A tripartite minute among merchants was sustained without witnesses.
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In a competition for a sum due by Sir George Maxwell, who became debtor for Sir Robert Stuart and others, and got up their bonds granted for the price of a bargain of victual sold by James Sanderson to them, and sent him to Ireland for the garrisons there, for which the Parliament of England and the said Stuarts gave bond; the bargain being made with Sanderson, and the bonds granted in his name, there is a writ produced by way of tripartite contract by Sanderson, James Ker, elder, and James Ker, younger, bearing, “That albeit the bonds were only in the person of Sanderson, yet that all the three were sharers in the bargain of victual, and in the right of the bonds,” and Barbara Forrest, relict and executrix-creditrix to James Ker, younger, craved the sums now remaining as her husband's share, the shares of the other two being paid before. It was alleged, That this tripartite contract was null, as wanting writer's name and witnesses. It was answered for Forrest, That she designed the writer, and this being a writ amongst merchants in re mercatoria for a bargain of victual, and subscribed by three parties, it was abundantly valid, and much more than a bill of exchange without any witnesses at all.
Which the Lords found relevant, and sustained the writ.
