ARTICLE II: ON PLEDGE

(Pawn or Pledge.)

1035. • Pledge is a contract by which the debtor gives a movable thing to the creditor as assurance of the credit. - Under the name of pledge also comes the thing pledged. L. IV. 913-915.

Rules of pledge. - I. On the part of the debtor handing over the pledge. He must: 1° hand over to the creditor a suitable pledge; 2° refund to the creditor the expenses made for the conservation or improvement of the thing; 3° not seek back the pledge before he has paid the whole debt, unless the creditor abuses it.

II. On the part of the creditor receiving the pledge. He must 1° not use it, unless from the at least presumed consent of the debtor; 2° guard it diligently; otherwise he is held for the damage; 3° compute the fruits perceived from it toward the diminution of the debt, namely so that equality may be observed; 4° not sell the pledge by his own authority or that of a judge for obtaining payment, unless the debtor is in culpable delay and has first been warned.

Kent treats of this contract, T. II. n. 577 sq.

Near to pledge is that which in English and American law is called "a Lien," i.e. the right which belongs to the just and legal possessor of goods to detain them until satisfaction has been made to the right which he has against their owner. One is general (a general lien), another special (a particular lien). "A general lien is the right to retain property of another for a general balance of accounts due in the ordinary course of dealing in the same business. Solicitors, for instance, have a general lien upon the papers of their clients in their possession, for the balance of their professional accounts; bankers on all the paper securities which come to their hands. A particular lien is a lien upon goods in respect of money due on them, or of labor, trouble, or care expended upon them. A tailor, for instance, to whom cloth has been delivered in order to make a coat out of it, has a lien upon the coat for the price of his labor." - See Kent, T. II. n. 634 sq.