to such discreet and experienced members of both branches of the profession, as may chance to be accessible to the parent. Dissolute and expensive habits may be as easily acquired at an inn of court, as at the Universities. Generally speaking, it cannot be supposed that any father would hesitate to give his child the unquestionable advantages of a college education, who had the means of supporting him with comfort, not only at, but AFTER college. If, however, the paternæ angustiæ must be consulted, if it become an object to put a son into the way of speedily acquiring a livelihood; then, the sooner he is entered at an inn of court, and settled with a pleader or conveyancer, the better. He may thus, with due industry, be qualified for practice at chambers in three years, and eligible for a call to the Bar in five. The author is inclined to think, upon the whole, after much inquiry and reflection, that the age of seventeen or eighteen is one very eligible for commencing, in these cases, the practical study of the profession.

Thus, then, from all these quarters, is collected a miscellaneous throng of candidates for admission to the Bar. Here is the confluence of the streams-or rather, the startingpost, whither to borrow an illustration from the turfhorses, from all parts, with all characters and pretensions, are collected for a great heat! We, however, must turn, for a while, from the exciting and brilliant race-course to the all-important scenes of the TRAINING.

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE FORMATION OF A LEGAL CHARACTER.

PART I.-GENERAL CONDUCT.

MAY it be presumed that, of those described in the foregoing chapter, a few, capable of attaining high excellence, but conscious of standing at the threshold of the Bar, with habits unsettled, characters immature, and education incomplete, will listen with candour and attention to the suggestions which may be offered, as helps towards the formation of a legal character, before proceeding to what may be termed the strictly business portions of this work? Surely something more than aptitude for the acquisition of law learning is to be looked for in him who comes to the Bar with proper feelings and objects-who aspires to become an honour to an honourable profession; one which fills so large a space in the public eye; which is fraught with such heavy responsibilities as conservator of so much that is dear and valuable in society-the property, liberty, life and character of every member of the community; which enables a man to become one of the greatest blessings, or one of the greatest curses, to his fellowcreatures; which-a very Hippomenes to Atalanta-at once

supplies its members with the most ennobling incentives to perseverance in the path of rectitude, and incessant and strong temptations to deviate from it; which affords almost equal scope for the exercise of the best and basest qualities of human nature-for integrity and corruption, for generosity, fortitude, fidelity, as well as "envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness;" capricious, moreover, and often tantalising to its most worthy votaries: well may the student, anxiously and distrustfully pondering all these things, exclaim, Who is sufficient for them! Let him not suppose that the above is an over-wrought picture of the profession he has selected: for, to a moderately thoughtful observer, every day's experience will serve but to corroborate the fidelity of the representation. Numerous as are, and have been, the ornaments of our profession, their numbers would probably have been doubled, had but a correct and comprehensive estimate been formed of it at the outset. Had its candidates but been cautioned against its peculiarly-besetting dangers, fewer would have been deflected from the paths of honour and integrity, or would have rested satisfied with a low tone of moral feeling, or with intellectual mediocrity.

Many, quite aware that the Bar is a learned, forget that it is also a LIBERAL profession; they seem to think it impossible to be lawyers, without being also mere lawyers: thus when brought to the brink, hurrying down out of the translucent water, with reptile propensities, into the mire beneath their congenial element. Such, however, are the appetencies of inferior organisation! These are the true pettifoggers! Your mere lawyer is but a pettifogger! and pettifoggers are to be found elsewhere than among the attorneys; however they may contrive to creep into,

with the hope of being at once disguised and dignified by, a wig and gown. Yes, truly

"Pigmies are pigmies still, though perched on Alps!"

Far better things, however, than these, are hoped of him who is perusing these lines! He will take special care not to lose sight of the duties he owes to society, in those which he owes to his profession-to himself; not to forget the heart, in cultivating the head; not to sink the MAN in the lawyer! It is, indeed, said of the law, as of metaphysics and mathematics, that it tends to deaden the sensibilities; but it is not so. It is the undue prosecution of all these pursuits, which is attended with such baneful effects. But when to an exclusive absorbing devotion to the study and practice of the law, is joined a mean, selfish, grovelling character-such a result is inevitable. Can it, however, be said, that these persons have a heart to be petrified?

Thus also it is with the mind. The eye which is able to "inspect a mite," is also able "to comprehend the heavens:" but a mole's is not so; and some men bring to the law a mole-eyed mind. They, crawling oft-times from their under-ground darkness, are only blinded by the broad day-light; they are not formed for coming out upon the open, bright, breezy eminences, and gazing at the diversified prospects of cultivation and refinement; the glorious realms of literature, art, science, and philosophy, are for ever hid from them,-"dark with excessive bright!"

Far better things are expected, it is repeated, of him who reads these pages. He is not required to bring to the Bar dazzling abilities, the lot of but few; he is, however, given credit for a frank and manly character. Grant, even, that he has but moderate pretensions to intellect;

if, nevertheless, he be prudent, reasonable, and teachable, he still has in him, to use the language of an old writer, "the stuff whereof a right worthie lawyer is to be made, so it bee but rightlie worked up;" and by beginning well, bids fair to overtake, and end better than very many who have preceded him. The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, as he will soon find. Let him, then, not despise the friendly and practical cautions which follow!

I. No profession so severely tries the TEMPER as that of the law-and that both in its study and its practice. First, as to its study. The young student is perpetually called upon to exercise calmness and patience, though fretted by the most provoking difficulties and interruptions. He is apt to feel, in a manner, enraged, disgusted, dispirited, when he finds, from time to time, how much he has utterly forgotten, that he had most thoroughly learned; and the increasing difficulties of acquiring legal knowledge, and turning it to practical account: all this, morcover, not in abstract speculative studies, but in those which he must promptly master, because his livelihood is at stake his whole future lifetime is to be occupied in them. Do all that he can-strain his faculties to the uttermost approach his subject by never so many dif ferent ways, and in all moods of mind, he will nevertheless be sometimes baffled after all; and, on being assisted by his tutor, or possibly even by some junior fellow-student, be confounded to think that so obvious a clue as he is then supplied with, could have escaped him. How often has the poor student, on these occasions, banged his books about, and shutting them up, with perhaps a curse, rushed out of chambers in despair!* How apt is

There have been instances of even suicide terminating the frenzy sometimes occasioned by unsuccessful law studies.