Montour American. (Danville, Pa.) 1866-1920, 1906-11-15
SLIPS OF NOVELISTS
LEGAL MISTAKES THAT HAVE BEEN
MADE BY GREAT AUTHORS.

Dickens and the Famous Case of
BnrdeII Versus sPickuIck-The Trial
Scene In Reade's Hard Cash"
TroIIope's Dip Into the Law.
Legal fictions," says one Of Giibert's
gondOiierS, are solemn things" Yet
It IS curious how seldom novelist
ventures into law court without drly.
Ing his quill through acts of parliament
and rules OF law alike.
That Dickens knowledge of law, like
Nj Weller's of London, was "exten.
sive aud peculiar" is amply demon
strated by the famous Gaze of Bardel
versus Pickwick Students Of that re-
port may have been struck by the fact
that neither plaintiff nor defendant ap-
peared in the witness box. The eX.
PLANTATION is that at that time parties
upon the record" were not competent
witnesses. their interest In the case be-
ing regarded as too strong tempta-
ton to. shall we say, inaccuracy. But
had Dickens been lawyer Mr.. Wrinkle
and his friends might also have been
spared the ordeal of cross examination
and their friends and admirers de-
prived of many merry moments.
In his anxiety to satirlZe the abuses
of cross examination Dickens over
looked the legal rule that the counsel
who calls q witness Is not permitted to
cross examine him at all, but, on the
contrary, Is bound by his answers;
! therefore had Serjeant BuZfuz permit
| ted the Pickwickians to be called as
| witnesses for the plaintiff (Which he
would have known better than to do)
| their version of the words heard
! through the door ION the jar" must
have been accepted, and at the first at
tempt to badger either Of them It would
have been the learned counsel for the
plaintiff who received his lordship's In
| junction "to be careful
But all lovers Of Dickens will rejoice
at his ignorance Of the rule which
forces counsel never to call hostile
witness. Who could bear to be depriv-
ed Of the evidence Of Mr.. Samuel We'll
ler?
Exactly the same mistake is made by
Anthony Trollope In his well known
novel, The Three Clerks" There the
hero, Alaric Tudor, IS placed upon his
trial for misappropriating trust money
| and defended by that famous leader,
Mr.. Chaffanbrass of the Old Bailey.
Tudor's Mephistopheles, the Hon. Tn
| decimus Scott, is Gale. much against
his will, as a witness for the defense,
cross examined by the celebrated Chat
| fanbrass, forced to confess his mis-
deeds and dismissed covered with
| ignominy, TO be subsequently expelled
| from his club-poetic justice which
would have been defeated even hy a
chairman Of quarter sessions.
The great theoretical and practical
| knowledge Of law possessed by Charles
Reade saved him from this error, as
| from many others. Yet the famous
| trial scene in Hard Cash would have
been ruthlessly deprived Of its most
dramatic moment by any judge of the
| high court When the hapless Alfred
Hardy. who has been wrongfully i'm
| prisoned in an asylum by his wicked
| father, comes at last to establish his
sanity before jury. his case i cl3f2d
| by the reading of q IL q" f"om his
dead sister Writing 1T the point of
| death, she soi2Iuiy denies his insanity
and begs him to show her words to his
accuscrS when she is no more Read
| aloud by the Judge himself, her letter
reduces a crowded court TO tears and
| goes far 10 secure her brother Il trum-
| phant verdict. with heavy damages.
Hard Cash il termed "a matter Of
| fact romance" hut. as Il matter of fact
| ana law. no such letter could have been
received IN evidence Knowing that,
| under ordinary circumstances. such
| testimony would be ;n.,dmiSsible,
Reade is careful to establish that the
writer knew herself = he dying: but
he was unaware that dying declara-
| ton" * only admissible in evidence
| upon Il charge of murder or man
slaughter of the person who has made
| it, and cannot be laid before the jury
| in any other case whatever.
Numerous and entertaining are the
| trial scenes which adorn the works of
| Mrs. Henry Wood but they hardly pro
| fess to be strictly accurate. Let me
point rather To an interesting slip on
| the part of that most careful of nov
| elists. David Christie Murray. who
| shares TO some extent the popular con-
| fusion on ;he subject OF the law OF
| libel and SANDER. His powerful story,
A Capful o Nails" has for its hero
q working mailer, who becomes an
| agitator on behalf of his much op-
| pressed class. In consequence of a
| speech denouncing an unscrupulous
employer he is prosecuted on a charge
Of criminal libel but, thanks to a faith
| full friend and II smart lawyer he
energies triumphantly.
No fault can be found in this case
with the way in which the villain is
cross examined to pieces. The diti1-
Guilty Is that no such prosecution could
have been Instituted at all. You may
slander d man by defamatOry speech,
but to libel him you mIst write, print
or otherwise permanently record" your
defamation of him, and, though SIAN
der and libel alike mag expose you to
an action for damages, 1t is libel alone
that can bring you within the grasp Of
the criminal law
1t is difficult to uphold this distinc-
ton. A libel Is regarded as public
crime as well as private wrong be-
cause 1t tends to provoke breach of
the peace, but one would think as
much might he said Of slander. Still
the distinction exists, and the ag-
gressor who confines his attack &c
words may suffer in purse. but not in
person.
Such are few OF the slips to which
the novels is liable who unwarily
trasnasSaS unnn lppal nrpsarVpS Pear.