Now this was a question that no man living had been able to answer yet. What was in the pleadings, that is, the pattern of the lawyer’s net, was visible enough; but as regards merits, I predict with the greatest confidence, that no man will ever be able to discover what the action of Bumpkin versus Snooks was about. But it speaks wonders for the elasticity of our system of jurisprudence and the ingenuity of our lawyers that such a case could be invented.
“Trespass,” said Ricochet, “was one paragraph; then there was assault and battery; breach of contract in not accepting a pig at the price agreed; trespass in seizing the pig without paying for it; and then, my lud, there were the usual money counts, as they used to be called, to which the defendant pleaded, among other pleas, a right of way; an easement; leave and license; a right to take the pig; that the pig was the property of the defendant, and various other matters. Then, my lud, there was a counter-claim for slander, for assault and battery; for loss of profit which would have been made if the pig had been delivered according to contract; breach of contract for the non-delivery of the pig.”
Mr. Justice Doughty: “This was pig-iron, I suppose?”
The two other Judges fell back, shaking their sides with laughter; and then forcibly thrust their hands against their hips which made their tippets stick out very much, and gave them a dignified and imposing appearance. Then, seeing the Judges laugh, all the bar laughed, and all the ushers laughed, and all the public laughed. The mistake, however, was a very easy one to fall into, and when Mr. Justice Doughty, who was an
exceedingly good-tempered man, saw the mistake he had made, he laughed as much as any man, and even caused greater laughter still by good-humouredly and wittily observing that he supposed somebody must be a pigheaded man. To which Mr. Ricochet laughingly replied, that he believed the plaintiff was a very pigheaded man.
“Now,” said Mr. Justice Pangloss, “have you considered what Vinnius in his ‘Commentary on Urban Servitudes’ says.”
Mr. Ricochet said, “Hem!” and that was the very best answer he could make to the learned Pangloss, and if he only continues to answer in that manner he’ll get any rule he likes to apply for—(no, not the Rule of Three, perhaps).
So Mr. Justice Pangloss went on:
“There are, as Gale says, ‘two classes of easements distinctly recognised by the Civil Law—’”