With only one year’s premium received, the office found this claim very unpleasant, and refused to pay. They said the mental state of the duke had not been mentioned, that they were ignorant of his loss of speech, and they fought very vigorously against discharging the policy. The question which rose was, whether it was necessary to give special information which was not asked; whether, in fact, a truthful answer to all queries was not enough. When the trial came on, the verdict was given for the office, because, according to Mr. Justice Littledale, it was the duty of the assured in every case to disclose all material facts within their knowledge: “In cases of life assurance, certain specific questions are proposed as to points affecting all mankind. But there may also be circumstances affecting particular individuals which are not likely to be known to the insurers, and which, had they been known, would have been made the subject of specific inquiries.” However legal this might be, it was scarcely equitable. The directors had insured the life of this gentleman, knowing, from private information, that his career had been gay, and his constitution debilitated, and they ought, on every principle of justice, to have been compelled to pay their obligation. In the same year another very important decision was arrived at. A gentleman assured the life of his son in the Asylum for 5000_l._ After the payment of two years’ premium the son died, and the office refused to honour the policy, because the father had no insurable interest in the life of his son. When the case was tried, the grounds on which the counsel endeavoured to prove an insurable interest were, that the father had expended a large sum in maintaining and in educating the deceased; that if a man had an insurable interest in his own life, he certainly had in that of his son; that a father might have many valuable rights and expectations depending on it which he could only protect by an insurance; that, by the statute of Elizabeth, if a father became poor in his old age, and his son was capable of maintaining him, he was bound to do so, and therefore the chance of the father being maintained in his old age was decreased by the death of his son. The special pleading evident in this line of argument was not calculated to be successful. But though a strict interpretation of the act might justify the refusal to pay, it does not appear that such a decision is strictly equitable.