Appeal from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County granting letters of administration on the estate of a deceased person.

Bernard Newman died intestate on November 15, 1886, a resident of the county of Los Angeles. He had never married, and at the time of his death had no blood relations nearer than brothers and sisters. On the 24th of November, 1886, the respondent, Mary Maldonado, the mother and guardian of one George B. Maldonado, a minor of about two and one half years of age, filed a petition for letters of administration on the estate of said deceased, claiming to be entitled thereto on the ground that said minor was the adopted child of the deceased. The appellant, Michael Newman, a brother of the deceased, filed his petition for letters on the sixth day of December, 1886, and also filed grounds of opposition to the petition of Mary Maldonado, alleging that George B. Maldonado was not the adopted child of the deceased; that he was not entitled to succeed to the estate of the deceased; and that therefore his guardian was not entitled to letters; and that Mary Maldonado was a married woman. On the hearing of the contest so raised, the respondent, against the objections of the appellant, introduced in evidence the record of the proceedings had in the superior court of Los Angeles County in the matter of the adoption of said minor. These proceedings consisted of a petition to said court, filed on the 28th of June, 1886, wherein the deceased prayed for the adoption of said minor, and Mary. Maldonado consented thereto, and an order for his adoption. The petition alleged that Mary Maldonado was the mother of the child, that his father, J. M. Maldonado, was a non-resident of the state, and did not reside with the child, and that he had been adjudged guilty of adultery, and had been judicially deprived of the custody of the child on account of neglect, and on account of such neglect and adultery Mary Maldonado had been divorced from him. The order for adoption was made on the 28th of June, 1886, and was signed by the Hon. B. T. Williams, the judge of the superior court of Ventura County. The order, after reciting that Mary Maldonado had consented in writing to the adoption, that she had been previously divorced from J. M. Maldonado, the father of the minor, and that he had been adjudged guilty of adultery by the judgment in the action for divorce, and had been deprived of the custody of said child, proceeded as follows:—

“It is therefore ordered .... by this court that said George Bernard Maldonado shall henceforth be the adopted son of said Bernard Newman, and shall be regarded and treated as the child of said Bernard Newman.

“Done in open court, this twenty-eighth day of June, 1886. B. T. Williams, Judge.”

The respondent, for the purpose of showing that she had been divorced from J. M. Maldonado prior to the time of the adoption proceedings, offered in evidence, against the objections of the appellant, the complaint and judgment in an action brought by her in the superior court of Los Angeles County for a divorce. The complaint in said action was filed on the 28th of July, 1885, and prayed for a divorce on the ground of the adultery of J. M. Maldonado. Judgment of divorce was signed by the judge on the 19th of October, 1885, was filed with the clerk on the 22d of the same month, and was entered on the 5th of January, 1887. The judgment recited the default of the defendant in the action, and that he had been duly served with summons by publication. For the purpose of showing the invalidity of this judgment, the appellant then offered in evidence an affidavit filed on the 19th of July, 1885, for an order for publication of the summons, which recited that the defendant was a resident of Phoenix, Arizona; an order of court, made on the same day, directing the summons to be published in the Weekly Express, a newspaper published in Los Angeles, at least once a week for two months, and that a copy of the complaint and summons be forthwith deposited in the post-office, directed to the defendant; an affidavit made on the 19th of October, 1885, by the principal clerk of the Weekly Express, showing that the summons had been published for “two consecutive months, commencing July 1, 1885, and ending October 30, 1885”; and also an affidavit of the attorney for the plaintiff, showing that “he had deposited in the post-office at Los Angeles, addressed to the defendant at Phoenix, Arizona, on the eighteenth day of July, 1885, a copy of the complaint and summons.” The respondent thereupon, against the objections of the appellant, offered in evidence an amended proof of publication of summons in the action of Maldonado v. Maldonado, filed on the 5th of January, 1887, nunc pro tunc as of the 19th of October, 1885; an amended proof of deposit in the post-office of a copy of the complaint and summons in said action, filed on the 5th of January, 1887, nunc pro tunc as of the 19th of October, 1885, and an order in said action, made on the 5th of January, 1887, allowing the filing of the amended proofs of publication and deposit, and ordering the entry of judgment in said action, nunc pro tunc as of the 19th of October, 1885. The court thereupon ordered letters of administration on the estate of said deceased to be issued to Mary Maldonado. The further facts are stated in the opinion of the court.