pleadings. This word is frequently used in indictments in the description of the offence; it is necessary when the crime did not exist at common law, and when a statute, in describing an offence which it creates, uses the word, but it is unnecessary whenever the crime existed at common law, and is manifestly illegal. The term is commonly used in indictments for statutory crimes, to show that the act constituting the offense was in violation of a positive law, especially where the statute itself uses the same phrase.