Welch

The defendant was indicted for grand larceny. The statute provides that every person who shall feloniously steal goods, etc., ‘ ‘ of the value of fifty dollars, or more, shall be deemed guilty of grand larceny”: Wood’s Digest, 337. According to the estimate of some of the defendant’s witnesses, the value of the stolen property in the aggregate would be some twenty-five to thirty dollars, considerably less than the amount necessary to constitute grand larceny. On the cross-examination, the district attorney, under objection, and exception on the part of the defendant, was> allowed to show that these witnesses, in estimating the value of the property, took gold and silver coin as their standard of value. And there was some testimony, also drawn out under like objection and exception, relating to a difference in the value of the property in case United States legal tender notes should be taken as the standard.

At the close of the testimony, the court, at the request of the district attorney, and under objection and exception on *222 the part of defendant, among other instructions embodying a similar idea, gave the following:

The grade of the crime was fixed by a statute of the…