CAUSTIC WIT.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 218, 14 September 1908, Page 6

CAUSTIC WIT.

LORD ELLENBOROUGH'S DIGS

Lord Ellenborough was a "dignified and courteous Judge, but he .was capable of correcting oeunsel with--a caustic wit. Many instance of this are recorded, and the following are noted by Townsend in his "Twelve Eminent Judges." When Justice Allan Park had been moved, in some hardfought case that appealed to the feelings, to repeated exclamations, and had called Heaven to.witness and so forth, while addressing the jury: "Pray, sir," said my Lord, "pray, don't swear in that way here m court!" The effect of this interruption, in a grave tone; was irresistible, and Mr Park heartily joined in laughing at this unexpected practical pleasantry. * ~.-'., .■ " When another counsel, too much addicted to self-praise, had -declared' in the course of his address that such things were enough to drive one from the' profession of the law—"Don t threaten the court," said his Lord-, ship, "with such a terrible calamity." The austere lectures which he sometimes read, flippant pedantry or hopeloss imbecility, are often remembered and quoted Vith malicious' glee, 'for they possess a character of quaint and grave sarcasm peculiar to the man: An eminent conveyancer, who prided himself on having answered thirty thousand cases, came, express from the Court of Chancery to the King's Bench to argue a question of real property. Taking for granted, rather too rashly, that common lawyers are little more acquainted with the Digest of Cruise than with the laws of China, he commenced his erudite harangue by observing "that an estate in feesimple was the higliest estate known to the law of England." "Stay, stay," interrupted the "Chief Justice, with consummate gravity; "let me write that down." He wrote, and read, slowly and deliberately, the note which he had 'taken of this A.B.C. axiom: "An estate in fee-simple is the highest estate known to the law of England. The Court, sir, is indebted to you for the information." There was only one person present who did not perceive the irony, and that was the learned counsel who incurred it. But though impervious to irony, it was impossible even for his self-love to avoid- understanding the home-thrust lunged < by the Judge at the conclusion of his : harangue. He had exhausted the year-books, and all the mysteries of real property law, in a sleepy oration which effectually cleared the Court; insensible alike to

the gi-im repose- of the Bench and the, yawning impatience of the ushers, when, at the close of some parenthetical' and apparently interminable sentences, the clock struck four, and the Judges started to their feet. He appealed to know when it would be their pleasure to hear the remainder of his argument. "Mr P.," rejoined the chief, "we are bound t!> hear you, and shall do so on Friday; but pleasure! hasbeen long out of the question." The hesitations ,of dullness and vagaries of fancy received no quarter from Lord Ellenborough. A young counsel commenced his stammering speech with the remark, "The unfortunate client whet appears by me," and then came to a full stop; beginning again, after an embarrassed pause, with a repetition of the r'Smapk, "My unfortunate client," he did not find • his fluency of speech quickened by the calm raillery of the Judge, who interposed in his softest tone, "Pray go* on; so far the Court jis quite with you." The late Sir James Mackintosh, who used to chuckle over the narration of this incident, would, however, sigh at the remembrance of its cruelty, and cruel it undoubtedly was. Another barrister was advancing rapidly into the regions of poetry in a grave argument, and observing, "It is written in the large volume of nature," when the Judge instantly recalled his wandering imagination by the caustic query, "In what page, pray!"