454 Ikfngs of tbe TCot>, IRffle, anfc (Bun 



Accompanied by his brother Maurice, he went straight 

 to the offices of James Fraser, the proprietor of the 

 magazine, and demanded the name of the writer of the 

 review. Fraser refused to give it, whereupon Berkeley 

 knocked him down and then thrashed him with his 

 racing- whip. It is true that Berkeley was a big, power- 

 ful man and a practised boxer, and that Fraser was much 

 his inferior in physique, though not by any means the 

 infirm old man it suited his friends to represent him as 

 being. But the provocation was great, and if it had been 

 Maginn who had been thrashed I should have said that 

 he richly deserved it. 



Fraser's yells of pain brought a policeman on the 

 scene, and Berkeley was marched off to Marlborough 

 Street Police Station. The charge of assault, however, 

 was not proceeded with ; Fraser, being a canny Scot, 

 preferred a pecuniary solatium for his injuries, and 

 brought an action against his assailant, laying the 

 damages at 6,000. Grantley Berkeley promptly 

 countered with an action for libel, claiming a similar 

 amount of damages. 



The assault case resulted in the jury awarding Fraser 

 100, the amount at which he had fixed his medical 

 expenses. The libel case ended in a compromise. 

 Berkeley agreed to take a verdict for forty shillings on 

 condition that Fraser did not appeal for a new trial in 

 the other action. On the whole, then, the publisher's 

 victory was a Pyrrhic one. 



But there was still Maginn to be dealt with, and he, 

 dreading the horsewhipping he deserved, cleverly avoided 

 it by expressing his readiness to give Mr. Grantley 



