y is
the seller's place of business, if he have one, and if not, his
residence. Again, when by the contract of sale of goods no time for
sending them has been fixed, the seller must send them within a
reasonable time.

Vast quantities of goods are bought and sent forward to buyers, which
are not to be delivered until payment. The Sales Act provides that
where goods are shipped and by the bill of lading that is given for
them they are to be delivered to the order of the buyer or of his
agents, but possession of the bill of lading is to be retained by the
seller or his agent, he thereby reserves his right to the possession
of the goods as against the buyer. Very often a buyer of wheat, for
example, will draw a bill of exchange on his principal or company
living in the place where the goods are to be delivered and will have
it discounted by a bank using the money to pay the seller. The wheat
may be in an elevator, or it may be in transit. In either case the
bank receives a document, elevator receipt, or bill of lading, and
thus becomes the real owner of the wheat, and can control it afterward
until it is actually delivered to the consignee, whoever he may be.
This is the bank's security for making the loan. The bank sends
forward the bill of exchange to its correspondent bank in the place
where the consignee lives and the wheat is to be delivered with
instructions to deliver it when the bill is paid.

With respect to speculative sales of stock, so well known by every
one, a contract, says Williston, giving one party or the other an
option to carry out the transaction or not at pleasure, is not a
wager, unless forbidden, as in some states is done by statute. A
contract to sell goods in the future, which the seller does not own at
the time is, aside from the statute, not only legal but common. "The
test," says Williston, "adopted in the absence of statute,
distinguishes between contracts to buy and sell in which the actual
delivery of the property is contemplated, and similar contracts in
which it is contemplated merely that a settlement shall be made
between the parties based on fluctuations in the market price. A
contract of the former kind is legal; one of the latter kind is a
wagering contract, and illegal."

=Shipping.=--The federal statutes require that every ship or vessel of
the United States shall be registered or enrolled in the office of the
collector of customs of the district that includes the home port of