Horse Trials
:
Laws And Lawyers.
In the art of cross-examining a witness, Curran was
pre-eminent. A clever repartee is recorded of him in a horse cause. He had
asked the jockey's servant his master's age, and the man had retorted, with
ready gibe, "I never put my hand into his mouth to try!" The laugh was
against the lawyer till he made the bitter reply,--"You did perfectly
right, friend; for your master is said to be a great bite."
Erskine displayed similar readiness in a case of breach of warranty. The
horse taken on trial had become dead lame, but the witness to prove it said
he had a cataract in his eye. "A singular proof of lameness," suggested the
Court. "It is cause and effect," remarked Erskine; "for what is a cataract
but a fall?"