CAN A MAN IMPRISON HIS WIFE? (_AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL CONSIDERATION OF THE QUESTION, BY AN EMINENT LEGAL AUTHORITY._) [Illustration: Summing Up.] It may be remembered that (I trust) in deserved acknowledgment of my professional pre-eminence, I received, some little while ago, the appointment of a Deputy-Assistant-Revising-Barristership. In performing the duties of this important office, I sometimes have to incur bodily risk--the more especially when I have to distinguish between the rival claims of the political parties that I am sorry to say have made Lambville-cum-Minton the antithesis of heaven upon earth. On the occasion to which I particularly wish to refer, I was accompanied by my Wife, to my secret annoyance, as I am afraid the Lady who does me the honour to share my name is unduly apprehensive of my safety, and, besides this general plea, I had yet another special reason for desiring her absence. To tell the truth, I had been greatly moved by a decision given in the Court of Appeal, whereby it seemed to me (and no doubt to many of my learned friends) the custody of a wife by her husband had become an empty phrase, signifying nothing. I felt that if, by any means, I could get this judgment set aside, I would not only confer upon myself, as a married man, a signal benefit, but, moreover, as a Counsel, obtain increased professional distinction. However, I was embarrassed by the presence of my Wife, when I came to consider the best mode in which marital authority might be assumed to raise the question of the right of _habeas corpus_. I had returned to my room before the opening of the Registration Court at Lambville-cum-Minton, in rather a disturbed frame of mind. Truth to tell, my Wife, having learned that political feeling was rising so high in the town that it was possible that the Deputy-Assistant-Revising-Barrister might be assaulted by either or both of the rival factions, had done her best to dissuade me from taking my customary seat. "What shall I do, to say nothing of the darling children, if you are brought home on a hurdle?" she sobbed out.