JUDGMENT : STANLEY, C.J.:— This second appeal arises under the following circumstances:—The plaintiffs are the payees of two Hundis which were made payable at Calcutta. They employed a broker, named Kunji Lal, to sell these Hundis, and Kunji Lal, in accordance with these instructions, purported to have effected a sale with the firm of Harsahai Mal Kedar Nath, to whom the Hundis were endorsed, on the representation that this firm had purchased them. Then the broker, Kunji Lal, forged two further endorsements on the Hundis purporting to have been made by the firm of Harsahai Mal Kedar Nath to a firm which had no existence, viz., the firm of Kedar Nath and Chandu Lal, and a further endorsement from this firm to another firm which also had no existence, viz., the firm of Bhola Nath and Moti Ram. Kunji Lal then went to the defendants 1 and 2 and offered the Hundis to them for sale and sold them, representing that the endorsements upon them were correct. The defendants accepting his word as to the genuineness of the endorsements, purchased the Hundis and sent Rs. 700, portion of the price, to Bhola Nath Moti Ram, the supposed endorsers. Then the plaintiffs, after requiring payments of the Hundis without effect and making enquiry, brought the present suit against the defendants, including the broker, Kunji Lal, for recovery of the amount due on the Hundis. The plaintiffs endeavoured to stop payment of the Hundis, but were too late. 2. The Court of first instance decreed the claim in part; but upon appeal the lower appellate Court reversed the decree on the ground that the defendants 1 and 2 were the holders of the Hundis in due course, within the meaning of section 9 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, and that they had no sufficient cause to believe that any defect existed in the title of the person from whom the title was derived—that, in fact, they had not the remotest idea that the intermediate endorsements were fictitious and were made by Kunji Lal fraudulently and dishonestly. 3. From this decision the present appeal has been preferred. We are wholly unable to agree in the view of the lower appellate Court, and for this reason. 3. From this decision the present appeal has been preferred. We are wholly unable to agree in the view of the lower appellate Court, and for this reason. Section 9 of the Negotiable Instruments Act appears to us to afford no protection to the defendants, because they were not the payees or endorsees of the Hundis, The section contemplates a person who is the payee or endorsee from the payee. In this case it has been found that the endorsers to defendants had no existence whatever. Therefore the defendants acquired no title to the Hundis. It is not a case in which endorsees have obtained a defective title—the defendants obtained no title whatever. The case seems to fall within the class of cases which are dealt with by a Judge of the Bombay High Court in the case of Hunsraj Purmanand v. Ruttonji Walji, [1899] I.L.R., 24 Bom., 65. In that case the plaintiff, as administrator of a Hindu, sued to recover from the defendants certain shares, debentures and Government promissory notes which he alleged belonged to the estate of the deceased, but which the first four defendants had stolen, and, by means of forged endorsements, sold to the other defendants and received the purchase money. The defendants, who had purchased the Government promissory notes, contended that they were innocent purchasers for value and were entitled to retain the notes, & c, but it was held that the plaintiff was entitled to recover all the shares, debentures and Government promissory notes from the defendants. In the course of his judgment, RUSSELL, J., observed as follows:— “Now it appears to me, as was argued by Mr. Mac-pherson, that there is a very great distinction between a defect in title and no title at all, the latter being the case where the endorsement is forged. ‘The law merchant never recognised a forger of another man's name as a real mercantile drawer’, per LORD ESHER, M.R., Vagliano Brothers v. Bank of England, [1889] 23 Q.B.D. 243, 248. Bills of exchange or promissory notes, whether payable to order or to bearer, are by the Law Merchant negotiable in both senses of the word. ‘The law merchant never recognised a forger of another man's name as a real mercantile drawer’, per LORD ESHER, M.R., Vagliano Brothers v. Bank of England, [1889] 23 Q.B.D. 243, 248. Bills of exchange or promissory notes, whether payable to order or to bearer, are by the Law Merchant negotiable in both senses of the word. The person, who by a genuine endorsement, or, where it is payable to bearer, by a delivery, becomes holder, may sue in his own name on the contract, and if he is a bona fide holder for value, he has a good title notwithstanding any defect of title in the party (whether endorser or deliverer) from whom he took it,’ per BLACKBURN, J., in Crouch v. Credit Fonder of England, [1873] L.R. 8 Q.B. 374, 382.” Then the learned Judge refers to the law in America and observes, “suppose a thief should erase the name of the maker of a note, and then forge the same signature, could he give a bona fide purchaser for value title to the paper? I am clearly of opinion he could not. The paper is not fair upon its face. There is a forgery, and although the purchaser may be ignorant of it, the Law Merchant does not protect him against such ignorance. He must know at his peril that the signatures are genuine”. These observations appear to us to be applicable to the present case, and we entirely agree in the view of the law presented by the learned Judge. We may refer also to the case of Arnold v. Cheque Bank, [1876] L.R. 1 C.P., 578 which has been relied on by the learned advocate for the appellant as supporting his case. For these reasons we are unable to agree with the view of the lower appellate Court, and must allow the appeal. We allow the appeal, set aside the decree of the lower appellate Court and restore that of the Court of First Instance with costs both here and the Courts below, including fees in this Court on the higher scale.