A certificate of protest by a notary upon foreign bills proves a demand of payment and notice, if it so recites;1 but if the protest certificate is made by some other officer than a notary, his authority to protest must be proven as a fact under the foreign law.2 The allowance of such proof by certificate upon foreign protest exists by virtue of the law merchant, and foreign protest can be proven in no other way.3 But there are numerous statutes of various states which permit protest of other paper than foreign bills, and there are various statutes which prescribe the effect of such protest as evidence. These statutes may be: 1st. A statute which allows within the particular state the protest of other paper than foreign bills and makes the certificate thereof evidence either of demand or of notice and demand. Such a statute, it is plain, would have no bearing upon paper protested out of the state, and would have no bearing upon the admissibility of a certificate made out of the state.4 2d. A statute may make all protests in another jurisdiction admissible in evidence when made upon paper not properly protestable by a notary.5 In such case it makes no difference whether the law of the other jurisdiction where the protest was made provides for such protest or not.6 3d. A statute in the jurisdiction where the protest is made may provide for protest upon paper other than foreign bills, but the protest may be offered in evidence in another state where there is no statute which makes the certificate evidence. In the latter case, since the protest is valid where made, according to the principle hereinbefore stated,7 the certificate ought to be admissible in evidence when supplemented with proof of the foreign law, if the paper was payable where protested,8 but this position is apparently denied in other courts; no reason is given, but it must be for the reason that no sovereignty can prescribe rules of evidence for another one's courts.9 If the certificate is admissible it needs no proof of its execution; it proves itself.10 And this is true both of protest on a foreign bill and of protest permitted by a statute. If the notary be dead, the books of the notary,11 or certified extracts from them made by competent authority,12 are in all cases admissible to prove the notary's demand and notice, provided the notary made the entries himself, and they were not made by some one who is alive.13 A statute, also, on this subject exists in some jurisdictions.14

1Dickens v. Beal, 10 Pet. 572; Pierce v. Indseth, 106 U. S. 546.

2 So of a French huissier. Cha-noine v. Fowler, 3 "Wend. 173.

3 See Sec. 246, ante, note 1.

4 White v. Engelhard, 2 Smedes & M. 38; Sims v. Hundley, 6 How. 1. Such a statute would not make good a certificate of a state notary-acting outside of his state. Dutchess Co. Bank v. Ibbotson, 5 Denio, 110.

5 Rushworth v. Moore, 26 N. H. 188; Dakin v. Graves, 48 N. H. 45; Daniel v. Downing, 26 Ohio St. 578; Douglas v. Bank of Commerce, 97 Tenn. 133; Bradley v. Northern Bank, 60 Ala. 252.

6 Union Bank v. Middlebrook, 83 Conn. 95; Kern v. Von Phul, 7 Minn. 426.

7 Townsley v. Sumrall, 2 Pet 170