ll pass over his criminal
cases altogether, though they abound in striking passages; and of his
civil cases in the courts of the State during his practice, I shall
select two only, and rather by way of allusion than in full detail, one
of which was tried at the beginning of this period, and the other in
1821 near its close.

About the year 1798, an eccentric individual named John Taylor, but
better known as Solomon John, to distinguish him from two other persons
of the same name living in Norfolk at the same time, a man of wealth and
position, but believed to be slightly deranged in some respects, was
returning from a hunting excursion, and, stopping at Burk's Gardens,
which have long since given way to the houses now composing Hartshorne's
Court, deliberately discharged his piece, which was loaded with small
shot, at a crowd of people, and wounded a man named Rainbow in the leg,
which was at length amputated. Rainbow instituted a suit, an action of
trespass on the case, in the Borough Court, and filed a declaration in
that form. Tazewell, as Taylor's attorney, offered to demur to the
declaration, a mode of pleading which, though old as the English law
itself, was a novelty in the borough; and the Court refused to receive
it. Mr. Tazewell took a bill of exceptions to the District Court at
Suffolk. The point of the demurrer was that the action should have been
trespass _vi et armis_. The District Court affirmed the decision of the
Borough Court; and an appeal was taken to the Court of Appeals, which
reversed the decision of the inferior courts. Until this time the
distinction, which is merely technical, had been hardly perceptible to
the courts of England and of this country, and was by no means settled
law; but thereafter the points of difference were regarded as clearly
defined; and both in England and in the courts of the United States, the
case of Taylor vs. Rainbow has always been cited as conclusive of the
question.

The other case, which was one of the last in which he appeared at the
Virginia bar, was Long vs. Colston, and was argued in 1820, in the Court
of Appeals. His associate in the case was Mr. Wickham, and the opposing
counsel were Gen. Walter Jones and Mr. Stanard; and it was decided by
Judges Roane, Cabell, and Coalter. The arguments of Tazewell are not
stated; but Mr. Gilmer, who reports the decision, laments that no
official reporter was present "to give to the profession even a sketch
of the profoun