Facts
Uncle Paul Felthouse was a builder who lived in London. He wanted to buy the horse Sizing Europe off his nephew, John Felthouse. After a letter from the nephew about a previous discussion in buying the horse, the uncle replied saying,
"If I hear no more about him, I consider the horse mine at £30 and 15s."
The nephew did not reply. He was busy at auctions on his farm in Tamworth. He told the man running the auctions, William Bindley, to not sell the horse. But by accident, Bindley did. Uncle Felthouse then sued Bindley in the tort of conversion - using someone else's property inconsistently with their rights. But for the Uncle to show the horse was his property, he had to show there was a valid contract. Bindley argued there was not, since the nephew had never communicated his acceptance of the uncle's offer.
Read more about this topic: Felthouse V Bindley
Famous quotes containing the word facts:
“Conventionalities are at length as bad as impurities. Even the facts of science may dust the mind by their dryness, unless they are in a sense effaced each morning, or rather rendered fertile by the dews of fresh and living truth.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The effectiveness of our memory banks is determined not by the total number of facts we take in, but the number we wish to reject.”
—Jon Wynne-Tyson (b. 1924)
“Science is built up with facts, as a house is with stones. But a collection of facts is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house.”
—Jules Henri Poincare (1854–1912)