is going out of fashion among law students. When I was commencing my legal curriculum, I was told this anecdote:-A young student asked Sir Vicary Gibbs how he should learn his profession. Sir Vicary : "Read Coke upon Littleton." Student: "I have read Coke upon Littleton.” Sir Vicary: "Read Coke upon Littleton over again." Student: "I have read it twice over." Sir Vicary: "Thrice ?" Student: "Yes, three times over very carefully." Sir Vicary: "You may now sit down and make an abstract of it." If my opinion is of any value, I would heartily join in the same advice. The book contains much that is obsolete, and much that is altered by statutable enactment; but no man can thoroughly understand the law as it is without knowing the changes it has undergone, and no man can be acquainted with its history without being familiar with the writings of Lord Coke. Nor is he by any means so dry and forbidding as is generally supposed. He is certainly immethodical, but he is singularly perspicuous, he fixes the attention, his quaintness is often amusing, and he excites our admiration by the inexhaustible stores of erudition which, without any effort, he seems spontaneously to pour forth. Thus were our genuine lawyers trained. Lord Eldon read Coke upon Littleton once, twice, and thrice, and made an abstract of the whole work as a useful exercise-obeying the wise injunction, "Legere multum-non multa." On the 8th of March, 1774, he had a fresh incentive to industry, in the birth of a son.

Soon after, his health suffering, he consulted a physician, who seriously advised him to be more moderate in his application; but he answered, "It is no matter-I must either do as I am now doing, or starve." He had a little relaxation in going for a few days, four times a year, to keep his terms in the Middle Temple; and during the general election in 1774 he paid a visit to his native place, when he took up his freedom as the son of a "hoastman," and voted for Sir Walter Blackett and Sir Matthew White Ridley. It is said that in this journey, coming late at night to the Hen and Chickens, at Birmingham, [1773-1775.] the house he used to frequent in travelling between Newcastle and Oxford, the landlady, seeing him look so dreadfully ill, insisted on dressing something hot for his supper, saying "she was sure she should never see him again."

While residing in New Inn Hall, his brother Henry married, and he wrote a number of letters to his new sister-in-law and to his other relations at Newcastle, which are preserved; but they are dreadfully stiff and dull, and indicate an utter loss of his ante-nuptial sprightliness.

It was full time that he should be transferred to a livelier scene, and the approach of his call to the Bar rendered his residence in London indispensable. Accordingly, in the long vacation of 1775, he bade Oxford a final adieu, and he moved, with his family, to a small house in Cursitor Street, near Chancery Lane. This house he would point out to his friends late in life, saying, "There was my first perch:

* Twiss, ch. iv.

many a time have I run down from Cursitor Street to Fleet Market to buy sixpenn'orth of sprats for our supper.'

He now diligently attended the Courts in Westminster Hall, with his note-book in his hand. Lord Bathurst presiding in the Court of Chancery, from whom little was to be learned, he took his place in the students' box in the Court of King's Bench, where Lord Mansfield shone in the zenith of his fame; but he never would acknowledge the extraordinary merits of this great Judge, and was always disposed to sneer at him. One source of prejudice was the marked predilection of the Christ Church man for his college, and the slighting manner in which he would talk of "University" along with all other colleges and halls at Oxford. This we shall find was the ostensible ground for Mr. Scott afterwards quitting the Common Law for Equity.

He seems to have been less struck by the learning of the Judges, than by that of Serjeant Hill-supposed to be the greatest black-letter lawyer since Maynard's time, and as much celebrated for his eccentricity as his learning,-insomuch that on his wedding-night, going to his chambers in the Temple, and continuing there reading till next morning,

he

"Thought of the Year Books' and forgot his bride.”

Lord Eldon related that, at their first interview in Westminster Hall, being entire strangers, the following dialogue took place between them :-Hill, stopping Scott: "Pray, young gentleman, do you think herbage and pannage rateable to the poor's rate?" Scott: "Sir, I cannot presume to give any opinion, inexperienced and unlearned as I am, to a person of your great knowledge and high character in the profession." Hill: "Upon my word you are a pretty sensible young gentleman; I don't often meet with such. If I had asked Mr. Burgess, a young man upon our circuit, the question, he would have told me that I was an old fool. You are an extraordinary sensible young gentleman."*

The custom having been introduced for law students to become pupils of a special pleader, or of an equity draughtsman, Mr. Scott would have been very glad to have conformed to it, if the state of his finances would have enabled him to pay the usual fee of a hundred guineas; but this he could not do without borrowing,—a habit he ever held in abhorrence; and he would have been without any preliminary discipline of this sort, if Mr. Duane, an eminent Catholic conveyancer,t

* The first day I dined in Lincoln's Inn Hall, a brother student, whose name I had not before heard of-but who has since deservedly reached high professional distinction-after a long silence in our mess, thus addressed me: "Pray, Sir, what is your opinion of the scintilla juris?" I entered into a discussion with him about the feeding of uses-but I am afraid I never could induce him to think me “an extraordinary sensible young gentleman.”

† At this time conveyancing was chiefly in the hands of Roman Catholics. Being long disqualified by their religion from being called to the Bar, they practised successfully in chambers; and being employed at first by their co-religionists, their industry and learning forced them into general business. Charles Butler, whom I well knew, may be considered the last of this race.

had not agreed to let him have "the run of his chambers," for six months, without a fee. He was particularly anxious to be initiated in this branch of the profession; for, ever since he took to the law, he cherished the plan of settling as a provincial counsel at Newcastle, where skill in conveyancing would have been essentially necessary to his success.*

Soon after making this arrangement, he wrote the following letter to his brother Henry :—

"DEAR BROTHER,

"I am at length settled in the circle of lawyers, and begin to breathe a little, after the laborious task of removing a

[a. D. 1774-1776.] family, which is a work as difficult as that of removing a mountain. You know, probably, that this is only a step preparatory to a settlement among you, which I begin to think is a prospect that brightens upon me every day. I have been exceedingly fortunate in forming my previous connexions, as the object which I had most at heart I have obtained. The great conveyancing of your country is done by Mr. Duane: it seemed to be, therefore, a most desirable thing to be connected with him, as his recommendation and instructions might probably operate much in my behalf hereafter. The great fear arose from his never having taken any person in the character of a pupil before, and the apprehension, that if he should now break through a general rule, it must be on terms with which I could not afford to comply; but he has offered me every assistance in his power, and is so extremely ready to forward my schemes, as to declare himself contented with the satisfaction he will enjoy in contributing to the success of a person whom he is so uncommonly kind as even to honour. This conduct of his has taken a great load of uneasiness off my mind, as in fact our profession is so exceedingly expensive that I almost sink under it. I have got a house barely sufficient to hold my small family, which (so great is the demand for them here) will in rent and taxes cost me annually sixty pounds. I thank God, it will be only for two years at most. I have been buying books, too, for the last ten years, and I have got the mortification to find, that, before I can settle, that article of trade-for as such I consider it will cost me near two hundred pounds :-not to mention the price of a voluminous wig."+

it—will

During the six months agreed upon, he worked at Mr. Duane's almost night and day, making a gigantic collection of precedents, and

* So early as 28th May, 1774, he says, in a letter to his brother Henry: "I hope once more to see you, about this time two years, when I intend, if I can manage it, to come to your circuit; and in case of encouragement, I shall, some three years after that, perhaps, settle in Newcastle." There is no foundation for the common opinion that his plan of settling at Newcastle originated from his bad success in London.

† In a letter from William Scott to his brother Henry, dated Oxford, Nov. 7, 1775, he says: "Brother Jack is gone to town to settle there under a conveyancer. God grant him success in his profession; he deserves the best wishes of his friends."

examining all the draughts and cases which went through the office. To this period of study he ascribed much of his success in the profession. When he referred, as he was fond of doing to Mr. Duane's liberality in taking him without a fee, he would add, "That was a great kindness to me. He was a most worthy and excellent man. The knowledge I acquired of conveyancing in his office was of infinite service to me during a long life in the Court of Chancery.'

I will here finish what I have to relate of his legal studies. To supply the deficiency arising from his not having been with a special pleader or equity draughtsman, he copied all the MS. forms he could lay his hands upon. He was very proud of the volumes he thus compiled, and regretted their loss, suggesting that "he had lent them to friends with a bad memory." Unconscious of the joke which I have often heard circulated against himself,-that, when Chancellor, he greatly augmented his own library by borrowing books quoted at the Bar, and forgetting to return them, he would say of such borrowers, Though backward in accounting, they are well practised in bookkeeping."

He engaged in a course of reading,-the expediency of which I should doubt. It is well for the student to pursue consecutively the Reports of Lord Coke and of Plowden; but Mr. Scott went through a systematic course of Reports, and, coming down to a reporter of such low credit as Vernon, he could tell the names of most of the cases reported, with the volume and page where they were to be found.

I wish I could add, that at the same time he attended to more elegant pursuits; but for such a combination I fear that human strength is insufficient. He seemed to have renounced all taste for classical learning with his academical cap and gown, and never to have taken the smallest interest in the literature of the day. He read a weekly newspaper, but no other periodical publication; and although when a boy he had studied the Rambler, and Johnson's earlier works, he is not supposed to have spared time from copying precedents to read the Journey to the Hebrides," or the "Lives of the Poets." Hence we have to desiderate in him the vein of classical allusion, and the beautiful diction, which gave such a charm to the conversation and compositions of Lord Stowell. But we ought to honour his unwearied industry, and to admire his stupendous acquirements in one department of human knowledge. Before he had ever pleaded a cause, he was fit to preside on the bench; and there he would have given more satisfaction than most other members of the profession, who could boast of their lucubrationes viginti annorum." It must be remembered always, that he had by nature an admirable head for law, and that he seemed almost by an intuitive glance to penetrate into its most obscure mysteries. He was ere long to reap the reward of his industry.

CHAPTER CXCIII.

CONTINUATION OF THE LIFE OF LORD CHANCELLOR ELDON TILL HE RECEIVED A SILK GOWN.

MR. JOHN SCOTT was called to the Bar by the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple on the 9th of February, 1776; [A. D. 1776.] but he did not begin to appear as a candidate for practice till Easter term following. He used in his latter years to talk much of his bad success at starting; but I am bound to say that this he greatly exaggerated. It seems to me, that, with a view to enhance the marvel of his ultimate rise, he was unconsciously disposed to dwell rather too much upon the difficulties he had overcome, and to forget the encouragements he had met with,-till at last, by oft repetition, he himself gave faith to a representation of his first years at the Bar considerably at variance with the genuine truth.

According to the following statement by himself, he was cheated of his maiden fee :- "I had been called to the Bar but a day or two, when, on coming out of court one morning, I was accosted by a dapper-looking attorney's clerk, who handed me a motion paper, in some matter of course, which merely required to be authenticated by counsel's signature. I signed the paper, and the attorney's clerk, taking it back from me, said, 'A fine hand yours, Mr. Scott-an exceedingly fine hand! It would be well if gentlemen at the Bar would always take a little of your pains to ensure legibility. A beautiful hand, Sir.' While he spoke thus, the eloquent clerk was fumbling first in one pocket, then in the other, till, with a hurried air, he said, A-a-I really beg your pardon, Sir, but I have unfortunately left my purse on the table in the coffee-room opposite; pray do me the favour to remain here, and I will be back in one moment. So speaking, the clerk vanished with the rapidity of lightning, and I never set eyes on him again."

He dilated often on the difficulty he had in procuring an equipage to go his first circuit. “At last,” he continued, "I hired a horse for myself, and borrowed another for an inexperienced youth who was to ride behind me with my saddle-bags. But I thought my chance was gone; for, having been engaged in a discussion with a travelling companion, on approaching the assize town I looked behind, but there was no appearance of my clerk, and I was obliged to ride back several miles, till I found him crying by the road-side, his horse at some distance from him, and the saddle-bags still farther off; and it was not without great difficulty that I could accomplish the reunion between them, which he had in vain attempted. Had I failed too in this undertaking, I never should have been Lord Chancellor."

He represented his gains for twelve months after he put on his gown to amount to 9s. sterling, and no more. "When I was called to the