The Comic Reciter (1856, Glasgow)/Daniel versus Dishclout

We shall now consider the law, as our laws are very considerable, both in bulk and number, according as the States declare, "considerandi, considerando, considerandum;" and are not to be meddled with by those that don't understand them. Law always expressing itself with true grammatical precision, never confounding moods, cases, or genders; except, indeed, when a woman happens to be slain, when the verdict is always brought in manslaughter. The presence of the law is altercation, for the law can altercate, culminate, deprecate, irritate, and go on at any rate. Now the quintessence of the law has, according to its name, five parts:—the first is the beginning, or incipiendum; the second, the uncertainty, or dubitendum; the third delay, or puzzleendum; fourthly, replication without endum; and, fifthly, nostrum and horendum. All which are exemplified in the following case:—

Daniel against Dishclout—Daniel was groom in the same family wherein Dishclout was cook-maid; and Daniel returning home one day fuddled, he stooped down to take a lop out of the dripping-pan; Dishclout pushed him into the dripping-pan, which spoiled his clothes, and he was advised to bring his action against the cook-maid, the pleadings of which were as follows:—The first person who spoke was Mr. Serjeant Snuffle; he began by saying, "Since I have the honour to be pitched upon to open this case to your Lordship, I shall not impertinently presume to take up any of your Lordship's time by a round-about circumlocutory manner of speaking or talking, quite foreign to the purpose, ​and not any way relating to the matter in hand! I should will, I design to show what damages my client has sustained hereupon, whereupon, and thereupon. Now, my Lord, as a client being a servant in the same family with Dishclout, not being at board wages, imagined he had a right to a fee simple of the dripping pan; therefore he made an attainment on the sop with his right hand, which the defendant replevied with her left hand, tripped us up, and tumbled into the dripping pan. Now, in Broughton's Reports, SI(illegible text) versus Smallwood, it is said that primus strocus sine joy absolutus est provokus; now, who gave the primus Strocus who gave the first offence? Why, the cook; she brought the dripping-pan there; for, my Lord, though we will all have if we had not been there we could not have been thrown down there; yet, my Lord, if the dripping-pan had not been there for us to have tumbled down into, we could not have tumbled down into the dripping-pan.".

The next counsel on the same side began with,"Lord, he who makes use of many words to no purpose, he had not much to say for himself; therefore I shall come to a point at once, and immediately I shall come to the point. My client was in liquor; the liquor in him having served ejectment upon his understanding, common sense was nonsuitable and he was a man beside himself, as Dr. Biblibus declares, that his Dissertation upon Bumpers. In the 130th folio volume and the Abridgment of the Statutes, page 1286, he says, that a drunken man is homo duplicans, or a double man, not or because he sees things double, but also because he is not as he should be, perfecto ipse he, but is, as he should not be defecto tipse he."

The counsel on the other side rose up gracefully, playing with his ruffles prettily, and tossing the tyes of his wig about emphatically. He began with, "My Lud, and you gentlemen of the jury, I humbly do conceive I have the authority to declare, that I am counsel in this case for the defendant therefore, my Lud, I shall not flourish away in words; words are no more than filagree work. Some people may think them an embellishment, but to me it is a matter of astonishment how any one can be so impertinent to the detriment of all rudiment; but, my Lud, this is not to be looked through the medium of right and wrong; for the law knows no medium, and right and wrong are but its shadows. Now in the first place, they have called my client's premises kitchen. Now, a kitchen is nobody's premises; a kitchen is not a warehouse nor a washhouse; a brewhouse nor a bakehouse; an outhouse nor an innhouse, nor a dwelling house ​or any house; no, my Lud, 'tis absolutely and bona fide, neither more nor less than a kitchen; or, as the law more basically expresses, a kitchen is, camera necessaria pro usus (illegible text)keree, cum saucepannis, stew pannis, scullero, dressero, coal(illegible text), stovis smokejacko, pro rostandum, boilandum, fryandum, et (illegible text) puddings, mixandum, pro turtle soupes, calve's head hashi(illegible text), cum calipee et calipashibus. But we shall not avail ourselves of an alibi, but admit of the existence of a cook-maid; y, my Lud, we shall take it upon a new ground, and beg few trial, for as they have enrtailed our name, from plain (illegible text)ry into Moll, I hope the Court will not allow of this; for they were to allow of mistakes, what would the law do? For when the law don't find mistakes, it is the business of the law to make them." Therefore the Court allowed them the liberty of a new trial; for the law is our liberty, and it is happy for us that we have the liberty to go to law.