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The Green Bag

of verdicts. He did not soar over the heads of the twelve jurymen. "Gentlemen," said Coleridge in the Saun'n case, "I cannot help thinking that people who devote themselves to this life (i.e., convent life) imitate too exclusively one part of the life of our divine Lord, and forget the other. They rememebr the forty days in the wilderness, and the hours in the garden, and on the mountain, but they fail to bear in mind the ‘Marriage of Cana' and the ‘Feast of Bethany.’" Lord Russell was a Roman Catholic, while

Lord Coleridge was a High Churchman.

But

among the delightful characteristics of the Bar of England, the entire absence of religious intolerance is the most delightful. There have been men of extreme views, like the late Mr. Reader Harris, K.C., the founder of the

Pentecostal League, and Judge Willis, the passive resister, but their opinions never inter fered with their friendships or stopped the flow of briefs to their chambers. There has rarely existed a closer friendship at the bar than that between the late Mr. Justice Day and Judge Willis. The one was a rigid Roman Catholic and Conservative, the other is an equally rigid Nonconformist and Radical. Judge Willis has written a small of "Recollec tions" in which he tells us: “Day was a Papist and I was a Baptist; we seldom discussed, we

loved." Mr. Justice Day's solemn expression won him the nickname of “Judgment Day," but he was blessed with dry humor, which his

legal learning never quenched. Mr. Crispe gives an instance of this. He was cross examining the defendant. and asked him for his trade card.

had a warm heart. Sir Alfred Willis (the retired judge) in a lecture gave the following anecdote which as it illustrates the comrade ship of the bar Mr. Crispe has very properly preserved. “Of Jessel, when Solicitor-General havin had a brilliant passage of arms with Lor Chief Justice Cockburn, a little creature at the bar said to Sergeant Parry, ‘Why, Parry, he drops his aitches.’ I shall never forget the manner in which the sergeant turned round, glaring at him and said, ‘Sir, I would rather dro my h’s with Jessel in hell than aspirate wit you in heaven.’" When a new trial has been ordered, it is not proper or right to refer to the amount of damages given by the jury to the plaintifi at the first trial. Sergeant Ballantine was charged with disregarding this rule. On one occasion when Sergeant Parry was leading Mr. Crispe at the second trial of an action,

where the plaintiff claimed damages for injuries sustained while on the defendant's premises, the plaintiff's solicitor was fearful of not getting such large damages as at the first trial and suggested to the sergeant that in his opening he might mention the amount previously obtained. "How dare you make such a suggestion? If you repeat it, I will throw up my brief." Lord Westbury is referred to by Mr. Crispe, but one little known fact linking the Lord Chancellor with Sir George Jessel is not given, and may be mentioned here. Jessel applied for silk to Lord Westbury, but his applica tion was refused, and for the four years

(1861-65) that Lord Westbury occupied the

On this card he was described . woolsack, Jessel had to practise as a junior.

as an undertaker with a telegraphic address. "I asked him why he gave a telegraphic address. The Judge (Day) interposed, “Oh," said he, “I suppose it is for the convenience of people who want to be buried in a hurry." Mr. Crispe has nothing to tell us of Lord Justice Bowen, but he has something to add to our knowledge of that equally great judge, Sir George Jessel, the Master of the Rolls. Mr. Crispe, being a common law man, was

naturally not thrown across Lord Justice Bowen. We will only say of Bowen that he was an ideal judge, combining as he did per fection of form with perfection of substance. He was an instance of sound law always clothed in the tersest and wittiest language. How different a man was his brother Chancery Judge, Sir George Jessel, but wisdom is justi fied of all her children. Jessel, like Bowen,

As Westbury and Jessel belonged to the same political party his exclusion was mainly due to personal dislike or prejudice on the part of the Chancellor. Every one is not as broad-minded as Sergeant Parry. When Jessel was examining a French witness through an interpreter, he thought his meaning was not being conveyed, and said to the inter preter: “Do tell the man, he don’t grasp my meaning. My question ‘and nothing to do with ‘eating the pipes." This the interpreter translated, "Monsieur l'Avocat vous prie de croire, qu'il ne s'agit nullement, dans son inter rogatoire, de ‘manger les tuyaux.‘" The late Lord Chancellor began his career

at the Old Bailey, and doubtless acquired there-in the study of criminals-his knowl edge of human weaknesses. Mr. Crispe tells one anecdote of an Old Bailey lawyer and his