PARTNERSHIP. If two or more persons join together their money, goods, labour, and skill, or any or all of them, for the purpose of buying and selling, and agree that the gain or loss shall be divided among them, that is a partner ship. The object of the partnership may be any thing that is lawful. Any agree ment of partnership for an unlawful ob ject is no agreement. The English law of partnership is founded on the common law, the so-called law of merchants, and the Roman law. By the common law a partner has no power to bind his co partner by deed. By the law of mer chants he has power to bind his co partner by a hill of exchange, and there is no survivorship in the partnership stock. From the Roman law is derived the principle that a partnership (societas) is terminated by. the death of a partner. (Gains, iii. 155.) No writing is necessary to constitute a partnership. The acts of the parties,
when there is no partnership contract in writing, are the evidence of the contract. Partners may be either ostensible, nomi nal, or dormant. He whose name ap pears to the world as a partner is an os tensible partner. An ostensible partner may or may not have an interest in the concern ; if he has no interest in the con cern, but allows his name to appear as one of the firm, he is a nominal partner ; if his name and transactions as a partner are purposely concealed from the world, he is a dormant partner. But if his name and transactions are actually unknown to the world, he is more properly termed a secret partner. Generally speaking, any number of persons may be partners, but there are some exceptions. [BANE; JOINT