Scottish Court of Session Decisions

Subject_1 DECISIONS of the LORDS OF COUNCIL AND SESSION. reported by JAMES BURNETT, LORD MONBODDO.

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Date: 29 November 1763

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A bargain about a house was concluded in this manner:—Two persons made an offer of a sum of money for a house in a missive letter wrote by one of them, and the offer was accepted by the seller, not holograph of him, but written by the buyer, who wrote the first, and attested by two persons not designed, but the subscription was acknowledged.

In a pursuit, at the instance of the buyers, for implement of the bargain, the Lords found, that a bargain concerning an heritable subject could only be finally concluded by a formal writing, that is, a writing, either holograph or according to the requisites of the Act of Parliament 1681; and that a party's acknowledging his subscription only proved the fact of the bargain, but did not make the writing solemn, and could signify no more than a party's acknowledgment of his subscription to a bond prescribed, or null upon the Act 1681. In such cases the debt may be acknowledged, as when a man pays interest upon a null bond, and such acknowledgment will, no doubt, make the debt effectual; but no acknowledgment can authenticate a null writing. This carried only by one vote, and the decisions had varied a little.