THE late Robert D. Holmes, once a leading criminal lawyer in New York city, had peculiar views as to selecting a jury. He was an ap proved gastronome, and one of his questions to a juror who had been called for examination as to his qualifications, would be, " What did you breakfast upon this morning?" If the juror answered, for instance, sausage or pork chop, or anything else that Holmes thought indigest ible, he would peremptorily challenge such juror. Said Holmes, when chaffed about it, "I do not care so much about preconceived opinions of a juror, because good evidence and a good argument can change opinions; but I do not choose to submit the life or liberty of a client to the brain of a man whose stomach is clogged with indigestible or brutalizing food." In an important case he would always procure a copy of the jury panel and personally enquire into the habits, mode of life and peculiarities of each juror from his intimates or neighbors. Mr. Holmes was unusually successful in his cases, and he was by no means a deeply read lawyer, but an exemplar of Lord Bacon's saying that "tact in a barrister often outvied learning."
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this : Longevity and happiness depend upon what you put in your stomach and what gets in your mind." A STORY is told of the late Hall McAllister, who, while eminently brilliant in all other re spects, was not particularly endowed with that stern business sense that shows the more prac tical man how many cents go to make a dollar. Well, it' occurred to McAllister, shortly before his death, that it would be a good idea to pur chase a memorandum book in which to jot down the items of his daily expenditure. " I can compare notes from day to day," he said, "find out how much I spend, and so learn to regulate my expenditure here and there." So the book was bought. After the great lawyer's death, his executors while going over his effects came across the book. Interested to know how far successful McAllister had been in "regulating his expenditures," they opened the book to find this, the sole item contained therein: "To one memorandum book, 250."
LITERARY NOTES. SAYS Chauncey Depew : " The law promotes longevity. It is because its discipline improves the physical, the mental and the moral condi tions of its practitioner. In other words, it gives him control over himself, and a great phil osopher has written that he who could command himself is greater than he who has captured a city. The world has been seeking for all time the secrets of longevity and happiness. If they can be united, then we return to the conditions of Methuselah and his compatriots. Whether I may live to their age I know not, but I think I have discovered the secret of Methuselah's happy continuance for nearly 1,000 years upon this planet. He stayed here when we had no steam and no electricity, no steamers upon the river or the ocean propelled by this mighty power, no electric light, no railways spanning the continent, no overhead wires and no cables under the ocean communicating intelligence around the world, and no trolley lines reducing the redundant population. He lived, not be cause he was free from the excitements incident to the age of steam and electricity, but because of the secret which I have discovered, and it is
THE September NEW LIPPIXCOTT MAGAZINE publishes complete one of the cleverest society novels of the year. It is called " The Dissemblers." The author, Thomas Cobb, is an Englishman who is much appreciated abroad, and his transatlantic suc cess is likely to be repeated in America. So feelingly does he write about Penelope Darnley and her lov ers that one feels a suspicion that he may have per sonated one of the lovers himself—but which one? Besides the complete novel there are short stories by Rev. Cyrus Townsend Brady, Cy Warman and R. V. Risley. No historian of the w^r has a higher standing than Major-General Jacob D. Cox, one of the lead ing actors in it, and at one time Secretary of the Interior under Grant, who is to contribute two im portant papers of military reminiscences to SCRIBNER'S this fall. His first article in the September number is on "The Chickamauga Crisis" when Grant was placed in command and Rosecrans re lieved. This article makes clear a much misunder stood episode in the great civil war. THE September number of THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY contains several articles of surpassing and timely interest. Noticeable among these is
