"Will you refrain

[Joe Chi Minh]

from calling the Crown Prosecution solicitor 'darling'."

Darts legend Eric "the Crafty Cockney" Bristow, accused of punching his wife, Jane, gets a ticking off from magistrate Eric Bradley. He was later cleared.

The above is a Quote of the Week in today's Mail on Sunday. A fuller account of the case was reported earlier in the week.

What tickles me is that it must have been clear to the magistate and lawyers that Bristow wasn't trying to be funny or a Smart Alec. He would have spent virtually every waking hour, since his early teens, eating, sleeping, imbibing, practising and playing darts, and would probably never have seen court proceedings on TV or read about them in a paper, and so be able to register their strict formality and enforcement. He certainly didn't take them lightly, though as he left the court, he did say that he'd had enough of women and was thinking of going gay.