1. One of the arbitrary marks or characters constituting the alphabet, and used in written’ language as the representatives of sounds or articulations of the human organs of speech. Several of the letters of the English alphabet have a special significance in jurisprudence, as abbreviations and otherwise, or are employed as numerals. 2. A dispatch or epistle; a written or printed message; a communication in writing from one person to another at a distance. U.S. v. Huggett (C. C.) 40 Fed. 640; U. S. v. Denicke (C. C.) 35-Fed. 409. 3. In the imperial law of Rome, “letter” or “epistle’ was the name of the answer re- * bishop. turned by the emperor to a question of law submitted to him by the magistrates. 4. A commission, patent, or written instrument containing or attesting the grant of some power, authority, or right. The word appears in this generic sense in many compound phrases known to commercial law and jurisprudence; e. g., letter of attorney, letter missive, letter of credit, letters patent. The plural is frequently used. 5. Metaphorically, the verbal expression; the strict literal meaning. The Icticr of a statute, as distinguished from its spirit, means the strict and exact force of the language employed, as distingulshed from the general purpose and policy of the law. 6. He who, being the owner of a thing, lets it out to another for hire or compensation. Story, Bailm. § 369. —Letter-book. <A book in which a merchant or trader keeps copies of letters sent-by him to his ig rd saae elie erm oppo ana An employé of the post-office, whose duty it is to car ry letters from the post-office to the persons to whom they are addressed.—Letter missive. In English law. A letter from the king or queen to a dean and chapter, containing the name of the person whom he would have them elect as 1 Steph. Comm. 666. <A request addressed to a peer, peeress, or lord of parliament against whom a bill has been filed desirin the defendant to appear and answer to the bile In civil-law practice. The phrase “letters missive,” or “letters dimissory,” is sometimes used to denote the papers sent up on an appeal by the judge or court below to the superior tribu- nal, otherwise called the “apostles,” (g. v. Letter of advocation. In Scotch law. The process or warrant by which, on appeal to the supreme court or court of session, that tribunal assumes to itself jurisdiction of the cavse, and discharges the lower court from all further proceedings in the action. Ersk. Inst. 732. —Letter of credence. [n international law. The document which accredits an ambassador, minister, or envoy to the court or government to which he is sent; ¢. ¢., certifies to his appointment and qualification, and bespeaks credit for his official actions and representations.-Letter of exchange. A Dill of exchange, (q. v.)—= Letter of license. A Ictter or written instrument given by creditors to their debtor, who has failed in trade, etc., allowing him longer time for the payment of his debts, and protecting him from arrest in the mean time. Tomlins; Holthouse.—Letter of marque. A come mission given to a private ship by a government to make reprisals on the ships of another state; hence, also, the ship thus commissioned. U. 8: vy. The Ambrose Light (D._C.) 25 Fed. 408; Gibbons v. Livingston, 6 N. J. Law, 255.—Letter of recall. A document addressed by the executive of one nation to that of another, informing the latter that a minister sent by the former has been recalled.—Letter of recredentials. A document embodying the formal action of a government upon a letter of recall of a foreign minister. It, in effect, accredits him back to his own government. It is addressed to the latter government, and is delivered to the minister by the diplomatic secretary of the state from which he is recalled —Letters close. In English law. Close letters are grants of the king. and. being of private concern, they are thus distinguished from letters patent.—Letters of absolution. Absolvatory letters, used in former times. when an abbot released any of his brethren ab omnia subjectione et obedientia, etc., and made them capable of entering ‘This process was also . LETTER 713 into some other order of religion. Jacob.—Let= ters of correspondence. In Scotch law. Letters are admissible in evidence against the panel, 4. ¢., the prisoner at the bar, in criminal trials. A letter written by the panel is evidence against him; not so one from ao third party found in his ion. Bell.—Letters of e and sword. See FIRE AND SWORD. —Letters of request. A formal instrument by which an inferior judge of ecclesiastical jurisdiction requests the judge of a superior court to take and determine any matter which has come before him, thereby waiving or remitting his own jurisdiction. This is a mode of beginning a suit originally in the court of arches, instead of the consistory court.—Letters of safe conduct. No subject of a nation at war with England can, by the law of nations, come into the realm, nor can travel himself upon the high seas, or send his goods and merchandise from one place to another, without danger of being seized, unless he has letters of safe conduct, which, by divers old statutes, must be granted under the great seal, and enrolled in chancery, or else are of no effect; the sovereign being the best judge of such emergencies as may deserve exemption from the general law of arms. But passports or licenses from the ambassadors abroad are now more usually obtained, and are allowed to be of equal validity. Wharton.—Letters of slains. or silanes. Letters subscribed by the relatives of a person who had been slain, dec —Litera Pisana. The Pisan letter. A term applied to the old character in which the copy ° the Pandects formerly kept at Pisa, in Italy, was written. Spelman.