HOW HE BECAME O J.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1330, 1 September 1886, Page 3

HOW HE BECAME O J.

“Some men are born for great things, r but it is not often that a man ilses to the i eminent position of a Chief Justice because ; thp weather was too cold to allow of him being a clerk of petty sessions. Sir James Prendergast, of New Zealand, started his colonial career as 0. P.S. at Maryborough (Vlct r’a) in the early days, and imn e dialely after his accsa.-ion the authorities j at Melbourne began to be worried by the

receipt of sheets of foolscap covered wit cuneiform inscriptions and footed by I signatme that looked like a fight betwee; I a spider and a gridiron. At first, -littl I notice was taken of the matter, it beiu I concluded that the documents ware copie of Belshszzit’s washing bill, or somethin! of the kind, which had gone astray, ant ! they were’ simply redirected to “Pos Office, Babylon ;tobe left till called for,’ and passed on. At length, howevei the trouble became too great foi human endurance, aud it V eing discovered that the illegible sorrows in question issued from Maryborough, a commission of inquiry was sent up. They found th-1 Me Prendergasl’s tflice consisted of an old Government tent pitched on a mud bank, the flooring consisting of one inch of water and three of Irish bog ; and as it was the depth of winter and bitterly cold a little ice lent variety to the scene. Inside this cloth mans on a benumbed clerk of petty B33elodb was making pot-hooks and han'ers in his official capacity as a member of the Civil Service, his stiffened fingers rendering it impossible to produce anything more legible.' The Commission as, in duty bound, inspected and reported on ihe blue-nceed cffi.er, but they did i ot. ;ake extenuating circumstances into uoant in those days, and Mr Prendei;ast received bis dismissal. His early mbition being thus nipped in the bud he I ook to the law for consolation, and is I iow a Chief Justice with a title instead of I bush Dogberry in a leaky tent. Hist bnry should point a valuable moral to I ou.ng men who are unable to write deantly in cold weather. Sydney Bulletin I