The Editor's Bag
409
send me out to that crazy house at Kankakee." When the jury finally returned with their verdict, they had found the old man guilty and sentenced him to four teen years. QUERY: Who was crazy?
in the United Kingdom would. The King cannot be sued for debt; but the Queen can be. Should the King die, some authorities hold that the Queen could not marry again, In case she wished to, without the license of the King's successor.
OATH AND AFFIRMATION A MEMBER of the Washington Bar tells of the distinction made by a colored witness in a Virginia case with reference to an oath and an affirmation. When this darky entered the witness box he said he thought he wouldn't swear. He thought he would just affirm. "How is this?" asked the judge, "A month ago, when you last appeared before me, you consented readily enough to swear. Why is it that you will now only affirm?" "Yo" honah," said Moses, "de reason is that I expects I aint quite so shore 'bout de facts of dis case as I was 'bout dem of the other."
WOMEN AS WITNESSES
THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE QUEEN THE quaint ness of many provisions of British law is curiously exem plified in the status of the Queen of Eng land. So far as Her Majesty's private business is concerned, she is not re garded by the laws and customs of Eng land as a married woman at all. She is the only woman in Great Britain who does not come within the scope of the Married Woman's Property Act. The idea in all this is that affairs of state consume all the time of the King, and therefore no responsibility for the Queen's business rests upon him. If the Queen contracted debts in her hus band's name he would not be respon sible for them, as any other husband
AN EXPERIENCED barrister has lately furnished a London news paper with some of his impressions of feminine witnesses. In his opinion, most women are more skilled in concealing anything they do not wish to be known than men are. Men may be bolder liars when it comes to perjury, but they lack the air of candor and simplicity which are a woman's chief defense in a similar predicament. Women, he considers, are not usually good witnesses with regard to precise dates and details. In numberless cases most important letters written by ladies have been vaguely dated "Sunday night" or "Thursday — after dinner." When you press the importance of the date, the witness usually shakes her head and says, "But I really don't re member." A mere man may be frightened or bullied into making admissions by a determined cross-examiner, but any such attempt with a woman witness ends only in a flood of tears, the indignation of the jurymen, and the probable loss of the case. While the educated woman is usually able to parry any awkward questions, witnesses of less education and lower social position sometimes get nervous and lose their heads, and that is why the evidence of domestic servants is regarded as doubly dangerous, in the divorce court especially. An indis creet witness called for the defense has
