Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, per Agnew, J., in delivering the opinion of that court. The same principle is held in Wyeth Hardware &c. Co. v. Lang, 127 Missouri, 242, 247; in Lancashire Insurance Co. v. Corbetts, 165 Illinois, 592; and in Harvey v. Great Northern Ry. Co., 50 Minnesota, 405, 406, 407; and to the same effect is Embree v. Hanna, 5 Johns. (N. Y.) 101; also Savin v. Bond, 57 Maryland, 228, where the court held that the attachment was properly served upon a party in the District of Columbia while he was temporarily there; that as his debt to the appellant was payable wherever he was found, and process had been served upon him in the District. of Columbia, the Supreme Court of the District had unquestioned jurisdiction to render judgment, and the same having been paid, there was no error in granting the prayer of the appellee that such judgment was conclusive. The case in 138 N. Y. 209, Douglass v. Insurance Co., is not contrary to this doctrine. The question there was not as to the temporary character of the presence of the garnishee in the State of Massachusetts, but, as the garnishee was a foreign corporation, it was held that it was not within the State of Massachusetts so as to be liable to attachment by the service upon an agent of the company within that State. The general principle laid down in Embree v. Hanna, 5 Johns. (N. Y.) 101, was recognized as correct. There are, as we have said, authorities to the contrary, and they cannot be reconciled.

It seems to us, however, that the principle decided in Chicago, R. I. &c. Ry. Co. v. Sturm, 174 U. S. 710, recognizes the jurisdiction, although in that case it appears that the presence of the garnishee was not merely a temporary one in the State where the process was served. In that case it was said: "All debts are payable everywhere, unless there be some special limitation or provision in respect to the payment; the rule being that debts as such have no locus or situs, but accompany the creditor everywhere, and authorize a demand upon the debtor everywhere.' 2 Parsons on Contracts, 8th ed., 702 (9th ed., 739). The debt involved in the pending VOL. CXCVIII-15

case had no 'special limitation or provision in respect to payment.' It was payable generally, and could have been sued on in Iowa, and therefore was attachable in Iowa. This is the principle and effect of the best considered cases—the inevitable effect from the nature of transitory actions and the purpose of foreign attachment laws if we would enforce that purpose." The case recognizes the right of the creditor to sue in the State where the debtor may be found, even if but temporarily there, and upon that right is built the further right of the creditor to attach the debt owing by the garnishee to his creditor. The importance of the fact of the right of the original creditor to sue his debtor in the foreign State, as affecting the right of the creditor of that creditor to sue the debtor or garnishee, lies in the nature of the attachment proceeding. The plaintiff, in such proceeding in the foreign State is able to sue out the attachment and attach the debt due from the garnishee to his (the garnishee's) creditor, because of the fact that the plaintiff is really in such proceeding a representative of the creditor of the garnishee, and therefore if such creditor himself had the right to commence suit to recover the debt in the foreign State his representative has the same right, as representing him, and may garnish or attach the debt, provided the municipal law of the State where the attachment was sued out permits it.

It seems to us, therefore, that the judgment against Harris in Maryland, condemning the $180 which he owed to Balk, was a valid judgment, because the court had jurisdiction over the garnishee by personal service of process within the State of Maryland.

It ought to be and it is the object of courts to prevent the payment of any debt twice over. Thus, if Harris owing a debt to Balk, paid it under a valid judgment against him, to Epstein, he certainly ought not to be compelled to pay it a second time, but should have the right to plead his payment under the Maryland judgment. It is objected, however, that the payment by Harris to Epstein was not under legal compulsion.

Harris in truth owed the debt to Balk, which was attached by Epstein. He had, therefore, as we have seen, no defense to set up against the attachment of the debt. Jurisdiction over him personally had been obtained by the Maryland court. As he was absolutely without defense, there was no reason why he should not consent to a judgment impounding the debt, which judgment the plaintiff was legally entitled to, and which he could not prevent. There was no merely voluntary payment within the meaning of that phrase as applicable here.

But most rights may be lost by negligence, and if the garnishee were guilty of negligence in the attachment proceeding, to the damage of Balk, he ought not to be permitted to set up the judgment as a defense. Thus it is recognized as the duty of the garnishee to give notice to his own creditor, if he would protect himself, so that the creditor may have the opportunity to defend himself against the claim of the person suing out the attachment. This duty is affirmed in the case above cited of Morgan v. Neville, 74 Pa. St. 52, and is spoken of in Railroad Co. v. Sturm, supra, although it is not therein actually decided to be necessary, because in that case notice was given and defense made. While the want of notification by the garnishee to his own creditor may have no effect upon the validity of the judgment against the garnishee (the proper publication being made by the plaintiff), we think it has and ought to have an effect upon the right of the garnishee to avail himself of the prior judgment and his payment thereunder. This notification by the garnishee is for the purpose of making sure that his creditor shall have an opportunity to defend the claim made against him in the attachment suit. Fair dealing requires this at the hands of the garnishee. In this case, while neither the defendant nor the garnishee appeared, the court, while condemning the credits attached, could not, by the terms of the Maryland statute, issue the writ of execution unless the plaintiff gave bond or sufficient security before the court awarding the execution, to make restitution of the money paid if the defendant should, at any time within a year and a day,

appear in the action and show that the plaintiff's claim, or some part thereof, was not due to the plaintiff. The defendant in error, Balk, had notice of this attachment, certainly within a few days after the issuing thereof and the entry of judgment thereon, because he sued the plaintiff in error to recover his debt within a few days after his (Harris') return to North Carolina, in which suit the judgment in Maryland was set up by Harris as a plea in bar to Balk's claim. Balk, therefore, had an opportunity for a year and a day after the entry of the judgment to litigate the question of his liability in the Maryland court and to show that he did not owe the debt, or some part of it, as was claimed by Epstein. He, however, took no proceedings to that end, so far as the record shows, and the reason may be supposed to be that he could not successfully defend the claim, because he admitted in this case that he did, at the time of the attachment proceeding, owe Epstein some $344.

Generally, though, the failure on the part of the garnishee to give proper notice to his creditor of the levying of the attachment would be such a neglect of duty on the part of the garnishee which he owed to his creditor as would prevent his availing himself of the judgment in the attachment suit as a bar to the suit of his creditor against himself, which might therefore result in his being called upon to pay the debt twice.

The judgment of the Supreme Court of North Carolina must be reversed and the cause remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with the opinion of this court.

Reversed.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN and MR. JUSTICE DAY dissented.

198 U. S.

Statement of the Case.

HARLEY v. UNITED STATES.

APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF CLAIMS.

No. 195. Argued April 6, 1905.-Decided May 8, 1905.

In order to give the Court of Claims jurisdiction under the act of March 3, 1887, the demand sued on must be founded on a convention between the parties-a coming together of minds-and contracts or obligations implied by law from torts do not meet this condition. Russell v. United States, 182 U. S. 516, 530.

An employé of the Bureau of Printing and Engraving, who at his own cost and in his own time perfected and patented a device for registering impressions in connection with printing presses, which with his knowledge and consent was used for many years by the Bureau, under orders of the Secretary of the Treasury, and who during that period never made any demand for royalties, cannot, under the circumstances of this case, recover such royalties in the Court of Claims on the ground that a contract existed between him and the Government, because, prior to the use of the device by the Government, the Chief of the Bureau promised to have his rights to the invention protected.

APPELLANT Sued in the Court of Claims to recover the sum of $102,000, for the use, during the six years preceding the commencement of the suit, of a device invented by the appellant for registering impressions in connection with printing presses. The Court of Claims dismissed the petition. The findings of the Court of Claims are as follows:

"II. In November, 1869, the Secretary of the Treasury determined that certain valuable securities should not be printed in the Bureau of Engraving and Printing until proper and reliable registers should be attached to the presses. While the Chief of the Bureau was endeavoring to devise and procure a trustworthy form of register, the claimant brought to him the drawings of a device which he had invented, being substantially the device described in the foregoing letters patent. The Chief of the Bureau ordered a register to be immediately made after the claimant's device. At the time of giving such order he understood that the device was the claimant's invention. "The register so ordered being completed, and tried and found satisfactory, the Chief of the Bureau proposed to take the claimant to the Secretary of the Treasury that he might