DOYEN OF THE BAR

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19048, 27 June 1924, Page 3

DOYEN OF THE BAR

AMAZING RECORD OF SIR HARRY POLAND. SOME PIQUANT STORIES. Sir Harry Bodkin Poland, the doyen - of the English bar, will celebrate his ; 95th birthday next month. At this I patriarchal age he displays a degree of activity which many men half his age might envy. Sir Harry entered the Inner Temple as a student in 1848, and was called to the bar in 1851. London was a very different place then from what it is to-day. There was no electric light; there was no telephone. Gas was the most popular illuminaut, but in the Temple oil lamps were used. Sir Harry’s life has been spent in the pursuit of the law. The Law Courts, 1 the Old Bailey, the Assize Courts on ( the Home Circuit, the Metropolitan Police Courts, and the paved walks of the Temple are the setting of his life. He has never staoped to meanness or stained his record by questionable conduct, and in the words of Wordsworth his old age is if serene and bright, and lovely as a Lapland night.” Sir Harry Polan, like many Other men who have led eventful lives, had until comparatively recent times (says a London paper), a rooted objection to the idea of a biographical work. His life, he would say, was contained in the law reports, in Blue Books, and other recorders of thoughts. He would never consent to the publication of a book about himself, but at last he conceded that out of a personal regard to a distinguished counsel he would answer any questions he desired to put to him. That friend was Mr. Ernest BowenRowlands, who has enriched the literature of the law with more than one volume of permanent value. • He has made brilliant use of the cross-exam-ining opportunities afforded to him by the doyen of the English bar. What Boswell did for Johnson, Bowden-Row-lands did for Sir Harry Poland. Mr. Bowen-Rolands has, in addition to other accomplishments, the gift of pictorial writing and the precious gift of humour. He employs both with admirable results in the volume t{ Seven-ty-two Years at the Bar,” which Messrs Macmillan have now given to the public. Sir Harry’s professional career as a barrister lasted from 1851 to 1895, and during the whole of that time he had a large practice, not only in the criminal courts, where he was for many years counsel to the Treasury and advisor to the Home Office, but in other courts as well. For long years he was the chief authority on il Licensing” and “Rating.” He was frequently retained in “election petition” cases, and was regarded as the greatest .authority on “parish law” He appeared in some great cases in the Ecclesiastical Courts, and conducted many important State trials. He was standing counsel to the Bank of Eng land, and was for 27 years Recorder of Dover. In the course of his long career he has given important evidence before many Royal Commissions, and has on several occasions guided or assisted those whose duty it was to make the laws which the bench and bar enforce

In this engrossing volume Mr. Bowen Rowlands treats of many of the historical cases in which Sir Harry Poland figured. We pass these by, preferring for the present to catch Sir Harry in lighter vein. Sir Harry Poland has known all the Lord Chancellors sinew Lord Cottenham, who ruled at the date of his call, and has some exceedingly shrewd things to say of some of them. Sir Richard Bethell, who, as Lord Westbury, succeeded Campbell, had a biting tongue. “Once in the court he rose to reply to the vigorous argument of an opponent, and began his address in this way, ‘My Lords, now that the noise has ceased!’”

He would never admit defeat until it was inevitable, but the following story is rather an account of his conceit rather than of his courage, in consultation in a case his junior made a suggestion and he put is aside saying, “Rubbish, only a d d fool would listen to that!” but the next day, when his own argument had failed and his junior tried the rejected one, the judge said that he. was impressed by it and would take time to consider his judgment. “Ah,” said Bethell to the junior, “you see he is a d fool!”

Sir Harry preserves a copy in his own handwriting of a famous epitaph to Lord Westbury, written, he believes, by Pember, the Parliament silk. It runs:— In memory of RICHARD, BARON WESTBURY, LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR OF ENGLAND. HE was an eminent Christian, An energetic and successful Statesman, And a still more eminent and successful . judge. During his three years of office He abolished The time-honoured institution of the Insolvent Debtor’s Court. The ancient mode of conveying land and The Eternity of punishment. Towards the end of his earthly career, In the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, He dismissed Hell with costs And took away from the orthodox members of the Church of England Their hope of Eternal damnation. Sir Harry tells a good story about Lord Campbell. The chief Justice corrected a barrister who pronounced Lord Brougham’s name as it is generally done. “Mr. , Broom and not Broham is the correct way to pronounce that nobleman’s name. If you speak correctly you will also save a syllable.’' Some time afterwards Lord Campbell spoke of omnibus to the same barrister, who therupon said, “If your lordship would call it ’bus we should understand your meaning and you would save two syllables.” Lord Jessel had a difficulty with the letter “ H. ” Once he exhibited it at the cross-examination of a French patent expert about a certain mineral. He put the question through an interpreter—“lf you were to ’eat (heat) the material, what would be the cf feet?” The interpreter translated ’eat,

by “manger,” and the witness thew up his hands and cried “Mon Dieu!” Sir Harry heard Mr. Justice Wightman say a clever thing at the Assizes. Rigton, who used to defend prisoners, had the habit of making long speeches to the jury. One day he was exceptionally boring and Wightman tried to pull him up. He said, Mr. Rigton, you have said that before.” “Have I, my Lord?” Ribton answered. “Yes, but it is such a long time ago that I pardon.you for forgetting it.” “My Lord,” Ribton expostulated, “in defending a prisoner whose very life is in jeopardy, I am surely entitled to some latitude.” “Yes,” said Wightman wearily, “You are. I am not complaining of the latitude, but of the longitude! ”

Of Commissioner Kerr, a judge of the City of London Court, Sir Harry remarked:—“He always was a strange sort of man. He used to sit in Court No. 4 at the Old Bailey—a sort of rabbit hutch, and always with his back turned to the jury. His summing-up was .something like this: ‘Ye’ve hc-r-rd the evidence, conseede r-r--ye-r-r y-e-r-dict.” He was equally economical of words in passing sentence. Sir Harry heard him one day say to a prisoner who had been con victed of uttering counterfeit coin: “Wunce a smasher-r everr a smasher-r Sever year-rs. ” He was always embroiled with the Lord Mayor and al dremen; a question of the amount of salary divided them; anyway, he and they were at loggerheads. “One day 1 met him coming out of the Guildhall” recalled Sir Harry, “and I said, ‘Why, Commissioner, don’t you go to the il Jdjermen’s 'room and have a /fine lunch?” He answered in a most surly way; “Men, do ye think I wad herrd wi’ swine?”

The greatest of judicial humourists, Maule, according to Sir Harry, was fond of port, and he exhibited his lik ing in a humorous way on one occasion. During the retirement of a jury in charge of the baliff, who was sworn to keep them without food, fire, or drink, the bailiff came into the court and said that one of the jury was ill and would like to have a glass uf water; might he give it to him?” Maule said, “Let me see; water Isn't fire, it is not food, and it certainly isn’t c(rink. Yes, he may have it.” When a barrister in the course of his argument told him, “If you decide in that way you will be acting contrary to the case reported by Espinasse or any other ass! ”

It is difficult to stop quoting from this entertaining volume, but we must conclude with the following story tjld by Sir Harry. “There are two very good judges who were on the bench about the same time, called Parke and Park. Parke was a Baron of the Exchequer and became Lord Wensleydale; Park was a justice of the Court of Common Pleas. Mr. Justice Park had a habit of beginning any pronouncement in court with ‘I am a Christian judge ’ and he had another of repeating aloud the evidence he took down and making audible remarks about it. He was once trying a man for stealing faggots, and when listening to the evidence re said, as he thought to himsilf, but in reality aloud; ‘One faggot is as much like another faggot as an egg is like another egg.’ This was overheard by counsel for the defence, and he dexterously incorporated the saying in his speech. ‘Stop, stop,’ cried Park, ‘this case must not go on; it is an interposition of Providence; the same thought occurred to me.’ The prisoner was discharged.