"It thus appears that in that case the question of the intent of the parties was complicated with that of the lawful authority of the master; and the decision in the Queen's Bench was put wholly upon the ground that the extent of his authority to bind the ship, the freight or the owners was limited by the law of the home port of the ship, of which her flag was sufficient notice. 6 B. & S., 100. That decision was in accordance with an earlier one of Mr. Justice Story, in Pope vs. Nicker-son, 3 Story, 465; as well as with later ones in the Privy Council, on appeal from the High Court of Admiralty, in which the validity of a bottomry bond has been determined by the law prevailing at the home port of the ship, and not by the law of the port where the bond was given. The Karnak, L. R. 2 P. C, 505, 512; The Gaetano & Maria, 7 P. D., 137. See also The Woodland, 7 Benedict, 110, 118; 14 Blatchford, 499, 503, and 104 U. S., 180.

"The judgment in the Exchequer Chamber in Lloyd vs. Guibert was put upon somewhat broader ground. Mr. Justice Willes, in delivering that judgment, said: 'It is generally agreed that the law of the place where the contract is made is prima facie that which the parties intended, or ought to be presumed to have adopted as the footing upon which they dealt, and that such law ought therefore to prevail in the absence of circumstances indicating a different intention, as, for instance, that the contract is to be entirely performed elsewhere, or that the subject matter is immovable property situated in another country, and so forth; which latter, though sometimes treated as distinct rules, appear more properly to be classed as exceptions to the more general one, by reason of the circumstances indicating an intention to be bound by a law different from that of the place where the contract is made; which intention is inferred from the subject matter and from the surrounding circumstances, so far as they are relevant to construe and determine the character of the contract.' L. R., 1 Q. B., 122, 123; 6 B. & S., 133.

"It was accordingly held, conformably to the judgment in Peninsular & Oriental Co. vs. Shand, above cited, that the law of England, as the law of the place of final performance or port of discharge, did not govern the case, because it was 'manifest that what was to be done at Liverpool was but a small portion of the entire service to be rendered, and that the character of the contract cannot be determined thereby/ although as to the mode of delivery the usages of Liverpool would govern. L. R. 1 Q. B., 125,126; 6 B. & S., 137. It was then observed that the law of Portugal, in force where the bottomry bond was given, could not affect the case; that the law of Hayti had not been mentioned or relied upon in argument; and that 'in favor of the law of Denmark, there is the cardinal fact that the contract was made in Danish territory, and further, that the first act done towards performance was weighing anchor in a Danish port;' and it was finally, upon a view of all the circumstances of the case, decided that the law of France, to which the ship and her owners belonged, must govern the question at issue.

"The decision was, in substance, that the presumption that the contract should be governed by the law of Denmark, in force where it was made, was not overcome in favor of the law of England, by the fact that the voyage was to an English port and the charterer an Englishman, nor in favor of the law of Portugal by the fact that the bottomry bond was given in a Portuguese port; but that the ordinary presumption was overcome by the consideration that French owners and an English charterer, making a charter party in the French language of a French ship, in a port where both were foreigners, to be performed partly there by weighing anchor for the port of loading (a place where both parties would also be foreigners), partly at that port by taking the cargo on board, principally on the high seas, and partly by final delivery in the port of discharge, must have intended to look to the law of France as governing the question of the liability of the owner beyond the value of the ship and freight.

"In two later cases, in each of which the judgment of the Queen's Bench Division was affirmed by the Court of Appeal, the law of the place where the contract was made was held to govern, notwithstanding some of the facts strongly pointed towards the application of another law; in the one case, to the law of the ship's flag; and in the other, to the law of the port where that part of the contract was to be performed, for the nonperformance of which the suit was brought.

"In the first case, a bill of lading, issued in England in the English language to an English subject, by a company described therein as an English company and in fact registered both in England and in Holland, for goods shipped at Singapore, an English port, to be carried to a port in Java, a Dutch possession, in a vessel with a Dutch name, registered in Holland, commanded by a Dutch master and carrying the Dutch flag, in order to obtain the privilege of trading with Java, was held to be governed by the law of England, and not by that of Holland, in determining the validity and construction of a clause exempting the company from liability for negligence of master and crew; and Lords Justices Brett and Lindley both considered it immaterial whether the ship was regarded as English or Dutch. Chartered Bank of India vs. Netherlands Steam Navigation Co., 9 Q. B. D., 118, and 10 Q. B. D., 521, 529, 536, 540, 544.

"As Lord Justice Lindley observed: This conclusion is not at all at variance with Lloyd vs. Guibert, but rather in accordance with it. It is true that in that case the law of the flag prevailed; but the intention of the parties was admitted to be the crucial test; and the law of the ship's flag was considered as the law intended by the parties to govern their contract, as there really was no other law which they could reasonably be supposed to have contemplated. The plaintiff there was English, the defendant French; the lex loci contractus was Danish; the ship was French; her master was French, and the contract was in the French language. The voyage was from Hayti to Liverpool. The facts here are entirely different, and so is the inference to be deduced from them. The lex loci contractus was here English, and ought to prevail unless there is some good ground to the contrary. So far from there being such ground, the inference is very strong that the parties really intended to contract with reference to English law.' 10 Q. B. D., 540.