The San Francisco call., 1908-03-08


that with women to lie is primal in
stincte"
For fraction OF a second the smile
became noisy.
NO. A primal privation." A sus-
picious sound came from the desk at
which the clerk wGs sitting. gazed
in his direction reprnvingiy. but his
face war as exp.a~ainn'ess as the covers
OF Blackstone. l turned again to his
honor, whose pen wss seeking the note
paper in front OF him,
You think the apple. then. was re-
sponsible originally for woman's ly-
ing?"
"It originated with fear-and her
subjection to man.
Not tn man. / corrected. "to the
snake. But. jesting aside. judge, what
do you really think OF women on the
witness stand? -
Judge Coffev slowly. solemnly shook
his gray old head.
"A burnt child breads the fire." Re
said, and this time the smile wore off
II said three words once and they
wrote three columns about 1t in the
newspapers"
Say three words now that I can
make three columns out OF. You
haven't given me even paragraph
yet
But the white head turned slowly
from side to side, and then, vaguely
there came to my memory q story of
several years back when the judge. In
a moment Of irritability during trial.
had remarked gonewhet acidly upon
the veracity of q woman witness. and
her lawyer. Mrs. Clara Foltz, had re-
torted in defense of iaer sex. The con-
yersation itself haG been brief. but by
the time the reporter who was present
had written it up it was enlarged to
three columns.
"I had 1t all pasted in my scrapbook,
but it was burned up in the city hall.
It was great conlagration over
there" and the smile crept back to the
kindly humorous face
"StilI. do YOU agree with Colonel
Lewis7" I persisted.
"No. It's not the sex IT'S the indi-
vidual" ard he returned to his letter
with resigned air. as though he had
been trapped and must stand the COM
sequences, even though they reached
once more to three columns.
Judge Hunt was very frank and
treated the subject inspartially.
My experience has been that women
are not as good witnesses as men," he
said They are too impulsive, and In
tense partisans even when not liti-
gants They are apt to treat impress
sions as facts, and are very positive
bic to guess and their interest some
times colors their testimony. They
drag in hearsay evidence instead OF
confining their testimony to their own
knowledge and observation. They are
too talkative, but for that matter 30
are lawyers. AS witnesses they are in
the same category, except that lawyers
ought to know better. They know per-
fectly well that answers that are not
concise weaken testimony and leave 1t
open for assault. But to say that
women are not as truthful as men is
absurd I'VE always found, even in se-
vAre1y contested divorce cases, where
the feeling is extremely bitter and the
temptation TO lie very strong, that
women have as much regard for the
truth as men. And IL woman is
fighting to retain the custody of her
children she may lie to me ,up hill and
down dale and I'll respect her for 1t,
for mother love is the most beautiful
thing on earth and the woman who
still possesses 1t, in spite of every
thing, has much good In her."
I left the Grant building and took
a car for the office of Samuel M.
shortridge, after interrupting Judge
Graham just long enough to ask him
IL he agreed with Colonel ]. Hamilton
Lewis He did not. "A woman is
quite as truthful witness In my opin-
ion," said he, 'as man. II any
thing. think she has more regard for
returned to his task OF reconciling a
man and a woman to q life from
which the glamour of love had fed.
Mr.. Shortridge was in his office, and
smiled geniaIiy when I told him why
had come