Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 05.pdf/520

 Rh WE take the following from a non-legal news paper, namely, that very excellent weekly periodical known as the " Sketch; " and true or not true, it is worth repetition : — '• I heard an amusing story of Sir Henry Hawkins from a legal friend a week or two ago, but I cannot vouch for the absolute truth of it. Sir Henry was presiding over a long, tedious, and uninteresting trial, and was listening, apparently with absorbed attention, to a long, tedious, and uninteresting speech from a counsel learned in the law. Presently he made a pencil memorandum, folded it, and sent it by the usher to the Q. C. in question. This gentleman, on unfolding the paper, found these words: ' PATIENCE COMPETITION. — Gold Medal, Sir Henry Hawkins. Honorable Mention, Job.' His peroration was wound up with as little delay as possible" A FAMOUS judge actually broke off a summing up upon one occasion with : " Mr. Sheriff. 1 should like to know what that fat man means by pressing against those two young women in the front row of the gallery." On another occasion the same judge, during the examination of a wit ness, exclaimed : " Really, Mr. Foreman, I am exhausted, worn out, with the outrageous conduct of that witness in the box, who amongst other pro fanities keeps on saying that what he deposes to is ' as sure as God made apples.'"

FROM a lawyers point of view, the people most sought after are those who do not pay their debts.

SIR BOYLE ROCHE said: "Single misfortunes never come alone, and the greatest of all possi ble misfortunes is generally followed by a much greater." THE following response was made to an in quiry of a character witness in a suit in Wilkes County, N. C. : — Ques. Do you know the general character of F ? Ans. I do. Ques. What is it? Ans, Well, passing and re-passing, entertaining and being entertained, in a social point of view it is good; but in matters of business, where he is finan cially interested, and especially in winding up dead men's estates, his character is bad.

IN the South the color line is so well drawn that in some sections to be a colored man and a Republican is synonymous. This was amusingly but innocently shown by the reply of a colored juror at Jones County Superior Court in North Carolina. A negro man was on trial for burglary. The jury consisted of four negroes and eight white men. During the night they came to a verdict which was received by the judge without awaking the Solici tor, as the prosecuting officer in that State is very singularly called. The next morning the Solicitor, Swift Galloway, while washing his face on the hotel porch, was surprised to see one of the negro jurors walk by. " Hello, Jim," said he, " did the jury agree? " " Yes, sah," was the reply. " How did the verdict go?" "The jury went democratic, sah," was the reply, meaning that the verdict was according to the views of the white jurors.

NOT long since, in the course of a trial before a certain Justice of the Peace in Texas, counsel for the defendant requested the court to rule on a certain point; whereupon counsel for plaintiff, whose name was Charley . insisted that the court had already passed on the point After con siderable argument, and due deliberation on the part of the court, the Justice (who was Irish) said : "Chaarley, this court has niver passed on that p'int." "Well," said Charley, " will your honor pass on it now i" "I do pass on it now," responded the court, with infinite dignity. " Well, how does your honor pass on it? " inquired the perplexed counsel. The court straightened himself up, cleared his throat, and relieved himself by delivering the fol lowing, in his most impressive manner : " Chaarley, ye must abide by the law, whativer it is."

NOTES.

IT is impossible to read Lord Justice Bowen's finely phrased judgments in the '• Reports '' with out being made aware that he possesses a con siderable power of gentle irony as well as of lucid expression. It is said that when the judges met to consider the terms of their address on the oc casion of her Majesty's jubilee, an objection was raised against the words " conscious as we are of our shortcomings;" and that Lord Justice Bowen