illustrated the profession of the law in modern times. Most men in the profession toil for a living, or for money, or for the transitory fame which sometimes attends the career of a successful lawyer.

Mr. Choate studied law as a science and practiced it as an art. He was indifferent to money, indifferent to fame. He neglected the care of his arguments and speeches, and he made only imperfect and desultory records of his services. Until his association with his son-in-law, Mr. Bell, his income was only sufficient to meet his moderate expenditures in everything except books. In 1851 I called at his house in the evening for professional consultation, and with me went a country lawyer who was not accustomed to the large libraries of modern times. We were taken into Mr. Choate's library, which filled two rooms in the second story of the house. The partition had been cut away, and thus at one glance we could see the extent of the library, the files of books rising to the ceiling, and occupying the larger part of the floor. Said my associate, in amazement, "What a collection of books you have, Mr. Choate!"

"Yes-more than I have paid for; but that is the bookseller's business, not mine." This was an exhibition of his habit of extravagance in statement. Let us not infer that he was indifferent to

his pecuniary obligations, although he was indifferent to money as a possession.

In an acquaintance of nearly twenty years, I was led to esteem Mr. Choate, perhaps to admire him. Long ago I gave a half promise to myself that I would make a mark upon the sands of time, though slight it might be, as a tribute to his genius. From that acquaintance I received the impression that he was the ablest jury-lawyer that America had then seen. Since his death I have had other twenty years for observation and reflection, and I announce my conclusion in one half-sentence— that, for all the varied exigencies of professional life, Rufus Choate was the best-equipped advocate who ever stood in a judicial forum and spoke the English language.

All this, and yet Mr. Choate's greatness was not of the absolute. It was a greatness achieved. It bore no relation to the supremacy of Shakespeare who spurned teachers and schools, and who for nearly three centuries has controlled art in literature and defied criticism. Mr. Choate's greatness had only a remote relation to that of Webster, of whom it may be said that we can not imagine a condition of society in which his superiority would not have been recognized, even if the training of the schools had been wanting.

Mr. Choate, however, is a conspicuous example

of the influence of schools and culture upon a man of genius endowed with the virtue of industry; and his career is an earnest, a sufficient protest against the opinion that the schools and universities should not teach all literature as well as all science, and in that literature all languages in which its gems are found or which contribute to the language that we speak. Not everything in literature and science for everybody; but there should be somebody for everything, and, that there may be somebody for everything, everything should be taught.

4

DANIEL WEBSTER.

IN the month of January, 1839, I made my first visit to the city of Washington, and for the first time I then saw and heard Mr. Webster. He had reached the summit of his fame as an orator, and it was then that in personal appearance he fully justified the encomium bestowed upon him by his friends and admirers who had crowned him "the godlike Daniel."

I heard him make one or two brief commonplace observations in the Senate, but I had also the privilege of hearing his argument before the Supreme Court in the case of Smith vs. Richards, reported in volume thirteen of Peters's reports. His opponent was Mr. Crittenden, of Kentucky.

Mr. Webster appeared for the appellant, who had appealed from the decree of the Circuit Court for the Southern District of New York, by which a contract for the sale of a gold-mine in Virginia had been annulled, upon the ground that the vender (Smith) made false representations at the time of the sale in regard to material facts.

The decree of the Circuit Court was affirmed by the Supreme Court, three of the nine judges -Story, McLean, and Baldwin-dissenting. Of these nine judges, only three-Taney, Story, and McLean-are now known, even to the profession. Yet to an inexperienced person it was an aweinspiring tribunal. Nor has the impression then produced upon me been removed by time and experience. In like manner the court will establish and maintain its power over many successive generations of American citizens. If the court shall ever be in peril, its peril will be due to politics-to the disposition of its members either to mingle in the political contests of the time, or to seek political distinction and office. Happily, thus far in our history, the small number of judges who have attempted to step from the bench to the presidency have been disappointed.

Speaking only of the past, it is to be noted as a singular circumstance that the three most distinguished judges were active politicians when they were appointed.

Marshall, Story, and Taney were pronounced partisans, and upon political questions their opinions as judges, were shaped or modified usually by the views of the politician.

could not have been anticipated.

The contrary
It would not

often happen that a Federalist and a State-rights