From cloakroom to courtroom
IT WAS a question of whether the bailment was complete at the end of the first day of the race meeting, the coat having been left in the club’s cloakroom that day, or whether it extended over the whole meeting. The plaintiff had paid admission to the course, and about noon had decided to leave his coat in the club’s charge. At the cloakroom he paid six pence to an attendant, and was given a check ticket. There was no notice either in the cloakroom or on the ticket concerning the conditions under which the coat was left. On the
Saturday he had left without his coat, concluding that, as there were no conditions mentioned, he could safely leave it in the club’s charge. Mr H.W. Bundle SM said the whole question was: What was the contract? As no conditions had been made, he would rule that the contract covered the two days of the meeting. Had the coat been left on the second day, the contract would, of course, have been for only one day. As the coat was about two years old he would allow £4 damages, with costs amounting to £2 6s.
Some fanciful definitions
A reader hands in to The Common Round a few cullings from a new cyclopaedia:
Appendicitis: A modern pain, costing about a hundred guineas more than our grandparents’ stomachache.
Blonde: A natty French word for hydrogen peroxide.
Bluff: About the only thing one can’t put up at a pawnshop.
Colonel: The only fellow who really knows how to run a war. In America — any man over 45.
Encore: The grumble of the man who wants more than his money’s worth.
Frugality: The art of being mean without meaning to be.
Gold: A precious metal once known to have occupied British pockets, but now transferred to American mouths. Synonym: What you use when you can’t spell the word you ought to use.
Valet: An English gentleman who has arose by conscientious work to the position of a bootjack.
Verdict (Law): The opinion of twelve men on a subject they don’t understand.
Vulgarity: An objectionable characteristic of the manners of others.
Wisdom: Knowing how ignorant we are, and keeping the knowledge to ourselves.
Zealot: One who is so keen for good that he would commit any evil to gain converts. — ‘Wayfarer’
Evan Parry visits Dunedin
Mr E. Parry, engineerinchief of the English Electric Company, and formerly chief electrical engineer for the New Zealand Government, is at present visiting for the official opening of the Otira tunnel. The company had the contract for the locomotives and the erection of the powerhouse and overhead lines. Mr Parry, who arrived in Dunedin yesterday, in an interview with a Daily Times reporter said the electrical work at Otira would be completed in a month. He thought it would turn out a very good job. Combining length with grade the tunnel was about as severe a test as could be found in any part of the world. The length was five and aquarter miles, and the grade, which was uniform throughout, was 1 in 33. Four locomotives had been supplied and one of these was capable of drawing a load of 240 tons through the tunnel at a speed of about 16 miles per hour. — ODT, 23.5.1923