The material facts are these:

A creditors’ petition was ¿led against said bankrupt, Fixen & Co., a corporation, August 14, 1899, and the order to show cause thereon was made returnable on the 21st day of the same month. On September 1, 1899, said corporation was duly adjudged a bankrupt, and a. general reference of the canse was made. Prior to the adjudication, to wit, on August 19,1899, on the application hereinafter mentioned, it was ordered by the court:

The application or petition for said order alleged, among other things: That said bankrupt for many years last past, and up to and just prior to June, 1899, had been the owner of a retail store, containing a large stock of merchandise, in Los Angeles, Cal., worth. $(>0,000, substantially all the property of said corporation. That Elias 0. Chapin and seven other persons, specifically named, conspired together to, and did, organize, under the laws of the territory of Arizona, a corporation known as the Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company, with an authorized capital of $350,000, of 3,500 shares, of $100 each, of stock, nonassessable, and the stockholders not person *750 ally liable for corporate debts. That said stock was divided into common stock of $175,000 in amount, and the balance preferred stock (only common stock entitled to vote at stockholders’ meetings), and that said parties subscribed for $226,700 out of a total subscription of $■284,400, and that, of their subscription, $154,200 consisted of common or voting stock, out of a total of $160,000 of common or voting-stock. That the officers and directors, who were Elias O. Chapin, president, John W. Tibbot, vice president, S. G-oodenow, treasurer,. W. M. Sheldon, secretary, J. M. Dávies, J. B. Tibbot, M. ⅛. Sheldon,, and two others to petitioners unknown, also conspired, by false and fraudulent representations and fraudulent promises made to the said Eixen & Co., to procure, and did procure, from said Fixen & Co., in June, 1899, a transfer of said store and merchandise, without any adequate, sufficient, or legal consideration, and with intent on the part of the promoters, officers, and stockholders of the said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company to obtain said stock of merchandise, and appropriate the same and the proceeds thereof to, the, use of the said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company, without the payment of any adequate or proper consideration therefor, and to hinder, delay, and defraud the creditors of said Fixen & Co. of their just debts and obligations. That said Fixen & Co. were indebted to various creditors in the aggregate sum of about $55,000 at the time of said transfer, none of which debts were assumed by said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company, and by said transfer,. and the want of any adequate consideration therefor, said Fixen & Co. were rendered irretrievably insolvent, and that of alb the matters and things aforesaid said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company and the stockholders, directors, and officers thereof, then and there had notice. That said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company took immediate possession of said stock of merchandise and business, and from thence until the 22d day of July, 1899, sold and disposed of the same at reduced prices, and rapidly converted the same into money, for the purpose of raising funds to pay off the notes of said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company, amounting to $25,000, which had been given in part payment for said merchandise; only $5,000 having been paid in cash; the balance of the consideration for said transfer being worthless stock in said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company. That, on the day and year last aforesaid, said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company, being unable to meet said notes, and having no money or means of raising money upon its property with which to pay said notes, and being then and there insolvent, and to avoid attachments upon said property, illegally, aDd without any adequate, sufficient, or lawful consideration, transferred said stock of merchandise and business to said S. Goodenow, who took said transfer of said merchandise, then amounting to $40,090 in value, and agreed to pay and take up said notes of the said Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company; and immediately thereafter said S. Goodenow caused to be organized a new corporation, by the name of the Goode-now-Sheldon-Fixen Company, and transferred to it the remaining portion of said stock of merchandise. That said corporation is organized under the laws of the state of California, with an authorized capital of $200,000, $75,000 of which is subscribed as follows: *751 & Goodenow, 350 shaves, $35,000; Willard M. Sheldon, 120 shares, $12,000; A. 11. Fixen, 100 sitares, 810,000; Frank H. Gibbs, 80 shares, $8.000; Millard N. Sheldon, 100 sháres, $10,000, — and which said, subscription embraces all the stock which has been subscribed or issued by said corporation. That said corporation has no paid-up capital, other than the stock oí merchandise and good will so transferred to it as aforesaid, and that said A. JEL Fixen and W. M. Sheldon are financially irresponsible. That said Goodenow-Sheldon-Fixen Company is rapidly selling and disposing oí said merchandise at greatly reduced prices, and sacrificing the same. That a trustee in bankruptcy cannot, in all probability, in the ordinary course of procedure, be elected herein before some time in October, 1899, and in the meantime said stock of merchandise, or at least the substantial portion thereof, will, in all human probability, have been dissipated and disposed of, and nothing left for the creditors of said Fixen & Co., except actions for damages a,nd stockholders’ liabilities against the persons connected with said corporation, which would be inadequate remedies for the creditors of said bankrupt. That it is absolutely necessary for the preservation of said bankrupt: estate to take charge of the property of said bankrupt, until the trustee has qualified, by the appointment of a receiver, with authority in him to begin and prosecute all necessary actions and proceedings to recover and preserve said estate. Said receiver duly qualified on 1 lie 10th day of August, 1899.

On August: 26, 1899, the court ordered:

The petition for said order alleged, among other things:

Pursuant to said order, M. N. Sheldon was duly summoned to appear as a witness and produce certain books and documents before William D. Stephens, referee in bankruptcy, who certifies in relation to the examination of said Sheldon as follows:

Counsel for said Sheldon seek to justify his disobedience of the orders and processes above -mentioned on the grounds: First, that *753 the order appointing a receiver was in excess of the jurisdiction of the court, and therefore said order and all proceedings had for the examination of said witness were void; second, that, conceding the general power of the court, its exercise in this instance was erroneous; third, that the books which the witness was required to produce were irrelevant. These contentions will be examined in the order of their statement.

1. The grant of power to courts of bankruptcy to appoint receivers is as follows:

These clauses unquestionably give to courts of bankruptcy ample jurisdiction in the matter of provisional receiverships. For instances of the exercise of this jurisdiction, see In re John A. Etheridge Furniture Co., 92 Fed. 329 , and In re Sievers, 91 Fed. 366 , affirmed in Davis v. Bohle, 34 C. C. A. 372 , 92 Fed. 325 . Besides the express delegation of authority above quoted, courts of bankruptcy have general equity powers (Blake, Moffitt & Towne v. Francis-Valentine Co., 89 Fed. 691 ), and, by virtue of these general equity powers, may, in suitable cases, appoint receivers. While the bankrupt law of 1867 contained no express provision for the appointment of receivers, still the pow'er was exercised by the courts under that law in appropriate cases. Keenan v. Shannon, Fed. Cas. No. 7,640; Lansing v. Manton, Id. 8,077.

The contention of counsel for the witness Sheldon, that so much of the order appointing the receiver as authorized him to institute actions for the recovery of the bankrupt’s estate is in excess of the jurisdiction of the court, and therefore void, has no relevancy to this hearing. It is not at all essential, as I shall show later on, to the authority for the examination of said witness, that a suit should be pending, but said examination may be for purposes entirely different from those? of a trial. An order for such an examination may be made on the simple application or demand of the receiver or trustee, without any showing of the questions to be asked, or the particular facts to be inquired into. In re Howard, 95 Fed. 415 . If said contention, however, were material here, the argument of counsel in its support, that a receiver appointed pursuant to subdivision 3, above quoted, has no power to institute legal proceedings, but can only take charge of property voluntarily delivered to him, is, in my opinion, unsound. The duty of a receiver is “to take charge of the prop- *754 ertj of bankrupts.” If an action at law or suit in equity is necessary to the accomplishment of that purpose, the receiver not only has the power, but it is his duty, to institute such action or suit. To say that he cannot resort to legal proceedings when necessary to take charge of the property of the bankrupt, while conceding that he may employ all other suitable agencies and instrumentalities for the purpose, is wholly illogical. Legal proceedings are sometimes the only means whereby the property of bankrupts can be preserved. Supppse that an estate consists of personal property, which has come into the hands of wrongdoers, who are about to secrete it or carry it beyond the jurisdiction of the court. Can it be seriously claimed in such a case that the receiver must sit quietly by and suffer the property to be irretrievably lost, on the ground that his functions are limited to the receipt of such property- as may be voluntarily surrendered to him? The statement of the claim is its refutation. I hold that it is cleai'ly within the jurisdiction, of the court appointing a receiver in bankruptcy to authorize him to institute necessary actions for the recovery of the bankrupt’s property.

2. The question whether the appointment of the receiver in the present case was providently made or not is immaterial, so far as concerns the alleged contumacy of the witness Sheldon. The order appointing the receiver being within the jurisdiction of the court, obedience to said order was and is the duty of all persons whom it affects, and disobedience thereof cannot be justified on the ground that it was erroneous. . There is another aspect of the case, however, which does make the question above stated material, and it is this: If the appointment of the receiver was improvidently ordered, further proceedings thereunder ought to be arrested at once, and the order vacated. For this reason I have re-examined the'petition, and am satisfied that the situation it outlines vindicates the action taken by the court thereon. It was not necessary that said petition should have disclosed absolutely grounds for equitable relief against the alleged wrongdoers. One of the objects of the appointment was to set in motion agencies of inquiry to ascertain whether or not such grounds existed. Therefore, to hold that-the petition ought to have alleged the grounds would, so far as said object is concerned, practically nullify the law, which authorized the appointment to be made. Assuming the allegations of the petition to be true, which must be done on this hearing, the preservation of the bankrupt’s estate seems to require an earlier investigation of the bankrupt’s dealings -with the Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company than can be had through the action of a trustee regularly selected in bankruptcy. Examinations of this sort, for the purposes of ascertaining the rights and interests of the bankrupt, and perpetuating testimony for their vindication, are in- some instances as essential to the preservation of the bankrupt’s estate as the taking of actual possession of his property. The provisions of law for such examinations are .these:

A. receiver is an officer. Id. § 1 (18).

For further provision touching the examination of the bankrupt: himself, see Id. § 7 (9).

The examinations thus provided for are not intended as means of producing testimony pertinent to issues then on trial, but their object is to afford to the creditors, and the officer charged with administering; the trust, full information touching the bankrupt’s estate, in order that necessary steps may be taken for its possession and preservation. Coll. Bankr. pp. 205, 206; In re Earle, Fed. Cas. No. 4,244; In re Krueger, Id. 7,942; In re Lathrop, Id. 8,106; In re Stuyvesant Bank, Id. 13,582; In re Mendenhall, Id. 9,423.

In re Krueger, supra, Lowell, District Judge, said:

3. In view of the charges of fraud against the Ohapin-Tibboi Commercial Company, 1 am at loss to see how it can be successfully urged that the books of said company are not within the scope of the examination authorized by law. If these charges are true, any books or documents which show or tend to show the disposition or receipt by said company of the stock of goods alleged to have been fraudulently obtained by it, or which in any other way relate to said stock, unquestionably concern the property of the bankrupt; nor can the custodian of said hooks be excused from their production, or answering questions in reference thereto, under a plea that the books contain nothing relating to Ote bankrupt’s property. This matter is not left to the opinion of the witness, but must he determined by the court. The offer of counsel for the witness Bheldon to now controvert and disprove said charges, and the circumstances on which they are based, cannot be entertained. The issues thus tendered involve» substantially the merits of the grounds of equitable relied whieeh it is alleged the receiver, or trustee hereafter to he appointed, lias or will have against said company, and can be properly trieel only in an appropriate suit brought for that purpose.

While the refusal of the witness Sheldon to produce the cash book e»f the Chapin-Tibbot Commercial Company for inspection, and to answer certain questions propemnded in reference thereto, was a dis-ejhe'diemee erf (lie order and prewess of this court, yet, in view of the fact that he acted under the direction of counsel, who in good faith *756 advised him to the course he pursued, and the further fact of his readiness, as announced by said counsel at this hearing, to submit to an examination on the matters in controversy, should the court hold such examination proper, I shall not order proceedings looking to the punishment of the witness, but simply direct his examination to be proceeded with, in conformity to the views herein expressed, at such time as the referee may appoint; notice thereof being given to the witness. For this procedure I find a precedent in Re Howard, supra, recently decided by Judge He Haven.