Present : Bertram C.J. and Shaw J.   1920.

PATHUMMA v. RAHIMATH.

20-D. C. Colombo, 50,582.

Oral authority to execute notarially attested instrument-Principal and agent.

An authority to execute an instrument which under our law must be notarially executed can be given orally.

THE facts appear from the judgment.

F. M. de Saram (with him Tisseverasinghe and Retnam), for the appellant.

Elliott (with him A. St. V. Jayawardene and H. E. Garvin), for the added respondent.

H. J. C. Pereira (with him Croos-Dabrera), for the defendant, respondent.

July 20, 1920. BERTRAM C.J.-

Many questions have been discussed in this case, but it is only necessary to give a decision on one point. What the case really turns on is whether an authority to execute an instrument, which under our law must be notarially executed, can be given orally. As to the facts, it appears that the plaintiff some years ago received from her late husband a transfer of the property in dispute. Before she had received that transfer she had given her husband a power of attorney authorizing him to transact business in her name, the object being that as she was a Muhammadan woman