Scottish Court of Session Decisions

This is an action of aliment by a wife against her husband. The pursuer claimed £100 a year, and the defender alleged that in consequence of the intemperate habits and violence of his wife he had been obliged about a year ago to remove her from his house, and that he had since paid her £1 a week which was sufficient for her comfortable support and maintenance as his wife. The pursuer pleaded that the defender's statements as to her intemperance and violence were irrelevant. The Lord Ordinary (Mure) repelled this plea hoc statu “reserving to consider, when the proof is being led, whether any portion of the defender's statement is irrelevant or not pertinent to the defence.” The pursuer reclaimed, but the Court adhered.

On the motion of the defender the Court farther found that the expenses incurred by the pursuer since the date of the Lord Ordinary's interlocutor should not form a charge against the defender, the Lord President observing that though a husband must pay his wife's expenses in such actions as this, that was no reason why he should be made to pay the expense of unnecessary litigation on her part.