RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

Otago Witness, Issue 313, 28 November 1857, Page 5

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

Monday, Nov. 24, 1857. (Before John Gillies, Esq., E.M., and a Bench of Justices.) James Paterson and George Hepburn, of Dunedin, storekeepers, were charged, on the information of Mr. Shepherd, chief constable, with selling one bottle of wine, they not being duly licensed, contrary to the provisions of the Licencing Ordinances. Mr. Thomas B. Gillies was retained for the defendants. The evidence, which was very defective, and not well brought out, went to show that on one occasion Mr. Strode, Resident Magistrate, while dining with a few friends at Sibbald's private hotel requested Mrs. Sibbald to procure for him a bottle of sherry ; that Mrs. Sibbald sent one Lee, her servant, to the defendants' to procure it, which he got from one of the defendants — Mr. Paterson, who simply said, " Here you are my boy," and said nothing about the price of it. Sibbald when examined as a witness, said that he was in the habit of borrowing and lending with the defendants, and that the transaction in question was not a matter of sale. The only other witness, Lee, is presently a waiter at the Union Hotel. The Bench dismissed the case. Thomas Birch, of Dunedin, licensed victualler, was charged on the information of John Shepherd, chief constable, with neglecting to keep a lamp burring over the front or principal door of his licensed public house, contrary to the provisions of the Licensing Ordinance. The defendant admitted the offence, and was fined the smallest penalty permitted by the Ordinance, viz., £2 with costs. Six cases of Breach of the Towns Cattle Trespass Ordinance were disposed of by a fine in each case. James Seaton, of Portobello Bay, settler, sued Angus M'Diarmid, of Dunedin, biacksmith, for the price of an anvil, said to have been sold and delivered by plaintiff to the defendant. Mr. Thomas B. Gillies appeared for the plaintiff. The oase appeared to have arisen out of a misunderstanding oi; the terms of the bargain — the plaintiff asserting that the anvil was sold for £10 and the defendant stating that the price was only 10s., although he on a subsequent occasion said he would give 10s. more; and further pled, that when delivery was tendered the article was not an anvil but a block of metal with some technical name. The case was dismissed with costs.