“Oh, certainly; though in England doubts have been suggested as to whether damages were obtainable to compensate for the loss of the services of a child so young as to be unable to earn anything;[588] but in New York a mother recovered $1,300 for the death of a daughter seven years old.”[589]
“That was a pretty good figure for a female youngster.”
“Yes, as the pecuniary loss is not supposed to be extended beyond the minority of the child.[590] In England, however, a father recovered for the loss of a son twenty-seven years old, but unmarried, who had been accustomed to make occasional presents to his parents.[591] There the old man rather ‘tried to stick it on’; he had a swell funeral and bought crape for the family and wanted the company to pay for them; the jury said ‘Yea,’ but the court said ‘Nay.’ In one case, however, a mourning husband recovered the funeral expenses of his wife.[592] As a rule, damages of a pecuniary nature must be shown; so, where a son was in the habit of assisting his father by carrying round coals for him, it was held that £75 was too much to give the old man for compensation for his death.[593] In an Irish case, where a boy of fourteen, earning no wages and whose business capabilities were valued at six-pence per day, was killed, it was considered that the probability of his assisting his mother was good evidence to go to the jury.[594]
“What sums have been given and allowed by the court for the death of the father?”
“Well, it was considered that $12,000 was not too much for the widow and three children of an industrious well-to-do farmer;[595] in an English case £1,000 was given to the widow, and £1,500 to each of eight young children, $65,000 in all;[596] then $1,300 for that baby girl.[597] But when $20,000 was given as damages for the death of a blacksmith—the inventor of a patent plough—who was killed at the celebrated Desjardins Canal accident, a new trial was granted, as the court thought the sum enormously excessive.[598] On the other hand, in one case, twelve miserable jurymen, who doubtless would have eagerly skinned a mosquito for the sake of its hide and tallow, gave £1 to a poor widow, and ten shillings each to her two fatherless children.[599] So you see the sum goes by the rule of thumb.”
“So it appears,” answered my young friend, who sucked in knowledge as a sponge does water—only to lose it again. “But some of those are not bad figures.”
“Certainly not; yet they are by no means as good as some people have get and had the pleasure of spending themselves. In one case, a man received $6,000 for a broken leg, which got well in about eight months:[600] another got $24,700 (Canada money) for the loss of his leg.”[601]
“What a leg that must have been—a match for Miss Kilmansegg’s precious limb, which
‘Was made in a comely mould,
Of gold, fine virgin glittering gold,
As solid as man could make it—
Solid in foot, and calf, and shank,
A prodigious sum of money it sank;
In fact, ’twas a branch of the family bank,
And no easy matter to break it.
All sterling metal,—not half-and-half,
The goldsmith’s mark was stamped on the calf,—
’Twas pure as from Mexican barter.
’Twas a splendid, brilliant, beautiful leg,
Fit for the Court of Scander-Beg,
That precious leg of Miss Kilmansegg!’”
Exclaimed Tom Jones glowing with poetic fire, his eye in a fine frenzy rolling at the thought of the bawbees.