t a
remote farm thereabouts that the trouble first began over which their
Lordships and Sir Rupert, together with innumerable other senior
counsel, junior counsel, solicitors, law reporters, lay reporters,
ushers, and what-nots were so troubling themselves and each other. The
farmer's stack of clover had been destroyed by fire, and the farmer,
feeling that this was rather the affair of the Insurance Company than
himself, had asked for solatium. The Insurance Company asked who set the
stack on fire; the farmer didn't know; the Insurance Company, having
regard to the size and the recent creation of the policy, were prepared
to guess. The case was heard at Presteign Assizes and the farmer lost
it, the jury who tried it being not quite so sure as was the farmer of
his innocence in the matter.

Encouraged by this, the Insurance Company prosecuted the farmer for
perjury; but the jury that tried this case took almost a stronger view
of the farmer's virtue than he did himself and found a verdict of "Not
Guilty," adding a rider very depreciatory of the Insurance Company.
Encouraged by this verdict, the farmer sued the Insurance Company for
malicious prosecution, but the jury that tried this case had no faith in
either party and disagreed. Another jury were then put in their stead
and they as good as disagreed by finding for the farmer but assessing
the damages at one farthing.

It will be observed that their Lordships have not yet appeared in the
matter, whereas the haystack, the cause of all the trouble, had as good
as disappeared. Meanwhile our tramp, who had seen better days and was
something of a mathematician, calculated that the total sum spent on
counsels' fees alone up to this point was well over two hundred guineas.

Social reformers get mixed up in everything nowadays, and one appeared
in the affair at this juncture. Having chanced to be in court at the
hearing of the Malicious Prosecution suit, he had formed an opinion of
the last-mentioned jury, and in an extremely witty speech, had included
them specifically in the long list of people and things that were no
better than they should, be. One of the jurors had unhappily been among
his audience and, possibly because his experience of another's cause had
endeared him to litigation, he must needs start his action for slander.
By the time that action had been tried, and appealed, and a new trial
ordered and held, and the legal proceedings in the respective
bankruptcies