treble costs

TREBLE COSTS, remedies. By treble costs, in the English law, is understood, 
1st. The usual taxed costs. 2d. Half thereof. 3d. Half the latter; so that 
in effect the treble costs amount only to the taxed costs, and three-fourths 
thereof. 1 Chitty, R. 137; 1 Chitt. Pract. 27. 
     2. Treble costs are sometimes given by statutes, and this is the 
construction put upon them. 
     3. In Pennsylvania the rule is different; when an act of assembly gives 
treble costs, the party is allowed three times the usual costs, with the 
exception, that the fees of the officers are not to be trebled, when they 
are not regularly or usually payable by the defendant. 2 Rawle, R. 201. 
     4. And in New York the directions of the statute are to be strictly 
pursued, and the costs are to be trebled. 2 Dunl. Pr. 731.