him. ' Oh, Mr. O'Brien,' said he, ' I did not think you meant to charge me for those horses. Come, now, my dear friend, why should I pay you for them?' 'Upon my word that's curious talk,' retorted Denis, in a tone of defiance; 'I'd like to know why your Lordship should not pay me for them? ' To this inquiry, of course, a reply was im possible; all the judge had for it was to hold his peace and pay the money." O'Connell thought that the Irish bar had no such wit as Curran, but that other mem bers of the bar participated in a large de gree in the laughter-stirring quality. " As for myself, to the last hour of my practice at the bar I kept the court alternately in tears and in roars of laughter. Plunket had great wit. He was a creature of exquisite genius. Nothing could be happier than his hit in reply to Lord Redesdale about kites. In a speech before Redesdale (then Lord Chancellor of Ireland) Plunket had occasion to use the word ' kites ' very frequently as de signating fraudulent bills and promissory notes. Lord Redesdale, to whom the phrase was quite new, at length interrupted him, sayfng, ' I don't quite understand your meaning, Mr. Plunket. In England kites are paper playthings used by boys; in Ire land they seem to mean some species of monetary transaction.' ' There is another difference, my Lord,' said Plunket; 'in England the wind raises the kites, in Ireland the kites raise the wind.' Curran was once defending an attorney's bill of costs before Lord Clare. ' Here now,' said Clare, ' is a flagitious imposition; how can you defend this item, Mr. Curran?' 'To writing innu merable letters £oo! ' Why, my Lord,' said Curran, ' nothing can be more reason
able. It is not a penny a letter.' And Curran's reply to Judge Robinson is exquis ite in its way. ' I'll commit you, sir,' said the Judge. ' I hope you 'll never commit a worse thing, my Lord,' retorted Curran. Wilson Croker, too, had humor. When the crier wanted to expel the dwarf O'Leary, who was about two feet four inches high, from the jury box in Tralce, Croker said, ' Let him stay where he is; De minimis nou curat lex.' And when Tom Goolde got re tainers from both sides, ' Keep them both, said Croker, ' you may conscientiously do so. You can be counsel for one side and of use to the other.'" "I remember," said O'Connell, " being counsel at a special commission in Kerry against a Mr. S.; and, having occasion to press him somewhat hard in my speech, he jumped up in the court and called me ' a purseproud blockhead.' I said to him, ' In the first place, I have got no purse to be proud of; and, secondly, if I be a block head, it is better for you as the counsel against you. However, just to save you the trouble of saying so again, I'll adminis ter a slight rebuke.' Whereupon I whacked him soundly on the back with the president's cane. Next day he sent me a chal lenge, but very shortly after he wrote to me to state that, since he had challenged me, he had discovered that my life was inserted in a valuable lease of his. ' Under these circumstances,' he continued, ' I cannot af ford to shoot you unless as a precautionary measure you first insure your life for my benefit. If you do, then heigh for powder and ball, I'm your man.' Now this seems so ludicrously absurd that it is almost incredible, yet it is literally true." — The Law Times.
