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Show "DECOLLETTE AGE." BlacftsToneT" wlio wiote the foundation founda-tion of law, was an Englishman, says the State Journal. True, he believed in witchcraft and had peculiar ideas of his own on many matters, but generally gen-erally speaking, he was sound on legal propositions and knew more law that some who!: families. Ever since Blackstone's celebrated work was discovered, dis-covered, to be good, men have held it in high esteem. But Blackstone was not, the only, lawyer England has product dS .And the only regret we have in the publi cation of this mention of an action is the fact that our telegraphic advice conceal the name of the prodigy of justice who has just handed down a decision, .that makes the Northern Securities affair look like a trivial act, and causes the "follow the flag" judgment of our own supreme court of the United States to turn yellow in the blinding light ihed by its efful-gent efful-gent rays., Several English actresses sued the publisher of some postal cards those souvenir affairs you mail to a friend for damages alleged to have been sustained by reasons of publishing their pictures, attired principally in the rosy blush of the morning. The girls said r,te pictures were made by attaching their heads and face.-, to other bodies and rephotographing them, making it appiar a if they . had been caught coining out of their baths, without clothing enough in sight to conceal their thoughts even. That to take such an unfair advan- tage was p injure thvir feelings and entitle them to heavj damage The learned justice, after hearing the evidence, the arguments of conn sel and adjusting things in his own mind, cleared his throat and decided adversely to the plaintiffs. First he said an actress was more or less of a public character; that she appeared on the stage for' a price, and was constantly taking a cab around town so folks could sec her. She catered to the public and as a public caterer was a public character. Next the gentleman on the woolsack wool-sack declared this was a decollette ae. Ladies did not wear any niore 1 clothing at a fancy dress ball than the law allowed them to dispense with, and the mete fact that it was possible tojeatch a picture of a wo-man wo-man in her""nightie" or another crawling craw-ling out of her shell of an egg, roLcd in a fine head of hair and a sweet smile, and then attach the pate of another girl,' to the same, and make a picture of both, was conclusive evidence. evi-dence. The judge pointed out that even the truth niay be naked and that all things 'were seen with the Hacked eye. Hence he could not see where these actresses had any kick coming, and , he did not sec where this publisher was guilty of any wrong, unless his pictures were positively indocent, and it took a whole lot in this advanced stage of civilization 10 maki a. picture pict-ure indecent. Then it was that Camille Clifford, the1 girl who was represented as cavorting ca-vorting around in a robe de nuit, and Gertrude Miller, the modest maiden portrayed as just having been hatched and lacking even the pinfeathers of chickenliQod, grew exceeding wroth 1 and they sniffed and said the court I "was a mean old theing, o there,' j and went away. So that from this time henceforth in England a man may photograph most any person in any old fashion, so long as the view is' profile and not front face. Shades of all that Anthony Antho-ny Comstock calls decency! Talk about the liberty of the press. Why the press' isn't a rohacklcd slave, loaded with chains, hampered with hobbles and fastened to walls of massive mas-sive masonry as compared with the liberty of, the photographer. : o |