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The Green Bag.

whether of the face or head, is always an out ward and visible sign of inward virtue, and whatever may have been the state of morals of concupiscent calves of his sex and size in Guad alupe county, the probity and chastity of this particular animal has not been assailed, nor do any of the witnesses attempt to swear that they had ever known any bald-faced bull calf to be guilty of the youthful indiscretion charged gener ally against ordinary calves. And the baldness of the face of this H. O. W. calf creates an al most conclusive presumption of his innocence. Yet appellant would have it believed that he abandoned his mother, together with all sense of propriety, and ran eight miles and broke through a barb-wire fence, for the purpose of associating with Jesse Smith's cows in amorous dalliance." One morning, recently, a specimen of the genus hobo (genus hobo, mind you, not genus homo merely) was brought up before a Michi gan police justice for vagrancy. Warm weather was coming on and the defendant did not antici pate with relish ten or fifteen days in the county jail. In consequence he pleaded not guilty. The law guarantees to every man a speedy trial and the man received his in seven minutes. Two or three policemen were sworn and testified to having found the stranger hanging about the railroad yards. When they had finished their stories, the justice turned to the defendant and asked : "Have you anything you want to say? I guess we're through." There is now a prominent lawyer of southern Kentucky who may be called Marble, because that isn't his name, who upon his first attempt to address a jury came near making as complete a failure as did the learned, though modest. Domi nie Sampson, of whose ignominious flight from the pulpit Scott tells us. He was to make his maiden speech in a murder case, his talk having been prepared by an older and more able attor ney. He had committed the piece well to mem ory, had rehearsed it in dramatic style time and again, and expected with his eloquence and legal lore to surprise the judge and his friends, cap ture the jury and win his case. The court-room was crowded when Mr. Marble, in a self-confi dent manner, began :

"It has always been the law in this State, and according to the Statute of 1779 —." Here he turned pale, then started again : " It has always been the law in this State, and according to the Statute of 1779 —." Here he balked again, scratched his head, and looked around at the judge, jury and spectators in a pitiable way; but regaining new courage, he raised his voice and exclaimed : "It has always been the law in this State, and according to the Statute of 17 7 9 — whose contents I forget, I believe I shall sit down." The court-room was convulsed with laughter, while the old judge, with a smile upon his face, looked over the railing at the trembling, redfaced young man, and said : "Well, Mr. Marble, you have gone a good many years back to find authority to take a seat." The lawyer's clerk was seeking information. "Is the ' a ' in this word pronounced like ' a ' in ' clam ' or like ' a ' in ' claim '? " he asked. '.' It seems to be preferable to pronounce it like ' a ' in ' claim,' " replied the senior partner. "I thought perhaps that circumstances altered the case when we took that writ this morning in Bell v. Jones." "How so?" "Jones was in the corridor and you should have heard that mandamus." In speaking of Lord Esher, a writer in The Law Times says : Under his rtgime Court of Appeal No. 1 was at least never dull. A visitor had not been there two minutes before he was laughing at some sally of Lord Esher. The Master of the Rolls was declaring — a propos of the Kempton Park puzzle, What is a place? — that for his own part he thought every spot was a " place " except a tight rope; or telling the distracted wife of a debtor — who had gone down on her knees in court and implored him to " spare her husband" — not to talk nonsense about "the disgrace of bankruptcy, for all that is exploded now "; or. at the rising of the court just before the Long Va cation, saying to the Bar " Good-bye," and then with a merry twinkle in his eye, " for the pres ent "; or — for he was not governed by prece dent —placing a little granddaughter beside him