Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 03.pdf/627

 586 usual custom to appear in public with a crowd of parasites and retainers, such marks of popularity occasioned no surprise. But even in cold, deco rous England, one instance at least of this en thusiasm has been known. After the trials of Hardy, Home Tooke, and Thelwell, and their tri umphant acquittal through the splendid advocacy of Erskine, his horses were taken from the car riage, and he was drawn home by the mob with tumultuous cheers. We are unable to give the name of the author of the following singular address to the jury : "Gentlemen of the jury, you are impanelled here to try a cause of the vastest importance to this com munity. The defendant has been guilty of a crime and cruelty unequalled in the annals of crime, which show him to be the most carniferous wretch that walks this celestial football. Gentlemen, when I think of it, I can scarcely help gushing out in a flood of tears, and crying out with one of the Apostles, ' Oh that my head was waters and my eyes a fountain of tears! ' While this poor unoffending hog, whose only bad trait was an in nocent waggishness, and that confined to one of his extreme extremities, was quietly nipping the miserable grass that grew in the defendant's miser able pasture, thinking of no harm, this cruel mon ster, armed with a deadly gun loaded to the muzzle with missiles of death, stealthily approached his unconscious victim, and discharged the whole deadly contents of that still deadlier gun right into his solar system, and, with one fearful squeal of agony, he fell dead on the ground!"

UUrcnt 2Deatfj0. In the death of Isaac Marston, ex-Judge of the Supreme Court of Michigan, that State loses one of the most prominent members of its bar. Mr. Marston was born at Poyntzpass, Ireland, on Jan. 2, 1839. At an early age he emigrated and came to Michigan, where he hired out as a farm laborer and got a little schooling. He graduated from the law School in 1861. After being admitted to the bar, he finally went to Bay City, where he speedily rose in his profession, and in 1872 he was a mem ber of the State Legislature. In 1874 he was

Attorney-General of the State, and in 1875, upon the resignation of Judge Christiancy, he was ap pointed to a place on the Supreme Bench, where he remained for eight years. He resigned in 1883, and resumed the practice of the law in Detroit. [An excellent portrait of Judge Marston, ac companied by an interesting sketch of his life, was published in the September (1890) number of the " Green Bag."] Francis Brooks, a prominent Boston lawyer, died October 28. He was born in Medford, Nov. 1, 1824, and came of distinguished ancestry, being descended in a direct line from Rev. John Cotton, the famous Puritan divine, and is con nected with all the great families that have figured in the early history of New England. His mother was Elizabeth Boott; his father, Edward Brooks, one of the founders and the first President of the General Theological Library; his grandfather was the well-known Boston merchant, Peter C. Brooks, in his day the wealthiest man in the country. Rev. Edward Brooks, his great grandfather, was Librarian of Harvard College previous to the Revolution, an active participant in the battle of Lexington, and afterward in 1777 Chaplain of the Continental frigate Hancock, which was captured by the British, who treated the prisoners with such severity and hardship that Chaplain Brooks died shortly after his release as the result of his sufferings. The family has owned and lived upon the same estate since 1679, when Caleb Brooks came to Medford from Concord and settled upon a lot of 404 acres that had been bought by his father, Thomas Brooks, in 1660, from Edward Collins, one of Governor Craddock's partners, and the ex ecutor of his will. This Thomas Brooks was the first of the name in New England, having settled in Watertown in 1631, removing to Concord in 1637, where he held important offices among the early settlers. Previous to 1854, Mr. Brooks was known as Francis Boott Brooks, and graduated from Harvard College Law School, Class of 1846. Mr. Brooks represented Medford in the Legis lature in 1862. He has also held honorary posi tions on State Hoards, and always took an active interest in educational and philanthropic matters. In 1871 he was sent with Edmund Dwight to dis tribute the Boston French relief fund among the suffering peasantry in the neighborhood of Paris.