"CODD'S PUZZLE."
Having somewhat succeeded in my practice at Quarter Sessions, I
enlarged my field of adventure by attending the Old Bailey, hoping, of
course, to obtain some briefs at that court; and although I abandoned
the practice as a rule, I was, in after-life, on many occasions
retained to appear in cases which are still fresh in my memory. I was
with Edwin James, who was counsel for Mr. Bates, one of the partners
of Strahan and Sir John Dean Paul, bankers of the Strand, and who
were sentenced to fourteen years' transportation for fraudulently
misappropriating securities of their customers. I was counsel for a
young clerk to Leopold Redpath, the notorious man who was transported
for extensive forgeries upon the Great Northern Railway. The clerk was
justly acquitted by the jury.
My recollection of this period brings back many curious defences,
which illustrate the school of advocacy in which I studied. Whether
they contributed to my future success, I do not know, but that they
afforded amusement is proved by my remembering them at all.
Hertford and St. Albans were my chief places, my earliest attachments,
and are amongst my pleasantest memories. It seems childish to think of
them as scenes of my struggles, for when I come to look back I had
no struggles at all. I was merely practising like a cricketer at the
nets; there was nothing to struggle for except a verdict when it would
not come without some effort.
But dear old Codd was the man to struggle. He struggled and wriggled;
tie him up as tightly as you could, you saw him fighting to get free,
as he did in the following great duck case. He was a very amiable old
barrister, a fast talker--so fast that he never stayed to pronounce
his words--and of an ingenuity that ought to have been applied to some
better purpose, such as the making of steam-engines or writing novels,
rather than defending thieves. He reminded me on this occasion of the
man in the circus who rode several horses at a time. In the case I
allude to, he set up no less than _seven defences_ to account for the
unhappy duck's finding its way into his client's pocket, and the charm
of them all was their variety. Inconsistency was not the word to apply
reproachfully. Inconsistency was Codd's merit. He was like a conjurer
who asks you to name a card, and as surely as you do so you draw it
from the pack.
This particular duck case was known long after as "Codd's Puzzle."
"First," says Codd, "my client bought the duck and paid for it."
He was not the man to be afraid of being asked where.
"Second," says Codd, "my client found it; thirdly, it had been given
to him; fourthly, it flew into his garden; fifthly, he was asleep, and
some one put it into his pocket." And so the untiring and ingenious
Codd proceeded making his case unnaturally good.
But the strange thing was that, instead of sweeping him away with a
touch of ridicule, the young advocate argued the several defences one
after the other with great dialectical skill, so that the jury became
puzzled; and if the defence had not been so extraordinarily good,
there would have been an acquittal forthwith.
There had been such a bewildering torrent of arguments that presently
Codd's head began to swim, and he shrugged his shoulders, meaning
thereby that it was the most puzzling case _he_ had ever had anything
to do with.
At last it became a question whether, amidst these conflicting
accounts, there ever was any duck at all. Codd had not thought of that
till some junior suggested it, and then he was asked by the Marquis
of Salisbury, our chairman, whether there was any particular line of
defence he wished to suggest.
"No," says Codd, "not in particular; my client wished to make a clean
breast of it, and put them all before the jury; and I should be much
obliged if those gentlemen will adopt any one of them."[A]
The jury acquitted the prisoner, not because they chose any particular
defence, but because they did not know which to choose, and so gave
the prisoner the benefit of the doubt.
The client was happy, and Codd famous.
[Footnote A: Sixty years after this event, in the reply in the great
Tichborne case, Mr. Hawkins, Q.C., quoted this very defence as an
illustration of the absurdity of the suggestion that one of several
_Ospreys_ picked up Sir Roger Tichborne--as will hereafter appear.]