LEGAL CURIOSITY.

MR. Punch has been unjustly accused of being hostile to the Lawyers. He repudiates the charge; and, in proof of his regard for a class whom he firmly believes not to be much blacker than they are painted, he subjoins a specimen of an honest attorney's bill. Mr. Punch offers it to the profession as a model, and is convinced that if bills of costs were framed on its principle, he should hear less of strikes in the higher Courts—that wholesome striking by which an attorney is abated, and the roll lightened.

		Jigger
In the County Court,and that of Common Honesty.	}	v.
		Squash.

Attorney's Charges.

January 1.-Attending plaintiff Jigger, who stated that he was a Vestryman of Marlebone, and that in the course of a debate upon Hungarian politics, which naturally arose out of a paving and lighting question, the defendant Squash, also a Vestryman, had called him a hignorant hupstart, intimating most unjustifiably, that he, Squash, would sooner request the opinion of a jackass upon the point at issue than that of the plaintiff. Informing Jigger that he had better mind his shop and not mind Squash.	No charge.
February 10.—Jigger calling and desiring to restate his grievances, which had rankled in his mind, taking down an almanack and pointing out to him that the month, which contained twenty-eight days only, was much too short for me to listen to such nonsense, and advising him to go about his business, and also attend to it.	No charge.
March 12.—Attending Jigger, who came in the evening with a paper, in which he said he had put his case in the strongest possible light. Convinced him that he had not, by burning his paper in my naphtha lamp, and recommending him to go home and take his wife to the play.	No charge.
April 19.—Perusing the first page of a letter from Jigger, in which he again stated his wrongs, and entered at some length into the Hungarian question, and the suspected levities of Mrs. Squash, the defendant's wife, and putting the said letter into the fire.	No charge.
May 24.—Being at the Derby, and Jigger coming up very tipsy, and insisting on entering into his affairs between the races, attending Policeman A 172, and instructing him to move Jigger.	No charge.
May 24.—Being at the Derby, and Jigger coming up very tipsy, and insisting on entering into his affairs between the races, attending Policeman A 172, and instructing him to move Jigger.	No charge.
June 29.—Attending Jigger, who came in great glee to tell me that he had served a County Court summons on Squash, when I apprised him of my opinion that he was a great blockhead, but as he dissented from this view of the case, taking instructions to conduct the case for him, and subsequently writing to Squash to tell him to give me a look in.	No charge.
July 1.—Attending Squash, and telling him that I hated to see a couple of neighbours and fellow parishioners squabbling and scandalising one another, and that they must meet and make it up; when Squash entered at considerable length into the Hungarian question, and also gave me some anecdotes of Jigger's rascality, and his daughter Jemima's vulgarity. He consented to withdraw the jackass, but adhered to the hignorant hupstart.	No charge.
August 3.—Having previously procured adjournments of the summons, my clerk's attendance to get Jigger out of the way on a fool's errand, so that when the cause was called on there was no plaintiff, and the matter dropped. No charge.	No charge.
September 4.—Attending Jigger, who had been talking to some jackanapes of a lawyer's clerk, and had been told that the County Court summons might be resuscitated by a Bill of Revivor in Chancery, which he wanted me to file, and instructing Jigger, as a preliminary, to go and kick his new adviser.	No charge.
October 11.—Attending Squash, who complained that my client was taking the law into his own hands, and throwing dead kittens, with insulting inscriptions affixed to their necks, into his, Squash's, shop, with intent to injure him in his trade of a sausage maker. To mollify Squash, ordering 3 lbs. of sausages; and N.B., presented same to my clerk, not having much faith in the defendant's zoological knowledge. Paid for sausages.	2 6
November 5.—Attending Jigger, who insisted on my coming to the window to see a Guy, which he had prepared in the likeness of Squash, and which he was causing his sons and apprentices to carry about, with a song containing pointed satire upon the Houses of Austria and of Squash.	No charge.
December 24.—Being out in the evening, ordering some spirits for my own Christmas festivity, and accidentally seeing Squash and his wife, instructing them to meet me in ten minutes in the parlour of the Jolly Snobs, and fetching Jigger and his wife to the same place; addressing the parties on their folly, and insisting on their all joining in a friendly bowl of Christmas Punch, to which proposition they ultimately assented: Squash, in broken accents, declaring that, in his heart, he preferred Jigger to Lord Palmerston for real political knowledge, and Jigger avowing that some gentleman, of whom he had read in the Sunday papers, called Haristydus, was an unjust party compared to Squash. Left them shaking hands, and the women crying over one another.	No charge.
Bowl of Punch	5 0
Total Bill of Costs for the year	£0 7 6

This is my Bill,

BOLT UPRIGHT, Attorney.