He liked to go out into side-paths and to
discourse of matters not material to the issue but suggested
to him as he went along. He had a curious fashion of using
the ancient nomenclature of the Common law where it had passed
out of the knowledge even of most lawyers and the comprehension
of common men. He would begin his appeal to the jury in some
case where a fraud had been attempted on his client, by saying,
"Gentlemen, the law abhorreth covin." He was a lawyer everywhere.
His world was the Court-house and his office. I met him in
the street, of a Sunday noon, one summer and said to him,
"Why, Brother Bacon, you must have had a long sermon to-day."
"Oh," Mr. Bacon said, "I stayed to the Sunday-school. I have
a class of young girls. It's very interesting. I've got
'em as far as the Roman Civil Law."
Mr. Bacon could seldom be made angry by any incivility to
himself. But he resented any attempt to deprive a client,
however much of a n'er-do-well he might be, of all the rights
and forms of a legal trial. He was also much disturbed if
any lawyer opposed to him misstated a principle of law, who
ought, in his judgment, to know better.
Pages:
1381
1382
1383
1384
1385
1386
1387
1388
1389
1390
1391
1392
1393
1394
1395
1396
1397
1398
1399
1400
1401
1402
1403
1404
1405