The quarrel grew. B said he would not share in the item; A said he must, as it was a partnership transaction. B said he didn't care. A said he would sue him in Court. B said, "Very well, sue me." So each went off to get a pleader. In due time the case came into Court, but what a case! Each side had considered that if he had got to fight he had better get all the weapons he could, so he raked up everything he could think of. It was a duel, you see, wherein each side fought not to settle the little point at issue, but for victory--any kind of victory he could get. Each side stirred up every sleeping dog of war he could find, resuscitated and galvanised dead dogs, made up imitation dogs, and came to battle. The issues finally framed covered several years' transactions, and the evidence included forged documents and quantities of perjury. Both sides were ruined. That is what comes of making a trial a duel. Each side fights for victory, to save his _amour propre_, and to wound the enemy wherever he can. The original cause of difference is quite lost. Now that case is typical of many. It is illustrative of human nature all the world over. If you awake the fighting instinct you cannot confine the parties to the original seat of war; they will urge the attack wherever they are likely to win. They cannot go to the judge in the beginning as to a friend of both parties who will inquire into the cause of difference himself and find a reasonable settlement, because judges are not intended to do that. Therefore parties do not go to Court at all until they have determined to fight it out. The case does not come to Court till matters are hopeless. You may say they should or could have gone to an arbitrator. Do people anywhere in the world trust an unofficial arbitrator? There is a provision in Upper Burma allowing reference to arbitration, but it is a dead letter. The original dispute in this case was about twenty or thirty rupees, the alleged excess paid for the goods. The suit filed was for several thousand rupees in transactions spread over years: there was an equally heavy counterclaim. The total value of the suits filed in Burma in 1910 was about £1,380,000. I wonder what the value was of the matters first in dispute before the cases came to Court. A fifth, I dare say, would cover them. I notice much the same thing in England. Human nature does not differ East or West. Now consider the enormous expense of all this. The value of the subject-matter of suits filed in Burma in 1910 was, as I have said, £1,380,000. The value of the matters really in dispute before they came to Court was infinitely less, but Court fees and lawyers' fees had to be paid on the full amount. Witnesses in thousands were called to prove matters that should never have come into Court at all. And with what result?