Noun | 1. | count - the total number counted; "a blood count" |
2. | count - the act of counting; "the counting continued for several hours" | |
3. | count - a nobleman (in various countries) having rank equal to a British earl | |
Verb | 1. | count - determine the number or amount of; "Can you count the books on your shelf?"; "Count your change" |
2. | count - have weight; have import, carry weight; "It does not matter much" | |
3. | count - show consideration for; take into account; "You must consider her age"; "The judge considered the offender's youth and was lenient" | |
4. | count - name or recite the numbers; "The toddler could count to 100" | |
5. | count - put into a group; "The academy counts several Nobel Prize winners among its members" Synonyms: number | |
6. | count - include as if by counting; "I can count my colleagues in the opposition" | |
7. | count - have faith or confidence in; "you can count on me to help you any time"; "Look to your friends for support"; "You can bet on that!"; "Depend on your family in times of crisis" | |
8. | count - take account of; "You have to reckon with our opponents"; "Count on the monsoon" Synonyms: reckon |
COUNT, pleading. This word, derived from the French conte, a narrative, is
in our old law books used synonymously with declaration but practice has
introduced the following distinction: when the plaintiff's complaint
embraces only a single cause of action, and he makes only one statement of
it, that statement is called, indifferently, a declaration or count; though
the former is the more usual term.
2. But when the suit embraces two or more causes of action, (each of
which of course requires a different statement;) or when the plaintiff makes
two or more different statements of one and the same cause of action, each
several statement is called a count, and all of them, collectively,
constitute the declaration.
3. In all cases, however, in which there are two or more counts, whether
there is actually but one cause of action or several, each count purports,
upon the face of it, to disclose a distinct right of action, unconnected
with that stated in any of the other counts.
4. One object proposed, in inserting two or more counts in one
declaration, when there is in fact but one cause of action, is, in some
cases, to guard against the danger of an insufficient statement of the
cause, where a doubt exists as to the legal sufficiency of one or another of
two different modes of declaring; but the more usual end proposed in
inserting more than one count in such case, is to accommodate the statement
to the cause, as far as may be, to the possible state of the proof to be
exhibited on trial; or to guard, if possible, against the hazard of the
proofs varying materially from the statement of the cause of action; so that
if one or more or several counts be not adapted to the evidence, some other
of them may be so. Gould on Pl. c. 4, s. 2, 3, 4; Steph. Pl. 279; Doct. Pl.
1 78; 8 Com. Dig. 291; Dane's Ab. Index, h.t.; Bouv. Inst. Index, h.t. In
real actions, the declaration is most usually called a count. Steph. Pl. 36,
See Common count; Money count.