" VOUS ETES RICHES, PAYEZ DONC."
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,-" H. C." may be interested in knowing that it is not merely among rural Juges de Paix and in the affairs of postboys that the idea prevails abroad that there is one law for the "rich" Englishman and another for the "poor" foreigner. Lord Selborne in his Memorials (i. 255) tells how the same difficulty confronted him at the Geneva Arbitration, when he endeavoured to get a hearing for the English case. There were three arbitrators—a Swiss, an Italian; and a Brazilian— and their simple solution of the whole case was that of Mr. Justice Wills's Juge de Paix—"Payez done ! " The Brazilian, Viscount d'Itajuba, was, says Selborne, "the fairest man of the three," but "he entered on the arbitration as if there were no serious question except as to the amount which Great Britain ought to pay, and this he thought we need not care much about : Vous etes riches, tres riches,' he said."—I am,
Sir, &c., J. R. F.
Previous page
