HUMOURS OF SCENE IN POLICE COURT.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1067, 9 July 1912, Page 4

HUMOURS OF SCENE IN POLICE COURT.

WELSHMAN’S AMAZING DISPLAY OF rhetoric.

At (Denbigh) Police Court in May last, William Williams —the “ premier town crier and billposter-in-chief,” as he said at the last county court, when he sought damages lor injury alleged to be done by hens to his onion beds, summoned Ralph Kerzie Williams, the husband of the defendant in the county-court case, for assault.

The town crier, who conducted his own case, opened it thus: “I came down to my native town to end my days in peace after twenty five years’ absence in Liverpool and elsewhere as a police-con-stable and other professional duties among strangers. I there came across every nationality, who treated me with respect, and I never expected when settling down in this ancient and powerful town that I would become the centrepiece in an ensanguined encounter.

“Your worships, between the hours of noon and one o’clock p.m. on Thursday ultimo last, I was walking peacefully along Walling Street with thoughts soaring aloft, when I was rudely and abruptly stopped by Kerzie, hereinbefore to be known and identified as the defendant in this action. (Laughter.) The defendant aforesaid detached my mind from its congenial pursuit by the use ot such terrible language that the most godly man at Llanwrst, who was approaching turned back shocked and hastened away. (Laughter), “ The defendant then challenged me to combat, but I am a man of peace and averse to war —since my retirement from the force (laughter)—-so I admonished him and told him to engage in battle with a younger man than I. But, seeing savagery deepening in his eye, I took refuge iu an adjoining shop and went through the back door to another house, where I stopped for twenty minutes in fear and trembling.

“ Thinking the defendant had sheered off, I emerged out of ray shelter when, before I could run for my life, the defendant struck me in the eye and another on the temple, where your honours will observe a patch of stamp paper, (daughter). The blows sent me flying into a shed. Therein the defendant in hurtling on the premises during closed hours is guiity of misdemeanour of the Act and should be punished accordingly- (Loud laughter). When I was emitted from the shop I leaned on the win-dow-sill and bled profusely, leaving an ensanguined mark on the pavement still observable.”

Mr T. Latimer Jones (for the defendant) : You called the defendant’s wife bad names that morning? The Witness : Where is she ? Produce —produce the female. Let me cross-examine her. (Loud laughter).

What was the conversation which led to the alleged assault?—He cast reflections. I fought an action recently against the defendant’s wife for allowing her pen of mongrel poultry to trespass and assimilate my onion beds four in number. The case —and the manner I conducted it awoke considerable national interest and wide-

spread 'publicity iu the Press. (Loud laughter). On this occasion I am again conducting my case, which will be duly published. (Renewed laughter). You made the “onion ’’ case a celebrated one ? —Nothing beyond my merits, (daughter). In the end the defendant was fined tos. and costs-