There was a company promoter from London, who had induced several people to take shares in a bogus concern, and was consequently defendant in an action brought against him in Cork.

He thought he would make an impression on the wild Irish by being overdressed and gorgeously bejewelled.

When Murphy arose to address the jury, he said:—­

’Gentlemen of the jury, look at the well-tailored impostor without a rag of honesty to take the gloss off his new clothes.’

Another counsel in the case was Mr. Byrne.  He was always in impecunious circumstances despite his legal eloquence, but the lack of a balance at his banker’s never troubled him.

Once he took Chief Justice Whiteside to see his new house in Dublin, which he had furnished in sumptuous style.

‘Don’t you think I deserve great credit for this?’ he asked at length.

‘Yes,’ retorted Whiteside, ‘and you appear to have got it.’

Lord Justice Christian, who had declined to sit on the Appeal, was considered one of the soundest opinions in Ireland.  When he ceased to be sole Judge of Appeal, he had addressed the Bar after this fashion:—­

’As this is the last time I sit as sole Judge of Appeal, it is an opportune time for me to review my decisions.  By a curious coincidence, I have been thirteen years in this Court, and I have decided thirteen cases which have been taken to the House of Lords.  Eleven of my decisions were confirmed, one appeal was withdrawn, and the last was a purely equity case.  The two equity lords went with me, the two common law lords were against me, and when I inform the Bar that my judgment was reversed on the casting vote of Lord O’Hagan, I do not think they will attach much importance to the decision.’

Judge Christian’s allusion to the Land Act is most noteworthy, for he said:—­

’The property of the country is confided to the discretion of certain roving commissioners without any fixed rules to guide and direct them.  In fact, we have reverted to the primitive state of society, where men make and administer the laws in the same breath.’

Reverting to the Harenc estate, a rather amusing account was once perpetrated by a Special Commissioner.

‘Never heard tell of Ballybunion?’ said his carman to the journalist as on the road they met the carts laden with sand and seaweed from that place.  ’Why it’s a great place intirely in the season, when quality from all parts come for the sea-bathing.’

As he evidently regarded it as the first watering-place in the world, the Special Commissioner thought he had better see the place, and here is his description:—­

’A village perched on the summit of a cliff, an ancient castle of the Fitz-Maurice clan, wonderful caves, and a little hotel are the leading features of the place.

’The morning after my arrival, I experienced a wish to see the cliffs and caves, and no sooner were the words spoken than a figure bearing an unlit torch appeared at the door.