Le Sage, the author of Gil Blas, said, to console himself for his deafness, with his usual humor, "When I go into a company where I find a great number of blockheads and babblers, I replace my trumpet in my pocket, and cry, 'Now, gentlemen, I defy you all.'"
MCCCXVIII.—ANSWERED AT ONCE.
A Scotch clergyman preaching a drowsy sermon, asked, "What is the price of earthly pleasure?" The deacon, a fat grocer, woke up hastily from a sound sleep, and cried out, lustily, "Seven-and-sixpence a dozen!"
MCCCXIX.—A DEADLY WEAPON.
"Well, sir," asked a noisy disputant, "don't you think that I have mauled my antagonist to some purpose?"—"O yes," replied a listener, "you have,—and if ever I should happen to fight with the Philistines, I'll borrow your jaw-bone!"
MCCCXX.—EQUALITY OF THE LAW.
The following cannot be omitted from a Jest Book, although somewhat lengthy:—
A man was convicted of bigamy, and the annexed conversation took place.—Clerk of Assize: "What have you to say why judgment should not be passed upon you according to law?" Prisoner: "Well, my Lord, my wife took up with a hawker, and run away five years ago, and I've never seen her since, and I married this other woman last winter." Mr. Justice Maule: "I will tell you what you ought to have done; and if you say you did not know, I must tell you the law conclusively presumes that you did. You ought to have instructed your attorney to bring an action against the hawker for criminal conversation with your wife. That would have cost you about £100. When you had recovered substantial damages against the hawker, you would have instructed your proctor to sue in the Ecclesiastical Courts for a divorce à mensa atque thoro. That would have cost you £200 or £300 more. When you had obtained a divorce à mensa atque thoro, you would have had to appear by counsel before the House of Lords for a divorce à vinculo matrimonii. The bill might have been opposed in all its stages in both Houses of Parliament; and altogether you would have had to spend about £1000 or £1200. You will probably tell me that you never had a thousand farthings of your own in the world; but, prisoner, that makes no difference. Sitting here as a British judge, it is my duty to tell you that this is not a country in which there is one law for the rich and another for the poor."
MCCCXXI.—OPEN CONFESSION.
In a cause tried in the Court of Queen's Bench, the plaintiff being a widow, and the defendants two medical men who had treated her for delirium tremens, and put her under restraint as a lunatic, witnesses were called on the part of the plaintiff to prove that she was not addicted to drinking. The last witness called by Mr. Montagu Chambers, the leading counsel on the part of the plaintiff, was Dr. Tunstal, who closed his evidence by describing a case of delirium tremens treated by him, in which the patient recovered in a single night. "It was," said the witness, "a case of gradual drinking, sipping all day, from morning till night." These words were scarcely uttered, than Mr. Chambers, turning to the Bench, said, "My lord, that is my case."