Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 03.pdf/166

 Rh Trie witness seemed puzzled by the new word. He repeated his former assertion. The lawyer with a sneer then asked, " What is the difference between plain and conspicuous?" But he was hoist with his own petard. The witness smoothly and innocently answered, " I can see you plainly, sir, among the other lawyers, though you are not a bit conspicuous."

Magistrate (to Prisoner). You are found guilty of meeting the plaintiff in a lonely street, knocking him down, and robbing him of every thing except a valuable gold watch which he had with him. What have you to say? Prisoner. Had he a gold watch with him at the time? Magistrate. Certainly. Prisoner. Then I put in a plea of insanity. Journal of Jurisprudence. A New Hampshire judge tells the following of the late Gen. Gilman Marston, who practised long and successfully at the Rockingham County Bar. The General was arguing a case, and made a rather outrageous statement. " I knew that it was not law," said the Judge, " and rather thought the General did; still I put the question to him, ' Do you think that is law, General? ' to which he au daciously responded with a quizzical look, ' No, I do not, Judge; but I thought you might.'"

NOTES. An Iowa judge has made a wise decision. An ingenious youth of that State tied a thread to a nickel, dropped the nickel in a slot-machine, got what he wanted, then withdrawing the nickel by the thread repeated the operation until he had made a clean sweep .of the receptacle's contents. He was arrested on a charge of theft; but the judge who tried him held that he had committed neither burglary, larceny, nor robbery, nor either obtained property under false pretences. He had merely done what the inscription on the machine told him to do, — dropped a nickel in the slot, — and had kept on doing it. Nothing was said about leaving the coin where it was dropped. This de cision will probably abate a nuisance.

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It is likely that there will be several changes in the personnel of the Supreme Court within the next two or three years. Justice Field is seventyfour years of age, while Justice Bradley, his junior in point of service, is three years his senior in age. Either could have retired on full salary for life. Two years hence the like right will be open to Justice Blatchford, who at that time will be ten years a member of the court, and seventy-two years of age. The probability therefore is, that the Supreme Court will contain more new faces within the next few years than it gained in any other equal period in the present decade. There seems to be something in service on that bench which is favorable to longevity. Few of its mem bers have reached it until attaining middle life, yet the instances in which service has been ex tended to more than a quarter of a century are not rare. John Marshall, of Virginia, and Joseph Story, of Massachusetts, exceeded that limit nearly ten years, while the service of John Mc Lean, of Ohio, and James M. Wayne, of Georgia, continued thirty-two years; that of Bushrod Wash ington, of Virginia, thirty-one years; of William Johnson, of South Carolina, thirty years; of Roger B. Taney, of Maryland, and of John Catron, of Tennessee, twenty-eight years; and of Samuel Nelson, of New York, twenty-seven years. Mar shall heads the list in this respect, his service ex tending over thirty-four years. — Central Law jfournal. "There is something peculiar about preserving order in a court-room," said a judge of seventeen years' experience, just after he had been presented with a handsome ivory gavel the other evening. "Now, as a general thing, the judge who makes the most noise himself will have the noisiest court room. It is usually the new judge who uses a gavel. A pocket-knife is my favorite article for keeping order. I find I can command more at tention when I rap with that and ask for a little more quiet than if I pounded with a big gavel and made more noise." And this experienced judge put his handsome gavel back into its red-plush box, there to repose, regarded with pride as a memento of his associates' esteem, but probably never taken into court. — iV. Y. Times.

It is said that there is not a lawyer in the Legis lature of North Dakota.