McElwaine CJ:

The plaintiffs sue as the administratrix and administrator respectively of Pang Kui, deceased. They claim $8,000 as being due under a comprehensive private motor car policy of insurance issued by the defendants to M/s. Kwong Hock Cheong Sawmill Co. Ltd.

The policy contained the following added clause which so far as material to this action reads:

In consideration of the payment of an additional premium it is hereby understood and agreed that the Company undertakes to pay compensation on the scale provided below for bodily injury as hereinafter defined sustained by Mr. Pang Kui in direct connection with any Motor Car described in the Schedule hereto or whilst mounting into dismounting from or travelling in any Private Motor Car and caused by violent accidental external and visible means which independently of any other cause shall within three calendar months of the occurrence of such injury result in:

(1) Death Scale of compensation $8,000 Provided always that:

(c) No compensation shall be payable in respect of death or injury directly or indirectly wholly or in part arising or resulting from or traceable to (1) intentional self injury suicide or attempted suicide physical defect or infirmity or (2) an accident happening whilst such person is under the influence of intoxicating liquor or drugs.

(e) Such compensation shall be payable only with the approval of the Insured and directly to the injured person or to his/her legal representative whose receipt shall be a full discharge in respect of the injury to such person.

Subject otherwise to the terms, provisions and conditions of this Policy.

During the continuance of the policy Pang Kui was on 29 March 1938, involved in a motor accident in which he suffered injuries. He was removed to hospital where he died on 6 April 1938. The Kwong Hock Cheong Sawmill Co. Ltd. has approved the payment of compensation under Proviso (e) of the clause above set out.

The dispute in this case is as to whether or not the death of Pang Kui was caused by violent accidental, external and visible means which independently of any other cause resulted in his death. The immediate cause of death was shock and haemorrhage from gastric ulcer.

The plaintiffs say that the deceased's death was caused by the injuries which he sustained, while the defendants say that Pang Kui "did not die from accidental external and visible means which independently of any other cause resulted in death. His death arose from or was accelerated or promoted by a disease or bodily infirmity or natural "cause arising within his system, to wit, gastric ulcer".

The deceased sustained the following injuries in the motor accident:

(1) Lacerated scalp wound 3'bd" left frontal region.

(2) Abrasions right leg and right hip.

(3) Fracture alveolar margin.

On admission to hospital he was also found to be suffering from severe diabetes and hardened arteries but these diseases were not caused by the accident.

On 3 April the right leg was slightly septic. Dr. Chew who attended the deceased said that this septic abrasion was less than half a square inch in area, was quite superficial and shewed no sign of spread. The septic condition was healed on 4 April and on that day the deceased was regarded as being out of danger. At 2.55 p.m. on 6 April Pang Kui suddenly became much worse and he died at 3 p.m.

An autopsy disclosed a moderately enlarged heart with flabby brown muscle which Dr. Chew described as serious heart disease. The two coronary arteries shewed marked hardening and thickening. There was a gastric ulcer of long standing. It was deep penetrating the wall of the stomach, and adhered to the surface of the pancreas. There was a blood clot adherent to an eroded blood vessel in the base of the ulcer. There was small subarachnoidal haemorrhage in both parieto occipital regions of the brain but this was not in itself serious.

The case for the plaintiffs was that the shock of the accident, the haemorrhage o