The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1893-03-17
Riscellanepl1s.
SHARP PRACTICE.

There is a lawyer in the temple
whom | shall take the liberty of term
ing J. Wellington Blk. That is moi
his name. | merely call him SO fol
the purposes of this narrative, for as
far as can find out, there is no such
temple, and l say at the beginnin4
that if there is any man of that title
he is not the man | mean. give the
name Blk, as it were, without pre-
judice,n so as to protect myself from
possible legal complications, for one
must be very careful when he speaks
of lawyers.
Mr.. Blk possesses much law and lit
tie money. This may seem strange
for our idea of q lawyer in the temple
| is that he has more cases than he can
attend to, and that he rolls in wealth.
Nevertheless, the thing state is true;
there are lawyers in this world who
have hard struggle for existence.
One of the disadvantages of being a
lawyer who is not getting ON is that
he has to dress well, and unless per-
son knows how to dodge his tailor,
dressing well costs money. 1t may
seem needles extravaganza to pay a
tailor, but unfortunately, gentlemen
of the cloth do not look upon it in that
! light, and they are sometimes persist
ent in demanding their money, es-
pecially if they suspect their customer
| is poor.
Mr. Blk kept encouraging his tailor
| by ordering more clothes than he ac-
tually needed. This is good plan as
long as it works, but it breaks down
after a time, and, like the indulging
in stimulants, leaves the victim with
the original trouble worse than it was
at first.
At last things came to crisis. Mr..
Hemms, the tailor, said that if he did
| not at least get some money on account
he would sue Mr. Blk for the whole
amount Mr.. Blk pondered long over
the tailor's letter, while in England
you may take what action you please,
you are not allowed to threaten, and
| the lawyer thought he could perhaps
| twist the epistle into a threatening
letter within the meaning of the act
but, unfortunately, the tailor had
been there before. His note was
couched in the most polite and con-
! ciliatory terms 1t was only by read
ing between the lines that anything
| like threat could be seen. Never
| theless, it was quite evident what the
tailor's intentions were, and Mr. Blk
felt that he could not afford to be
| brought into court over the matter.
1t would at once dispel the fiction that
he had a large and lucrative practice
"a fiction he was anxious should not
be interfered with by any cold display
of fact.
OF course, it was daring and cour-
| ageous thing for tailor to intimate
that he would bring Il lawyer into
| court. This was, indeed, fighting the
devil with fire. Let no one say after
| this that it takes nine tailors to make
a man.
Although the scheme of the tailor
| was magnificent, it was not war. 1t
was not to be expected that any mere
tailor could tread the slippery path of
legal knowledge and keep step with u
! lawyer Mr.. Blk remembered an
act or two relating to tailors, and he
looked them up. He also ferrete1
out some precedents bearing on the
case, and in good old England, when
you can find a precedent, you are all
right. He wrote to Mr.. Hemms, ask
ing him to call personally at his cham
bers in the temple at certain hour.
Mr.. Hemms was there, prompt to the
| minute, and had some faint hopes he
| would see at least little money, not
realizing the impossibility of remov-
| ing certain garments he was in the
| habit of making, from the person of II
highlandman.
'Sit down, Mr.. Hemms,n said Blk,
affably ''it may take some time to
settle this little matter"
"lf you pay me something on ac-
count" said Hemms, Il am willing to
let the balance stand over for the
present"
"Quite so. The proposition does
you honor, Mr. Helnms, and shows
that you have no desire to press your
customer as hard as you do the rliment
| he wears. Unfortunately, it is incon-
venient for me at the moment to pay
even the little on account
SIN that case" said Mr.. Hemms, 81
will be reluctantly obliged to take
proceedings"
Exactly. / gathered as much from
from your most courteous note. Now,
to do so with any chance of success
you will need legal advice. | beg to
offer my services in the matter, and l
think | will do as we'll by you as any
other; better, perhaps, for l under
stand all about the case"
Impossible. You could not appear
against yourself"
my dear sir, you have evidently
little conception of the length a law
yer is willing to go for the love of the
profession, and incidentally for the
fees appertaining thereto. Why pay
good money to another lawyer, when
l will be quite willing to undertake
your case for las you say a little
money down, taking the rest out in
trade ?''
Mr.. Hemms was stricken dumb by
the proposal.
being certain that so amicable an
arrangement would commend itself to
you the moment it was presented i'll
its full advantage, have taken the
trouble to look up the law on the sub
iect, and will without further parley
let you know just where you stand.
You are doubtless aware that there
have been a number of acts passed in
relation to tailoring which l think
will tend to make our negotiations ex
ceedingly simple. For instance, there
was an act passed in the reign of Will
liam and Mary which made it illegal
for a tailor to sew cloth buttons Oh a
suit. The penalty is forty shillings
for every hall dozen buttons he uses,
besides the forfeiture of the goods.
But you were, of course, cognizant of
this before you threatened the law on
a lawyer"
81 never heard of such an outra-
geous act. 1t is certainly not the law
now"
"Ah, there you are wrong, and that
shows the advantage of having the
best legal assistance. 1t would ill be-
come us, Mr.. Hemms, to characterize
the wisdom of our ancestors as outra-
geous. There are many many things
pertaining to the law that may not
commend themselves to thelay mind.
"Do you mean to say that act has
never been repealed ?h