Williams, delivering judgment, said: The question is, by what law is this contract to be governed? The rule upon that subject is well settled, and has been often recognized by this court, that contracts are to be construed according to the laws of the State where made, unless it is presumed from their tenor that they were entered into with a view to the laws of some other State. There is nothing in this case, either from the location of the parties or the nature of the contract, which shows that they could have had any other law in view than that of the place where it was made. Indeed, as the goods were shipped to be transported to Boston or Providence, there would be the most entire uncertainty what was to be the law of the case if any other rule was to prevail. We have, therefore, no doubt that the law of New York, as to the duties and obligations of common carriers, is to be the law of the case.'