About Witnesses. said he had been keeping it for me, and that he — " " No, no; he could not have said that; he spoke in the first person." "No, my lord; I was the first person that spoke." "I mean, don't bring in the third person; repeat his exact words." " There was no third person, my lord, — only him and me." "My good fellow, he did not say he had been keeping the pig; he said, '/ have been keeping it.' " " I assure you, my lord, there was no mention of your lordship at all. We are on different stories. There was no third person there; and if anything had been said about your lordship, I must have heard it." The Baron gave in. A Jew, speaking of a young man as his son-in-law, was accused of misleading the court, since the young man was really his son. Moses, however, persisted that the name he put to the relationship was the right one, and addressing the bench, said : "I was in Amsterdam two years and three quarters; when I come home I finds this lad. Now the law obliges me to maintain him, and consequently he is my son-in-law." "Well," said Lord Mansfield, " that is the best definition of a son-in-law I ever yet heard." A most inexcusable want of recollection was displayed by a Benedict, who thought he had been married only three years, while he had not the faintest notion when or where he made his wife's acquaintance. A woman never pretends to ignorance on such matters, oblivious as she may be regarding the number of birthdays she has seen. For getting that a woman should be at least as old as she looks, a lady told a Paris magis trate she was twenty-five. As she stepped out of the box, a young man stepped in, who owned to twenty-seven. " Are you related to the previous witness?" he was asked. "Yes," said he, "lam her son." "Ah!" murmured the magistrate, " your mother must have married very young." The in quiry as to age was met by an Aberdeen
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spinster with a protest against an unmarried woman being expected to enlighten the public on such a subject. Finding that of no avail, she admitted she was fifty, and after a little pressure, owned to sixty. Counsel then pre sumed to inquire if she had any hopes of getting a husband, and was rebuffed for the impertinence with: "Weel, sir, I winna tell a lee. I hinna lost hope yet, but I wudna marry you, for I am sick o' your palaver." An examiner's perseverance is not always successful in eliciting the desired answer. "Was there anything in the glass? " asked a counsel of a somewhat reluctant witness. "Well, there was something in it," he re plied. " Ah! I thought we should get at it in time," observed the triumphant questioner. "Now, my good fellow, tell us what that something was." The good fellow took time to think over it; at last he drawled out, " It were a spoon." Equally unsatis factory from a legal point of view was the following short dialogue : " You have property, you say; did you make it your self? " " Partly." " Are you married?" "Yes." Did your wife bring you any thing? " " Yes." " What? " " Three chil dren." The witness had the best of that bout. The information imparted was as little to the purpose as the answer to the question : " When you called upon Mr. Roberts, what did he say? " propounded to a voter before an election committee. Before the man could open his mouth to reply, the question was objected to. For half an hour counsel argued the matter; then the room was cleared that the committee might con sider the subject. After the lapse of an other half-hour the doors were opened, and the chairman announced that the question might be put. All ears were strained to catch the impending disclosure. But the mountain did not bring forth even a mouse. "What did Mr. Roberts say? " asked the counsel; and the witness replied : " He was n't at home, sir; so I didn't see him."
