IT WAS THE “LIMIT,” SAYS MAGISTRATE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18188, 22 June 1927, Page 9

IT WAS THE “LIMIT,” SAYS MAGISTRATE.

YOUNG MAN BORROWED FROM GIRL HE HAD KNOWN ONE WEEK.. (Special to the “ Star.”) WELLINGTON, June 22. “Defendant in this case admits that he inserted an advertisement in a paper for a wife and a week after he met her he went up to Masterton, where she lived, and asked her for a loan of £5. I consider that to be the limit, and it shows him to be nothing more or less than an adventurer pure and simple, who was out to get as much as he could out of her.” These remarks were made by Mr Riddell, S.M., yesterday, concerning Jack Lindsay M’Millan, an advertising agent, aged twenty-six, against whom Agnes Maude Boyd, a domestic, aged twenty-eight, brought a civil action to recover £7l Is 6d, for money alleged to have been lent to defendant under a promise of marriage. Plaintiff also sought to recover £IOO general damages for breach of promise, but thfs was struck out, as the Magistrate said that it did not come within the jurisdiction of that count. Plaintiff’s evidence included a statement that her mother found she was lending defendant cash and went and saw defendant. “When he had borrowed £lO from me,” she said, “he asked me to sign a receipt for it so he could show it to my people. This I did, saying that anything else between us had taken place, at my own free will, as he suggested. He then sai’d he owed me nothing.”

Witness thought that, he being a journalist it would have been all light to have married M’Millan, who seemed a nice young man who was fond g£ her. M’Millan claimed to have belonged to the literary department cf a Wellington newspaper. This was denied, it being stated he was nothing more there than a telephone attendant.

M’Millan, in the course of evidence, said he met plaintiff for the first, time when he advertised lor a wife—that was in April, ±925. He was hard up and went on a week-end to Masterton, where he borrowed £5. Mr Riddell: Do you mean to say you borrowed £5 from this woman within a week after she had answered your advertisement? Witness: Yes, sir. Defendant said that he borrowed another £5 a week later. This he had also paid back. lie now owed plaintiff nothing. They were never actually engaged; but the understanding was that they were to marry. Asked if he thought it a very creditable thing to borrow £5 from a servant girl by pretending he was going to marry her, defendant said: “No, I don’t, but I wanted the money for business reasons, and I paid her back. We were going to be married.” But you haven’t married her. Why haven’t you? Defendant: Oh, well, I can’t because I’m married. I’ve been married sijc months, (f daughter.) Mr Riddell said that he did not propose to weigh the matter with scales of gold. lie awarded plaintiff £SO on her claim.