LEGAL INCIDENTS. VIII. MINE OF WEALTH IN A MULE. "IT ELLO, Bob, how 's the mule?" LM. " First-rate." "Still alive and eating against the writ?" "Yes, the mule 's all right, and as lively as when I first took charge of him." "Well, I guess I 'd better take another re ceipt from you, Bob, to keep the sheriff's records straight," said Under-SherifF Long, in an official talk with R. T. Scott, who chanced to drop into the sheriff's office re cently to report that he was alive, and that he still recognizes the red tape which is at tached to an old mule. Mr. Scott signed the following paper : — I, R. T. Scott, do hereby certify that of the two mules that were left in my charge by Thomas Cun ningham, Sheriff of San Joaquin County, in 1872, and which mules, I was informed, belonged to the estate of M. Capurro, insolvent, one died in the year 1878. The other is still at this date alive and doing well, considering age and infirmities incident thereto; the said mule being now to my certain knowledge about thirty years old; nevertheless I am still holding the said mule subject to the orders of Thomas Cunningham, Sheriff. R. T. Scorr. Dated Stockton, Nov. 14, 1890. The story of the mules is interesting to show how property can be tied up in litiga tion. Somewhere about 1864 M. Capurro was a well-to-do business man of this city, owning a fine team, which was engaged in hauling freight to the mountains, and a horse and dray, which the owner used about the city. Hard luck came upon the pioneer, however; and along in 1866, when C. C. Rynerson was sheriff, an attachment was issued against M. Capurro's property, and the muleteam and horse and dray were taken in charge by the officer.
The owner claimed a pair of mules as ex empt property under a law exempting a pair of animals for a teamster, and also set up a claim to his horse and dray, which were the means of his livelihood. Then commenced a legal fight, and in a little while the Stock ton man was forced into insolvency under the United States laws. He finally won in his fight for the horse and dray; but the pair of mules claimed as exempt for a teamster were tied up in litigation, which has never been settled. The sheriff then in office held the ani mals under a writ of attachment, and when he went out of office in 1867 the mules were delivered to his successor, Freeman Mills. Two years later Sheriff Mills gave the ani mals to the next sheriff, George C. Castle; and in 1872, when Sheriff Cunningham went into office, the mules were given over with the books and records and property under attachment. Sheriff Cunningham placed the mules in the charge of R. T. Scott, and he kept the animals together until one died in 1878. The other animal is fat and healthy, and promises to live to the end of the century, but not to the close of the litigation. Allowing the sheriff's keeper $3 per day, which is the limit fixed by law for the pay of keepers, the surviving mule is charged with $28,280 costs. If the mule is charged with ranch fees at $2 per month, the bill against the animal struggling to outlive the courts is $576. Adding $144 for ranch fees, chargeable against the one that grew tired of the law's delay and died, would make a bill for ranching to be collected out of the only property remaining, the lone mule, $720. — Stockton Independent.
