Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 12.pdf/568

 Whimsicalities of Irish Witnesses. months ago a woman asked for a warrant against a man for using abusive language in the street. " What did he say? " asked the magistrate. " He wint forenst the whole world at the corner of Capel street, an' called me, yis he did, yer wuship, ' an ould encommunicated gasometer."" In a trial at the Galway Assizes, a witness, one Patrick Flanagan, was a great friend of the accused and gave his evidence very re luctantly. He was thick in his utterances and added to his obvious dislike to testifying, he labored under the physical difficulty of having lost several of his front teeth in a re cent fight. Several times he was asked to repeat his answers, and he got excited. Then the use of long words by the counsel added to his nervousness, and he answered very in coherently. " Don't prevaricate, sir," shouted the Judge angrily. " Prewaricate, is it! " ex claimed the witness, " I'm thinkin', me lord, it's yerself wouldn't be able to help prewaricatin' if three or four of yer lordship's teeth wor knocked out of yer head!" "Not guilty, me lord, but the jury advises the prisoner not to do it again," was the ver dict in a case tried in Tipperary, and this has its counterpart in the verdict of a Gahvay jury, " My lord, we find the man who stole the horse not guilty." "How can you swear that the hens found in this man's 'yard belonged to you? " asked a lawyer of a witness who appeared against an alleged chicken thief in Waterford. " By the kind, sor." " Why, that is absurd, I have some like them myself." Quick as a flash of lightning the witness replied, " Very likely, sor, I lost some a bit afore this man took thim this toime." In a northern Court an old woman was ex ceedingly garrulous, and insisted in telling the Court what she would do if she were on the bench. The Judge at last exclaimed, "An old woman is not fit for the bench." "Sure, your lordship ought to know from ex perience," was the retort which convulsed

531

the Bar, for the Judge in question had earned, the soubriquet of " old woman." In Ireland the peasantry still use the word, "killed "in its original sense, conveying the idea of serious injury, rather than death. Thus the frequenters of Irish Courts will often hear a witness swear in assault cases that he was " kilt entoirely." An amusing instance in which the word was used in that sense appears in a report of a case recently tried in Sligo. An old man, who had been assaulted, was being examined by a young and inexperienced barrister, who was con ducting the prosecution. " And were you stunned when you were knocked down? " he asked. " Was I what, yer honor? " asked the witness. " Stunned," repeated the bar rister. " Shure, I don't know what yez mane, sor." " Were you rendered insensi ble? " Shure, what's insensible at all, at all? " the witness asked, his face showing clearly that he was perplexed. " I'm afraid I cannot get any good out of this stupid wit ness, my lord," said the counsel. " Let me try him," said the Judge. " Come, my good man, did they kill you now? " The face of the witness brightened up and he exclaimed, "Faix, that they did entoirely, me lord." In a Petty Sessions Court a man was sued for the non-payment of his rent. In his de fence he maintained that the place was so small that it was not worth the rent de manded. " Why, yer honner," he exclaimed, "the room is so small that a donkey couldn't turn around in it; just come and try it, yer honner." The witnesses have no intention of being disrespectful, but their simplicity, shrewd ness and brightness mingle together and cause the whimsicalities to which I have referred. I was making a pedestrian tour of Ireland in the later days of the Fenian movement, and many curious incidents came under my observation, showing how zealous the Royal Irish Constabulary was in arresting strangers