Humors of the English fury Box.
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To every rule there is an exception; and juror replied with the following " Irishism" : I suppose there are satisfactory jurors, who "He's living in the same house as I am. joyfully look forward to the happy day when He 's been dead about a year." " That 's not they will be called upon to do their duty to true," added another voice, " he 's in the the State, and to justify the assertion put lunatic asylum. Wouldn't he like to be forward by the authors of the Magna Charta here! "(Sometimes, alas, we fear that he is.) An unusual plea for exemption from jury who insisted so positively that juries were service was made some fifteen years ago at the bulwark of the people's liberty. Such a person was a certain Louis Ellis, the Old Bailey, when a juror pathetically bewho answered " Here " when the roll was seeched the presiding judge (the Common called at a City of London Court a couple of Sergeant) to excuse him because he weighed years ago. Twice was the roll of fourteen twenty-three stone (322 pounds), and could names read out, and twice did the fourteen not possibly get through the door into the items of the bulwark answer to their names, jury-box. In complying with the request the though not all so pleasantly as did Louis judge remarked: "It is a weighty reason." Ellis. Once again was the list recited, while The same might have been said by the judge the fourteen wondered, as indeed did the who allowed the juror to be exempt from ser reader, and well he might, for thirteen men vice on the ground that he was very anxious answered to fourteen surnames, and " con to attend a funeral. The feelings of the judge when he learned after granting the re tempt " seemed rampant. Eventually it was discovered that Louis quest that the applicant was an undertaker, Ellis was a woman, and a justly enraged can be left to the imagination of the reader. "Well, I don't intend to sign the verdict," woman, too, when told that her name was not " Louis Ellis," and that her services said a juror at an inquest. And turning to were not required. Said the fair jury-woman the coroner, he added : " Can 't you give me to the officer : " You said, ' Does Louis Ellis a day's shooting? " And then, apropos of the live here? ' and I answered ' Yes,' and you official salary : " If I was paid ten pounds a week, I 'd 'ave some good 'unting' for my handed me the paper." And when the offi cer, having got all the worst of the encounter, friends, I would." It is with pleasant interludes repeated that she need not stay, she retorted : such as this that the dull round of a coroner's "Oh, don't think I want to serve. I 've been existence is enlivened in England. He must blessing this job of having to come here and be either a physician or a lawyer (solicitor), waste my time, instead of cooking my hus and as a rule, outside the large cities, his pro band's dinner 1 " And yet from the charac fessional work is small. In the higher courts ter of the protestations one is disposed to the jurymen (this word in Great Britain is think that the lady was a little disappointed more common than " jurors ") are usually re quired to reserve their energies for the ver at not being allowed to serve. In the City of London Court, a court for dict, although it is true that in the celebrated the trial of unimportant cases involving small baccarat case a juror who insisted upon exam sums of money, — the pleas for exemption ining the then Prince of Wales extracted from have become so numerous that it is difficult the royal witness some valuable testimony. The great desire of " the gentlemen of the to secure a jury, and laughter often fills the court when the various excuses are heard. jury " to pose as humorists is always ap Once, upon a name being called, a fellow parent, and in addition, unconscious humor
