A curious case was decided on Saturday before Vice-Chancellor Wood.
In 1849, Mr. Gye wished to become lessee of the Royal Italian Opera, but had not sufficient funds. His friends, however, -came forward, and one of them, Colonel Brownlow Knox, offered to lend him 5,000/. He did, apparently, lend it and various other ,stuus, amounting, it would. seem, in the whole, to little less than 20,0001., without security. In May, 1860, the Colonel quarrelled with the manager, apparently about his right to a box, and after
• a sharp correspondence, applied for the return of his money, and not getting it went into Court for a dissolution of partnership. The Vice-Chancellor decided that there was no evidence of any such partnership, and that the Colonel must be considered to have acted simply as Mr. Gye's friend. The case must, of course, come on again as an action for debt, and meanwhile, the facts seem to show that opera management is next to an election petition, or running a plausible horse for the Derby, the most expensive of fashionable amusements.
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