things, when he induces her to enter into the business of keeping boarders and promises to let her have all the proceeds, he is allowed to keep his promise if she keeps the boarders. It would seem that the law ought to tolerate him in being faithful to his word in such a matter, even though he has pledged it only to his wife, and we think it does.

McNaught v. Anderson, 78 Ga. 503.

In the ornithology of litigation this case is a tomtit furnished with a garb of feathers ample enough for a turkey. Measured by the verdict, its tiny body has only the bulk of $25, but it struts with a display of record expanded into 83 pages of manuscript. It seems to us that a more contracted plumage might serve for a small bird, but perhaps we are mistaken. In every forensic season we have a considerable flock of such cases, to be stripped and dissected for the cabinets of jurisprudence. We endeavor to pick our overfledged poultry with judicial assiduity and patience.

HENRY CLAY

Lukens v. Ford, 87 Ga. 542.

CLAY could tell an anecdote in a captivating way. There was a freedom, a sweep, an elegance in his anecdotal style which was irresistible. One of the anecdotes he was fond of telling related to an incident which occurred in Kentucky when he was abroad, in 1814, acting as Commissioner in negotiating the treaty of Ghent. He used to tell the story for the purpose of illustrating how readily and triumphantly a Kentucky stump speaker could encounter an emergency and surmount an obstacle. Clay, while abroad, was in the habit of writing letters to his friends at home giving them an account of the progress of the negotiation of the treaty. When a letter from him arrived in Lexington, the news of its reception would be circulated, and his neighbors would assemble to hear it read. In one of his letters, which was read to an outdoor crowd by a veteran politician, Clay used the phrase sine qua non several times. At the third repetition of the phrase, an old man, wearing a hunting shirt, who stood on the edge of the crowd, called out to the reader:

"Say, Gineral, what's siner quer non ?"

The "Gineral" had no idea what the phrase meant, but he was one of the kind who are always equal to the occasion, and elevating his voice to its utmost pitch, he shouted:

"Sine qua non is an island in Passamaquoddy Bay, and Henry Clay goes for Sine qua non!”

This declaration was received with enthusiastic applause, and Henry Clay's great reputation among his neighbors as a patriotic and unflinching upholder of his country's rights against Great Britain became greater than ever.

SHORTLY after the agitation of the famous compensation bill in Congress, Clay, who voted in favor of the bill, found a formidable opposition arrayed against his re-election. After addressing the people from the hustings, previous to the opening of the poll, he stepped down into the crowd, when he met an old and influential friend of his named Scott, one of the first settlers of Kentucky, and of course, in his younger days, a great huntsman. The gentleman, stepping up, addressed Clay as follows: "Well, well, Harry, I've been with you in six troubles-I'm sorry I must desert you in the seventh; you have voted for that miserable compensation bill--I must now turn my back upon you.' "Is it so, friend Scott? Is this the only objection?" "It is." "We must get over it the best way we can. You are an old huntsman ?" "Yes." "You have killed many a fat bear and buck?" "Yes." "I believe you have a good rifle?" "Yes, as good a one as ever cracked.” "Well, did you ever have a fine buck before you when your gun snapped?" "The like of that has happened." "Well now, friend Scott, did you take that faithful rifle and break it to pieces on the very next log you came to―or did you pick the flint and try it again?" The tear stood in the old man's eye -the chord was touched. "No, Harry, I picked the flint and tried her again--and I'll try you again—give us your hand." We need scarcely say that the welkin rang with the huzzaing plaudits of the by-standers.-Clay was borne off to the hustings, and re-elected.

PERHAPS Clay's most famous retort was that made to a long-winded congressman who, in the midst of an interminable speech, turned to Clay and said, "You speak for the

present generation, but I speak for posterity." Clay replied: "It seems you are resolved to speak until your audience arrives."

WILLIAM T. HASKELL

JUDGE PHILIP LINDSLEY, of Dallas, Texas, in The TaylorTrotwood Magazine for July, 1908, tells the following anecdote which he heard from the lips of the famous Tennessee orator, William T. Haskell:

A fox-hunting farmer had a favorite hound, and was fond of boasting of his dog's speed. One morning at break of day, he and his friends started a fox, and the dogs went yelling, the favorite in the lead. On they sped, over hills, and across creek and vale, the hunters at last outstripping all the pack, except the favorite dog. He was clear out of sight, but ever and anon they heard the deep bark of the flying hound, and the excitement was at fever pitch. Then they came upon a woodman, cutting down a tree.

"Did you see anything of a dog and fox running by just now?" exclaimed the farmer.

"Yes," said the woodman.

"How were they making it?"

"Oh," said the woodman, "the dog was a leetle ahead!"

PATRICK HENRY

We do not commonly associate humor with Patrick Henry, but few lawyers have had greater skill in turning ridicule to their service. Perhaps the most striking illustration in Henry's career was the celebrated case against John Hook, narrated in Wirt's 'Life of Patrick Henry.' Hook was a Scotchman, a man of wealth, and suspected of being unfriendly to the American cause. During the distresses of the American army, consequent upon the joint invasion of Cornwallis and Phillips in 1781, a Mr. Venable, an army commissary, had taken two of Hook's steers for the use of the troops. The act had not been strictly legal; and on the establishment of peace, Hook, under the advice of Mr. Cowan, a gentleman of some distinction in the law, thought proper to bring an action against Mr. Venable, in the district court of New London. Mr. Henry appeared for the defendant, and is said to have disported him

self in this cause to the infinite enjoyment of his hearers, the unfortunate Hook always excepted. After Mr. Henry became animated in the cause, says a correspondent [Judge Stuart], he appeared to have complete control over the passions of his audience: at one time he excited their indignation against Hook: vengeance was visible in every countenance; again, when he chose to relax and ridicule him, the whole audience was in a roar of laughter. He painted the distresses of the American army, exposed almost naked to the rigor of a winter's sky, and marking the frozen ground over which they marched, with the blood of their unshod feet-"where was the man," he said, "who had an American heart in his bosom, who would not have thrown open his fields, his barns, his cellar, the doors of his house, the portals of his breast, to have received with open arms, the meanest soldier in that little band of patriots? Where is the man? There he stands -but whether the heart of an American beats in his bosom, you, gentlemen, are to judge." He then carried the jury, by the powers of his imagination, to the plains around Yorktown, the surrender of which had followed shortly after the act complained of: he depicted the surrender in the most glowing and noble colors of his eloquence—the audience saw before their eyes the humiliation and dejection of the British, as they marched out of their trenches-they saw the triumph which lighted up every patriot face, and heard the shouts of victory, and the cry of "Washington and Liberty!" as it rang and echoed through the American ranks, and was reverberated from the hills and shores of the neighboring river— "but, hark!, what notes of discord are these which disturb the general joy, and silence the acclamations of victory? They are the notes of John Hook, hoarsely bawling through the American camp, beef! beef! beef!"

The whole audience was convulsed: a particular incident will give a better idea of the effect, than any general description. The clerk of the court, unable to command himself, and unwilling to commit any breach of decorum in his place, rushed out of the court-house, and threw himself on the grass, in the most violent paroxysm of laughter, where he was rolling, when Hook, with very different feelings, came out for relief into the yard also. "Jemmy Steptoe," said he to the

Mr. Steptoe was only "Never mind ye," said

clerk, "what the devil ails ye, mon?" able to say, that he could not help it. Hook, "wait till Billy Cowan gets up: he'll show him the la'." Mr. Cowan, however, was so completely overwhelmed by the torrent which bore upon his client, that when he rose to reply to Mr. Henry, he was scarcely able to make an intelligible remark. The cause was decided almost by acclamation. The jury retired for form's sake, and instantly returned with a verdict for the defendant. Nor did the effect of Mr. Henry's speech stop here. The people were so highly excited by the tory audacity of such a suit, that Hook began to hear around him a cry more terrible than that of beef; it was the cry of tar and feathers: from the application of which, it is said, nothing saved him but a precipitate flight.

THE following exchange of notes is said to have taken place between Governor William B. Giles, of Virginia, and Patrick Henry:

"Sir, I understand that you have called me a bob-tail politician. I wish to know if it be true; and if true, your meaning. Wm. B. GILES.”

To which Henry replied:

"Sir, I do not recollect having called you a bob-tail politician at any time, but think it probable I have. Not recollecting the time or occasion, I can't say what I did mean; but if you will tell me what you think I meant, I will say whether you are correct or not.

MR. MILES O. SHERRILL, State Librarian of North Carolina, in "The Methodist Handbook' for 1906, relates the following stories of Rev. Peter L. Herman, a former Methodist minister of the State:

"Rev. Peter L. Herman was full of good humor; he used to relate a case where imagination dominated the mind. A Mr. Jones was a pronounced hypochondriac, and claimed that his stomach was all gashed up as if by pieces of glass. He an