Master's decision, and the opposite party will not consent to confirm the report absolutely in the first instance, the party taking the report should, immediately he has filed it, apply either by a petition 21st N. O., or a motion as of course for an order nisi to confirm the Master's report. If a petition is presented, the order is drawn up, passed, and entered at once by the secretary of the Master of the Rolls. If the application is by motion, the motion paper is left with the registrar, who draws up the order, and the same is entered at the entering seat in the registrar's office.

The motion for the order nisi to confirm is made by the plaintiff, or the party taking the report; but if he neglects to do it, it is competent to any party to the suit to move to confirm the report. As a preliminary step, however, he should give the party taking the report notice, that unless such party moves to confirm the report within a given time, he shall do it. Such notice was considered necessary in a recent case. Shirley v. Earl Ferrers, M.S. Where it has been referred to the Master to make a separate report of a creditor's claim, the creditor may obtain the order to confirm the report. Gibbons v. Caunt, 15th July, 1803. The order nisi is drawn up in the following terms; that the report, and all matter and things therein contained, do stand ratified and confirmed by the order, authority and decree of this Court, to be observed and performed by all parties thereto, according to the tenor and true meaning thereof, unless the defendants. having notice thereof, shall within eight days after such notice show unto this Court good cause to the contrary.

Before the Orders of 1828, it was necessary to serve the order nisi on the defendants, unless they exceeded the number of six, and were living far apart from one another. Upon an allegation of those facts, an order of course was obtained, that service on the clerk in court of the order

nisi should be deemed good service on the defendants. Under special circumstances, even where the number of defendants did not reach six, but where some of the defendants lived in the East and some in the West Indies, an order that service on the clerk in court might be deemed good service, was granted upon affidavit. Jackson v., 2 Ves. 417. By the 21st N. O., service of the order nisi on the clerk in court of any party, is deemed good service on such party.

A copy of the order nisi is served at the seat of the defendant's clerk in court. An affidavit of the service of this order is made and filed, and if no cause is shown within eight days (one inclusive and the other exclusive), after service of the order nisi, or before the day on which the motion is made to confirm the report absolutely, the party is entitled to move on a half guinea motion, at the first motion day after the expiration of such eight days to make the order nisi, absolute. The application to confirm the report absolutely must be by a motion, and cannot be by a petition.

In computing the eight days, the one on which the order nisi was served is included, so that if the order nisi was served on the 14th of March, it would be regular to move to confirm the report on the 22nd of March, if that day happened in term time, or on the first day of any seal after term. In the case cited the Court held, that the 21st of March being a holiday, did not entitle the party to show cause on the 22nd of March by filing exceptions. The Lord Chancellor said, the circumstance of the 21st being a holiday, did not, in his opinion, alter the case. The party had till twelve o'clock at night of the last of the eight days within which to show cause; and if, as in the present instance, no cause were shown before the opening of the offices the following morning, the certificate then granted

by the registrar to that effect, was strictly regular. It is difficult to understand how, if the 21st of March was a close holiday "the party had till twelve o'clock of the last of the eight days within which to show cause."* There is probably some mistake in the report of this judgment. In the same case (Manners v. Bryan, 5 Sim. 148,) the Vice Chancellor said, as the holiday was the last of the eight days, it was not to be reckoned; but if it had been one of the intermediate days it ought to have been counted; and the ground of the Vice Chancellor's decision was, that the order for setting down the exceptions was not brought to the entering clerk to be entered till the 23rd of March. In strict analogy with this view of the subject, it has been decided, that if the eighth day after service of an order nisi for confirming a report is a Sunday, that day is not to be reckoned. Milburn v. Lyster, 5 Sim. 565; and an order obtained on the Monday to confirm the report absolutely was discharged, an order setting down the exceptions having been served on that day; and in the case of Bullock v. Edington, 1 Sim. 481, deciding that the eight days within which a demurrer must be entered with the registrar, means eight office days, is a further confirmation of the same view of the subject.

The motion to confirm the report absolutely may be made every day in term; but only on fixed seal days

"

In this case, notice is taken of a variation in computing the eight days in the six clerks' office, and in the registrar's office; the former allowing eight clear and entire days; the latter, including the day of service as one of the eight days. I believe the reason to be, that the real time allowed to show cause against confirming a report is only seven days, or by the space of a seven-night." Beam. v. Ord, 22; and that the time for appearing to a bill is eight days after service. In other instances, there is no variation in the manner of computing the days in the two offices. The four days in the order nisi for a serjeant-atarms, or to obtain the Master's report of insufficiency in an injunction cause, are reckoned as four entire days in the registrar's office.

appointed for motions out of term. In the latter case if the eight days do not expire on the first day of the seal, and the seal be continued to such a time that the eight days expire before the seal is finished, it is not competent to the party to make the motion. Coffin v. Cooper,

11 Ves. 600, Anon 1 P. W. 523, the computation of time having relation always to the first day of the seal, and the subsequent days being regarded as a continuance of that first day. Anon 1 P. W. 523. The application to confirm the report absolutely cannot be made on petition, but must be on motion, and is granted on an affidavit of the service of the order nisi, and on the production of the registrar's certificate of no cause shown. The order absolute does not require to be served.

If the party taking the report is not satisfied with it, and intends to except, yet if he desires to proceed effectually with the cause, he must procure and serve the order nisi to confirm the report on the clerks in court of all the parties interested. This proceeding does not preclude him from afterwards taking exceptions to the report, and is a necessary notice to the other parties to file their exceptions, if they intend to object to the report. For if the plaintiff should take exceptions, and proceed to hear the same without having served the order nisi to confirm the report, it would remain open to all the parties to except, whereas by serving the order nisi he compels the other party to except, and is enabled, if he thinks proper, to set down his cause on further directions, and to obtain an order that the same may come on to be heard, together with his exceptions, which he cannot do until the order nisi has been served. Thus, then, although at the first impression it appears an anomaly, for the party objecting to a report to move to confirm it nisi, yet, practically, it is the only manner of effectually prosecuting a suit.

336

CHAPTER XXXIV.

EXCEPTIONS TO THE MASTER'S REPORT.

If any party is dissatisfied with the Master's report, or with any portion of it, the subject must be brought under the consideration of the Court, either in the form of exceptions to the report, expressing the points objected to; or by a petition for the Master to review his report; and, in some few cases, the question may be raised when the matter is brought before the Court, either on further directions, or on a petition for directions consequent on the Master's report.

Each of these remedies is applied according to the nature of the report.

All reports, whether made pursuant to a decree, or a decretal or interlocutory order, which involve a question of law or a question of fact, upon which the Court may be called upon to give a legal decision, must be objected to in the form of exceptions. Thus it will be seen that all those reports comprised in the second class of reports (see p. 329,) and described as reports requiring to be confirmed by orders nisi and absolute, (excepting the report allowing the highest bidder at a sale to be the purchaser,) must be objected to in the same manner. To these may also be added certificates relating to any pleading either of suffi ciency or insufficiency, as to scandal or impertinence, or of the allowance of interrogatories, and a revort approving a