Dunning was defending a gentleman in an action brought from crim. con. with the plaintiff's wife. The chief witness for the plaintiff was the lady's maid, a clever, self-composed person, who spoke confidently as to seeing the defendant in bed with her mistress. Dunning, on rising to cross-examine her, first made her take off her bonnet, that they might have a good view of her face, but this did not discompose her, as she knew she was good-looking. He then arranged his brief, solemnly drew up his shirt sleeves, and then began: "Are you sure it was not your master you saw in bed with your mistress?"—"Perfectly sure."—"What, do you pretend to say you can be certain when the head only appeared from the bedclothes, and that enveloped in a nightcap?"—"Quite certain."—"You have often found occasion, then, to see your master in his nightcap?"—"Yes—very frequently."—"Now, young woman, I ask you, on your solemn oath, does not your master occasionally go to bed with you?"—"Oh, that trial does not come on to-day, Mr. Slabberchops!" replied the witness. A loud shout of laughter followed, and Lord Mansfield leaned back to enjoy it, and then gravely leaned forward and asked if Mr. Dunning had any more questions to put to the witness. No answer was given, and none were put. The same counsel, when at the height of his large practice at the Bar, was asked how he got through all his work. He replied: "I do one-third of it; another third does itself; and I don't do the remaining third."
A witness under severe cross-examination by Serjeant Dunning was repeatedly asked if he did not live close to the Court. On admitting that he did, the further question was put, "And pray, sir, for what reason did you take up your residence in that place?"—"To avoid the rascally impertinence of dunning," came the ready answer.
A barrister's name once gave a witness the opportunity to score in the course of a severe cross-examination. Missing was the leader of his Circuit and was defending his client charged with stealing a donkey. The prosecutor had left the donkey tied up to a gate, and when he returned it was gone. "Do you mean to say," said counsel, "the donkey was stolen from the gate?"—"I mean to say, sir," said the witness, giving the judge and then the jury a sly look, at the same time pointing to the counsel, "the ass was missing."
Mr. Clarke, a leader of the Midland Circuit, was a very worthy lawyer of the old school. A client long refusing to agree to refer to arbitration a cause which judge, jury, and counsel wished to get rid of, he at last said to him, "You d—d infernal fool, if you do not immediately follow his lordship's recommendation, I shall be obliged to use strong language to you." Once, in a council of the Benchers of Lincoln's Inn, the same gentleman very conscientiously opposed their calling a Jew to the Bar. Some tried to point out the hardship to be imposed upon the young gentleman, who had been allowed to keep his terms, and whose prospects in life would thus be suddenly blasted. "Hardship!" said the zealous churchman, "no hardship at all! Let him become a Christian, and be d—d to him!"
It is sometimes imagined by laymen that verdicts may be obtained by the trickery of counsel. Doubtless counsel may try to throw dust in the eyes of jurors, but they are not very successful. Lord Campbell tells a story of Clarke, who by such tactics brought a case to a satisfactory compromise. The attorney, coming to him privately, said, "Sir, don't you think we have got very good terms? But you rather went beyond my instructions."—"You fool!" retorted Clarke; "how do you suppose you could have got such terms if I had stuck to your instructions."
JOHN ADOLPHUS, BARRISTER.
In the biography of John Adolphus, a famous criminal lawyer, we are told that the judges of his time were much impressed with the following table of degrees. "The three degrees of comparison in a lawyer's progress are: getting on; getting on-er (honour); getting on-est (honest)." He declared the judges acknowledged much truth in the degrees. The third degree in Mr. Adolphus' table reminds us of the story of the farmer who was met by the head of a firm of solicitors, who inquired the name of a plant the farmer was carrying. "It's a plant," replied the latter, "that will not grow in a lawyer's garden; it is called honesty."