Judgement

The principal question involved in this appeal was as to the law which governed the succession to the property of the late Matthew Abraham, a Protestant native of India, resident in the Madras Presidency, and who died intestate in the year 1842. The ancestors of Matthew Abraham for several generations had been Christians; and Matthew Abraham, who had been baptised in infancy in the Roman Catholic faith, but afterwards became a convert to the Protestant religion, married a European wife in the year 1820, and with her and the children of the marriage conformed in all respects to the language, dress, manners, and habits of English persons up to the time of his death. The Sudder Court at Madras held that the property should be distributed in accordance with the Hindoo law.

The circumstances of the case were as follows—

In the year 1812, Matthew Abraham, then a youth, was residing at Bellary with his father; and was at that time receiving religious instruction from a Protestant Missionary, having become a convert from the Roman Catholic to the Protestant religion. The Respondent, another son of Matthew Abrahams father, was born in the year 1813. About the year 1815, Mathew Abraham was appointed to a situation in the Arsenal at Bellary, upon a salary of Rs. 52.5 a month. His father died some time prior to the year 1820, without leaving any property. In the last-mentioned year, Matthew Abraham married the Appellant, Charlotte Abraham, whose father was an Englishman and her mother a Portuguese. In the year 1823, he opened a shop on his own account at Bellary; and in the year 1827, the Respondent, Francis Abraham, who was then of the age of fourteen, was placed by Matthew Abraham as a writer and attendant in his shop, and on the 2nd of April, 1832, he and a Mr.

Richardson were admitted as partners in the shop under a deed of partnership, whereby the then partners were to be entitled equally to the profits. No capital was contributed by the Respondent upon his admission to the partnership. Mr. Richardson retired from the partnership in or about the year 1836, but upon his retirement no new arrangement was made between Matthew Abraham and the Respondent, as to their shares in the shop. Matthew Abraham, besides being a shopkeeper, held a contract from Government for the supply of spirituous liquors to the troops in cantonment at Bellary called "The Abkarry contract;" and in order to enable him properly to carry out that contract, he erected a large distillery in or near Bellary. The contract was first taken by Matthew Abraham in the year 1827, and the contract was re-taken by him from year to year, with, the exception of the official year 1829-30, until his death in the year 1842, at which time the contract was still subsisting. The distillery business so carried on by Matthew Abraham was separate from the shop, and was carried on by him alone on his own account,. and, as it appeared and was insisted by the Appellants, without any partner; but for some time previously to and at the time of the death of Matthew Abraham, the Respondent was employed as a clerk or manager in the distillery business, and during the frequent periods of absence of Matthew Abraham from Bellary, transacted the chief part of that business. On the 10th of July, 1842, Matthew Abraham died intestate, leaving his widow, the Appellant, Charlotte Abraham and two sons, Charles Henry Abraham, who is since deceased, and the Appellant, Daniel Vincent Abraham, him surviving. At the time of the death of Matthew Abraham, the other son, Charles Henry Abraham, was of the age of twenty years, and was in England for purpose of his education, and the Appellant, Daniel Vincent Abraham, was of the age of nineteen years, and was residing with his mother at Bellary. The property of Matthew Abraham consisted of the benefit of the Abkarry contract, which was still subsisting, and the sum held in deposit for the due fulfilment thereof; and of the distillery business; of the capit