Perrin v. U. S. Express Co. 78 N. J. L. common law liability for any loss, except such as might arise by its negligence or misfeasance, and in Atkinson v. New York Transfer Co., 47 Id. 608, we also held in the language of the learned Chief Justice delivering the opinion of this court: "The carrier is entitled to be compensated for his services in proportion to the value of the article consigned and the consequent risk assumed by him. The shipper is entitled to take the benefit of a lower rate, if he desires to do so, by placing a value upon his goods for the purpose of their shipment, below their actual worth. Such a stipulation stands as if the carrier had asked the value of the goods shipped, and had been told by the consignor that it was the sum named in the contract. * ** * It exacts from the carrier the measure of care due to the value agreed on, and is, we think, a proper and lawful mode of securing a due proportion between the amount for which the carrier can be held responsible, and the charges received by it as a consideration for the safe transportation of the goods shipped." This case did not go to the length that the courts of many of our sister states have gone in holding that the shipper receiving a bill of lading is conclusively presumed to have read it and acquiesced in its terms, in the absence of fraud, imposition and mistake. (See 6 Cyc., where the cases are collected.) The case under review does not call for a decision on that point. The Atkinson case, supra, however, did declare that if a shipper has knowledge that the express charges are based upon a value placed on the goods by him which is less than their real value, and is specified in the receipt, coupled with a clause limiting the carrier's liability to the specified amount, he may not, having accepted such receipt in silence, afterwards repudiate that he assented to the valuation and recover the full amount of his loss. The case in hand, however, is one where the plaintiffs must be held to have drawn the contract, and by their own language to have limited the liability of the carrier, to which it has assented. The plaintiffs had knowledge of the entire contents of the receipt, for they had by their agents in charge of 49 Vroom. Perrin v. U. S. Express Co. shipping the goods prepared it and tendered it to the defendant, contrary to the general course of such transactions, where customarily the receipt is filled out by the carrier and tendered to the shipper. Although it was written upon blanks furnished by the carrier, yet these blanks had been in the possession of the shippers and had been uniformly used and filled out by them in their usual course of shipping goods for more than a year previous to the transaction in question, and were tendered by them to the defendant, and so had been adopted by the plaintiffs as embodying their own contract. In the absence of evidence or circumstances tending to show the contrary, a person who personally, or by his dulyauthorized agent, prepares a writing, will be deemed to know the contents of such writing. And so here the contents of the receipt prepared and furnished by the plaintiffs by their agent accustomed to prepare such receipts and tendered by the plaintiffs to the defendant for signature will be presumed to have been known by the plaintiffs. They have not attempted to rebut this presumption. Here, then, we have essentially a case of the shipper limiting the liability of the carrier, not the usual one where the carrier has sought to do so. The plaintiffs themselves incorporated in it a provision that the goods covered by it would be valued at $50, unless the true value was stated therein; that the liability of the company was limited to $50, unless a greater value was stated in the receipt; and that the party accepting the receipt agreed to the conditions therein, and having thereafter at the time of making the shipment received the receipt from the carrier and retained it without objection with such knowledge, the plaintiffs must be held to be bound by its terms, as a contract put forward by themselves. The court should, therefore, have directed a verdict for the plaintiff for the amount of the sum tendered. The judgment of the Supreme Court is reversed, and a venire de novo awarded. Riddle Co. v. Auditorium Pier Co. 78 N. J. L. For affirmance-None. For reversal-THE CHIEF JUSTICE, GARRISON, SWAYZE, REED, TRENCHARD, PARKER, BERGEN, VOORHEES, MINTUrn, BOGERT, VREDENBURGH, VROOM, GRAY, CONGDON, JJ. 14. MARY A. RIDDLE COMPANY, DEFENDANT IN ERROR, v. NEW AUDITORIUM PIER COMPANY, PLAINTIFF IN ERROR. Argued June 30, 1909-Decided November 15. 1909. A tenant, by his lease, covenanted with his landlord "to pay all taxes levied on said (demised) land." It appeared that an assessment for taxes had been levied upon other adjoining lands of the landlord but that the demised lands had not been assessed by the assessor. Afterwards proceedings of the commissioners of appeal showed the existence of an assessment against the demised premises equal in amount to a reduction which appeared in the assessment upon the landlord's other land; and it further appeared by the judgment of the commissioners of appeal that the assessment so shown against the leased lands had been reduced. In a suit by the landlord against the tenant on the above covenant to recover the taxes paid by the landlord-Held, that from the mere circumstance that the amount assessed against the leased premises was the same as the reduction in the assessment against the other, an inference would not be permitted to be drawn that an apportionment of the taxes, rather than an assessment, had been made when the tax under the circumstances of the case, if apportioned, would be illegal. Held, further, that the proceedings and judgment of the commissioners of appeal disclosed the existence of an assessment which it will be inferred had been made by the proper officers, and had been legally laid until the contrary is made to appear. On error to the Supreme Court. For the defendant in error, Thompson & Cole. For the plaintiff in error, Bourgeois & Sooy. 49 Vroom. Riddle Co. v. Auditorium Pier Co. The opinion of the court was delivered by VOORHEES, J. This action is brought to recover damages for the breach of a covenant contained in a lease. The plaintiff was the owner of a tract of land in Atlantic City which was divided by the boardwalk. The portion of this land lying oceanward of the boardwalk was, by a writing, leased to the defendant corporation, which covenanted "to pay the said yearly rent in manner aforesaid and to pay all taxes levied on said land or buildings that may be erected thereon." The plaintiff, after defendant's refusal to liquidate them, paid the taxes for the year 1905 assessed against the leased premises, and brings this suit for reimbursement. At the close of the case a request was made that the court direct a verdict for the defendant, and upon its refusal the defendant duly excepted to the ruling. The plaintiff then requested a direction in its favor, which was granted. Error has been assigned upon these two rulings. Witnesses were produced by the defendant, whose testimony, it is claimed by the defendant, tended to show that the plaintiff's lands lying inside the boardwalk were assessed but that the leased lands lying oceanward thereof had not been assessed, but that afterwards, on the petition of the plaintiff, the assessment upon the lands inside the boardwalk was apportioned between them and the leased lands outside, the apportionment to the latter lands being the tax which plaintiff has paid. No petition for the apportionment was produced. The original assessments were offered, and confirm the fact that the ocean front was not originally taxed. A comparison of the original assessments, which excluded. the leased property, with the final assessments made and certified by the commissioners of appeal, and furnished to the tax collector for entry on the tax list pursuant to section 28 of the Tax act of 1903 (Pamph. L., p. 394), and which include the lands both inside and outside the walk, shows that their aggregate amounts are the same. From the identity of these amounts it is argued that what the commissioners of Riddle Co. v. Auditorium Pier Co. 78 N. J. L. appeal did was merely to apportion, and not to assess; and that it thereupon became the province of the jury to determine whether the leased lands had been assessed, or whether the original assessment that had been levied on the lands inside the walk had been divided and a portion thereof transferred to those lying oceanward of the boardwalk. The defendant insists that if the latter action was taken it was beyond the power of the commissioners of appeal; that their power to apportion is confined to the division of a tax, levied generally on a tract of land, as between two or more portions of the same taxed land on the application of the owner (Tax act 1903, § 31, Pamph. L., p. 414), but that this act confers no jurisdiction to deduct a portion of the tax assessment against one tract and place it upon another tract not assessed. Assuming the correctness of the contention as to the power to apportion, it does not meet the conditions of this case. All property is taxable except that which is specially exempted. As between the public and the defendant the matter has been set at rest by the judgment of the Supreme Court. Auditorium Pier Co. v. Atlantic City, 45 Vroom 303. If the assessor did not assess the lands he violated his duty. It then became the duty of the collector or commissioners of appeal to make the assessment. Tax act, supra, § 28. An assessment on the leased lands signed by the secretary of the commissioners of appeal and the judgments of the commissioners of appeal reducing this assessment, were offered in evidence. The judgment concerning the land outside the walk recited that the plaintiff having appealed to the commissioners of appeal from the assessment on the land which was assessed at the value of $91,100, and having heard the parties and witnesses, after the examination of the facts, adjudge that the said assessment be reduced from $91,100 to $86,100, and that the tax be reduced from $1,612.47 to $1,523.97. It nowhere appears in the record of the proceedings that an apportionment had been asked for, or was actually made. If the tax founded upon such attempted apportionment |