Sir George Rankin:-

In this case the appellant's suit has been dismissed as barred by limitation and the sole question is whether the dismissal is justified upon a true construction of the relevant provisions of the Mejelle. By a deed of wakf (wakfieh) dated 11th Muharram, 1228 A. H. (1812 A.D.), Emir Ali Pasha made wakf of a number of properties directing that the income should be applied in the first place to the upkeep of a certain mosque and fountain. As regards the balance of income, he directed that it should be paid or distributed to himself for his life and after his death to his three children, Abdulla, Miriam and Hanifeh, and their children.

Then after them it shall be for their children, then to their grand-children and then to their great-grand-children, etc., etc., and so on, males and females according to the Sharia distribution, viz. the share of a male shall be twice as much as that of a female and for their descendants after them as long as they live and continually as they generate, provided that any one of them who dies leaving after him a child, or a grand-child or a great-grand-child his share shall pass down to his child or grand-child or great-grand-child. When one of them dies leaving after him no child, or grand-child or great-grand-child, then his share shall pass down to those who are of his category. The upper category (ascendants) shall enjoy it before the lower category (descendants) and the parents shall enjoy it before the children but not before the children of other beneficiaries. When one of them dies leaving after him a child, or grand-child or a great-grand-child, before becoming a beneficiary to anything in the wakf, then his child, or grand-child, or great-grand-child shall become beneficiaries to the share of their father, as if he were alive. One of them may enjoy it independently in the event if he alone remains alive.

In case of failure of all descendants there was a provision that the money was to be expended for the benefit of two named mosques, and that if this should not be feasible, it should be spent on the poor. The provision as to the office of mutwalli was as follows:

The second condition is that the mutwalliship shall be vested in his honoured son Abdallah Bey Salhashoor Khassa, and then after him it will devolve on the most prudent amongst the male children (descendants) of the dedicator, then after them it shall devolve on the most prudent amongst the female children and then it shall devolve on the most prudent amongst their grand-children and great-grand-children, etc., etc., and so on. If they (wakf properties) revert to both honoured Harams (mosques), then the management shall be vested in the nazir (manager of both of them).

The appellant, Saadat Kamel Hanum, claims to be descended from Ali Pasha through his daughter Miriam in the manner disclosed by the pedigree table hereunder:

In 1915 the appellant's uncle, Abdulla Lami Bey, was appointed to be mutwalli, and by an order of the Sharia Court at Acre, dated 10th January 1926, the appellant was found to be more prudent than either Baland Bey or Youssef Bey and was appointed mutwalli. This order does not expressly mention that Abdulla Lami Bey or the appellant's father, Said Pasha, had died, nor do the dates of their deaths appear from any other of the documents on the record. On 26th October 1931 the appellant as mutwalli and beneficiary of the wakf of Ali Pasha, brought in the Land Court, Haifa, the suit out of which the present appeal arises. She sued the Attorney-General on behalf of the Government of Palestine to recover for the wakf two properties in or near Acre as being properties comprised in the deed of 1812. The two properties are known as Kishleh and Dubaya: they have long been in the possession of the Palestine Government, the former being now used as a prison and the latter as a depot and stables. At the trial the only matter of defence which was dealt with by the Land Court was the question of limitation, thoug