PRICE. The consideration in money given for the purchase of a thing.
2. There are three requisites to the quality of a price in order to make a sale.
It must be serious and such as may be demanded: if, therefore, a person were to sell me an article, and by the agreement, reduced to writing, be were to release me from the payment, the transaction would no longer be a sale, but a gift. Pothier, Yenta, n. 18.
It must be certain and determinate; but what may be rendered certain is considered as certain : if, therefore, I sell u thing at a price to be fixed by a third person, this is sufficiently certain, provided the third person make a valuation and fix the price. Pothier, Vente, n. 23, 24 ; 2 Sumn. C. C. 539 ; 4 Pick. Mass. 179 ; 13 Me. 400 ; 2 Ired. No. C. 36 ; 3 Penn. St. 50 ; 2 Kent, Comm. 477. When the parties have not expressed any price in their contract, the presumption of law is that the thing is sold tbr the price it generally brings at the time aud place where the agroe ment was made. 3 T. B. Monr. Ky. 133 ; 6 Harr. & J. Md. 273 ; Coxe, N. J. 261 ; IO Bingh. 376 ; 4 Mann. & S. 217 ; 6 Taunt.
108.
3. The third quality of a price is that it consists in money, to be paid down, or at a future time ; for if it be of any thing else it will no longer be a price, nor the contract a sale, but exchange or barter. Pothier, Vente, n. 30 ; 16 Toullier, n. 147 ; 12 N. II. 390 ; 10 Vt. 457 ; 21 id. 147.
The true price of a thing is that for which things of a like nature and quality are usually sold in the place where situated, if real property, or in the place where exposed to sale, if personal. Pothier, Vente, n. 243. The first price or cost of a thing does not always afford a sure criterion of its value. It may have been bought very dear or very cheap. Marshall, Ins. 620 et seq.; Ayliffe, Parerg. 447 •, Merlin, Repert.; 4 Pick. Mass. 179 ; 8 id. 252 ; 16 id. 227.
In a declaration in trover it is usual, when the chattel found is a living one, to lay it am of such a price ; when dead, of such a value 8 Wentworth, Plead. 372, n.; 2 Lilly, Abr. 629. See Bouvier, Inst. Index.