48 noun. umrourmu.
The respondents contend that the blockade of the destined ports
dissolved the obligations of the charter in respect to the rate as well
as the place of delivery, and that the duties of each party to the other,
in the subsequent endeavors to make and receive delivery elsewhere,
V are not to be determined by the stipulations of the charter-party, but
by the equities of the case growing out of the particular circumstances
that subsequently arose, which were not contemplated by the charter,
and were wholly outside of its provisions. The decision of the case,
therefore, involves-First, the construction to be put upon the char-
ter-party, and the conduct of the parties under it; second, the legal
effect of a blockade of the stipulated place of delivery, and the con-
sequent duties of the parties as to delivery of the cargo at other ports.
1. This charter was executed after the war between Chili and Peru
had broken out, but before Arica was blockaded. The parties con-
templated the possibility of the blockade of that port before the ar-
rival of the ship, and stipulated that in that event the ship should go
to the "next nearest open port" to discharge. They had no intention-
of violating any blockade. The cargo was not contraband. The ob-
ject of the voyage, therefore, was not illegal even under the law of
nations, still less under our municipal law. The City of Mexico, 24
Fed. Rep. 33; Naylor v. Taylor, 9 Barn. & C. 718. Arica was the
primary port of discharge, and the provision for proceeding to the
"next nearest open port"`is connected solely with the blockade of
Arica. Wholly independent of this clause is the further provision of
the charter giving the charterer the privilege of "a second port in Peru
not north of Callao." The ship, however, exacted for her benefit the
condition that "i1` second port be used, the cargo to be discharged at
that port to be stowed so that it will come out of the vessel last." The
manifest object of this clause was to save the ship the double labor
of shifting the cargo in discharging, which might otherwise have be-
come necessary, if the cargo to be discharged at the second port should
have been loaded promiscuously with the rest. The last clause evi-
dently, therefore, required the charterer’s option to be determined be-
fore loading. This was accordingly done, and a portion of the cargo
was loaded for Callao as a second port, and so stowed as to come out
last.
The ordinary meaning of the requirement of "customary dispatch"
in unloading is the dispatch customary at the place of discharge.
Linclsay v. Cuslmano, 12 Fed. Rep. 504, 507; S. G. 10 Fed. Rep.
303; Kearon v. Pearson, 7 Hurl. & N. 388. At Ancon and Chancay
there was no custom; for those places were never before ports of entry,
and such cargoes had never been discharged there. If the charter
had expressly stipulatedfor a discharge   those places with "cus·
tomary dispatch," possibly the custom of the ports on the coast where
similar- cargoes were usually discharged might be held to have been
intended by the parties, and the clause, therefore, have been so in·
terpreted; since otherwise the whole clause would have been futile.