JUDGMENT : 1. This appeal arises out of a suit brought by the appellants upon a hundi drawn in their favour by the respondents on 2nd March 1909, made payable 54 days after date, i.e. on 25th April. The hundi was dishonoured on or about 7th March (the exact date is not known). The suit was instituted on 9th April 1912, and was clearly barred by limitation, as was held by the Court below. The only, question for decision in this appeal is whether the Court below was right in refusing to allow the appellants to amend their plaint so as to rest their claim upon a letter, dated 11th March 1909, said to have been written to them by respondents containing a promise to pay the amount of the hundi on or about 23rd April. It appears that the appellants endorsed the hundi to the Allahabad Bank by whom it was presented for acceptance. When the appellants were informed by the Bank that the hundi had been dishonoured, they gave the Bank a jakri hundi on another firm in Bombay from whom the Bank in due course received payment. Meanwhile the appellants had informed the respondents that the original hundi had been dishonoured and the respondents are said to have written to them the letter of 11th March 1909, on which they now wish to rest their case. In this letter the respondents said that the dishonour of the hundi was due to a mistake and they hoped to arrange to have it accepted. They said also that if the jakri hundi was accepted, they would arrange to pay the amount two or three days before it fell due. After the question of limitation had been argued, and the case of limitation had been reserved for judgment, the appellants put in a petition saying that they had been unable to find the letter of 11th March 1909, when they brought the suit, but that they had recently coma across it and they asked for leave to amend the plaint by setting out the contents of the letter and alleging that ca, cause of action accrued to them on 23rd April. The Subordinate Judge rejected this petition. The Subordinate Judge rejected this petition. It was urged before us that under O. 6, R. 17, a Court has power to allow an amendment of this kind at any stage of the proceedings and that the Subordinate Judge ought to have allowed it. 2. It may be that the Court has power under the present Code to allow an amendment of this kind which would introduce a fresh cause of action and alter the whole basis of the suit. Amendments have been allowed under the existing Code of Civil Procedure which could not have been allowed under the former Code, and we have been referred to cases upon the corresponding provisions in force in England in which far-reaching amendments were allowed (O. 28, R. 1, Rules of Supreme Court, 1883); but neither in England nor in India will the Courts as a rule allow a plaintiff to amend his plaint by introducing a cause of action which, since the institution of the suit, has become barred by limitation. That is the case here. 3. It must also be noticed that this suit was not instituted till more than three years after the transaction, and that the application for leave to amend was made at a very late stage of the suit after the parties had definitely agreed not to put in any evidence on the question of limitation. The affidavit in support of the application for leave to amend is vague, and we doubt whether the appellants made any search for the letter before instituting the suit. In the circumstances we are not prepared to hold that the Court below was wrong in refusing to allow the plaint to be amended. The appeal is dismissed with costs, but the decree will not be prepared until the respondents make good the deficiency of Rs. 355 in court-fee in the Court below.