No other judicial fame in the country can rival his,
with the single exception of Marshall. He was induced to
undertake the office of Chief Justice very reluctantly, by
the strong personal urgency of Mr. Webster. Mr. Webster
used to give a humorous account of the difficulty he had in
overcoming the morbid scruples of the great simple-hearted
intellectual giant. He found Mr. Shaw in his office in a
cloud of tobacco-smoke. Mr. Webster did not himself smoke,
and was at some disadvantage during the interview for that
reason.
Mr. Shaw was rather short in stature and, in the latter part
of his life, somewhat corpulent. He had a massive head, a
low forehead, and strong and rather coarse features. He reminded
you of the statues of Gog and Magog in the Guildhall in London.
His hair came down over his forehead, and when he had been
away from home for a week or two, so that his head go no combing
but his own, it was in a sadly tangled mass. His eye was
dull, except when it kindled in discussion, or when he was
stirred to some utterance of grave displeasure.
There is an anecdote of Mr.
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