Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 24.pdf/581

 538

The Green Bag

spoken half through his nose, rather slowly and jerkily, was, "'I wish the legislature would pass an act declaring Bill D a skunk, and then it wouldn't be manslaughter for anybody to kill him."" Each has gone to his reward and each life had in it, toward the last, many elements of failure.

August, 1912, the said R. G. B. was duly appointed guardian ad litem of P. B. who is an infant by one of the honorable judges of this court for the purposeof prosecuting the cause of action herein set up and alleged."

"While they were in their prime, a young man, who has run his course and joined them beyond the river, came to this bar. Among his early cases, if not his first, was an action of replevin against his client to obtain possession of a hog. It was the old question of identity, the same, but of inferior magnitude, that was later involved in the Tichborne case. "The justice's office was crowded on the day of the trial. The law of replevin had not then many of its recent feat ures, and the young lawyer had not caught one material point of its opera tion. He had set his heart on winning possession of the chattel. The verdict came in for his client, somewhat in its form, and what the justice said about the damages sent his thoughts wool gathering. They were still at it as he went down the stairs. "As soon as he struck the street, some friend, who had taken an interest in his success, hailed him, 'Well, John, how did you come out?' "John, still dazed, was non-committal and, in a discouraged tone, replied, 'Why, I — I won the case, but I lost the hog.'"

FROM Sam B. Dannis, Esq., of the Los Angeles Bar, we learn the facts of a rather unusual incident. A case had been in progress in the criminal courts of Los Angeles for about three or four weeks, one McKinney being charged with manslaughter. A great deal of expert testimony was introduced by both sides and at the conclusion of which Judge Cabaniss charged the jury, and after twenty minutes' deliberation a verdict of not guilty was returned. After the court received the verdict Judge Cabaniss, in thanking the jury, composed a little poem which he recited at the time from the bench. The fore man of the jury replied to the judge in the following verses, written in his honor:

THE ESOTERIC LANGUAGE OF THE LAW A CORRESPONDENT sends us the following extract from a complaint recently filed in a New York court: — "Second: That on the 27th day of

THE FOREMAN'S VERSES

"THE GATES AJAR" To Judge George H. Cabaniss The honest man ne'er needs a law, The just man wears a smile; The criminal has a mental flaw, Marring the whole with a soul of guile. You naturally are kind and just, Sometimes too much, by far; You think of the lust, the measly crust, With San Quentin's gates ajar. Human nature is weak and depraved — Knowing this you seek to be fair. Mentally diseased many are enslaved And fall in the Satan-meshed snare. If men would think of the wasted years Spent behind prison walls, Of the useless tears and mental fears, They would shun error that ever enthralls.