"Are you aware, sir," said the testy, but eminent judge, to the man-sitting opposite him in the train,” that this is not a, non smoking carriage.''
Yes said the stranger coolly; but he continued to puff at his particularly evil-smelling cigar.
"Then sir, pressed his lordship, "allow me to say that I think you guilty of a great piece of impertinence in breaking the company’s rule, as you have done. Perhaps you think you can flout me with impunity, sir : but I'll allow you that, you cannot. Here is my card, sir."
A few minutes more and the train pulled up at a small station, and his lordship the judge pounced on the guard and insisted that the stranger's name and address be taken.
“Oh,don't worry, said the Stranger, " here's my card guard I’m getting out here."
The guard, to the judge's surprise, touched his hat to the impudent one as he walked away, and the judge was furious.
At the end of his journey he took the, guard seriously to task for not dealing more severely with the offender.
"Very sorry, sir," said the guard, "but I dare not make a fuss—see who he was," And he handed the judge the card which the man had given him.
And the judge's astonishment when he saw that the impudent fellow had given the guard his (the judge's) card was wonderful to see.
Notes
From The Western Australian Railway Gazette June 15 1909 page 7
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