JUDGMENT

Piggott, J. - This is an application to file an award, dated November 22nd, 1920, made in connection with a trade dispute between two firms upon a private submission and an arbitration conducted without the intervention of the Court. The defendant-firm is the same as in eases Nos. 1 and 2 to day decided by us, and the facts of the dispute are broadly similar. Here also, the award is that' of an umpire appointed by the Committee of the Delhi Piece Goods Association after the arbitrators chosen by the parties had failed to agree. There are two points upon which the present case is distinguishable from those above referred to:

(i) The order placed by the defendant-firm with the plaintiff firm was embodied in seven indents; the letters of acceptance in respect of two of these are not forthcoming, but in each of the remaining five letters the form of words employed is as follows:

"We have to intimate that your indents have been accepted by wire and the same are subject to revision and confirmation by mail." The qualifying expression, "if required," to which I attached considerable weight in deciding the connected eases, is not to be found here: though we do not know for certain that it did not appear in the letter of acceptance which was undoubtedly written and delivered in respect of the first two indents. Mr. Tota Ram, Manager of the plaintiff firm, has made a very clear and (as I think) straight forward statement regarding the course of business between the parties and the reasons why he did not think it necessary to make any further communication to the defendant-firm when the arrival of the mail from England showed that there had been no error of transmission in the tables which had passed between his firm and their Manchester correspondents. If this were the only point in the case I should be prepared to hold, though not without some hesitation, that the meaning of the reservation with which the plaintiff firm's acceptance was qualified was perfectly under' stood by both parties, that it had reference only to a contingency which never in fact arose, and that there was a completed son-tract between the parties.

(ii) There is, however, another difficulty in the way of the plaintiff-firm. According to Clause (14) of the printed form of indent, which is the basis of the contract between the parties.

No claim or dispute of any sort whatever can be recognised if not made in writing within sixty day a from due date of payment

2. The first letter written by the plaintiff-firm, after the defendant, firm had refused delivery and repudiated the contract, in which the former prefer any claim for damages is one dated April 13th, 1920, considerably more than sixty days after due date of payment in respect of the very latest of the indents concerned. The empire has considered this point: he says, in effect, that the clause above quoted refers to claims put forward or disputes raised by the buyers and has nothing to do with any claim by the sellers for damages (or breach of contract. It must be remembered that Clause (3) of the indent form provides the sellers with a prompt and effective remedy against failure on the part of the buyers to accept delivery: if the plaintiff-firm had short n to avail themselves of this remedy we should have had a "claim" on their part well within the prescribed period of limitation. They chose not to avail themselves of this remedy and to fall back on their rights under the ordinary law as the vendors under a contract of sale which the vendees had repudiated and refused to perform, The question is, whether the plaintiff firm, having done this, can claim the benefit of the arbitration clause, which is No, la in the indent form, without first fulfilling the obligation imposed upon them by Clause 14; that is to say, without preferring a claim in writing within the prescribed period of sixty days. On the contract as it stands nothing could well be plainer than the expression: "No claim or dispute of any sort wha