My reference last week to 'an action brought by a
peer and his son against the publishers of a reference-book which had erroneously stated that the peer had no heir has brought me a reminiscence—which I have not had the opportunity of verifying —of a case heard some thirty years and more ago before Lord Coleridge. There a reference-book had entered against the name of a younger son of a younger son of a peer "unmarried," whereupon the son of the " unmarried " person in question brought an action for libel. In the course of the hearing the learned judge mentioned that if anyone went to Great Hampden in Buckinghamshire he would see on the graveof John Hampden the statement that he was married first to A. B. and then to C. D., followed by the statement that he died unmarried, i.e., as the context showed, a widower. This light on the term clearly had its influence on the case, and the plaintiff failed. Further investigation showed that the John Hampden in question was not in fact the antagonist of ship-money, but a relative of the same name. But the argument (such as it is) remains unaffected.
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