WHAT IS A “ TEAM ?"

Lyttelton Times, Volume LI, Issue 5584, 17 January 1879, Page 7

WHAT IS A “ TEAM ?"

The Court of Queen’s Bench were rec ,-ntly called upon to give a .legal definition of the word “ team.” A tenant of an English duke had agreed, as a part of his rent payment, to furnish at sundry times “ one day’s team work with two horses and one proper person.” On one occasion the duke’s manager desired the farmer to send a cart to fetch coals from a railway station to the ducal mansion. The farmer offered to furnish two horses and a man, but insisted that the duke should supply the cart. “ There can’t be a ‘team’ without a cart or waggon,” said the manager. “Ob, yes, there can!” replied the farmer, “ the horses are the team.” Both parties were honest, and both were obstinate, and so law was asked to decide which definition of a “ team” was comet, the duke’s or farmer’s. A jury said the duke’s, but the farmer asked the Court of Queen’s Bench if the jury were not quite as incorrect as was the duke. The Court heard learned lawyers argue, and also discussed among themselves, “ What is a team ?” Poetry and lexicons were appealed to. One judge quoted these lines to show that the team is separate from the cart; “ Giles Jelt was sleeping, in his cart he lay, Some waggish pilf'rers stole his team away, Giles wakes and oiies, ‘Ods bodkins, what is here, Why, how now; am I Giles or not ? If he. I’ve lost six geldings to my smart; It not, Ods bodkins, I’ve found a cart!' " Another judge quoted a line from Wordsworth : “ My jolly team will work alone for me.” “Horses,” said the learned judge, “might be ‘ jolly,’ but a cart cannot.” Whereupon, the counsel for the duke gave the judge “a Roland ” for his “ Oliver ” by citing Gray’s lines: *' Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield. Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe hath broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield, How bow’d the wood beneath their sturdy stroke!’* But the farmer’s lawyer “capped” that quotation with several citations from the poets. From Spenser: 11 Thee a ploughman all nnmeeting found. As he his toilsome team that way did guide, And brought thee up a ploughman’s state to hide.” From Shakespeare : “ We fairies that do run, By the triple Hecate's team. From the pre <ence of the sun. Following darkness like a dream.” From Dryden : “ Any number, and passing in a line. Like a long team of snowy swans on high, Which clap their wings and cleave the liquid sky," The judges decided, two to one, that the farmer’s definition of “ team ” was correct -, and then, as if to add another to the many illustrations of the “ glorious uncertainty of the law,” said they would hear the case over again. The case shows the importance of putting down in a written agreement just what is agreed upon, and of-eschewing all ambiguous words. —Pacific Rural Press.