Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 21.pdf/494

 Review of Periodicals President Roosevelt. Mr. Taft had previ ously declined both of these seats before they were offered to the present Secretary of State. The idea is firmly lodged in Mr. Knox's mind that some day his mail will be addressed to the White House; and it is not the contem porary practice of the Republican party to select its Presidential candidate from the Justices of the Supreme Court." Nisbet. "Sir John Nisbet of Dirleton." By George B. Young. 21 Juridical Review 170 (July). "A modern author has thus epitomized Dirleton's legal career: 'When bad judges were common, he was one of the worst, and it does not appear that in the course of his public career he did one act which brightens the darkness of his servile and mercenary life.'" Democracy. "The Old Order Changeth: The Schools, the Mainspring of Democracy." By William Allen White. American Magazine, v. 68, p. 376 (Aug.). "The Report of the United States Com missioner of Education, 1907, indicates (p. 525) that there are only twice as many school teachers as there are bartenders in the coun try. So while the aggregate amount spent for schools is large, the comparative amount is small." Fiction. "The Iron Empire." By George Randolph Chester. Cosmopolitan, v. 47, p. 281 (Aug.). "To the victor belong the spoils, and the spoils of this war were the proxies. Breed got the proxies, and through personal repre sentatives from his New Jersey offices he walked into one meeting after another with a majority of stock. He had succeeded, through Kelvin, in that apparently impossible dream of every railroad man since Stephenson in vented the steam-engine—the concentration of every railroad in the United States under one management." History. "Was 'Secession' Taught at West Point?" By Col. Edgar S. Dudley. Century Magazine, v. 78, p. 629 (Aug.). "The result of this examination of the records of the United States Military Academy and of the review of statements on both sides of the subject, shows conclusively, to my mind, that Rawle's work, 'A View of the Constitution of the United States' was intro duced as a text-book by the professor of geography, history and ethics for one year only (1826), and was then discontinued, never again being used; that it was never officially adopted as a text-book by action of the academic board; that of all the graduates named, only one, General Albert Sidney John

465

ston, of the class of 1826, received instruction in that work; that the records show positively the use of Kent's Commentaries from 1841 until after the beginning of the Civil War, so that no one who was graduated during that period could ever have had Rawle as an authorized text-book. "There is no necessity to seek to assign 'instruction at the military academy' as an excuse for the action of those who joined the Confederacy or for those who remained loyal to the Union." Miscellany. "Stories of a Famous London Drawing-Room." By William H. Rideing. McClure's, v. 33, p. 388 (Aug.). "Most of the judges and many barristers were, of course, frequent among the guests of that house. I have been at the Royal Courts of Justice in the afternoon, and watched them, gowned and bewigged, at their solemn work— the judges precise, austere, portentous, Rhadamanthine; the barristers deferential, ingra tiating, and all attention. Then they have assembled at dinner in the evening, like Olympians descending from their pedestals, as worldly-wise, as merry, and as familiar as common mortals. Who could have been more human and amusing than the late Lord Chief Justice Russell of Killowen (once Sir Charles Russell), a stately, handsome man of commanding presence; or his successor, the present Lord Chief Justice Alverstone, who, when he can be persuaded to sing after dinner, is likely to select W. S. Gilbert's nonsensical song from "Trial by Jury," and rattle it off with the greatest spirit—that song which just describes his early days when he had— "'A couple of shirts and a collar or two, And a ring that looked like a ruby.' "The late Justice Day was another guest, he upon whose name was obvious and easy play. In criminal trials he was so severe that he became 'Judgment Day'; when he married, 'Wedding Day'; at Bristol, 'Day of Reckoning'; and one day when he was seen to nod on the bench, 'Day of Rest.' Once when he was trying a case, a prolix barrister tried his patience, and at the end of a long and tedious speech spoke of some bags which were in. question. 'They might, me Lud, have been full or half-full bags, or again they might have been empty bags,' 'Quite so, quite so, the judge interjected, adding dryly and significantly: 'Or they might have been wind-bags.' "On one occasion the conversation turned to the thoroughness of the administration of the law in Great Britain. 'We sweat the law in England to get all the justice out of it we can,' declared a vivacious gentleman who sat next to me, and I infer that no one doubted his sincerity or the truth of what he said."