Beadle's Dime National Speaker, Embodying Gems of Oratory and Wit, Particularly Adapted to American Schools and Firesides: Speaker Series Number 2, Revised and Enlarged Edition
General
Beadle's Dime National Speaker, Embodying Gems of Oratory and Wit, Particularly Adapted to American Schools and Firesides: Speaker Series Number 2, Revised and Enlarged Edition
Recitations
Nine o'clock. Couldn't see much of any thing. Concluded I must be
sun-struck. Thought I would go home. Saw an omnibus, and thought I
would get in. Turned out to be one of Swartz's what-d'ye-call-it.
Tried another, and got in. Went home in a coal cart. Think eclipses
are humbugs, besides making people have headaches.
THE BEAUTIES OF THE LAW.
[Recited in the character of Counsellor Quirk.]
Farmer A. and Farmer B. were good neighbors. Farmer A. was seized or
possessed of a white bull; Farmer B. was seized or possessed of, or
otherwise well entitled to, a ferry-boat. Farmer B. having made his
boat fast to a post on shore, by means of a piece of hay, twisted
rope-fashion, or, as we say, _vulgato vocto_, a hayband, went up to
town to get his dinner, which was also very natural for a hungry man
to do. In the mean time Farmer A.'s white bull came down to the town
to look for his dinner, which was also very natural for a hungry bull
to do; the said white bull, discovering, seeing, and spying out, some
turnips in the bottom of the ferry-boat, the bull scrambled into the
ferry-boat aforesaid, eat up the turnips, and, to make an end of his
meal, fell to work upon the hay-band. The ferry-boat being ate from
its moorings, floated down the river with the white bull in it: it
struck against a rock, which beat a hole in the bottom of the boat,
and tossed the bull overboard; whereupon, the owner of the bull
brought his action against the boat, for running away with the bull.
The owner of the boat brought his action against the bull, for running
away with the boat; and thus notice of the trial was given, Bullum
_versus_ Boatum--Boatum _versus_ Bullum. Now the counsel for the bull
began with saying: "Your Honor, and you, Gentlemen of the Jury, we
are counsel in this cause for the bull. We are indicted for running
away with the boat. Now, your Honor, your Honor may have heard of
running horses, but never of running bulls before. Now, your Honor,
I humbly submit to your Honor, the bull could no more have run away
with the boat, than a man in a coach may be said to run away with
the horses; therefore, your Honor, how can an action be maintained
against that which is not actionable? How can we punish what is not
punishable? How can we eat what is not eatable? Or, how can we drink
what is not drinkable? Or, as the law says, how can we think on what
is not thinkable? Therefore, your Honor, as we are counsel in this
cause for the bull, if the jury should bring the bull in guilty, the
jury will be guilty of a bull." The learned counsel for the boat, in
the cross-action of Bullum _versus_ Boatum, observed, that the bull
should be nonsuited, because, in his declaration, he had omitted to
state or specify what color he was; for thus wisely and thus learnedly
spoke the counsel: "My Lord, if the bull was of no color he must be of
some color; and if he was not of any color, what color could the bull
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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