Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The SearchlightHolt, Mathew Joseph
General
Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight
Holt, Mathew Joseph
Fiction
"When I was young, and began the practice of law, there were lawyers at
the bar in this State and real Judges occupied the bench. There was Clay
and Crittenden and Judge Robinson and Judge Underwood. Now who have we?
Such lawyers as John Calhoun Saylor and such judges as Saylor will make
when elected;--The Lord save us!"
* * * * *
At the November election Colonel Saylor was elected; but by a very small
majority. He ran more than five thousand votes behind the head of the
ticket, and in a district where little scratching is done. The State
ticket pulled him through.
When the returns came in Searcy Chilton, commenting on the race,
concluded his remarks by saying; "Next time we must throw that Jonah
overboard."
A day or two before he qualified, Judge Saylor came to Frankfort, and
visited the courtroom a few minutes after adjournment; he even went up
and tried the chair of the Chief Justice, and found the seat was none
too large. No one was present but Jake, the negro janitor.
"Jake, what do the lawyers and judges have to say about my election?"
"They don't say nothin, Boss; they jest laff."
NIRVANA.
We are told that at one time the British Isles were connected with the
mainland of Europe; that Italy was at least within sight of the African
coast; and that westward from Gibraltar, there was a continent which
ultimately sank beneath the waves, leaving isolated mountain peaks, now
islands and shoals, to mark its submerged position.
The Egyptian priesthood told Solon of the greatness of the civilization
of this submerged land, Atlantis or Kami, even then, as of an ancient
past; and Homer, Horace and Plato have whispered of its greatness.
The soul of one of its ancient inhabitants, yet wandering upon this
earth, may through transmigration have become in part your own, and you,
in reverie at odd hours and in company with it, live again a few scenes
of those old days.
* * * * *
Near Winchester, Kentucky, driving out the Lexington turnpike you pass
an old brick farmhouse of ante-bellum days; flanked on the one side by
an old stone springhouse under two spreading elms and on the other by a
large tobacco barn that looks extremely modern and out of place. Behind
the house is an orchard of ancient apple and pear trees, all dead at the
top, a negro cabin beside which are two black heart cherry trees, higher
than the farmhouse and more than three feet through; and yet farther
back, hemp and tobacco fields and a woodland pasture of oak and walnut
trees. At least this was a description of my home thirty years ago.
I had just graduated from Center College, and having in mind to practice
law in Lexington, had during the summer formed the habit of going down
to the springhouse and under the shade of its eaves and the overhanging
elms, sit and read Kent's Commentaries.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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