Land-Wharton Co. v. Hughes

Citations

• 37 Pa. Super. 602
• 1908 Pa. Super. LEXIS 334

Syllabus

<p>Contract — Writing—Contemporaneous parol agreement — Evidence— Affidavit of defense.</p> <p>In an action by an engineering company for the cost of a report on a railroad property, where the written contract consisted of a letter offering to do the work for a certain amount per day, and a letter in reply stipulating that the time on the report should not exceed three days, the defendant may show by parol evidence that as an inducement for the signing of the letter accepting the offer, the plaintiff’s secretary agreed that he would do the work in person, that the investigation should occupy three full days, that a proper investigation could not be made in less time, that as a matter of fact the examination covered only a period of four hours, that the figures and information in the report were obtained not .by personal examination by plaintiff’s officer, but from a person who had formerly been in the employ of the railroad company, and that by reason of the negligence alleged, the report was of no value. In such a case the defendant’s offer is not an attempt to impeach a written instrument, but is an offer to prove a contemporaneous parol agreement not inconsistent with the terms of the writing which was the inducement to the defendant to sign the writing.</p> <p>In such a case it is immaterial that the defendant did not return the report or offer to return it, inasmuch as the report was not an article of merchandise and to be treated as such.</p>