CHAPTER XXI.
COURTS OF JUSTICE AND COURT SCENES.
Conrad.—Away ! you are an ass, you are an ass.
Dogberry.— Dost thou not suspect my place? Dost thou not suspect my years ? O that lie were here to write me down an ass ! But, masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass. No, thou villain, thou art full of piety, as shall be proved upon thee by good witness. I am a wise fellow; and, which is more, an officer, and, which is more, a householder; and, which is more, as pretty a piece of flesh as any is in Messina; and one that knows the law, go to; and a rich fellow enough, go to; and a fellow that hath had losses, and one that hath two gowns and everything handsome about him. Bring him away. O that I had been writ dowTi an ass !
—Much Ado About Nothing.
1st Clown.—Argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life.
Sd Clown.—But is this law ?
1st Clown.—Ay, marry is't; crowner's quest law.
—Hamlet.
Courts of justice in California were, in early times, equal if not superior to those of any new country or border settlement founded since the days of Justinian—equal if not superior in ability, stupidity, or what you will. Anything that courts of justice could do any where or under any circumstances, good or bad, ours could achieve. Yet I may safely say that the judges, on the whole, were honest men; and while frequently neither educated in law nor specially fitted for the position, they were far above the average magistrates in general intelligence and practical judgment. On the supreme bench and presiding over the district and county courts, particularly in the cities and more thickly populated parts, have been from the first occupation of the territory by citizens of the United States until the present day, as able and erudite jurists, men of as broad and enlightened intellects, as might be found elsewhere in Europe or
