Yale University Library 39002028026418 ii :[;\::\'. ''A-'} ' ' I ¦>J!--L-/-.'&--T-r: -~tf' ¦¦ "ft".: . r "A'1 I ¦ ¦ -Vf ,.,-—.-, — ... '':''¦! ;,.: ;¦.',,¦ : $$ 029.\89 ^ffTf,W'fwn£mg' my decision whether I would take a year's voyage to the antipodes in a sailing ship, or go for a year to my uncle's farm, in Cambridgeshire, where my ancestors had lived for very many years. Having a traditional love for field sports and the open air, I went to Cambridgeshire, and soon shook off every sign of the enemy that my father dreaded. When my year was up the doctors passed me as cured, but recommended my living in the country, rather than resuming at once work, and play, in Lon don. Therefore, I was transferred to a firm of solicitors at Braintree in Essex, and there stayed out the next year, 16 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Country solicitors in England have the privilege of sending their articled pupils to be finished off in the offices of their London agents, who are always lawyers of large and established reputation, and who practise in the High Courts of Law and in the Chancery Courts, and there these London agents carry through the final stages of hearing in court, and the conclusion of all important cases, both at law and in equity. What this privilege was to mean to me I by no means appreciated when I announced to my father that I was to return to London and to enter the offices of Field and Roscoe, in Bedford Row — the London agents of my Braintree masters. But I went there in due time, and the next and vital stage of my life was reached. CHAPTER II EDWIN WILKINS FIELD A SKETCH WHEN I entered the dingy office of Field and Roscoe, in Bedford Row — that nest of at torneys and solicitors of all grades and characters — I took with me a letter of introduction from the Braintree lawyers. I found a large man, above middle height, broad and solid, dressed in rough clothes, evidently regardless of his personal appear ance. He had long, brown, but scanty hair, a fine domelike forehead and large, light-blue eyes ; his large hand grasped one firmly, and a kindly smile dispelled the sense of a formidable personality. His voice was full and well modulated, but he was no great talker, except when under the stress of some important subject. With him in his office at the time was his chief clerk, "Billy" Francis, as he was always affectionately called. He got up and also shook hands, and I felt that I had already one friend in those new regions. "So you wish to come and work here for a while?" said Mr. Field. "Can we make room for one more, Francis?" "Yes, sir, I think so." "Well then you can turn up to-morrow morning at nine o'clock. You had better be on time, as the work of the office is distributed then." And I left him and waited for Mr. Francis in the anteroom. 17 18 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents He soon came, and took me into his own room. "We have a great lot of young men here all the time," he said, "some of them come just for a name of working at Field and Roscoe's. They each and all get one chance, which is their testing time. If they evidently mean working we help them along, and, after a bit, the Governor will himself try them out, and he is a mighty good friend. If a man doesn't work we just let him alone and he very soon drifts away. It's all up to you. Well, stay round the office, if you like, and you will see a good many of the men. The Governor's two boys, Basil and Allan, are both here, and I will introduce you to them. They are both friendly fellows of about your age." He was as good as his word. Next morning I was there. A mob of young fellows of from twenty to twenty-five years of age were crowding into Mr. Field's room — many of them having bundles of law papers in their hands — and I followed in. Francis was there and another old clerk. Presently the Gov ernor came in with his two sons, and the perform ance commenced. The old clerk had some kind of diary or day book, from which he called the title of some suit, action, or proceeding, and the young man in whose charge it was answered the call. The Governor sat watching him, but not speaking until the young fellow had given account of his steward ship. If the answer indicated due diligence no com ment followed, but the next step to be taken was noted, and probably a time was set for him to come to Mr. Field's room for further discussion and in structions. If he had to acknowledge shortcoming in labor and interest, and undue delay in his work, woe betide him. A few words of acid comment gen- Edwvn, WUkms Field — A Sketch 19 erally brought the color to his cheek, and the next matter was called up. The business was of a most varied character and importance, ranging from some property or part nership dispute, or some ordinary business issue, to the conduct of a liquidation of some bankrupt bank, involving hundreds of stockholders and debtors, and millions in value of properties — to be or being settled in the Court of Chancery. I confess to trembling lest my time should come before I was prepared. It is true that I had behind me four years of appren ticeship, but they had been broken up by a year off in the country, and I had not been a zealous stu dent. However, I had already fallen under the Governor's spell, and I intended doing my best not to> fail. For a few months nothing of great importance fell to me, and I had got through without setbacks ; but I was taken aback one morning when the chief clerk called the title of the "Northumberland and Dur ham District Bank Liquidation," and a huge bundle of papers was handed to unlucky me, with orders to go through them and make a report on the stage of the various matters, showing which would soonest be ready for hearing in court. I showed that I hesitated, but I caught Francis' eye, and that, with a kindly smile, reassured me, and I carried off the papers to the room that was assigned me. There I labored honestly, early and late, for probably a week, and was prepared for my first important work to be submitted to the Governor's eye. When he saw that to consider it would be a long job, I was told to wait till the other men had been got through with and the room was cleared. The ordeal was a 20 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents hard one, but I was on my mettle, and the evidence of honest, if apprentice's, work, helped me through the toughest two hours' job I had ever faced. The Governor was then, and ever thereafter, very kind and considerate, and it was the first of many bundles of papers that he pushed towards me across the big table in the morning allotments. Very soon the Field boys made friends, and I was invited to join one or two others of the pupils, for dinner and the evening at their Hampstead home. The whole family were hospitality itself. We young men were welcomed. The young people — the two boys and three attractive girls — received us and we all spent a happy evening. Mrs. Field, a frail woman, and seemingly a sickly one, took pains to get acquainted with all the young men. We, in turn, talked with her as she lay on her sofa, and found her full of interest, and of motherly spirit to us young sters, collected from every county in the land. The house was a perfect gallery of water-color art, the collection of David Cox's drawings being, I think, unequalled. But hardly any of the water colorists of the English school of the past fifty years were unrepresented. The Governor himself was a diligent and very successful painter, and his vacations, mostly spent in the Thames Valley or at some lovely coast resort not generally known and made common, were illustrated in drawings large and small. In those years, when in the long vacation I visited them, one was sure to see the Gov ernor's big umbrella and his easel planted in some favorite nook, with a large drawing in progress. There and then he was perfectly happy, and never seemed to tire of our English scenes, nor to need Edwin Wilkms Field — A Sketch 21 the mountain and glacier, the pass and the climb, that attracted so many of us to European lands. He had the happy faculty of being able to com pletely set aside in play time the problems and catastrophes which filled his working months, and in the solution and remedy of which he then put heart and soul. He was a most reliable counsellor in big affairs. His was always the ideal view. There never was a man to whom mere money meant so little. I think he gave up more time and thought to public ques tions, where common pay there was none for him, than to securing the management of the great busi nesses whose names were written on the tin boxes in his office. Frills and furbelows he would none of, either in himself or in those about him. This lesson he taught me early. In the first sum mer I worked for and with him he and I were to gether in his office in Bedford Row, all the others having long since gone home. It was past eight o'clock of a summer evening, and the rush and rattle of the London streets had died down, though there was little coolness in those offices. Suddenly he stopped me in the middle of a sentence I was writ ing: "I am very thirsty," said he, "I wish you would get me some water. The big can that Whatley (the janitor) keeps filled from the old Gray's Inn pump stands in the passage." I went to see. "The can is empty, Mr. Field," said I, "I'm afraid we shall have to go thirsty!" "Not a bit," said he, "take the can to the pump and fill it ; it is not far ; it will not take you long !" In those days I was, I suppose, a bit of a young fop, and the notion of "packing," as we call it, that, big can through three or four 22 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents streets to Gray's Inn Square, to find the pump sur rounded by a gang of slum youngsters, and to bribe one of them to fill it, and then pack it back again did not appeal to me. I looked in his face; there was no sign that he recognized my difficulty, nor had any idea of withdrawing his request. There was no help for it — go' I must, and that quickly. Taking up that beast of a can, putting on my silk hat, I started with the best grace I could muster. It was as bad as I expected. There was a swarm of Irish kiddies round the pump, all with cans and buckets and jugs to be filled. I had to wait my turn, and the boys saw my fix and began to chaff me. Pick ing out the most brazen of the bunch I proposed to give him a three penny bit to fill my can. He jumped at the chance. I soon was ready to start back, with subdued cheering from the boys. The water spilled over, but I carried my drink across Gray's Inn Square, through the streets into Bedford Row, to find Mr. Field calmly waiting for his water. He hardly said thank you, taking it all as a matter of course. But he did me a real service, for, from that day to this, I do not think I have ever balked at carrying my own burdens, or been prevented by the looks of things from doing what I really wanted to do and could do. I was learning then the lesson of comparative values. CHAPTER III WORK UNDER E. W. F. LIQUIDATIONS, NEW ENTER PRISES, LIMITED LIABILITY AND ITS FRUITS THE work that came to Field and Roscoe that year of my apprenticeship to big things drove the firm to seek larger offices. These they found in a spacious old mansion, on the sunny south side of Lincoln's Inn Fields. From its wide windows we looked out on the historic square garden that linked the present with the last century. No one knows the number of duels there fought to a bloody finish in the days of the Georges. It was the first year of a financial panic, when joint stock banks, and financial houses, and new enterprises of all kinds were tumbling to ruin like card houses blown down. Specially was it a time of disaster for the unhappy stockholders whom the laws then in force compelled to accept the fruits of unlimited liability. Stockholders were held to be legal partners, regard less of the number of shares they held, and their entire fortunes were made to answer for the aggre gate liabilities of the failed enterprises. My wife tells a story of a grand aunt of hers who, without her husband's knowledge, had invested her house hold savings in some twenty shares of a big bank that failed. From the morning paper at breakfast the husband read out the name identical with hers 23 24 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents of a stockholder summoned to answer by a diabolical engine of torture called a "balance order," in the lingo of that day; but the sufferer knew it for her own, and fell, fainting, from her chair. In Field and Roscoe's office alone the liquidation of the Glasgow Joint Stock Bank, the Liverpool Joint Stock, The Northumberland and Durham District Banking Company, and various smaller undertak ings was in progress in the Court of Chancery. Many millions of pounds were involved. That court appointed certain public accountants as "Offi cial Liquidators," and they in turn engaged solici tors, with the sanction of the court, to collect assets and to pay dividends until all debts were discharged ; having recourse to the possessions of all the stock holders to meet the ultimate balance after all the bank's assets were realized. It was a barbarous pro cess. The only alleviation was found in the careful and skilful handling of the bank's assets. As one of the small cogs in a great machine, the distress of a large proportion of the six thousand Northumber land and Durham stockholders was brought home to me. I knew that much questioning was going on as to the possibility of a new code or system that would substitute for the cruel unlimited liability a proportionate liability for payment of the ultimate balance of debts, graduated by the number of shares each stockholder might hold. One morning Mr. Field called for me and told me to accompany him to the Chambers in Lincoln's Inn, of Mr. Henry Thring (afterwards Sir Henry Thring), the Government draftsman. He said that they were going under orders from the Government to put in shape a new statute that should accomplish these ends. It was Work Under E. W. F. 25 to be confidential work until the proposed measure had taken final shape. This was before the day of the stenographer and the typewriter, and I was to act as the amanuensis of the two lawyers. In those days I wrote a rapid and clear hand, which was then a useful accomplishment. A mass of material lay on Mr. Thring's table, gathered from Scotland, as well as from the Continental countries which had grappled with this problem. If the work then begun proved successful it needed no prophet to foresee not only the relief of stock holders in existing enterprises, but a development of new business in all countries where British capital was seeking investment which would revolutionize business throughout the world. It was a great future that hung on the work of those two lawyers, and I was proud to own the hand that wrote for them. It took many days for them to sketch out the intended law, reserving for future settlement mat-. ters that had not received final discussion. Then followed that final revision, and the bill for limited liability which became law and has fulfilled all the purposes of those who drafted and submitted it to Parliament, and the public, was in complete shape. Less than fifty years have passed since that day, and probably few now living could tell this tale from personal knowledge. More competent experts than Henry Thring and Edwin Wilkins Field could not then have been chosen for that work. I am writing at a little inn on the shores of the Pacific, very far from libraries and books, but I think the date of the British act in question is 1872. I have recognized the ideas and even the wording in the codes and legislation of many of our States, but few of us rec- 26 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents ognize the pit of legalized cruelty from which we have been digged. Even these strong words do not exaggerate the misery wrought on those hundreds of innocent stockholders in the failed banks of which I had personal knowledge. Business, and indeed do mestic and foreign commerce also, were suffering from the dread of failure in their enterprises entail ing inevitable ruin. Inefficiency, ineptitude, inexpe rience in management, would be as fatal as inten tional wickedness; therefore the prudent business man, and the well-advised woman and clergyman, refused nearly all invitations to contribute capital to new undertakings, at home or abroad. The wonder is that in the face of such bitter experience British commerce and industry still grew. The new act struck off those chains, and legitimate invest ment sprang to new life the world over. From those years it became fashionable as well as safe for British men and women to be stockholders in foreign railroads and factories, in waterworks, gas works and other municipal undertakings in for eign countries and in the colonies, through joint stock corporations having British headquarters and management. Striking evidence of this was shown in the opening year of the great war, when British hoards were brought to light in terms of millions, and turned in towards the support of the nation. That office of Mr. Field's witnessed a miscellany, a procession, of invention and discovery. I recol lect seeing temporary shelving round the room crowded with all the infantile forms of sewing ma chines, evidence to the court in the arguments for and against the original Howe patents. At another time a collection of machetes and bill-hooks used in Work Under E. W. F. 27 the sugar plantations of the West Indies were brought into comparison, to test the honesty of various specifications on which an important in dustry of Birmingham and Sheffield then depended. One heard very little of German rivalry then, and even the United States was far behind in the race with the mother country fifty years ago. It was after my time in that office that Mr. Field received from the Government the coveted honor and emolument of condemning and clearing the wide area in the Metropolis near Temple Bar on which the new Law Courts were to rise. He had much to do, in the office of the Commissioner of Works, with the selection of Mr. Street as architect. Till the un timely end of his life he was very proud of the archi tect and his work. He little dreamed that his own statue was to perpetuate his name and likeness in the hall of those courts, paid for by the limited and defined contributions of one thousand lawyers who had passed some part of their term of training under his hands. CHAPTER IV IPSWICH A TYPICAL ENGLISH COUNTRY TOWN A GLANCE at the map of England shows a coast line cut every few miles by the estuary of a good-sized river, though the little island is not big enough to give room for the giants that dominate our American continent. The eastern coast of England is well served by such estuaries, for on each stands at least one con siderable city, fed by the surrounding fertile coun try, but supported by factories that have attracted industrial populations. Ipswich, the chief town of Suffolk, is no exception. She has a continuous his tory, starting from the times of the Saxon invaders, fifteen hundred years ago, and many and picturesque examples of early English architecture still stand. To most Americans, however, I suppose, Ipswich recalls the adventures of Mr. Pickwick and Sam Wel ler. I confess that my first exploring walk when I ' set out to see what kind of town it was in which I was invited to settle, led me to the old White Horse Inn, looking on the marketplace, and then next to find out where Mr. Nupkins, the then mayor, lived, and the scene of Sam Weller's courtship. I found both. It surely was a master's hand and eye which seized and fixed for all time, and for millions of readers, the features of his scenes. The old White 28 A Typical English Country Town 29 Horse was still open when I went in and verified my memory of my early reading, for I found the bar and the parlor, and even satisfied myself as to the bedroom, with its great dark four-post bed and dingy carpet, in which poor Mr. Pickwick invaded the privacy of the middle-aged virgin. As to the mayor, I failed, for my friend, who gave up hours of a busy life to going about with me to introduce the young successor of the lawyer then sickening to death to a whole band of prospective clients, had nothing in common with the pompous Mr. Nupkins of the story — save, perhaps, a harmless pride in the position of the first citizen of the town, won by his own industry and business prowess. To Ipswich I brought my young bride, and the beautiful town and river, and the kindly and affectionate people who welcomed us to their homes and their business I can never let myself forget. The dividing lines between Established Church people and Nonconformists of every style were very strongly drawn in those days, and were carried through both business and social life. The Friends were numerous, and the chief bankers were Quakers of long standing and much wealth. The then head of the firm was an old bachelor^ — a portly, white-haired gentleman, very saving of his words and more so of his friendship. He lived in a white mansion standing in beautiful grounds. He was proud of many things, but most of a cellar of old wines of which he was a noted judge. But a year or two before my time a temperance wave had struck the town, and especially the Friends, who, with one consent, gave up their wine drinking. The old banker, very unwillingly yielded to the remonstrances 30 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents of his friends and partners, and undertook to aban don his wine. Was there no alternative? he won dered, as he stood among the crusted bottles of his old port, if he could save them from the menaced destruction. At any rate, he could postpone it. The next morning he sent for his chief bricklayer, and ordered him to bring his men and solidly wall up the door to the cellar that held the cherished bottles. So it was done, and the old gentleman breathed freely. But, after a year or two had gone by it oc curred to him that his library would be the bet ter for enlargement. Again the head bricklayer was called into council and a plan was settled. A wing of the house was to be built from the ground up. Again the white-jacketed bricklayers passed in and out from the lower regions to exit through the gar den, when the day's work was done. But when Sat urday night came a passerby noticed that two or three of them were very unsteady on their pins, and one was arrested for beating his wife when drunk, and held to be brought before the Bench of Magis trates on the Monday morning. The old banker was one of these same justices, and the chairman. "What excuse have you to offer for your disgraceful conduct?" Tom Jeffries was asked. Very sober now, and much ashamed, the culprit wriggled and hesi tated. "Well, your Worship," he stammered at last, as he looked up at the chairman, "It was the wine in your old cellar as did it." "My wine? Why what do you know about my wine ?" "Why, sir, we went in and out past the new bit of wall in the basement that was built in a year or two back, and Jack says to me, 'What do you think is on the other side of that wass, Tom?' 'I dunno,' says I. 'Why the old A Typical English Country Town 31 gentleman's cellar o' wine; hundreds of bottles; that's no use to him now,' says he, 'for he's gone tem perance this three years past. We might as well have a bottle or two, and no one 'd miss it. Just knock out a few bricks out o' that bit o' wall and there y' are !' Well, Sir, our week's work was done, and we'd all Sunday afore us. So Jack and me, we soon got two or three bottles out and walled up the place agin, so nobody couldn't tell it had ever been opened. We knocked the top off a bottle pretty soon and shared up the wine; but it's awful strong, and first thing you know we was both as full as ticks. I wish I'd never seen the stuff!" The Bench of Magistrates giggled, but the chair man looked sourly down his nose. "Well," said he, I thought I had put that wine out of harm's way, at any rate, but it seems there's danger in it even if it is walled up. My brother was right, and I ought to have had it all poured down the gutter. But I'll have it done as soon as I get home." "Don't do that," said his neighbor, in his ear, "send it to the hospital, for the patients !" "Send it to the hos pital?" said the old gentleman. "What, send it to those people' who couldn't tell if it was port or elder berries? No, sir; if it can't be drunk by gentlemen, down the sewer it shall go!" Many an old manor house, many a park, with its groves of "immemorial elms" and herds of dappled deer, looked out on the broad reaches of the river. One of the oldest and most beautiful of these1 old English homes is Broke Hall, some six or seven miles on the way from the town to the sea. There the Brokes have lived from generation to generation. Among the great oil paintings on the walls of the 32 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents big hall is that of Captain Philip Bowes Vere Broke, the English hero of the duel between the "Shannon" and the "Chesapeake," when, for once, an American frigate had to strike her flag to a worthy antagonist. Not only the halls of the highly born are found in that old country. Many are the manor houses and granges, where the estate is measured by hun dreds, not thousands, of broad acres ; but the tradi tions of descent in one family from father to son are precious to each generation in its turn. One manor house I visited that impressed me much. The house was truly ancient, the gabled roofs, red tiles, and small paned windows telling of the Elizabethan builders. The rooms were low, the massive oak beams stretching across from wall to wall. The dining room was reached by one wide staircase. The windows looked, through the lozenge-shaped panes of rather cloudy glass, over the wide fields. Across two of the panes some guest of former days had scratched with the diamond in his finger ring, in capital letters, run together but distinctly legible to-day, this legend, "Whoso setteth doune to mete and letteth grace passe setteth doune like ane oxe and riseth like ane asse." Both the script and its significance antedated Puritan times. Another of the old halls was inhabited in my time by a very ancient dame, who was living there in ex ercise of her "dower rights." One day I was walk ing, with my friend the mayor, through some of the narrow streets of the town, where one of the oldest of the lawyers held his dingy office. The street was A Typical English Country Town 33 blocked as we came by with a high, yellow, chariot of the last century, with a gray-haired coachman and footman to match, in bright-colored though faded livery. The footman had been sent into the lawyer's office with a message, which brought out the lawyer, bareheaded, to interview the occupant of the carriage. The door was thrown open as we passed. Inside was a veritable Witch of Endor, who was grinning at the lawyer. Her companion shrunk into the corner of the carriage. "Who on earth is that?" I whispered. "That is old Lady Heathcote," he re turned. "I will tell you the story in a minute. Whether that is tragedy or comedy I leave you to judge. The old dame's husband was Sir Henry Heathcote, and the family is a very old one. They had no children, and Sir Henry was a good deal of a rake. They led a cat-and-dog life. He borrowed a big lot of money from our lawyer friend, and it all went on cards and horses. Just when he could borrow no more, the old gentleman died suddenly, and nothing but the old lady's dower stood between the lawyer and the property. She hated her creditor and vowed to him she would outlive him and he should never set foot as owner in Heathcote Hall; and that, she promised, she would show him twice a year. She was twenty years his senior then, and he is, as you saw, a more than elderly man. From that time to this, at Christmas and midsummer, she has out her old chariot, and drives into town to ex hibit herself to him, as well and hearty, and she baits him with her promise to outlive him, and, by George, I believe she will, though she must be well on the way to the hundred mark now." 34 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents A red mark in my memory in Ipswich recalls the reading of Charles Dickens in the great bare Corn Exchange. The seats and stands of the money changers had been all removed, and regiments of chairs from all sources filled the floor. A small table on one side, covered with a green cloth, holding a pair of silver candlesticks and the traditional water pitcher, was all the stage setting, and no musical introduction or interlude was thought needful in those days. The place was dimly lighted by temporary gas burners, for gas was a comparatively recent invention, except for street lamps. There was a great crowd when our ideal novelist came quietly in and took his place behind the little table. He was in evening dress. I have the clearest recollection of his appearance. A slender man, wavy and plentiful brown hair, a high forehead and large, blue eyes, a voice that soon cleared itself from its first huskiness and carried to every quarter of the great building. He opened his copy of David Copperfield at the episode of the death of Steerforth, and without pref ace began to read. All the world knows that Charles Dickens was a great actor by nature, but I never heard another reader with his power of producing the scene before us in every telling detail. Without effort his voice was pathos itself as the narrative went on to its tragic end. Even now, when fifty years have passed, if I take David Copperfield from its shelf on a winter evening the big Corn Exchange at Ipswich rises in my memory and I hear again the rise and fall of that magic voice. In that same building the next year I heard Jenny Lind, the Swedish nightingale. She was giving con- A Typical English Country Town 35 certs all about the country. The only stipulation she made, apart from a bountiful fee, was that she would bring her special accompanist, old Jules Benedict, and he was a marvel — undoubtedly the most sympathetic artist of his day and specialty. She sang for us, "Hark, Hark, the Lark at Heaven's Gate Sings," which gave scope for her wonderful trills ; several of Handel's songs, some bal lads, mostly of the English school, but no Beethoven, or Schubert, or Grieg. As for me, I heard a most unusual voice, with a rich, throaty quality that fol lowed it into its highest notes, a sweetness and naturalness that once heard is not forgotten, but all that rather than the songs themselves make up my memory of Jenny Lind. Life in Ipswich passed quietly on, and we seemed to be acclimated to this country town, when all plans were upset by a letter from Allan Field, re ceived without warning. He was Edwin Field's sec ond son, and a great crony of mine during all my work in his father's office. "Dear Wallis," he wrote. "Drop all that stuff in Ipswich and come back to London as soon as you can get your plunder packed and your wife ready for the journey. And this is why. You have probably heard of the firm of Dimmock and Burbey, offices in 2, Suffolk Lane, in the heart of the city. It is an old firm, and the business is both big and profitable. Burbey was the working partner, and lived his life out to fill the pockets of that old sinner, Dimmock. Since Burbey died that old ruffian had either to go to work, to get a new partner, or to sell out. And he chose the last. The Governor heard of the chance 36 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents for a boy or two who were not afraid of work, and he thought of you and me. He sets us both up higher than we deserve. But, anyway, he told the accountants that keep the Field and Roscoe accounts to set to work investigating the Dimmock and Bur bey business, and if it stood the acid test to find how much money it would take to buy old Dimmock out. I know we haven't got the money, for it will be a big deal, but the Governor thinks we can borrow it. I have been talking to the accountant, and he advises us to tackle it now. Will you take hold with me? Then come up to town and let us get things settled. The Governor will help, and I sup pose your father will do the same. "Ever yours, A. F." To make a long story short, everything went as Allan proposed. He and I borrowed ten thousand pounds from the bankers who had for years had the Dimmock and Burbey account. The two fathers went security for it — the big sum to be payable with in three years, and old Dimmock to stay on with out pay for six months to introduce us to his clients. But we got rid of him in three months, and we re paid the bankers' loan within two, not three, years, for the business went well, the big clients all stood by us, and many new ones came in. CHAPTER V NO. 2, SUFFOLK LANE, AND LAWYERS' BUSINESS IN THE CITY OF LONDON THE little street called Suffolk Lane for some centuries, ran from Cannon Street to Thames Street, and was full of memories, as also of struc tures, of early days of the citizens of London and their guilds. On the east side stood the "Merchant Taylor's School," a foundation from Queen Eliza beth. The building abutted directly on the street, and when I passed in, opposite, to take up my quar ters in No. 2, a low hum of many young voices filled the air. When noon came the school bell sounded, and the boys poured out for their dinner recess. The black-coated masters followed them, and abso lute silence reigned. No. 2 was one of the former mansion houses of the city. The lower floor was kept for their offices by the owners of the building, a wealthy firm of wine merchants, whom we came to know as clients of Nash and Field. Two upper floors and the attic were Our territory. My own office was the old mayoral dining room * — spacious and lofty. The carved and painted mantelpiece was a work of art which caught the eye of every visitor. My partner, by his own wish, went to the upper story, with clerks of his, the chancery department. My own people had other 37 38 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents rooms on the same floor as myself. I looked with some trepidation on the payroll for some twenty men to be provided week by week, exclusive of the law stationers and copyists, who worked outside. Each of us had a personal stenographer, but all let ters were written out by hand — typewriters being unknown. The old man whom we had bought out shared my room from the first, on the plea of introducing me to clients. From the very beginning I looked on the great bulk of a fat man with a treacherous face as an Old Man of the Mountain, to be got rid of at the earliest moment, since I could see no signs of re spect or confidence in the demeanor of such clients as came in. Personally, I should have taken an in troduction by him as a serious drawback to be over come. At the end of three months he was out, and I never saw him again. Then our real life began. It was a pure novelty after my apprenticeship to Mr. Field and the Lincoln's Inn practice, centering in the Law Courts and in the High Court of Chan cery. Very soon I found the personal relations be tween solicitor and client to be much more intimate and closer than I had imagined. I was but twenty- seven years old, but I had men of mature age and of high standing coming in to consult me on all kinds of affairs. I remember one business man, who was on the Surrey Magistrates' bench, as well as be ing very prosperous in a money sense, holding con ference for an hour, after he had finished the pretext with which he had begun, on the possible means of disentangling his only daughter from a love affair of which the father greatly disapproved. Eventually I recommended a long foreign tour as a likely No. 2, Suffolk Lane 39 remedy, and we talked it all out. The prescription answered. Father and daughter were away from England for six months, but she returned cured, and the friendly relations between the father and myself lasted for many years. The plant of confidence also grew strongly from consultations over will making. The English solici tor shares with the family doctor the frankest self- divulgence when a man unbosoms himself as to the family relations that must result from and after his own death. I fancy the Englishman trusts no one so absolutely as his solicitor, once he is satisfied that the man is worthy. It is not so essential that he shall be learned as that he shall have tact and com mon sense. Above all, the client must believe you to be, and you must be, honestly interested in him and his affairs. As our business grew and prospered I had two waiting rooms for clients, and turning from one to the next all day long, each in turn convinced that no one's business was as important as his, I have gone home as wearied out as if I had been con ducting a heavy case in court. In Suffolk Lane there was a great variety. Allan Field was a devotee of the stage. Leading actors were his friends. He was accustomed to discuss the leasing of theaters, contracts with stars and man agers, and every kind of interest in the theatrical world. One did not know whom he would have in con ference when one opened his door. We had a department wholly devoted to the affairs of brewers and distillers, and their lessees and cus tomers. We inherited that branch from our prede cessors, but I knew much about the business from the lawyers to whom I was first articled, who represented 40 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents the oldest and largest of the London breweries. Pub lic houses in the metropolis had, and still have, an artificial though now diminished value on sale, a value depending on the license being held intact, and on a purchaser's having a good name in "The Trade" for honesty as well as experience and suc cess. The publican is the slave of the brewer, dis tiller, and wine merchant. They are the first, sec ond and third mortgagees of his lease, and provide most of the money for his purchase. If his business with them falls off, or if, for any reason, his creditors are dissatisfied with him, he is turned out on short notice and his bar knows him no more. It is in fear of such an ending that the London publican main tains strict order in his house, according to police standards. The whole business is one gigantic trust, with powers and influence so wide and deep spread- ings that even Lloyd George is held back from its destruction, and the British Nation still suffers. But my own clientele was miscellaneous indeed, and each year more so, as it expanded. The most amus ing and interesting of our clients at that early time was Henry Labouchere. I am not sure how our in troduction to him came about, but I fancy it was through some theatrical affair in which Allan Field was a leading agent. He came several times to the office when Field was absent and saw me, and we be came pretty good friends. Labouchere, and an associate of his named Staniforth, were at that time trading in and handling various concessions and privileges in continental and Eastern countries. They were both cosmopolitans, in the strictest sense. Henry Labouchere spoke perfect French, and was as much at home in Paris as in London. Labouchere No. 2, Suffolk Lane 41 brought Staniforth to see me, and in quick order I found myself discussing with them the possibilities I have already referred to in the creation of London corporations for holding foreign concessions and attracting British capital for their development. I always enjoyed Labouchere's visits. His per sonality was one not easy to forget. He was a broad, rather thick-set man of middle height, swarthy complexion, curly black hair, worn long, always wearing a frock coat. He had a flat face, and won derful dark eyes — which he more often used to veil than to express his thoughts. He was a constant smoker of cigarettes. His fad was to show as a cynic, imperturbable, self-contained, inaccessible to argument or influence — almost conscienceless. But during quite a long experience I found him at bottom kindly and a man of his word, and by no means inconsiderate of others. He had many odd habits. One of these was to keep no books or ac counts of his transactions, but to trust to a quite wonderful memory, which proved the undoing of any who thought to impose on him. Another was to use no bank book or check book, but to' write out his checks on any old envelope or scrap of pa per he chanced to have in his pocket. I have passed through my hands many of such impromptu checks for very large sums. His bankers knew of course by heart those three cornered or scrappy pieces of paper, covered with his microscopic handwriting. As time passed those two capitalists grew accus tomed to call in at my office on their way from the city to the West End. Those visits not infrequently ended by a commission to start at a day's notice for some foreign city, and examine terms, conditions, 42 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents and surroundings of some enterprise in which they were interested. Once it was the water works of the city of Genoa in Italy, where it was in contemplation to take over the centuries old concession and the supplies of wa ter to the aristocracy of the city from the marble reservoir of Roman days. The attractive feature to the municipality was the substitution of modern iron piping for the ancient lead, and extension of the system to some of the newer districts. When the engineers investigated they found in the heart of the city a great marble tank into which springs from the nearest mountains delivered the supply, and whence eleven hundred leaden pipes carried the wa ter into the various palaces and signorial homes of Genoa. The leaden pipes were well worth taking up, for I was told that there was a profit of eleven hun dred pounds sterling on the substitution of new iron in place for ancient lead. The same engineer told me that water in abundance for the proposed exten sion was running unseen below the channel of an apparently dry watercourse through the desired portion of the city. I had nothing to do with the business side of the Odessa water works. Mr. Staniforth told me that it was no wonder that high rates were demanded and paid for the supply, since the severity of the winter climate required the pipes to be buried seven feet deep to cope with the frost that would other wise prevent the winter supply of water. The Cesena Sulphur Company was another prop erty the transfer of which to the English buyers I was sent to supervise. Cesena is an ancient city No. 2, Suffolk Lane 43 in the Apennines, then reached only by a carriage road from Bologna. I spent a few days in Bologna going through the title records of the Italian own ers of the sulphur beds, and of the ovens or kilns which yielded the pure mineral, with the Italian avocato, whom I found from the credentials handed me I could safely trust. When all was straight he and I started in a carriage for Cesena, where we arrived in the late evening after a rough and rocky journey. There we met Signor Fr. Kossuth — then an Italian engineer — the son of the great Hungarian Liberator, and afterwards an Italian statesman of eminence. He was the engineer for the sulphur mines and works. The old hotel stood in the market place, the guest room on the upper floor looking down on the splen did water fountain in the center, with sculptured figures, at four angles, and water flowing from the stone mouths on every side of the great structure. The wives and children of the towns people were gathered in groups, with water pitchers and ves sels of classic shape, round the fountain, gossiping in the cool evening air. Darkness was coming on fast, and as I stood at the window behind the shut jalousie blinds, I reached forward and unfas tened them and threw them open to watch the more easily the novel scene. From the other side of the room Franz Kossuth rushed forward, seized me forcibly by the arms and dragged me back into the chamber and reclosed the blinds. "What on earth is the matter?" I exclaimed. "Thank God, you are alive !" he panted. "What was happening?" I asked. "Are you not a foreigner, and therefore an enemy in the eyes of these banditti? And are they not 44 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents therefore bound to' shoot you on sight?" he an swered. "This is a notorious center of those doc trines, which prevailed till now in all the States of the Church," he explained to me, giving chapter and verse for even recent crimes. We got through the business in good shape. I decided to return by way of the Splugen pass dili gence, and so to Thun and Basle, and there to take the train as usual for Paris and home. The time was late in May. Lago Maggiore, the queen of the Italian lakes, was never more beautiful. In the evening, with one or two other guests at the hotel, I went in a boat to be rowed on the moonlit waters. The nightingales were flooding the dark shores with their songs. As we got toward the middle of the lake a boatload of musicians rowed out to meet us from a little town on the farther side, and their voices added to the romance of the scene. Late in the evening I was rowed to the old town at the upper end of Maggiore, whence, in the middle of the night, the diligence started over the pass. I chose the seat in front next the driver. In an hour or two we had left behind us the soft air of Italy, and the mountain road from there on had been cut out between snow walls, in many places ten feet high. The morning dawned before we were clear of the snow. Later in the day we were in the thickest dust, and landed at our journey's end all but smothered. A bath and dinner refreshed us, and we started — -a. young English fellow trav eller and myself — in a coach, with no seats filled but ours, for Paris. The slides were drawn over the lamp in the roof of the compartment, and we were both soundly asleep. At some unknown stopping Convent of St. Bernard No. 2, Suffolk Lane 45 place the door was thrown open, and we awoke to see a group of ecclesiastics clustered round an elderly man of dignified and portly presence, in the white wool garment of a Carmelite monk. They ushered him into our compartment, and he was blessing them as the train started. By this time we were wide awake. Our new traveller addressed us courteously, and in French, asking if we were sleepy. We assured him no, and he started in to talk. He asked if we were English — and being so informed began, in good English, to talk of Lon don, of the issues of the day, of English literature — pouring out a flood to which I, for one, could have listened without fatigue to the end of the journey. Presently he asked if we had noticed the place where he had joined us. We said no, we were both trav ellers over this road for the first time. He told us it was the nearest railroad station for the ancient monastery of La Trappe, and it came out that he was the Prior. Seeing we were interested, he told us a good deal about the life there and its attractions, in spite of its severities. Turning the conversation to- ourselves, he asked us of our occu pations, of our family relationships, of our inter ests in business and pleasure, and seemed honestly to appraise and value the frankness of our replies. Meanwhile the night had passed, and we were already in the outskirts of the big city. Our fellow traveller paused, and the conversation stopped. Looking at us both with a warm and friendly smile, he said : "You are both young1 — I am already old — with much that you have told me of your faith you know that I, as you are English Protestants, do not and cannot agree. Yet the same Father in Heaven 46 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents watches over you and me, and hears the prayers of both. Are you willing that I should commend you to His care?" After our gestures of assent this Carmelite Prior began a prayer than which I have never heard one from English canon or Methodist preacher more simply and earnestly expressed. He blessed us, our families and friends, he wished us long and happy and useful lives — and, after he closed with the familiar gesture of benediction, we told him that neither of us would forget him or this memorable journey. And so we parted as the train stopped, and he alighted in the center of another group of his black clothed friends. Paris was to me in those days familiar ground. One of the failed enterprises being wound up and dissolved was a very costly affair at Trouville, on the coast of the channel. The stockholders were part English and part French. My firm was acting for the Englishmen, under the direction of the Eng lish court of chancery, which controlled the Board of Directors and the selling of the properties. The English liquidator was a widely known public ac countant, his Flrench colleague was his brother, the head of their Paris branch. A meeting of French stockholders had been called, at which the policy of sale of the properties that had been approved by the English court was to be submitted and ex plained to them for their formal approval. The chief clerk of the Vice Chancellor, who was the act ing officer of the English court, desired me to go to Paris as his representative at the coming meet ing. The properties at Trouville were hotel, cafe, No. 2, Suffolk Lane 47 restaurant, dancing floors, bathing houses, and a long et cetera. I had considerable misgiving about the French investors, especially as a big loss had to be faced. The next day after my arrival the time came for the meeting in a good sized hall, which was crowded with all classes of the French investing public. As I sat on the platform facing them side by side with the French liquidator, I blessed my stars that the burden of explanation would fall on him. In the front row I remember a stout old French lady, with a very austere look in her eyes, and I set her down as a trouble maker. We began business, and the liquidator made his talk. When he came to the point when he said that the English Court had sent a special representative to the meeting I smelt fire and trembled. After he got through, he proposed to read to them and explain the resolution of ap proval. Then up got that wicked old lady and inquired if I were the Court representative he had spoken of. He assented, and then she appealed to the meeting to call on me to present to them the views of the English Court. I protested that though I understood French yet I could hardly take on my self to address them in their own language. The old dame was not to be denied, and promised they would make all allowances for my modest attempt. My liquidator friend urged me on. I fancy he looked on me for a diversion of trouble from him self. Anyhow, to keep the peace I knew it was up to me to make the attempt. My old lady was as good as her word, and very encouraging if I stopped for a French equivalent for an important word. Others in the audience were also considerate. Some- 48 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents how I got through, and then was grilled for a time between question and answer. In the end the reso lution of approval was put and carried, and the audience dispersed, my old vis-a-vis stopping to shake hands and smile. I made up my mind then and there that the chief clerk should do his own explaining in future, whether in French or English, before I would shoulder the burden for him. Another inter-allied business that we had in hand a year or two afterwards was the joint provision of capital for a Brazilian railroad four or five hun dred miles long by French and English bankers and financial agents of the first class. Once a month or so for the best part of a year I had to cross to Paris before arrangements were complete. I should be well contented to be fed by the Frenchmen pro vided the business part might go through on Eng lish lines. We used to meet, say, at ten o'clock at the French banking house, and when all parties had got together then we would politely discuss our differences and mark time till noon. Then there was a break for dejeuner, and I was taken to one of the Paris cafes, for a beautiful feed. Plenty of conver sation went on over the cigars and coffee until after an hour or so we returned to the stamping ground and made s,ome progress till four o'clock came. Then a date was set for an adjourned meeting and we dispersed, the Frenchmen to their clubs, and a drive or ride in the Bois de Boulogne, then dinner and theater, the English to report progress to their own people and kill time till the next day. How ever in the end the needed capital was subscribed, the issues to the public were successful on both sides of the channel and the Brazilian railroad was built. CHAPTER VI LONDON NOTABILITIES THE absolute uncertainty of what the day had in store was one of the great attractions the city lawyer's life had for me as, day after day, I took my chair, and my stenographer brought in the early mail's letters to' be dealt with and answered. Doubtless there was a good deal of routine work, but on the other hand some stranger might be pre sented, or might come in on some friend's or client's introduction with an absolutely new story to tell. For instance, one day the managing partner of our bankers' firm came into my room with a rather undersized, elderly man of undoubtedly German lineage. The banker presented to me Mr. Heintz, who, he said, had studied out a novelty in banking that had interested him, and he thought would in terest me, and which he would leave our German friend to explain fully: and thereupon he went off. Mr. Heintz seated himself and began his talk in good English but with a strong German accent. He said that he had, for a long time, been of opinion that a check, to be drawn on a new style of bank by any of its customers, might be devised that would pass from bank to' bank and from man to' man on the strength of the check itself, regardless of the financial standing of the drawer. He thought that 49 50 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents such a check might stay in circulation for an un defined period, and be taken at its face value in any of the ordinary transactions of life, and in any of the civilized countries of Europe, as soon as enough time had elapsed to secure a common, if not a uni versal, knowledge of this new currency and its originating bank. I confess I should have stopped him then and there and declined a longer interview had it not been for the common respect and confidence enjoyed by the banker who introduced him to' me. As it was I told him to explain himself and his plan more fully. He said that he proposed to name the new insti tution "The Cheque Bank, Limited." That it would sell to customers check books containing, say, twenty check forms of a total amount of four hundred pounds. That each of the check forms would be good for twenty pounds and no more — but could be drawn and signed by the drawer for any less amount, so leaving to the credit of the drawer in the bank the balance of the check's original value of twenty pounds. That such customer could take or send to the bank the check book when all its forms had been filled up and buy a new check book, with all undrawn balances credited to him — he sat isfying the bank as to the sums for which the checks had been filled up by him by the return of the original checks through banks or by presentation to the Cheque Bank for payment in the usual way. This is but an outline, but it may serve. I told him that he must first satisfy me, and afterwards any intending stockholders in his bank that there would be no interference with the prerogatives of the Bank of England, and then that the form of London Notabilities 51 check that he had devised would not lend itself to forgery or mutilation, and thirdly that such trial and publicity could be obtained in a reasonable time as might bring his new checks into common request and use. Having made an appointment for an other interview a week from that day, Mr. Heintz left me. Next day I went to see my banking friend and fully discussed the matter. He told me to' make a preliminary examination of the points raised, and if satisfactory answers could be given to see him again. To make a short story of it, Mr. Heintz's form of check was produced and submitted to ex perts, and his plans were put before the authorities of the Bank of England and passed by them. A year later the Cheque Bank, Limited, opened its doors for business. Many men of large capital bought the check books for their wives to use in household affairs. Many were bought by conti nental travellers. Some came back to' London, I recollect, from Suez and Cairo, others from hotels in several continental countries. Only about three attempted forgeries came to light in two years, one under circumstances that would make a story by itself. But, as the vogue of the Cheque Bank extended it began to attract more careful scrutiny from the Bank of England and other governmental heads. Quietly, soon after I left England, as I heard at the time, the capital was bought up and the bank and its business dropped out of sight : but some features of it were taken up for use of travellers abroad. The Cheque Bank check was quite a work of art: it was printed in colors which could not be photographed. Among my legal acquaintances Judah P. Benj a- 52 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents min — the ex-Confederate Secretary — was one of the most interesting. He was admitted by courtesy to the English bar, when he took refuge in the old city after the Civil War. My partner, Field, was intro duced to him, liked him, and proposed to me to send him some briefs. I met him therefore in his dark and dingy little chambers in the Temple where he had established himself with an ancient clerk. I found a short, stout man, whose noteworthy fea ture was large, dark brown, liquid eyes, Jewish in shape, and full of expression. He had a soft and musical voice and I soon found he was a master advo cate, with all his resources available at call. His manners were very graceful, and he had excellent powers of expression. He came among us as a stranger and a fugitive, but never did those condi tions interfere with his rapid advancement, even among the iron-bound traditions which he seemed to imbibe instinctively. His first work in London was to publish there his masterpiece, "Benjamin on Sales." It became at once a ready reference and an epitome of his sub ject. It took its authoritative place immediately. In arguing in the English courts the barrister cites precedents and decided cases but not textbooks. Yet before Mr. Benjamin had been more than one or two years at that bar I heard counsel produce and cite "Benjamin on Sales" in the Court of Queens Bench in a case under argument, without protest, and with a friendly smile from the Lord Chief Jus tice for the American newcomer, sitting there in Court. Another innovation we owed to him. It had long been the practice for counsel to hold three or four cases for one day, when one case would London Notabilities 53 occupy all their time and effort — but they pock eted all the fees attached to all the briefs though not even present in the Court where the cases were tried. It was left for Mr. Benjamin to return all the fees that he did not earn by presence in Court and taking his part in the conduct of the case. No wonder that business flowed in on him. He very soon "took silk," as the phrase goes, was made a Queen's Counsel, and earned a pocketful of money, to which my firm were very substantial contributors. His mind was one of the most logical with which I came in contact in many years. This was strongly brought out in the "consultations" which I often attended, when Mr. Benjamin, and other leaders of the Bar, and the junior counsel in the case were all present. I remember once a case of much im portance when Mr. Benjamin was a leader, in co operation with Sir Henry James, then Attorney General. I don't think there is any practice in American courts that quite parallels English prac tice in this matter of "consultations." In England the attorney and solicitor (who change their title as between the Attorney in Common Law and the Solicitor in Chancery as the cases vary) receive the client's instructions, interview the witnesses and sift and take down their testimony. The '*Brief" is then prepared, with such outline of the legal as pect of the case as seems to be desirable. Copies are then made for all the counsel to be engaged in the hearing and are left at the counsel's chambers in the Temple or in Lincoln's Inn with the bar rister's clerk. The fees are marked visibly on the brief. A time is then set for the consultation by the clerk of the senior or leading counsel — which time 54 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents is either before or after the court hours. In this consultation the counsel and the solicitor meet for the first time. Counsel are supposed to have mas tered the brief in advance. But with busy men this work is often a mere lookover. At any rate, before the consultation is far ad vanced all present have found out the main points of the case and intelligent discussion begins. The master minds disclose themselves by their quick grasp of the main facts and their ready application to them of more or less familiar principles of law. In these trials of wit Mr. Benjamin always shone. Arguments taken up, stated, weighed and either dropped or accepted are passed back and forth be tween these highly trained gladiators in the legal forum. To me, sitting mostly at the side, the con sultation was the most interesting and exciting phase of the case: for on the decisions here arrived at the future of the case can generally be foretold. I have introduced this side discussion because I have SO' often been asked by my American friends as to the English practice, in which they are much interested. To return, then, to Mr. Benjamin and Sir Henry James. Pitted against each other in Court, the fight was sure to be a royal one. Associated, each one having the same statement of facts in the brief before him, and taking up an agreed side of the ar gument that specially appealed to him, they were well nigh invincible. It may be safely said that no point in their client's case would be overlooked. The great chancery advocates of those days were Sir George Jessel, Sir Hugh Cairns and Sir Roun- dell Palmer. Each of them in turn was Attorney London Notabilities 55 General. Sir George Jessel became Master of the Rolls, and for years was a Justice of Appeal. Each of the others became Lord Chancellor. The three men were as diverse in appearance and demeanor as can be imagined. Sir George Jessel was big, burly, rough voiced, and with one movable eye that used to revolve in an alarming fashion. He was the most quick witted of the three, and a. most effective advo cate. Sir Hugh Cairns was tall, graceful, light haired and one of the handsomest of men. His face was that of an ancient Greek. His voice was care fully modulated, but quite cold in tone. Sir Roun- dell Palmer was held to be the best equipped lawyer of the day. His delivery in Court was most deliber ate and every word counted. A regular attendant in the Chancery Courts of those days was tiny Miss Flite. Yes — the Miss Flite of Bleak House. Many a time have I sat out a long hearing beside her, in her deep hooded black bonnet and her tight drawn black shawl. She always knew the place in Court she wanted, and every one made room for her: if not, she would elbow her way in without mercy or restraint. But she was a privi leged character. She had her own favorites among the counsel and was prone to audibly express her comments. She always carried a black silk bag, tightly drawn. It was full of papers, with just room for the hard, round "Abernethy" biscuit, which was her invariable luncheon when the court rose for the midday interval. When I was a pupil with Mr. Field my special delight in the Lord Justices' Court was Lord Jus tice Knight Bruce. He was a little rotund man, with an apple face, and a bitter wit, which he gen- 56 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents erally repressed. His colleague on that bench was Lord Justice Turner, with the face of an ascetic and of a chronic invalid. His voice was cracked and often hardly audible — yet every one in the court listened for his words, for he was every inch a judge of the first rank. But Knight Bruce was the senior and a stickler for the traditional usages of his court, held in terror by the younger brethren of the Bar. There are some, not many, members of the English Bar who are called "Conveyancers," and scarcely ever appear in court, and then only in cases dealing with real property. To them questions of title, of old customs and duties still attached to the pos session of estates and conditions of tenure are sub mitted. One to whom I was really attached was named Rudall, with large chambers in Lincoln's Inn, and a large and valuable library. It was always a pleasure to take to him some knotty questions, and submit to him doubts that had been bothering you, and to watch him bring to bear on it his stores of experience. He was old and little and gray, soft and gentle of voice. I went to him first as a stranger — uncertain of my ground and very diffident. He welcomed me and set everything else aside to talk me out and give back to me what had no expressed value, but was worth very much to me. Afterwards I found that he, like other great lawyers of that and I believe of every other time, was as attentive to Christian duties as he was to every day professional calls. One of these was Vice Chancellor Page Wood, the judge of those courts then most highly in repute. Sunday after Sunday for many years he might be London Notabilities 57 seen with a great class of lads in the slums of West minster, teaching them and, more than that, giving himself to influence them in the right way. I should note that Sir Roundell Palmer edited "Hymns, Ancient and Modern," and Lord Cairns was much interested in Ragged schools, and other work among the London poor. As time passed a new class of cases came my way — dealing with new inventions and patents, and so with their originators. The first who came to me in Suffolk Lane was Fred. Ransome, an Ipswich friend. He was a chemical engineer, and was pos sessed by one great idea, which, having entered his soul, absorbed his life and work. The time was one of new construction and development in many lines, requiring new and costly structures. Archi tects were abandoning the horrible late Georgian designs, and demanding stone, in place of brick, and carved and decorated stone at that. Fred. Ransome appreciated this, and believed that he had in mind a method of making an artificial stone, which could be moulded into any artistic form in process of manufacture, and would be hard and durable in the ultimate surface, and stand exposure in the fluctu ating English climate. A great idea if practical. He knew that chloride of calcium and certain forms of alumina were subject to a double decompo sition if brought together in a liquid solution, the four constituents changing hands according to their affinities, and that the result was silicate of lime, permanent, hard, and immovable when once the orig inal water was evaporated, and the rest of the mix ture would be washed away — also that the silicate of lime passed through a gelatinous phase as it hard- 58 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents ened, when it could be moulded into any shape desired. Not only did Mr. Ransome make artificial stone, but his material, in a much diluted condition, made a wash which he applied to the surface of existing structures showing signs of decay. It entered the pores of either stone or brick and there hardened, giving the material, from core to' surface, a new lease of life. He believed that he had discovered the secret of the ancient Roman cement — a mortar which survived the centuries, and was to-day even stronger than the stones in which it was at first imbedded. He was a convincing talker and a real master of his subject. It did not take long to get together a large group of capitalists, among whom Sir Henry Bessemer, and Mr. Donkin, the head of the great engineering firm bearing his name, were prominent. Various chemists and architects were taken into council, and numberless experiments made. A great immediate prize was in sight, as the stone of the splendid Houses of Parliament buildings already showed signs of needing some treatment to stop disintegration and decay. Laboratory experiments were all but uniformly successful, and there seemed to be no reason why large scale manufacture would not be wisely undertaken. So ground at Greenwich, on the bank of the Thames, was secured, works con structed and set in operation. The news spread and a stream of architects and builders came to see, and in many instances to give orders. It was an instance of quick development. One could see hundreds of blocks of stone ready for shipment, of color exactly resembling the costly London Notabilities 59 Portland building stone, but in all the multiform shapes needed in expensive mansions, hotels, law courts, and modern factories. For a year or two all went well, but then complaints began to come in that certain of the blocks were showing imper fections. Mr. Ransome went off to examine, and in various instances to replace the faulty blocks— but profits began to fall off and the prestige of success to fail. Such men as were on that Directorate were not easily discouraged, and improved methods were applied — but uniform success was not gained, and the orders steadily diminished. Poor Ransome was the worst sufferer. He always dealt honestly with his colleagues and held their respect throughout. His salvation was the protective wash. There, how ever, he met another difficulty. There came a glassy white film on the surface of the treated stone, which spoilt its beauty. So the big government order was not forthcoming. And the company was set back to the day of small things. As for myself, good and faithful friends came from my association with them on the Artificial Stone Board. Sir Henry Bessemer was one. He and I sat side by side there for several years. He told me much about his early life and struggles. He was an inveterate inventor. He went about the world with wide open eyes. More than two hundred inventions of his were recorded first and last in the British Patent Office. The Bessemer steel, of course, brought him fame and abundant fortune. I heard from his own lips how every shilling he had, or could borrow, and all the possessions he and his good wife owned, even to her wedding ring, were in the furnace 60 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents in the infant works in the Gray's Inn Road, when the iron melted and bubbled, and at last the air broke through the metal and did its work, and steel was made. The Prentices, owners of the Gun Cotton Pat ents, were also early clients, coming in the first place by virtue of a distant family connection. Their factory at Stowmarket, an old Suffolk town, was then built and in full operation, turning out gun cotton in large quantities, both for mining, for ar tillery and other war engineering purposes. They were experimenting all the time to stabilize the manu facture, and to safeguard several processes in its production. The distinctive action of the explosive in the open or enclosed in mine hole or gun de manded constant study, as also the amazing con trast between combustion and detonation. I have seen Eustace Prentice set fire to a given quantity of gun cotton in the open, and it burned harmlessly away: while the same quantity, detonated, but also in the open, drove a hole through the half-inch iron plate on which it rested. They were then trying to get the stuff into common use in shotguns. To make it safe in the gun the explosion had to be gradual, and many methods were tried. A cartridge was made in which the percussion cap exploded a very minute quantity of highly explosive gun cot ton muslin, which enwrapped a gun cotton paper wad, filling the bore of the gun, and exploding very slowly, so that the total force of the explosion was not entirely used until the charge of shot left the muzzle of the gun. This worked very well, but was costly to manufacture, and every one interested had to be shown. Eustace Prentice was the salesman, London Notabilities 61 and travelled all over the British Islands with his samples. Sometimes I accompanied him, but I own I looked apprenhensively at the little black suit case that never left his hands or immediate control. Once we were travelling to Cornwall, for him to demon strate in the copper mines, down deep, and stretch ing out under the ocean, the superiority of the new gun cotton over the old black powder. He had no trouble with the owners and superintendents. The foremen oh the surface were almost convinced, but Prentice's task was to satisfy the actual miners deep below. He and his black bag went down in the cage, while I waited in the office talking to the others. In an hour or two he returned, radiant. The shots had been quite a success. But his black bag was nearly empty. He was to go down again in the morning and meet another shift of the miners. He told me that the foreman had urged him to leave them a couple of charges that they might set off in his absence and to doing so the foreman said he was entirely competent. Prentice said he very un willingly agreed. When he went down the next morning the foreman came to meet him with a very sheepish look, and his left hand was strongly bandaged. The man tried to make very little of it — but this came out on cross-examination — that the second gun cotton cartridge was rather too long for the hole and stuck out an inch over the top. Therefore the foreman had taken out the cartridge and proceeded to cut a couple of inches off it: this he did by laying the cartridge on the rock at the edge and chopping the two inches off with a hatchet ! Tableau, an explosion, and a badly damaged hand. The British Government was a very large cus- 62 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents tomer, and gun cotton in the then most recent form of solid paper disks with a hole through the center of each, was part of the equipment of the Royal Engineers. I read in the narrative of the siege of Delhi in the Indian mutiny, how an engineer had at imminent risk of death carried a string of these disks through the approach to the main gate, swept by the fire of the mutineers inside, and had sus pended the gun cotton string on the surface of the gate, had lighted the fuse and calmly retired unhurt, to see the gate blown to fragments and the British stormers rush in. I wish I could there leave my tale: but the clos ing records are abundantly sad, even in the horrors of the present day. The manufacture of gun cotton depends on the saturation of absolutely clean cotton with a mix ture of nitric and sulphuric acid in defined propor tions and conditions. At the Stowmarket factory this process went on under the careful eye of a specialist workman. On exactness depends whether the product shall be stable and safe to handle or store, or to be unstable and liable to explode with out warning. There came over the wires one sum mer day the news of a terrible explosion at those works, which had blown the factory to pieces, with a gang of workmen just returning from dinner, and also told that Mr. Prentice, Senior, and his son and the superintendent were instantly killed, with a number of their work people. The concussion had set off a number of the under water magazines where many tons of a government order for gun cotton were stored. Every window in the town was broken and many buildings wrecked there, and in London Notabilities 63 the immediate neighborhood. Eustace Prentice, the younger brother, was absent at the time and so escaped. The inquiry brought out that there had been some ill-feeling between the superintendent and one of the workmen under him, who had been instantly dis charged. He was arrested, but every witness of the tragedy had been killed, and as to evidence of the condition of the machinery and of the unmanu factured stock — there was literally none. So there was another case where "not proven" was the only possible verdict. I must stop, for the tale would be too long to tell here of other discoveries and inventions of im portance deeply interesting at the time, though they included the introduction into paper making of esparto grass, an African and Spanish product, by Mr. Routledge of Newcastle, and, last but surely not least, of the telephone. In my office in Queen Street, Cheapside, was installed the London end of the first English long distance telephone — the other end be ing in Queen Victoria's Palace at Osborne in the Isle of Wight. A group of us listened in turn, as we distinctly heard for the first time the bugle that played at Osborne, "Home, Sweet Home," "Annie Laurie," and other well known strains. It fell to me to make arrangements with various business houses in London to introduce the telephone into their business life. It tells the story of British slowness and immovableness that, whereas I thought I was doing these people a favor in inviting their co-operation, I had to woo and press them to do their part ; they believing that they were doing my clients and myself an unmistable kindness. CHAPTER VII DEATH OF EDWIN WILKINS FIELD 1 THINK it was in October of the third year of our partnership, and late in the afternoon, that Allan Field came suddenly into my room with an ashen face. A telegram was in his hand. He threw it in front of me on my desk, without a word. This was the message: "Your father was drowned in the river last evening — 'The Yankee' capsized." Signed Elwood, the old cashier who had served Field and Roscoe for many years, and to whom above almost all others the Governor was at once patron and hero. It was sent from the little river town near which Mr. Field had his summer home that year. He had returned to business some weeks previously, but had evidently returned for a week end, taking Elwood with him. Allan rushed off to get the earliest train to the scene. The next day but one I heard from him that the funeral was set for the coming Saturday, the service to be at the Unitarian church in Hampstead, of which Mr. Field was a member. There was not room in the church for those who pressed to be present. There were men of all ages and conditions. Many were business associates and competitors, many were members of the committee of the Law Society, of which Mr. Field had been one of the 64 Death of Edwvn Wilkins Field 65 governing board for many years. Many members of the Bar were there, who by his invitation had passed months in the offices of him whom we all mourned. The staff of the present day were there of course — among them I recognized my old friend Francis, who had welcomed me to the office those years ago. His face was wrung with grief at the personal loss that I knew well would cut him to the heart. Room was found for many like myself, who had been specially drawn to their old master by affection, as well as by gratitude for in spiration and help. Among his personal friends were several artists, whose features were generally familiar. The service was very simple, consisting mainly of Bible passages read by the minister of the church. A few words of remembrance and farewell were spoken by old friends, and then came the sad jour ney to Highgate Cemetery, where very many men fa mous in the history of the country have been laid to rest. Later I heard the tragic story. "The Yankee" was the name given by Mr. Field to a beautiful American yawl, sent to him a year or two previ ously by Mr. Cyrus Field, as a memorial of the friendship between the two namesakes, originating in their association in the work of providing for and carrying out the laying of the Atlantic cable. "The Yankee" carried one large sail. She was very fast, but, in spite of ballast, was quite cranky, among the twists and turns of the upper Thames. Mr. Field would let no one but he steer her when he was on board. He was a very reckless steersman and gave his sons many an anxious moment. His 66 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents custom was to have his old clerks down, two at a time, for the week end, making the round of the office before the vacation ended. But two had not had their turn, and Mr. Field took advantage of his returning to the cottage for a few days on this occasion to invite the cashier, Elwood, and one of the older clerks on the common law side of the office, to visit him. I have told before what a water dog the Governor was. On the river he de lighted in the "washers" of the water mills. On the sea shore he would go into the waves two or three times a day. He had brought up his boys to love the water. That there was danger to the Governor in the waters of the Thames was unthinkable. But — the elder of the two clerks who visited him on that most unlucky Sunday was a little, nervous, short sighted man, a townsman proper, with no country tastes or pursuits. The other, Elwood, was a big, healthy man, used to walking, rowing, swimming. On that October day the air was chilly, the wind blustery and fitful. No one but the Governor would have thought of going out sailing on that evening, but he had planned to take out those two clerks in "The Yankee," so of course it had to be gone through with. Poor Elwood told the tale, how his mate shook and trembled when the boat heeled over as the rough gusts struck her, and the boat tore along through the waters of -a- long reach not far from the house. There was a sharp turn at its end, and the Governor, steering, made not enough allowance — a violent gust struck her, and over she went, smothering her three passengers in the big sail. The river is wide there, but to the Governor and to Elwood to swim ashore was a trifle, and they Death of Edwin Wilkins Field 67 shook themselves free of the sail and quickly were ashore. But the other man could not swim, and was clinging to the mast and, losing what little nerve he had, shouted frantically to them to rescue him. Instantly the Governor jumped in and swam to him, calling to him to be quiet, and that there was no danger. But he cried the more, and when the Governor reached him his feet were encumbered in the sail. Telling him to let go and that he would take him ashore, the Governor pulled him loose from the mast ; instantly the man threw his arms round his neck and clung the tighter as he feared the more. Down the two went into the dark water, and the Governor was never again seen alive. Seeing the danger, Elwood plunged in again and got hold of the weakling and dragged him ashore, not doubting that the Governor would follow him on coming to the surface. Whether he was entangled in the boat's gear, or whether the weight of his sodden clothes was too' much for his strength, no' one can ever know, but the sad fact stands that Edwin Field, the fearless and experienced swimmer, was drowned in his own well loved Thames, in the self-sacrifice of his life for that of another who relied on him for salvation in what he deemed his own extremity. I shall have written very poorly if I have not made it clear that in losing Edwin Field in the full scope of his power and influence a great light in my own professional and personal life went out. His loss to me, and to many more of those associated with him, was irreparable. CHAPTER VIII ENGLISH SUBURBAN LIFE WORK AND PLAY FORTY years ago, and for a few previous years, we lived in Beckenham, a Kentish village ten miles from London. By that time the all-changing railroad had built its line, past Beckenham on its way from London to Tonbridge. Many new houses had risen for the London merchants and profes sional men who came to make their suburban homes on the farm and orchard lands that had lain for centuries near the door of the great city, with a farming, hop and fruit growing population of mas ters and men. In the main street of the village many of the brick and wooden cottages survived, bordering the Beck brook which gave its name to the place. There stood the village lock-up, and also the fire engine house- — the first example of the de mands of the new immigration. Several lovely and spacious parks and demesnes were in close neigh borhood, their owners being represented in the old monuments and tablets, in the ancient church, whose spire caught the light from among the big elms and yew trees that bordered the churchyard. The rectory stood just across the road from the "lych gate," where for many generations the funeral processions had stopped, sheltered from the rain, to meet the waiting clergyman in surplice and stole, 68 English Suburban Life — Work and Play 69 to begin the solemn words of the burial service, as he preceded the coffin to the church. The rectory garden and grounds bore testimony to the tastes of their occupants, with old elms and well grown lilacs and laburnums surrounding the brilliant flower beds that fronted the entrance to the house. The rector, at the time of which I write, was a fine example of the Low Church or Evan gelical clergyman, loved and respected by all, high and low. He had begun life as a soldier and had served with honor in the Indian Cavalry — then, hearing another call to' a higher duty, he had re turned to the home land, had taken the clergy's spe cial training, and had settled here when presented to the living by the owners who, at that time, had no qualified member of the family to fill the office. In the family, in sickness or in health, Mr. Chal mers shone : no one could be a more welcome visitor. In the pulpit, while we listened to him, Sunday after Sunday, his habit was to preach, without manuscript or notes, closing his eyes, and pouring forth a stream of orthodoxy to a somnolent con gregation, often without any special connection with his text. How well I remember the commentary of a highly educated and rather critical friend of ours as we left the church: "How strange that so good and competent a man should think his duty dis charged when he lets a verse take the bit between its teeth and carry him wheresoever it will!" There were two sons in that family. The older chose a business career, married the daughter of the managing partner in a great financial house in London, entered the firm and was a leading figure on 'change for many years. The younger son was 70 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents our special friend. He graduated at Oxford, was called to the Bar in due time, and had a typically English successful career. Slight and active in physique, dowered with modesty and gentleness like his father, having the gift of efficiency, and im mense powers of work, doing all with a smile that made for him friends wheresoever he went, Macken zie, or better "Kenny," Chalmers never lacked op portunity, nor seemed to let it pass. Without po litical backing or influence, "Kenny" Chalmers was found, but a few years after his call, a special coun sel to the Home Office. Then his talents as a drafts man were developed, and he was associated with other counsel in preparing for the British govern ment statutes, and by-laws and Orders in Council. The next thing we heard of him was that he was' sent to India and was set to' work there on the codi fication of the Indian Criminal Code — a Herculean task. Several most trying and eventful years fol lowed. His work there being accomplished, he was recalled before falling a victim to the Indian fever which is the scourge of the British Politicals. The new Indian Criminal Code, as Chalmers and his co adjutors left it, regulating the lives of three hun dred million people, I understand has since been de veloped, but their work is still the foundation on which the superstructure stands. After returning to England he was given other important employment by the British Government, representing them in various foreign countries and on several commissions — always unobtrusive, always efficient and conscientious. He died but a few years ago, still hard at work, a good example of that civil service where names are forgotten, but of whom English Suburban Life — Work and Play 71 it may be safely said that "their works do follow them." In his early Beckenham days Kenny Chalmers was, like the rest of us, an enthusiastic cricketer. He was the crack bowler of our eleven, and in those days could generally take a day off for any good match. The captain of the club was also an Ox ford man, as were many of the rank and file of the members. A jollier set of young fellows it would* be hard to find. The field was in a corner of a large park nearest to the village. A road, bordered with the spick and span houses of the new residents ran along one side, but the field was screened by a splen did thick hawthorn hedge, ten feet high, from the intrusive eyes of those newcomers. A big marquee stood on one side of the field, and provided shelter for the tea, which was invariably served on match days by Mary Elliott, the village nurse and general benefactor, when she could run off from her arduous duties. A more important side of Mary's life is seen from the record that in one year she helped sixty babies into the world, without one loss, and unaided by any doctor. No story of life in Beckenham would be complete without the tale of Mary's activities. I wish I could show you her smiling face and twin kling eyes, shining from a countenance that even weeks of night watching seemed never to dull. Besides the parish church there were two others — one filled by a clergyman of more moderate and modern views than those held by the old rector. There great pains were taken in the music of the volunteer choir, in which both male and female voices 72 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents were heard. The organ was new, and a beautiful instrument, which I much enjoyed playing for sev eral years. We had a funny trial the Sunday the new organ was first used. Beckenham was troubled in those days with a plague of rats, which had headquarters in the old farms and barns that still survived. All new buildings were invaded by those most unwelcome visitors. The choir had been prac tising the music for the next morning. After they went I stayed on, happy over the new organ. Everything was in good fix. Imagine my conster nation when the organ blower met me at the church the next morning with a very long and scared face: "Please, sir, rats got into the church last night, and they've bit a big hole in the bellows of the organ, and it won't hold any wind !" It was even so. The congregation was beginning to arrive, and there was no time to apply any remedy. I got in side the organ, and found a hole as big nearly as an orange in the bellows at the angle nearest the ground. I got two or three handkerchiefs and made a wad that I jammed into that hole with all my force. By that time the bell had stopped and the clergyman was in his place. I slipped onto the organist's bench, and began with the utmost caution, using the smallest and softest stops, depending on the choir to make out. All went well at first. The organ blower minded my orders and filled the bel lows very cautiously. But — in the hush, when the second lesson was just ending, I heard the wind rushing into my poor organ. The worst happened, for as the choir stood up to sing, puff went the bellows, and there was indeed a "sound of a mighty rushing wind," of which we had just been hearing, Mary Elliott — The Village Nurse English Suburban Life — Work and Play 73 and my pad blew out, amid the amused looks of the congregation, and I hid my shamed head for the rest of that day. An occasional resident at the Rectory in those days was Miss Catharine Marsh, sister of Mrs. Chalmers. She was a pioneer in the awakening of the British people to the value of woman's work, and especially of woman's service to the Nation. This followed without interruption on the recogni tion of the heroic figure of Florence Nightingale, as the angel of the hospitals in the Crimean war. Miss Marsh accepted a call to special work for the British "navvies" who congregated in hundreds in and round Beckenham, in the work on the grounds and buildings of the Crystal Palace on the range of hills opposite our village, and on the building of the Chatham and Dover Railway. These men were in sooth sheep without a shepherd. They slaved early and late through the week, and when Sunday came filled all the public houses and drinking places with riot and drunkenness, as they wasted hardly won wages. They were indeed a rough lot, and it took a courageous woman .to venture on them in their haunts and lodging houses. But Miss Marsh was the ideal woman for that work. She was tall and predominating, with a big voice for a woman, very good looking for that type. She was full of belf-confidence, and feared nothing. She always dressed handsomely. Above all she was full of the missionary spirit, and surely trusted in God to deliver those to whom she believed she was sent. She started at Penge, with the Crystal Palace men. When she entered their lodging houses she made her- 74 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents self welcome, and the men accepted her at her own valuation. She set a time for her first meeting and invited them, and many of them came from the first, and her fame spread. Very soon she was the fashion, and her first battle was won. Then she took up the railroad navvies in Beckenham. There her friends built her a hall big enough to hold, I should say, well over a hundred men. I went to one of the early meetings and found it a new ex perience. Miss Marsh read admirably, and the audience followed every word. Her exposition was homely and to the point. The sermon was of the straight Gospel type, and there were several con verted, as she and they believed, every night. Cer tainly the drunkenness and rioting were greatly re duced. Some time afterwards there was a great outbreak of cholera in London, and Miss Marsh had a great chance to prove the metal of which she was made — and she rang true. She took a foremost part in organizing ministry and relief in the stricken districts, and "took her full share in visiting. She was thoroughly practical, and followed the doctors' orders about cleanliness and disinfectants. I saw a good deal of her at the time, and she surely did a great work. Miss Marsh addressed her audiences sitting. She spoke with great deliberation; and when her big voice boomed through the room he would have to be a very bold man who refused to obey her orders, or to accept her invitations. It was my custom in those happy days when I was still young to stop at the cricket field on my way home from the station, and spend an hour with English Suburban Life — Work and Play 75 comrades and the club professional in practice at the nets. Our dinner time was set for half past seven and no one complained. This, be it remem bered, was only so long as the long summer daylight " lasted. Here is one great difference between the American business man and his English cousin. The Englishman thinks most of the game in which he can take a personally active part. He keeps in practice until the time comes when he unwillingly admits that he is growing old. The American "Fan" is unknown on the other side of the Atlantic. The Englishman would not know what to make of it if he were expected to attend a game played by paid, and very highly paid, professionals several days in the week. And that he not only would be pardoned but would be praised for his excess of emotion if he howled and shouted at every perfect play through out the afternoon. Moreover that the professionals whose feats he witnessed had no local interest in the game, but might be here to-day and there to morrow under the orders of an "owner" of the team, whose money the players received, and who was pocketing a fortune by his investment in a game. The average Englishman, even he who loves cricket and has himself played the game as long as health and strength lasted, never sees a game where all the players were professionals, and scarcely ever when his county, or city, or university or town are not pitted against another club in the same class. I suppose once a cricketer always a cricketer, and I willingly' admit that the same is true of the base ball fan. Each game suits its own nationals best, and proselytism is vain. But I confess that I 76 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents should dearly love to sit even once more in the Beckenham pavilion, and see out a game between the native club and West Kent — professionals barred, if that restriction be necessary since I left the old land and swore a willing allegiance to the Stars and Stripes. oaE ra sa Z, o O CHAPTER Ii ENGLISH VACATIONS THE summer term is over and done with. The Courts are closed, the benches empty, the throng, coming and going, is no longer seen. The judges and the barristers are off for the long va cation. Even the solicitors and their clerks share in its blessings, and even new clients receive but a modified welcome if they hope to keep us in town. The head clerk in our office comes into my room with a smiling face. He has a long paper in his hand, which is the vacation list — where every one's name has its appointed date and period, ranging from the janitor's week at Margate to the head clerk's three weeks' lodgings for him with his wife and the chicks at Hastings or the Isle of Wight. Salaries and wages go on just the same, for our people are a satisfied and interested lot — with few complaints, and no hardships that we can cure. Field and I settle it between ourselves, that we shall share the time between now and the beginning of November — each adapting his absences to his own pursuits. Looking back over the years these blessed times stand out in bold relief. This year marks North Devon, with Exmoor and Lorna Doune and the meet of the big staghounds, with their scarlet coated riders — the next calls up Mid Devon, and 77 78 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents the Tors and trout streams of Dartmoor, the pink and purple heather and the smell of the peat smoke in every one of the ancient granite cottages and farms — the stone dividing walls that shut off farms from moor, and the bunching of the wild ponies from many a mile of the roughest of rough pasture. We must not overlook the visit to the old home in the East country, where wide fields of wheat stubble and acres on acres of turnips and mangold shelter the partridge coveys on the open, and the hares squat in their forms, waiting for the Oc tober days when the farmer and his friends bring their couples of greyhounds to give these poor hares the race for their lives, while the horses are stretched in full gallop to keep pace with the greyhounds and their quarry. Other years mean Norway and Switzerland, Bel gium and France, and each has its own tale to tell. But we turn back to Dartmoor now and the peat smoke, as to the king of all the holidays. I heard of an old house in Devon, four miles from Chagford on the Teign, and standing in a wild old park of many acres, stretching southward to' Dartmoor. The owner was an out at elbows old gentleman, who wanted to lease the whole estate for two or three years and so prevent its sale. I found that by becoming a leaseholder there I could secure from the Duchy of Cornwall Trust a lease for a simi lar term of the ancient sporting privileges over the Moor and its surroundings, and keep away tres passers and poachers. I closed the business ac cording to these plans, and my wife's mother, with two of her girls, was glad to go to live in so beau- English Vacations 79 tiful a spot, and so make for my family a holiday home. The old stone-built and thatched-roofed house stood near the bank of the Teign, where great rocks caught the fast- water in its course and the sound of its dashing on and over them filled the air. An ancient bridge was the only access to the house from Holy Street, misnamed a road, piled with boulders and heavy stones to break up well nigh every car riage that tried to pass along it from Chagford town to Gidleigh church, and so to Dartmoor. The very air smelled still of the ancient — very ancient — times, when the Druids brought the tall stones into a wide circle on the Moor to form their church, and the Celts who made up their congregation dragged other stones to build their round houses on the banks of one branch of the Teign, and laid the oak limbs for their roofs — the remains of all of this standing to this day. The only building in the park, besides the house, was the dog kennel, inhabited by six or eight little liver and white spaniels for rabbiting, and half a dozen Gordon setters — a favorite breed which I held to for many years. There my "keeper" Saun ders reigned. I brought him from Surrey, but he soon adapted himself to Devon. There he married a pretty girl, and they set to raising a family, so binding east and west. These Devon folk were a superstitious race. Saunders had a bad tooth ache once, and on asking him what he did for it he opened his shirt and showed me his wife's thimble hanging by a string round his neck. This, he told me, held a large live spider, which his wife and her 80 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents people insisted was a sovereign cure for the tooth ache. Our children ran wild, and one was added to the family while we stayed in the old Gidleigh Park house. He has proved the widest traveller of the bunch, ranging from Venezuela to Nome and the Arctic. I tell my wife he must have taken in the Wanderlust with the wild moorland air. I am reminded of little Maria, our most faithful little Devon servant. She came into the dining room from the kitchen one day, and spied two knives left crosswise on the table. She rushed out in stantly to dig up an earth worm and to rebury it with crossed sticks over it, to ward off the evil eye from the family's future. I was, naturally, a stranger on Dartmoor when we arrived. Whoever thinks there is no wilderness in little England should take a course on Dart moor. Just in miles it is more than twenty-four miles by twenty, and in variety it more than equals the Western Oregon that I know so well. On its whole expanse there is no cultivated land. It is ranged by some half wild sheep and by more than half wild ponies in large bands. A fine sight is the annual gathering for mark ing, and selecting the ponies for sale. One of the larger farms on the edge of the moor is chosen, and some rough pole fences set up leading from the open moor to the farm yard enclosure. The owners on horseback scour the moor, and presently one sees these bands of ponies, with flying manes and tails, converging on the farm. Then the fun begins when each man claims those of his own brand. On a much larger scale the scene is reproduced on our Western plains and ranches — but these Devon men Devon. Holy Street Bridge English Vacations 81 do their best to show a wildness that matches their surroundings. Heather covers the big rough hills, the valleys have each their bogs, green and deceitful, that will engulf and drown the stranger traveller or sports man. Crossing them means jumping from tussock to tussock of the moor grass, shaking and quiv ering as one lands. There the snipe hide themselves. They are the chief moor game, though there are occasional wild duck, and black game — heathcock and grayhen. These bogs are often connected by narrow and deep streams called Leets — dating from Roman times. Crossing these is sometimes a ticklish task. The chief peril of the moor is the white moor fog. In the autumn months it often falls quite without warning. In a few minutes, as it seems, every land mark is obliterated, from a few yards' distance : noth ing but a compass will give you any direction. Absolute silence reigns. One can find no familiar feature, and many men have been turned completely round in their wanderings, and have there lost their lives. I have heard of escaped prisoners from the great Dartmoor Prison, who have thought themselves at a safe distance from the jail when the fog came down on them— they have wandered on in blind hope — but when the mist lifted they were at the doors of the prison. There was one man at Chagford whom to' know was first to value and then to love. This was Jem Perrott — the Dartmoor guide. I was soon told how and where to find him out. I opened the door of an old house in Chagford town and walked into 82 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents the family living room. There I found the father, old Jem, a middle aged man of Devon, with an active figure and a most friendly smile. Round a long board table he sat, with a son and daughter. The materials for artificial fly-making were piled on the board and many specimens of their work, ready to go into the envelopes for sale, lay by them. The flies they made were first class, and for them there was quite a big demand. We soon made friends, and he and I were to go to a moor river, fishing, the next day. We soon lost sight of house and park. Fronting us was the wide moorland, and over it the heads of the great Tors, masses of rugged gray granite, looked down on us. The three, Yestor, Big Tor and one other whose name has slipped my memory, be came familiar to me, and I thought I should know them anywhere and anywhence — but Perrott warned me against over-confidence in such recollections, and told me weird tales of men, women, and children lost on the moor. After some miles we came to a moorland river, flowing fast in its rocky bed. As the banks were clear of fern and brush, I soon got to work. The creels of each of us were getting filled with the brisk quarter-of-a-pound trout when the clear sky was rapidly overcast — a big black cloud enveloped the whole scene and the thunder began to roar. There was no shelter. So we kept on fishing. The water was lashed into little waves with the heavy rain and wind, which beat into our faces, and it occurred to me to pack up and get home by the quickest route. Not so : in an hour or so the rain stopped, the wind fell, the sun shone out on us, the colors came out on English Vacations 83 the heather, the trout jumped in the river and took the fly: our creels were filled and we carried home quite a burden. We crossed on the Moor the old Druidical way from Holy Street to the Hut Circle. The line of white stones ten feet apart caught the eye from far back to as far forward as the eye could reach. It ended, Jem said, at the circle, but there took a fresh start for the British houses by the river. Many a day we spent together that season on the Moor. Perrott took me one day to the old Roman surface mine workings, where no one knows what metal they found, but the old ditches were plain enough. Another time we examined the remains of the diggings for porcelain clay — quantities of them. Then we came across the peat pits — some worked out, but most in use to-day, where the vil lagers came with their narrow, long spades, and dug out the bricks of peat, piled by each worker for himself on the edge of the pits. The dark brown water gathered in the pits, and was nasty in every sense to get out of if one incautiously slipped in when jumping across in the snipe bog. I had two favorite Gordon setters in those days, Shot and Bang. Bang was the smaller dog and more intelligent of the two. Both were absolutely pure in breed, direct from Gordon Castle a few years ago. Bang, especially, was dead on snipe, which he loved to retrieve and bring to me, in so far passing the strict limits of the setter's duty. The snipe have a troublesome way of zigzagging when they rise, and in that way often escape; at other times they catch only the edge of the charge of shot, and hide on 84 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents falling, slightly hit. One day two snipe got up out of the rushes together and flew off quickly, separat ing in the air as they flew. Both fell when I fired, but I doubted if either were killed. Bang went on after the first and found it before long, picking it up unbitten in his tender mouth. Then he re membered the second and went on after that before bringing home the first. He found No. 2 and set his paw on it to hold it while he thought things over, his mouth being full of No. 1. Presently he broke all rules by biting and killing No. 1. He laid it down there, took No. 2 in his mouth and brought it to me alive — then he went quickly after No. 1 and brought in that also. Suffer another tale of Bang. My brother-in-law was staying with us. He was an eager but by no means successful shot. One day I was telegraphed for to go to London. My brother-in-law asked me if he might take Bang out the next day. I told him by all means, if he will work for you. When I got back Saunders, the keeper, told me this tale. They went out after breakfast on the Moor and Bang worked perfectly as usual and found various snipe. But none went into the bag, because they got away unhurt. Bang was disgusted, but worked steadily on until the twelfth snipe got up. Break ing the sequence this one was knocked down, on the farther side from the shooter of one of those big, deep, leet ditches, which I described. The bird was near Bang. He looked round at the shooter and the keeper: then he went soberly and slowly to the dead snipe, picked it up, ate it — and at once went home. Once in a while an otter came to stay in our Teign English Vacations 85 and take toll of the trout. Then I wrote with the news to Mr. Cheriton, the owner and huntsman of the only pack of otter hounds in that part of Devon. He set a day to come over with the hounds, and so gave the usual notices to the people that hunted with him. By starting very early on that summer morning the big omnibus or covered wagon carrying the huntsman, the whip, and the hounds arrived by eleven o'clock at Gidleigh Park. By that time quite a large company had gathered — ladies on horseback, men in breeches and gaiters, and heavy nailed shoes, the men carrying long hazel sticks, but no weapons. Two little white fox terriers, with rough coats, strange to say, accompanied their master. This breed is very rare, and has been kept pure, it is said, for two hundred years. We all trooped down to the rough river and the hounds dashed in. There were over twenty of them, mostly big, white and tan foxhounds, turned out of foxhound packs because of undue height. That they had noble voices we all could testify. It was a lively scene indeed, men in and out of the water, ladies on horseback follow ing along the banks, the huntsman calling to and encouraging some favorite hound. Presently Ranger gave tongue, and the fun began. The otter was afoot and making his best speed down the river. Now a hound would dash at him and miss, then another, till we reached a long deep pool, where the otter could dive and hide. The hounds were all in the water, and most of the men. Two were de tailed with their long sticks to hold the ford below the pool and keep the otter from crossing down stream. Some one would shout, "Here he blows!" 86 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents and a stream of bubbles would show where the beast had come up for air. Once several of the big hounds seemed to catch him, and I thought all was over, but the otter bit and tore his way through those dogs, leaving bloody marks on their necks and shoulders. He dashed for the ford and got through in spite of the sticks, and the hunt went on through the reaches below. Before long the otter took ref uge in a tunnel of rocks, issuing below the level of the river, and having a mouth above the banks. There he was safe from the hounds, all being far too large to get in. Some one halloed for the ter riers, and the little dogs showed up promptly, full of eagerness. The dog dived in below ground, one would have thought to' certain death having seen the otter fighting all those big hounds at once. All stood round silently while the huntsman drew off the hounds, who were grouped in a picturesque bunch near by. The master stood listening for sounds of what was going on below ground, sometimes encour aging little Prince with a cheerful call. Pres ently Prince backed out with bleeding jaws and shoulders, and stood a moment or two with staring bristles. Then in he dashed again — but this next drive ended the other way, for Mr. Otter had had enough of the little dog and backed off into the river at the lower end. The huntsman called on his hounds again, and we all took a fresh start. The fight varied, though, I must say that I did feel that twenty against one was no fair odds : but that one was surely a fighter and most of the twenty carried his marks. In the end they got him on a shallow, and there was a tangle of otter and hounds and huntsman and English Vacations 87 sportsmen, with all manner of cries and voices of dogs and men. There was a terrible sound of worry ing, and the play was over. The huntsman managed to get hold of the otter's big tail and drag him on shore. I supposed his hide would be torn to pieces, but so thick and tough was it that not one hound's tooth had pierced it. The hide was stripped from him and given to me and mounted, and ornamented our hall for years. As a great favor a puppy of the famous white, rough haired Cheriton terriers, which may be bitten to death but never turn tail, was given to a son of mine visiting in England, and was brought to Corvallis, Oregon. We took all pos sible care of him, but distemper got him and he died. Nothing but a picture of his bright little face, looking out from his travelling basket, remains to us, and that still hangs on our sitting room walls. CHAPTER X VACATION JOURNEYS ABROAD NORWAY MY recollections of Norway antedate the build ing of all railroads in that country. There were no public vehicles, and the travel on the finest of fine roads in all Europe that I have seen was by the little one man, or woman, carriole, driven by the traveller, drawn by one little pony, named a "heste," and in the general charge of a small boy, called a "lille gut," who hung on behind, and be guiled the time of his fare and himself by chanting numerous songs in a loud but high treble voice. The very act of travelling was a romance, from the time one landed at Stavanger or Bergen on the western coast, and bid farewell to the dirty little steamship that had brought us safely, if very slowly, from the big British port of Hull, to the time when at Christiania, the capital, a few weeks afterwards, we took ship for Copenhagen on the sorrowful return. When my first Norwegian trip began the change of the coinage from the medieval coins to the mod ern decimal system was in progress, but both sorts were still in circulation. Our first need in Bergen was to change twenty pounds of British gold into the Norwegian silver. Such a mixture, and such a bulk was never seen. We had to invest in a big 88 Norway. Soholt1 — The Herring Catch Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 89 bag, and into that was poured the stream of great and small coins. To master the comparative value of old and new was impossible. In the succeeding five or six weeks we covered a great mileage of Nor wegian roads, stopping every seven miles of our measurement, or one Norwegian mile, at the "Sta tion," on the post road, which was both the refresh ment and the sleeping rest house as the days sped by. At each stop we paid for the carrioles, so much per mile, and also for meals and beds. My custom was to unloose the string of the big bag as soon as the amount was told, and invite the station keeper to help himself, or herself, from the mass of silver of all sorts inside. He, or she, would look up into my face and smile — I smiled back and then the toil worn hand went into the bag; a handful came out, and the necessary sum was counted out and the bal ance went back into the bag. When we got round to Christiania I went to the handsome store of Mr. Bennett, the Norwegian Cook, and there we sat down and figured out together what the legal and cus tomary charges on our journey, as marked on the map I carried, should be. When the total was added up I poured out on his table what was left at the bottom of the bag. It was not much, but it accounted for every expense, less about two dol lars and a half which I feel sure was represented by some side trips that I had forgotten. Was there ever such a testimony to the scrupulous honesty of the road housekeepers and the horsekeepers of a nation? Unlimited loot was in their hands, but one and all refrained from even one illicit krone. Well, our first Norwegian port was Stavanger on the west coast, as I said. A mile or so off the little 90 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents harbor, the vessel blew her whistle and stopped, rising and falling on the great seas. A little boat was already coming off to meet us. It was flying from wave top to wave top, the one big sail kept full as she tore along. A girl of twenty and a boy of ten were the crew, and the girl steered. Her yellow hair fluttered in the breeze. She rounded to in the lee of the ship, the sail came down and the mail bag was handed up. What we brought of mail was tossed down to her, and we went on to Bergen. The little boat was the first of many that carried us on Norwegian fjords. Such an one, built on the lines of a wide chested duck, ran safely on and over, but never in the wave. The harbor of Bergen was crowded with ship ping — the fleet that carries . cargoes of salted cod every summer to Spanish and Mediterranean ports. These Norwegians are Lutherans of the strict type, but they supply with fish for Friday and fast days the Catholic peoples of half Europe. These ships of theirs have high forecastles and cabins well aft. The deep open waist of the ship uses all the intervening space with a well that is packed full with the dried and salted cod, trodden in hard, and wedged in tightly into one mass. Then the vessel is ready for sea, and she shows a brave front to the great waves of the Bay of Biscay, and survives as a family possession and livelihood for many generations. We saw several in that harbor that we were told bore records of five hundred years and more. They have two cabin windows that look out astern, from either side of the rudder post, and distinctly mark out the fish ship of Norway. We went on board one or two in the harbor. The wood Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 91 of which they are built is the toughest fir, now as black and shining as the oldest oak. I see no reason why they should ever wear out, and why accident should not be the only cause for leaving their old bones on any foreign coast. The Bergen fish market is a lively scene. Fishing boats from fifty little har bors line one side of the market with their varied cargoes — ranging from the ling that measures more than the height of a man, and cod of all sorts and sizes, to the silvery herring. The warm ocean current — the Gulf Stream — from the Gulf of Mexico washes the west coast of Nor way. They say at Bergen it rains 366 days out of the 365. The fuchsia and myrtle grow in profu sion and were covered with lovely flowers when we were there. They carried us back to the south coast of Devon, where also the Gulf Stream is their foster father. On the broken and indented coast of Norway an ancient population of the sea folk have their homes. Harbors are many, and at all of them call the little steamboats that, from Bergen as their home port, keep up constant sailings. We took one for Gutvangen and sailed at ten o'clock on a full moon night. There were plenty of passengers, among them, twenty or more college students returning to their homes in the far north. The little ship was loaded with a full cargo outbound, mostly of necessaries for families for the next winter. Shf brought down barrels of butter, piles of cheeses, old and new, dried cod, salted herrings, wild berries for the city housewives, a little deer meat from tho wild reindeer of the snow mountains. No passenger went below. Berths there were, but 92 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents no one used them. All were grouped about the deck, either in deck chairs or stretched out on the white boards. Then, as the night drew on, the students began to sing. Once started they never stopped. I wish you could have heard them. Folk songs, old and more modern; occasional ballads. The stock was endless and the singers needed no urging to continue. And the scene — who can describe it? Once in a while the little boat passed out into the open sea, whence one could see the snow mountains backing the coast line — then she would turn into some dark break in the continuous rocks, and con fidently press on until she was in some narrow har bor, twisting and turning into the land. Oftentimes it seemed as if we were butting straight against a rock: but when but a few yards off a sudden turn of the wheel would send us spinning up the nar row lane. Ferns and green bushes everywhere draped those rocks even to the water's edge. Then the moon lighted up some group of deep eaved, brown roofed houses. People of all ages were wait ing on the old wharf, and the boat's captain and his men were as busy as bees while the week's busi ness was crowded into half an hour. Then the bell rang, the landing stage was lifted, the whistle blew, and we backed out slowly into the dark shadows of the mountains. Then the songs began at once again, and so the night passed, and the chill air of morning sent us seeking for wraps and coats — but we could not even then leave that deck. On the first trip, that which I have chiefly in mind, we landed at Gutvangen, a little, little old town, which I think stands on the bank of the Sogne Fjord. A great glacier is seen over the heads of the snow Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 93 mountains, and I know not how many waterfalls may be counted in the edges of the sheer fall of three thousand feet and over from the steep foothills of the ranges to the deep fjord below. Three thousand feet is the snowline there. Up land pastures lie between the snow and the foothills, and here and there are the stone built huts that are the summer homes of the village maids and children. Each family has its own hut where the cream is made from the little herd of brown and fawn colored cows, and the cheese of various kinds from all the remaining milk. In the icy waters of the neighbor ing little creek the pans and buckets and wooden dishes are washed and stand out to dry in the sum mer sunshine. The first real excursion I made from Gutvangen was with two guides after the wild rein deer, one of which I had a license to' kill. The gov ernment guards their number carefully. To such a hut we found our way late in the eve ning, where the sisters and young brothers of one of the guides lived for these summer months. No one need fear arriving too late, for the Norwegian sum mer days are very long, and in the moonlight up to and after eleven o'clock one can see easily to read. Our welcome was warm enough, and our supper of fresh and sour milk, of cheese and of the abundant "flat-bro," was bountiful enough even for very hun gry men. "Flat-bro" I could never get too much of. Every Norwegian kitchen has its stove, and a wide movable iron plate to cover the top. Bread making being in order a good fire is made up below the iron plate. Then on that is poured a thin batter of flour, of mixed oat, barley, and wheat. This spreads over the 94 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents plate, and there is quickly baked a thin sheet of the mixed bread — thin as medium pasteboard. Re moved from the stove this dries out fully and is ready for the eaters. Fold the sheet together and fill your pockets, and have provision for the day. To enjoy it fully there should be given you a low wooden bucket of thick sour milk, to go with the flat-bro, also a wide wooden spoon that will just fit into your mouth. You and your friends should establish your selves on low stones, with a higher stone on which to rest the bucket. Then take opposite sides with the thick sour milk between you and go to work with your big spoons, working from the edges toward the center, not forgetting the bites of flat-bro to make up the big mouthfuls. In the strength of this meal you may go all the day long. After supper the girls sang to us for a bit and we went to bed. The hut was furnished in the inside with several deep shelves on three sides, which held the girls and the children and their blankets. On the floors the two young men and we two Englishmen just found room to stretch ourselves. As the chief visitor I was given the place by the embers of the fire that had heated the milk for cheese in the huge iron kettle that hung in the corner of the hut. Over the fire a corner was left out of the roof, so the smoke escaped into the sky, and I, as I lay there awake, was con scious of a thousand eyes of bright stars peering at us from the deep black vault of the heavens above. Naturally there was early waking in that hut, where I counted that seventeen, of young and old, had taken their rest within the narrow walls. When I went outside to wash I found the cows gathered round, and the eldest girl was chatting, as Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 95 she milked, with the younger of the two guides. So Cupid, evidently, was not to be balked by high moun tains and scarce visitors and cold air. We started soon after the deer. All day we climbed, from one high top to the next. It was ex plained to me that we must always get above the deer. They fed all day on the deer moss, looking down. They were on the watch for danger from below — that from above escaped them if the wind was right to crawl upon them. So we found it when the head guide, peeping over a rock ledge into a dip below, signalled to me to take his place. Below us a couple of hundred feet, and within two' hundred and fifty yards, four deer were grazing in a line. There were two does, a fawn, and one big deer with wide branching horns. I watched them for a bit while they scratched up the moss and ate — but they were not making ground towards us, and it was a case of now or never. I glanced at the guide and he at me and signalled now. So I took pains and luck was with me as I shot. The big deer fell, hit behind the shoulder, and lay struggling, while the guide hurried to him to perform the hunter's rites. Skinned and drawn, we found afterwards that he weighed a hundred and sixty pounds, and it was no light task to get him down to the village from which we were a good many miles away. So we camped close by, where was a ruined hut. The floor was unusable and very foul. The roof would bear us. All hands set to pluck the nearest heather. We had two blankets and a scanty lunch. We ate the bread and meat, smoked a bit and then went to bed. This was a simple process. Both blankets were spread on the roof, over some of the heather. Over 96 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents the two the rest of the heather was piled. All four of us climbed in between the blankets, the two Eng lishmen in the center and a Norwegian at each side. My friend and I were so tired that we speedily went to sleep — but we could not stay in that happy plight. As I woke, with the stars still out, my feet were sticking out beyond the blanket. Cold is not the word — they were frozen. We started very soon. The guides took turns in carrying the deer, along the narrow ledge that fol lowed the edge of the ridge overhanging the fjord very far below. In an hour or two we got sight of the faraway doors of houses that meant Gutvangen, and then slowly climbed down to the lower levels that led us to the little town. Farther north we travelled on, sometimes by boat, sometimes by carriole to see some notable place in land. We saw, before we left Gutvangen, the travel of the good people to the communion service of their church. We had a boat, and drew up to the best point of vantage to take in what was almost a pro cession to the church by way of a long pier that led to the church door. Boats without number were moored to the piling; their occupants showed in an unbroken black string, too many to count. Where all came from we could hardly imagine, though we had been cruising in and out among the fjords for several weeks. One of the most striking sights to which that moon gave value was the herring fishery at a place called Soholt. The bay had a narrow entrance from a big fjord. The school of fish had got in and then, with long nets they were held in side. When the moon rose that evening the fish Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 97 were in motion everywhere, their bright, silvery bodies flashing back the sparkles from the moon-beams. Fishermen are a proverbially patient lot, but an old fellow whom we saw at his work near one of the guest houses on a fjord "takes the cake." I was go ing to fish at a higher reach on the river, and passed in the early morning the pool where my old friend was casting, with the help of a bamboo rod fourteen feet long, a bunch of grey feathers that he called a "floe-engel" — or fly angel — in other words a fly of native manufacture — into the dark recesses of a pool where I could see the dim shadow of a mighty sal mon. As the so-called fly struck the water with a splash the great fish would, with a wave of his tail retreat into the shadow of the rock. Finding noth ing happen, he would very quietly take his first place again, and the comedy would be played once more. I got fascinated, and watched the pair — the would- be catcher and the won't-be-caught — for some time. I came back to supper that night at seven o'clock along that same road. I was just in time to see the old man disappearing round a corner of the road. Lo and behold he was dragging that salmon along, his tail making a streaky pattern in the dust. I hurried and caught him and congratulated. He was entirely unconcerned. He said that he fished for that salmon all day until six o'clock, or supper time, and that the fish then made up his mind that he was hungry for that fly and it was all over in a minute! Norway has some fine ancient buildings. One of the best is the "Stave Kirche," or old church. It dates from the twelfth century. The fir wood of which it is built has grown black and shiny with 98 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents sheer age. But the old church, with its four tall angles and low, central spire stood untouched by the ages when we saw it. On one trip I travelled the district in Southern Norway called "Telemark" from end to end. It is a great contrast from the bare grandeur and rugged forms of the snow mountains of the North and West. The fir woods are thick, the stems of only moderate size. Farms are seen, where the church and parson age are features in the landscape. There are many little lakes and not a few rivers, but they glide, not dash, on their way to the sea. I was walking by a little lake, fishing rod in hand, when there was a rush of wings and a pair of the great white gulls at tacked me furiously, striking in quick turn at my face and eyes. Here and there they flew, but never stopped for a moment. I had no weapon, no decent stick was in sight, and I did not know how things would end. It was no use to turn back, nor yet to run. So I paced steadily on, warding off each at tack as it came. After what seemed to me a long while the road turned away from the river, and there the gulls left me to return to their precious nest. I found afterwards that I had been let off easily in comparison with other victims of those dangerous birds. Since those days Norway is radically changed by the construction of a complete system of national railroads, that follow the natural features of the several districts. Norwegians are born sailors, lineal descendants of the Vikings. So they come rightly by their merchant navy, of higher quality and greater number than their scanty population and mostly barren country would suggest. Shame Vacation Journeys Abroad — Norway 99 on the Germans who, with their submarines, have struck to destroy at their ships and at their splendid sailors to wantonly murder — ships and sailors by which the whole world was the richer in that the Red Cross of Norway was seen in every corner of the world as a carrier for all the nations. Four times have I gone to Norway for my vaca tions — each time making fresh friends with place and people. The language is still to me a stumbling block, I confess. More SO' than to my wife who was with me twice, and who, "word book" in hand, used to keep the little guts behind her carriole busy with teaching her the words and their .pronunciation. Pride had a downfall, however, since, when we got to Christiania and to our city friends there, my wife was taken to task severely for some of her country expressions — "My dear, we never say this, that and the other, such words are only used by the unedu cated, and really belong to a patois, not to a language !" CHAPTER XI VACATION JOURNEYS ABROAD SWITZERLAND, BELGIUM, PARIS IT is a marvel to meet in the playgrounds of Eu rope, when early autumn calls, the thousands of Englishmen who habitually cross the channel and spread over whatever country draws most strongly on them. One meets them by the salmon rivers of Norway, on the cliffs of Normandy and Brittany, on the high mountain passes of Switzerland and the Tyrol, in the lower mountains of Belgium, Alsace and Lorraine, in the Pyrenees and the Apennines. Wherever the Englishman shows his face he may be known by his rough clothes and heavy shoes, and by his everlasting walking — whether on roads or trails, on the mountains or in the valleys, no matter how far from the big hotel or the gay city. The same men have landed from the channel steamboat, worn, pale, and tired, but in a few days they wear another face and trudge gaily on uncounted miles, with cheerful faces and in unmistakable enjoyment of life. And this applies to women as well as men. But for this lightning change of face, and demeanor there is a reason. One vacation long ago my wife and I settled on a Swiss tour, being aided in fixing our route by various friends who, like us, were avoiding the ever 100 Switzerland, Belgium, Paris 101 beaten track. Leaving London one evening we landed at Geneva in 26 hours. One of the gay boats on the lake took us to Lausanne, where we found settled an old German schoolmistress of my wife's early days. Thence another boat took us to the castle of Chillon — with its dungeon below the level of the lake, where the "Prisoner of Chillon" spent those weary years. Another short stage took us to Martigny whence started the road to Chamounix and Mont Blanc. The day was dark and rainy, and I trudged by the side of my wife's horse, seeing nothing through the veil of mist, and finding the way a weary one. Late in the afternoon we arrived at Chamounix, and took a, room at one of the hotels that we were told faced the mountain, and we took it on trust. The bedroom had two narrow beds along one side, opposite the windows. Both of us slept soundly, but I woke up suddenly and sat staring out through opened jalousies. Clouds, mist, and dark ness had vanished, and I looked straight into the face of Mont Blanc — that splendid cone of glittering snow that filled the view. The tributary peaks were grouped round him: glaciers — the ice rivers — re flected the moonlight ; we were in a new world. The burdens of work and worry dropped off, like Chris tian's in the immortal story, and with them the sense of ill health and threatening sickness that drove us to that same new world. I became then one of that army of travelling Englishmen, though my enlist ment had a too short term to run. We had learned that the success of our trip de pended largely on the guide. Several mountaineer ing friends held by the Chamounix, or French Swiss guild of guides, ethers preferred the German guild 102 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents whose headquarters were at Zermatt, with the Mat- terhorn as the great feature of their routes. My leanings were to the Chamounix guild. I found that one of the most experienced, named Jean Couttet, was disengaged, and I sent for and engaged him. We both fell in love with him from the very start. Jean Couttet was gentle, amiable, untiring, wise and tactful, and stored full of the lore of the mountains and their trails. He never boasted of the great Alpineers whom he had led up this mountain, with whom he had climbed that Col, and crossed this pass. He never suggested saving me from long days on the passes, and their consequences, but for my wife he was a guardian angel. Our first task was together to study the map of the routes from Chamounix to other districts, and mountain regions, and so to other headquarters and ranges, to pass over one road from Switzerland into Italy, then back by another into German cantons, and so, eventually to Berne, and Basle and the ulti mate road home. First we had a few days in the foothills and on the lower glaciers centering in the great snow fields of the king of Swiss mountains. I felt that Jean was leading us through the infant and into the pri mary class — most needful, since we had never seen a snow mountain or travelled a snow and ice road in our lives. So we climbed to the Montanvert, and the Grand Mulets, the red rocks on the way up Mont Blanc, faced us across the valley. Then we started for the Mont St. Bernard, with its monks and their dogs, my wife riding a mountain trained horse with its owner to lead it, and Jean and I afoot. Over this road Napoleon led his army into Italy — and engi- Switzerland, Belgium*, Paris 103 neered a way for the artillery — a task only under stood as we followed in their footsteps. As the sun shone on us and no rough wind blew the way was easy, but here and there by the side of the pass stood many a cross, telling where the monks of St. Ber nard and their dogs had found the winter travellers buried in their snowy winding sheet. Late in the day we reached the gaunt, bare, tall white convent, alone in that wilderness of snow and rock. The lay brother at the big door let us in, but inside we were received by the guest-master, a dark eyed monk of thirty-five or so. He spoke excellent English, and we found that in French, German, Italian, at least he conversed with equal fluency and grace. There were several travellers beside ourselves, of other nationalities. We sat round a large fire, casting a cheerful light on this casual gathering. We were called to supper, and a, bountiful meal was served, of soup, kid meat, rice, some simple sweet, with a bottle of sour red wine to' accompany. Of course everything was carried up to the monastery from the nearest town — I think Martigny, where a re serve of monks lives, to replenish the ranks when that bitter climate drives the monks down to save their lives. All we saw were young men. Then we returned to the guest room, and the big fire was replenished — while the host set himself to find something in every one to entertain if not to profit the listeners. We made him tell stories of win ter tragedies and rescues, of the reasoning powers and the courage and endurance of the dogs, and he promised to show us their kennel in the morning. There was a piano in the room and singers and players were invited to contribute. Among them my 104 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents turn came, and there surely was a scene that fixed itself in the memory. Presently we were called to bed in the long gallery of bedrooms or cells in the uppermost floor. Cold? It was bitter, and the blankets were none too abundant. In the course of the night the convent bell called the monks to their devotions. The same bell roused all very early, and we trooped down into the chapel and all took part in what was in all truth a morning prayer. I saw Jean Couttet in the small crowd. He told me he never lost a chance of presence at that service, for "they are good men," said he, "those fathers up on the mountain. They never live long." The height at which the convent stands is 10,000 feet. In the guest book, when presented for our signatures, there were most noteworthy names from every na tion. It was indeed a European album. Then we passed down the pass into Italy, and stopped at an old town, nearby the hunting lodge of the King Victor Emmanuel of those days — where he came to hunt, and they say to kill the chamois, for he was a mighty hunter: though, if tales are true of him, not always "before the Lord." We were to come back into Switzerland over the Theodule Pass: 12,000 feet, and dominated by the mighty Mont Cervin, as Jean called it — the Mat- terhorn of the German travellers and guides. My wife rode a pretty bay pony, the pet of her mistress, a friend of Jean's. She, the pony, was decked out with all sorts of horse finery and was a pretty picture, especially in those surroundings. She was to go to the head of the pass on the Italian side and return home : thence, down to Zermatt we were all to walk. I must not forget that the brother told Switzerland, Belgium, Paris 105 us that his pretty sister was the first woman to make the ascent of the Matterhom, that he and two other guides with ropes got her to the top of the great mountain. I asked him why he took such a risk. He answered, "Oh just to give cour age to the travellers, so that they would be ashamed to hold back if a young woman could get safely up and down." We soon began the climb. The path was well de fined, but of course very abundantly steep. The sun beat down on us fiercely. We soaked our handker chiefs in melted snow and carried them in our hats to the horror of the guides, but we took no hurt. As we rose towards the crown of the pass the view spread on every side. We were in the center of a wilderness of peaks — all named in the books, the ascent of many of them being the graduating test for the Alpine Club. There was even in those days no Virgin summit — every one had been scaled, many by Tyndall and other well known Englishmen for the first time. At the summit a little stone hut had been built, and a woman served bread and hot wine to travellers. We sat there in the shade of the hut to rest. Our guide was chatting with several of his mates who were on their way back to' their homes. My wife held her umbrella open, to shelter her, when a sud den gust snatched it from her, and it went bowling along at top speed down the snowy slope. The black speck came to rest for a while all but out of sight, but the wind caught it again, it took to the air and disappeared. We thought that was the last of it, but two of the guides came to me and asked if I would give them five francs for recovering it. More 106 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents to see how they would set about it than for the worth of the thing I said yes. At once they seized their ice axes, roped themselves together, and started, with great cheerfulness down that terrible declivity. Soon they were out of sight and we sat down to wait. A half hour passed, then an hour, but in another half Jean Couttet pointed to them, cutting steps in the ice, and climbing in the far distance. They got back to us in time, with the precious umbrella, which they presented to my wife with a bow and a pretty speech. Alpenstocks were very necessary for the rest of our way down. The Matterhom loomed bigger and more predominant, and the point came into view where the two English travellers, Douglas and an other, and two guides paid with their lives for a broken, or as many believe, for a cut rope, and fell to death 3,000 feet to the glacier below, and to the icy torrent which carried their bodies into the grim darkness of the heart of the mountain, yielding them up far below. A monument, in the Zermatt church yard recalls the tragedy. As we came in sight of the village there were several miles of grassy slopes still to be covered. Jean Couttet passed his arm round my wife's waist, and off he sprang with her down, down, from slope to slope, without a slip, with no chance of a stop, until they did come to a stop at the foot of the great hill. She had made seventeen miles of distance since the morning start, but alternate hot and cold baths for half an hour, and an hour's rest sent her to the supper table hungry but none the worse. One of our grotesque remembrances is of the Leu- kenbad hot baths. We had come over the Gemmi Pass, frightened but unhurt. The path was both Switzerland, Belgium, Paris 107 rough and broken and steep. I walked first, then came my wife on horseback, then Jean Couttet and the horse owner side by side. This last by the strict rule of the mountains should have led the animal, for the river, by which the path ran, rushed over the rocks fifty or sixty feet below. I heard a sud den stumble and clatter, and turned quickly to see that horse slipping over the edge, his hind feet strug gling to keep a hold and his fore feet scratching the rocks to save himself and his rider. I grabbed for and caught his bridle, and dragged my wife from her saddle. When relieved of the rider's weight the horse managed to regain the path, helped by his frightened owner, with a face ashy pale. That pass had an evil repute, for not long before a Russian lady had lost her life under similar conditions. But, as to the baths. There was a handsome build ing and shrubs and trees to help its surroundings. Entering it the way was clear1 to the bath itself. There was a huge pool, in which probably forty men and ladies were immersed to their necks. The water was quite warm, and, as Sam Weller said, "there was a remarkable flavor of a hot flat iron." Before each bather floated a small japanned table, holding cards, teacups, light refreshments, newspapers, and any other ictas that would serve to pass the time. Laugh ing and j oking and chatting were going on, in which I would defy any looker-on not to join, as those merry folks bobbed up and down in the hot water. We passed on to a little rjlace called Visp, where stands a white inn, loved of Alpine travellers. It stands, high up, overlooking the lower reaches of the great Upper Aletsch Glacier, which issues from the snow mountain ten miles away, and pours its 108 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents fifteen miles length in one splendid rounded sweep to the lower lands. In the little hotel we passed Sunday. There was a noteworthy gathering. Among them were Pro fessor Tyndall, of Alpine fame, the two Misses Somerville, one of whom was a noted geographer and writer, and an American lady traveller who wore bifurcated petticoats, quite interesting to< the Eng lish guests. The English church service was read by a clergyman resident in Switzerland, to serve the crowds of holiday tourists in the autumn months. In the afternoon we clambered down to the glacier. The center of the ice river was made of a moraine of piled rocks, which showed from a distance as the backbone of that enormous snake. Till we reached it we had no idea how hard it would prove to cross. We did cross, and returned to the inn along the nearer bank. The Upper Aletsch is one of the moving glaciers, about which Professor Tyn dall has written. That glaciers do move I remember I was satisfied as I sat watching the face of one in the heart of Norwegian snow mountains. It was a brilliant day, with a hot sun. Below the lower face of the ice river was a deep blue pool, fed by the melting ice. In it floated masses of ice of all sizes which had broken off. As we looked there was a sudden crash, and a huge block fell into the pool while the wave so caused washed the shores. Scarcely had the water resumed its smooth blue surface than there was an other crash, another block fell, and again the sud den waves in the pool rose and fell. Five or six times this phenomenon recurred while we looked on, and I remember the demonstration that those masses Switzerland, Belgium, Paris 109 moved in response to irresistible pressure from above. By this time we had reached the turning point to wards home. It remained to see Interlaken, the town that takes its name from its position, with its parts joined by the ancient bridge over the lake waters. The bridge is roofed over all its length, an old picture filling every panel. It is long indeed, I cannot tell how long. This is the starting point for the Rigi, the first of the Swiss mountains to which tourists go, early in the morning to see the sun rise. I confess that I was not specially moved by the spectacle, having seen many others of what to me were higher standards. But our time was up and it was a speedy journey across France to the Channel and home. The page was turned on the Swiss trip, and memory's picture gallery was filled afresh. A few years afterwards business was driving very hard, and I found it impossible to get away from London for my usual vacation. But ten days were practicable, and we were busy in choosing a place for a Continental ten days' holiday. We chose Belgium, with the Ardennes Mountains, and the neighboring old French cities, such as Lille and Peronne. Whoever has read Quentin Durward, a story that I deem one of the best of Sir Walter Scott, has those old cities, especially Peronne, and neighboring districts of Burgundy — the scene of that tale — firmly impressed on his mind. It took but a little while to cross the Channel to Ostend and then all Belgium lay before us. Who would have dreamed that the whole civilized world would one day ring with the tale of the mur derous horrors that have now engulfed the little 110 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents state which smiled then at us as we travelled from cathedral to abbey church, to university and mon astery, to ancient market place, to town hall and guild house. And to the old woods and forests which seemed out of place in the near neighborhood of factories and workshops ! We visited first Antwerp, and listened to a mass of Mozart's splendidly sung under the arches of that great church. We went to' the Picture Gallery, hung with masterpieces, described in every record of the legacies that Middle Age artists have be queathed to us. Van Eyck and Rubens, Rembrandt and Teniers — masters of the Dutch and Flemish schools — all were there: then safely guarded from every risk until the Prussian storm of rapine, bar barism, and abominable cruelty has been let loose to blacken the German name to all future generations, past all forgiveness and all remedy. We saw the Belgian people and their country in the heyday of their prosperity and happiness — for happy the whole people seemed as we passed among them. The Ardennes was a whole district of wild tim- berland far larger than I expected. We left rail roads and took the country stages and sometimes a farm wagon as we got farther into the interior. They were a kindly and hospitable folk. Sometimes there was a village dance and merrymaking, some times our driver stopped at an old cabaret to ex change jokes and drinks with the peasants there con gregated. Then we found an old inn, set by the roadside, where a broad and shallow river was crossed by an ancient bridge, and there we stayed the night, in a stuffy room with a huge feather bed. Switzerland, Belgium, Paris 111 One of those village scenes I cannot forget. I car ried a fishing rod for a pretext, and my wife painted. We came to such an inn as I have described and stopped to look. The hostess came out from the door to see us, and a great gray cat followed her out and sat down in the sunshine and watched the river for a while. The silvery dace were jumping in the shallows of the river. Presently Mr. Cat step ped daintily to the water's edge, so close that I won dered if he would not wet his feet. But he did not stop and marched on till the water was half way up his shoulders. He stopped a moment, still and watching, and then his paw shot out. He struck one of the fish and with one motion swept it out on the edge of the water, quickly picked it up in his mouth and carried it into the house for breakfast. This, his mistress told us, was his daily practice. But it was the first and last time I ever saw a cat go fish ing on his own account. We got out North and Eastward to Aix la Chapelle — Charlemagne's old city — now crowded to the roofs with the German wounded in this last cam paign. Then Belgians and Germans lived in har mony, and all were prosperous. As to Paris what can I say in short compass? Napoleon the Third then reigned, and prodigality and extravagance were seen in every rank and call ing. The Boulevards were crowded with gay throngs of thoughtless people, not reckoning of the misery ahead, when the gay city was to be besieged and cap tured and German hordes were to march as victors through the great Napoleon's triumphal arch. Many times I had visited that proud city on busi ness or pleasure bent. Little did I dream that I 112 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents should have to see her in her misery. But it fell to me to be a traveller in the first train to enter Paris after free travel was resumed between France and England, but while German soldiers were still hold ing Amiens and St. Denis, and the criminals of the Commune had just recently paid the penalties of the firing squad and the guillotine exacted from them by an outraged France. That train entered the great railroad station at Amiens between long, closely drawn lines of Prus sian soldiers and passed on to Paris on the word of a German officer, after the passports had been ex amined. What, to me, was worse, followed when the same Prussian guards held the ancient city of St. Denis, burial place for many centuries of the kings of France. That was the last I saw of German soldiers, for France was then raising the ransom exacted for the release of French soil from their hated presence. It was such a Paris as no one could then imagine, and, please God, will never be seen again. The gaiety of Paris was transformed into the processions of sad, and bitter faced men, and black clad women. I got one of the few fiacres on the streets for hire, and was driven for miles along routes where every standing house was pitted and torn by cannon and rifle shot, the fronts broken down and the pitiful interiors exposed to every eye. The ruins of the public offices, of the Admiralty and War Bureaus, and of the Public Debt, were still smoking. The Tuileries had been sacked, but the Louvre, with its galleries of ancient sculpture and art had been spared. The trees and shrubs in the Bois de Bou logne had all been felled and the glades and gardens Switzerland, Belgiwm, Paris 113 used for pasture of the sheep and cattle which, at the first, had been driven in for the provisioning of the city. The Jardin des Plantes had given up all the ani mals, from elephants down, for the feeding of the people, and even the rats in the sewers had been caught and eaten. The family pets had been fed until there was no food left, and then in their turn been eaten. The great fort of Mont Valerien showed on every side the crumbling ruin wrought by the big guns of the Germans, though it was still in use, for Paris was garrisoned by the rest of France. Other forts on the ring of fortifications had been worse damaged than Valerien. No theater was open and hardly any cafe. The storekeepers were just beginning to re plenish their stocks of goods and resume business. The rise of Paris from her ashes is, I think, one of the wonders of history — I saw her again in 1876 or 1877 and no trace of the devastation of 1871 was visible. The stores on the main streets were full and beautiful as ever, the dresses as bright, the theaters as crowded, the hotels as full, the banks as busy. France, in her new and revived prosperity, was lay ing up in store the riches which have enabled her to hold her own in face of the demands of the past awful four years. The power and stamina of her wonderful people have withstood every drain on them, and she stands in the face of the world to-day resolute to the end. CHAPTER XII SOCIAL LIFE IN LONDON I MUST not leave the impression that life in the late Victorian era in London meant ten months of hard work, and two months of vacations, at home and abroad — and nothing else. London is a most in teresting big city in which to live, just for itself, its records and traditions. No well educated Londoner fails to recognize that the city is, as well as holds, its own history. As I passed, every day, from railroad terminus to my law office I brushed against the rail ing guarding the ancient "London Stone," the un couth block that was, from the tenth century, and from possibly long before, the symbol of the city. Two streets more and I was in "Walbrook" — no brook now, but the name recalling the real brook, that, widened out just there, was lined with the quays where the olden farmers and gardeners tied their boats of produce from Middlesex and Surrey farms for the citizens' buying. First encroached on by the street along one side, then arched over from end to end the "brook," in many years became a sewer, and its waters polluted, not fed, the Thames. Long before, the boats and their owners had been driven to other quarters. Further up Walbrook to wards the Guildhall the old buildings on the West ern side of the street were being torn down, and their 114 Social Life in London 115 foundations excavated for new tall stores and offices, at the time I have in mind. The square hole was sunk, certainly twenty feet — and the beams and rafters of adjoining buildings cut off and shored up. At the bottom the work was stopped, for the nine teenth century builders found themselves standing on a tessellated marble pavement of the Roman bath room of the fourth century after Christ. Carefully the pavement was removed, the tiny marble squares of all colors being carried to the Guildhall, and there set together again and fixed to the wall, a treasure to the antiquary, a wonder to the citizen of to-day. But deeper down below the pavement were the re mains of the oaken house of the Britons that the Roman soldiery had burned. Above it were the ruins of the Roman house telling the tale of the Saxon sack of the city and the expulsion of the Roman in vaders. Higher up were brought to light the relics and remains of the houses of the Anglo Saxon burghers, each layer being marked by ashes and dirt, the deposit of the centuries. Then came the times of the Edwards, later on of the Tudors, and then of the Stuarts, when a thick deposit of ashes meant that the great fire had burnt over this plot of ancient ground. So there was written in enduring characters the story of London for all who- had eyes to see. A stone's throw farther towards the Guildhall and I was in Queen Street, where the old house that we had bought for our new offices was being remodelled and made modern, for the old walls and beams were sound enough. The ground floor had been given up to the store, above it were the living rooms. In the second floor room there was a chimney and in front 116 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents of it a fireplace of a hundred years ago, and a plas tered wall to make good the older cavity. Our archi tect called me to see what they had found. Behind the iron fireplace was the much older floor on which the burghers of Queen Elizabeth's time had built their fire and cooked their meals. There were the old ashes. On either side of the fire were the heavy oaken benches on which they sat and smoked the long, crude, white clay pipes, of which they oblig ingly left us a sample on the little shelf next the room, with several old ballads, none of later date than James the First in 1610. When I was but a lad, in the early days of my articles, I had plenty of time to spend in the nooks and corners of the old city. I loved to turn east at London Bridge, and in a few steps I was in the Fish Market, Billingsgate. A little farther and then came the stores and warehouses of the dried fruit men and the oranges and lemons from Spain and Portu gal with the smells and atmosphere of the Levant. There was the "Monument" — the tall shaft with a gilt sheaf of arrows at the top, recalling that there the great fire started that destroyed the houses, but purified from the plague taint, the site of the rebuilt city. Next down the river came the Custom House, and then the Tower of London. There was between the Thames and the Custom House a wide esplanade, with a long stretch of the river and its tiers of ship ping, of all ages and sizes — the greatest place to stroll and muse. The White tower was the legacy to us moderns from the tenth century, still standing four square and strong. That was the best point to study the city churches. The Gothic tower of St. Saviour's, Social Life in London 117 Southwark, with its pinnacles and buttresses, stood untouched by the great fire. It contrasted with all the churches that Sir Christopher Wren built, with the great dome of St. Paul's dominating all. In half a mile North and West from London Bridge on another day I was in St. Bartholomew's great church, near by Smithfield, once the site of the martyrs' fires of Bloody Mary's days, then, in my time, the London Cattle Market, where hundreds of steers and thousands of sheep were penned in nar row quarters. Not far away one reached the Bun- hill Fields Burial Ground, where, I think, John Mil ton was buried, and other heroes of the Common wealth: before his time the train bands of London met there for their exercises, and there stood the Butts, where the prentice boys learned to shoot. There was no lack of memories in the old city, if only time could be found, or rather taken, to refresh them. But in my days there were every year certain days that called all out, old and young — I wish I dare write rich and poor— for in nothing is the change from Queen Victoria's days to her grandson's, George the Fifth's, more marked than in the recognition of the right of the poor to share in the common heritages of Englishmen. Doubtless the Great War will throw down still more walls of distinction as the common sacrifices carry through all ranks the ties of brotherhood in sore sorrow, pain and travail. The high days in London came mostly in the London sea son, from May to the first of September. The first was the opening of the exhibition of the Royal Academy oil pictures in Burlington House. A week or two afterwards was the Royal Watercolor ex- 118 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents hibition. Then came the Botanical Society's show in the Regent's Park. In my days the Derby Day, the 29th of May, was the one day in the year for peer and costermonger to travel the crowded road from London to the races on Epsom Downs. Then in July came the Oxford and Cambridge universities, and the Eton and Harrow (schools), cricket matches, at Lord's Ground, in the West of the city. The great grounds were crowded to- the gates. Apart from the drawing power of the games old school and university men of all years and ages met and grasped hands. And the ladies ! Then came out the gayest colors and the newest creations of the dressmakers ; and they all made believe to understand the games — (the pretty hypocrites ! for mighty few knew even the distinction between "off" and "on" sides, or be tween a "leg hit" and a "draw" or a "cut.") Still a little later in the year came the annual Cattle Show of the Royal Agricultural Society. In the Great Hall, crowded with the competing cham pions of all breeds, all classes of men met. There was the proof how essentially the Englishman is an outdoors man, a farmer, or stock raiser. Princes and lords, farmers and stockmen, in Sunday clothes or in corduroys, rubbed shoulders, and exchanged criticisms on the beautiful stock, much of which was worth a king's ransom. Whether a man was really up to the fine points or not made no difference — all were out to enjoy themselves, and they did. Meanwhile the great singers and players on in struments were all gathered in London. The opera season was on, and concerts and recitals were crowded, night after night. I think no favorites Mast's Peak, Benton County, Oregon Social Life in London 119 were played, but every real artist got his or her show. What a cosmopolitan place is that great city. One proof is in the variety of ends for which people are drawn together, when like meets like. While I have been writing with a full pen of interests and amusements that would seem to fit Vanity Fair, at the same time are the "May meetings" held. The assembly room, of the biggest was Exeter Hall — a room holding probably three thousand people. In that one month the great Missionary Societies, the Bible Society, the various hospitals, charity schools, city missions, and a hundred other charities held their annual meeetings, often overfilling the capacity of Exeter Hall, and meaning overflow meetings else where. As one passed along the Strand there was an endless stream of sober faced, grey suited, black silk bonneted, white chokered, well favored people, all bound to Exeter Hall, until it seemed as if the city must be filled with such folk. But they were, even in their multitudes, but a drop in the bucket. No one who knows me would expect me to leave out music from my subjects. I came by the love of it honestly, for my father not only played the flute with skill and taste ahead of the average amateur, but he had a pure baritone voice, well cultivated, and sang songs and took his part in a glee or four part song to the pleasure of his hearers. He had me "entered" very young, as the dog breakers say, for from aged eight to aged twelve, I was taught the piano week by week by an expensive master, but my father never grudged the cost. Except for some lessons on the organ a few years later I had no more 120 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents piano lessons, but was left to sink or swim by my own free will. I must have had a genuine love for it, since, until I was grown up, I hardly ever missed practising for an hour or more every day when a piano was accessible, and it generally was. And here I bear my testimony. The time I have spent on the piano, even when time was scarce and valuable, I am certain was well spent. Apart from the mere joy of it, there has come solace and com fort in times of sorrow, and rest when mind and soul were both weary. To myself there has been enjoy ment, and, I think, to hearers, until I grew too old, there has been given pleasure. When but a young boy, and taking lessons, if, in any company I was asked to play my mother insisted on my going to the instrument and doing my best without delay or ex cuse — for, she used to say, "if you do your best and yet break down it is the people's fault who asked you, not yours ; if you hesitate and hang back, and then fail it is your fault and you will be the suf ferer." I was taken, as a mere boy, to Exeter Hall, to hear the first London performance of "Elijah" — then re cently brought out at the Birmingham Festival. As the 700 chorus of the Sacred Harmonic Society filed in and took their places, and the orchestra, from the Philharmonic, began tuning up, the big organ let out its G, and my young soul vibrated in unison as it throbbed through the hall, and the strings came into line. Many times since I have heard that oratorio, and even taken part in it, but the voices of the origi nal quartet of that night have never, no, never, been excelled. Clara Novello was the soprano, Caradori Allan Social Life in London 121 the contralto, Sims Reeves the tenor, and Braham the baritone, or bass as we called it in those days. May I tell the points that have stayed with me sixty years and more? Sims Reeves in "If with all your hearts," Caradori Allan in "Oh, rest in the Lord," and the soprano, Clara Novello, in "Hear ye, Israel." Great pictures live through years and even centuries, but the tones of the great singers die out as the vibrations extend and lose their power. Those tones are dead: they may be imitated, but never fully reproduced. Shall there ever come a time when the joy from the ear shall be as permanent as the joy from the eye, and yet lose nothing from repetition? In early days I came in touch with a violoncellist, and we played much together. He gave to the world a son who is a great pianist, whether still living or not I do not know. For pure enjoyment jn the heights of music the Monday Popular Concerts in their first few seasons can never be forgotten. Joachim, Ries, Webb, and Piatti, made up the quartet of strings par excel lence. A capacity audience heard them in quartets of the very greatest masters. I had an "ivory," en titling me to a selected seat through the season. Near me I always saw Mr. Arthur J. Balfour, evidently a critical and delighted hearer. I have understood since that he is a real music lover, and plays good music, especially Chopin, in the very late evenings, for his own delectation. There are more music lovers than performers. Not many can have had the honor of playing several sonatas of Beethoven to Mr. Herbert Spencer. In my case it came about thus. When some years later 122 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents we were living in the village of Down, in Kent, (Mr. Darwin's Down), we were neighbors of Sir John and Lady Lubbock at High Elms. One day we had an invitation to dine there, and I was asked to "bring some music," according to the common formula. There was quite a distinguished company of scien tific folk — among them Mr. Spencer. As soon as we reached the drawing room after dinner Mr. Spen cer came up to me with Lady Lubbock, and asked me if I would play some Beethoven to him. I said "Most willingly," and offered him the first volume of the sonatas to make his selection. He chose one, and came close to the grand piano while I played. Then he chose another and I played that. Then he chose a third, but I thought people would have had enough. So he came and sat down by me, and I thought he should do his part too, and started him talking on the relations, or rather the connec tion, between brain and eye and hand in interpreting such music. I thought at the time that I got the best of the exchange, for he surely made some things clear which to me were very obscure. Sir John Lub bock, afterwards Lord Avebury, was the pleasantest of companions. In his study was a square glass case, in the center of the room, where, divided off by glass shelves into distinct communities, were his ants. He deemed them more intelligent a great deal than bees — basing that on the far more numerous prob lems that met the ants in their daily lives, and the obstacles they had to surmount — while the bees lived by routine. He had the oddest pets. We often travelled together in the half hour's quick ride to town. The railroad compartments there hold six. One day a fellow traveller asked him, "Where's your Social Life im London 123 pet wasp, Sir John? Bring it out!" Whereupon, from his vest pocket, there was produced a little cardboard box. This was opened, and disclosed an ordinary wasp, which crawled on to the edge of the box, thence on to its master's hand, and thence took a flight round the carriage, investigating each of us in turn. Then he flew back to his starting point, crawled on to and into his box. Sir John shut it up carefully and returned it to his pocket. This I saw. He was always trying odd experiments with crea tures. He gave some ants from one of his colonies a feed of alcoholic drink. They got staggering, drunk. He put them back among their kith and kin, but to his great amusement, these last would have nothing to do with the drunkards, but pushed them off into the little water course round their nest and watched them drown. There was some talk then about making dogs talk. Sir John had a favorite setter that he took in hand. She would try to talk when he told her, but I thought she was not much of a conversationist. Among our music loving friends was Mrs. Dinah Mulock Craik — the author of John Halifax, Gentle man, which, the librarians tell me is the only one of Mrs. Craik's books that survives. She was a neigh bor of ours and delighted in informal gatherings, where she poured tea. After my first journey to America Mrs. Craik urged me to write of my experiences. She read the M.S. and did me the honor to give the final revise to the proofs. She was another who never could get too much of Beethoven, especially of his sonatas. CHAPTER XIII AN ENGLISH SUNDAY IN the year 1873 my wife's brother and his family returned from India after his spell of service in India and China. Colonel John Desborough had served in the British Artillery for many years. He had commanded the artillery in the then recent second Chinese war. He died only a few months ago as a retired Major General, at the ripe age of ninety- three. They came to stay with us at Beckenham for a time. A more pleasant guest than the Colonel one could not find — ever bright and cheerful, with a memory stored with happenings in most quarters of the British empire. Devoted to his men he shared with Earl Roberts the record of introducing the canteen into the British army. For many years he bore the nickname of Canteen Colonel. He was a sturdy foe of drunken ness, and worked early and late on the Board of the Soldiers' Temperance Society. While staying with us I suggested to the Colonel that he might accompany me on a sermon testing excursion. He agreed, on condition that the morn ing sermon should be heard at our parish church, for the Rector was a great friend and admirer of the Colonel. 124 An English Sunday 125 So, the next Sunday, the third in November, was agreed on. In the morning we all filled our pew in the parish church. Our verdict was, I think, that of Tenny son's Northern farmer — "I tho't he said what he ought to ha' said, and I corned awa-ay." In the afternoon Canon Liddon, by general con sent one of the greatest preachers in the English Church, was to deliver one of his Advent addresses at St. James' Church, Piccadilly, and that we must not miss. This church is one of the ugliest in Great Britain, I imagine. But it is near the Houses of Parliament, and the parks : it holds great audiences, and it is often chosen for special occasions for those reasons. The service was to begin at three p. m., and the afternoon was typical for the November fog and gloom. But when we arrived early the great audi ence room was crowded to the doors, with a great and mostly masculine congregation. That church is of no special order of architecture, but may be described as "late Georgian." It has a large and deep gallery running round the building, and a tall and narrow pulpit, built up so that the preacher is in sight of all. No stained glass in the bare windows, no note worthy choir and organ — the preacher must hold his audience by sheer force of personality. Promptly on time the service commenced with the Evensong of the English Church. When the time came for the sermon a rather heavy set man of ad vanced middle age, slowly climbed the pulpit steps, clad in the black cassock, for to preach in the white surplice had not then become the fashion. His dark 126 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents eyes lighted up his face, while his grave and earnest demeanor claimed the attention of all in the great audience, which came to an absolute hush, as the first word of the text reached our ears. "Trust thou in God, yea in the Living God." A slight pause — then a repetition, with a lingering stress on the final syllable, and many hearers grasped the special significance of words which will follow them to the end of their lives. Only nine words in that text, but each one marked off a division in the speaker's appeal. As the speaker reached his first resting place the tension of the audience relaxed, and a low murmur of restrained coughing ran from pew to pew, telling of a London November. In stant and almost painful silence resumed its sway as the preacher proceeded, and judging by the ex pression on such faces as I could see, his sermon was producing an effect that would not soon pass away. So went on the hour and a quarter that the sermon lasted and brought him to the last repetition of the cardinal words — "the Living God." Slowly and solemnly the great congregation with drew, as soon as the benediction had been pro nounced. And what a congregation it was — Ministers of the Crown, members of the Opposition, many other mem bers of Parliament, judges, lawyers, doctors, artists, financiers, soldiers — most of their faces were fa miliar in the London of that day. My colonel and I got home only just in time for a hasty meal before returning to town for the last course in the pulpit treat, "Where this evening?" said he. "To the tabernacle," I answered, "where C. H. Spurgeon will preach to ten thousand people An English Sunday 127 — as he does twice, in nearly every Sunday of the Christian Year." "Can you stand it?" "Yes, in deed," said he, "and it will be for me a very memor able Sunday." Spurgeon's Tabernacle stood, and still stands, in Newington, a Southern district of the metropolis, where many routes of traffic cross and millions of middle class people live. It is a huge egg-shaped building, with ground floor and galleries, seating, it is said, ten thousand. A gallery spectator can well believe it. When we visited it there was no organ or other instrument visible, but a well trained and carefully selected choir led the singing, responsive to the voice and gestures of the leader. The place of the preacher was set at one of the foci of the oval, and there was a sofa on which two people could be seated, and also a desk for the Bible. But the congregation was the real spectacle filling every pew on the floor and gallery, and overflowing to pack the aisles of the great building. One fea ture I remember — At a given point far on in the service the preacher paused, the congregation rose, and those who had been seated gave up their places to their hitherto standing neighbors. In a few mo ments the momentary confusion ceased and the or derly flow of the service was resumed. We took our places half an hour before the ad vertised time for commencement. I think we sang familiar hymns until seven o'clock. Then there en tered the man on whose strength and personality this whole enterprise had gathered its force and in fluence. My recollection of the personal appearance of 128 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents this great preacher is of a solid looking man of medium height, and in complexion neither dark nor light, with smooth shaven face: his eyes gray and genial in expression. His movements were more ac tive than his first impression indicated. His special personal endowment was a wonderful voice, a rich tenor in tone, full of variety and of far reaching quality. When he took his place on the rostrum that eve ning he glanced round that immense audience, and at once opened the service by announcing a hymn familiar to us all. This was followed by a short extemporary prayer, then another hymn, and then came a Bible reading. The passage chosen included the parable of the Good Samaritan. The reading was varied with re marks, connecting it with the circumstances of daily life, and the demands of to-day — vivid, pointed and shot through with that humor which marked Mr. Spurgeon. No trace or taint of extravagance or irreverence was felt to grate on any hearer of the well known parable, which, indeed, seemed to receive fresh illustration from an active and original mind. The audience was evidently in close touch with their teacher, as one's eye ranged over the close serried faces, and each in turn awoke to the impression from the old story — told, rather than read in that wonderful voice which carried to the farthest corner of the vast building. The sermon was extemporary — delivered without notes, and containing what is known as the Gospel appeal, which Mr. Spurgeon's sermons, whether spoken or printed, always convey. I came away convinced that I had been listening to one, who, if he had not been the earnest servant An English Sunday 129 of our Lord that his whole hfe showed, had it in him to develop into a most powerful Tribune of the peo ple, swaying and dominating those who heard him. When a young man I have heard that his beset ting weakness was personal vanity — excusable doubt less by his immediate popularity. Many anecdotes along that line have been told of him. I was im pressed by one, the more so as I knew both actors in the incident. Returning to> London from some preaching engagement in the Eastern counties Mr. Spurgeon chanced to travel with Miss Catharine Marsh — widely known as the author of the life of Captain Hedley Vickers, which was one of the books in vogue in that day. The train was passing Col chester, an Essex town with a history dating from Roman days. Neither of the travellers was known to the other. As they drew past the town, with its lines of old houses fronting the river Colne, Mr. Spurgeon is said to have moved over to Miss Marsh's side of the carriage, and said to her, "I wonder if in years to come travellers along this line will call attention to this old town, and say, that is where Charles Spurgeon, the great preacher, was born?" Miss Marsh looked him steadily over before she replied : "I wonder whether if we had been travelling and passing Tarsus in company with the Apostle Paul he would have said, 'That is Tarsus, no mean city, where Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, was born ?' " Mr. Spurgeon colored and was silent for a space, and then had grace to answer, "I have not the honor of knowing you, but you must give me leave to thank you for a reproof that I brought on myself, and which I shall not easily forget." The tale runs that an acquaintance between two noteworthy people was thus begun. CHAPTER XIV CHARLES DAXWIN— A PERSONAL SKETCH DURING ten years of our residence at Becken ham, the character of the place was radically changed. The inflow of city people — merchants, lawyers, engineers, architects, brokers, and so on — had caused the breaking up of the little farms and orchards, and of several old parks and demesnes, into building spots along the new roads. Very modern houses were everywhere built or in building. The train service was doubled. The delivery wagons of the London department stores and of London grocers and butchers were seen in the new streets, while the old-fashioned shops in the village lost what trade they had. The atmosphere became distinctly suburban, and many of the earlier residents moved farther afield. In my rides about Bromley, Chislehurst, Keston, and even to Sevenoaks, I was on the lookout for a home in real country, still untouched. One of the villages, an old-world place of which I was very fond, was named Down. It consisted of one row of laborers' cottages, of two or three farm houses belonging to past generations, the old flint built church and the rectory, with a green churchyard in which a grand old yew tree stood ; a little general store, where the villagers got their necessaries and the school chil- 130 "f M * i ¦«¦ . #f r mi r IS, f,£mSM , '¦ ¦ , V fl Ik ?. ^^*#&, . 1 Chaeles Dabwin Charles Darwin — A Personal Sketch 131 dren their toffee and candy ; a gentlefolk's house at each end of the village stood in its own grounds, with ancient elm trees overhanging the road. These houses both stood back in their own gardens and lawns. I forgot the village pump, and two other substantial houses of the better class surrounded by their own gardens in the eastern end of the village near the pump. Now I have told it all. As I rode through it one day I saw in front of the white house on the London road a board, adver tising the place for sale. I inquired at the postoffice, and got the name of the owner and learned that the family had lived there for some years, and that much care and some money had been spent on the gardens and greenhouses, whence grapes and peaches and other forced fruit was regularly sent to the London market. Inquiring about other residents, I learned that Mr. Darwin lived in the house at the far end of the village. Also that Mrs. Darwin's sister, Miss Wedgwood lived in the larger of the houses near the pump. All which was to me, and to my wife, so at tractive that in a few weeks I became the owner of "The Rookery," and we soon moved in. Mrs. Darwin was an early caller, with her daugh ter-in-law, Mrs. Frank Darwin, and acquaintance be tween the two families rapidly advanced, soon ripen ing into friendship which became closer during the next four years. More delightful neighbors we could not have found. The village life was untouched, unchanged, by the great city seventeen miles away, whose presence was only shown by the reflection in the evening sky of its innumerable lamps. Several of the cottagers had never travelled in a railway train or trodden the 132 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents streets of London. Mrs. Darwin was the Lady Bountiful of the village community, caring for the sick and the poverty stricken ones, often sending to the weakly ones food from her own table. For many years Mr. Darwin was the treasurer and manager of the village Friendly Society, taking charge of their little savings, keeping their accounts. I think he showed more simple pride in the successful balancing of the yearly statements of his poorer neighbors' provision against sickness and old age than in receiving some degree from a well-known for eign university. , Their house stood behind an ivy-covered wall, looking from the garden front over an English land scape of green fields, high hedge-rows, and ancient trees. At the left of the view was a small grass field, surrounded by a gravel walk, where it was Mr. Dar win's habit to take daily exercise when heavy rains muddied the neighboring roads. This field, and one belonging to a neighbor, were the scene of his obser vations on the work of the earth-worm in altering the face of the ground, and hiding deep, and still deeper, the one-time surface by the worm earth-casts. This was his last book, but the observations were as careful, minute, prolonged, thoughtful as any on which rested his earlier fame. The same power of arranging and accumulating knowledge ; the same in sight into the causes of seemingly trivial results. On the right of the entrance to the house was Mr. Darwin's study. A large writing table, a high- backed chair, another table with microscope, and, maybe, some other instrument. A potted plant, the object of experiments in progress for the time being. The walls were covered to the ceiling with well-worn Charles Darwin — A Personal Sketch 133 books, which overflowed into the passages and land ings on the upper floor. Last, but not least, on the floor near the fire was "Sally's" comfortable basket. She was an old white bull terrier, an adept at the "expression of the emotions" in animals, who would, if she could, have told many a tale of the researches into dog nature of her kindly master. The books were, many of them, the records of the proceedings of zoological, geological and botanical societies, Eng lish and foreign, for many years. Once, I remember, we were plagued in our grape forcing house by an invasion of "mealy bug," coming one knew not whence, and immune to spraying, sulphuring, tobacco smoking, and all known gardening arts. I took a branch carrying a colony to Mr. Darwin, telling him of our trouble. He studied it for a moment, and then turned to his son and collaborator, Frank, who was standing by. "Go upstairs," he said, "and on the third shelf from the top of the left-hand book case, about the middle of the shelf, you will find the journal for 18 — of such a German entomological society. About page 257, on the right of the book and midway down, I think you will find the descrip tion of the insect and its life history." And there or thereabouts, we did find it. In the garden behind the house was the greenhouse with a mixed collection of the plants familiar to' the world. Their habits were studied, changed modes of growth in the face of natural and artificial obstacles — their insect friends and enemies — influences on growth of light and moisture, retarded or quickened life, self and cross fertilization, changes of color, form, flower; influences of chemistry on plant foods. On all such lines was research progressing. And the 134 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents infinite patience of it all, never hasting, never dis couraged. Here are some of his own words : "Trol- lope, in one of his novels, gives as a maxim of con stant use by a bricklayer, 'It's dogged as does it!' and I have often and often thought this is a motto for every scientific observer." And again, "As far as my experience goes, what one expects rarely hap pens." Yet again, "Investigation with very poor success, as usual; almost everything goes differently from what I anticipated." The family life was the most genial, gentle, courte ous, affectionate, I can imagine. Mr. Darwin's eldest son, William, was a country banker. The second, Dr. Frank Darwin, was his father's constant assistant and co-worker. He was in later years professor of botany in the University of Cambridge, and famous on his own account for researches into plant life. The third son was George, afterwa/rd Sir George. He was a distinguished mathematician, known widely for experiments and devices for weighing the moon among other achieve ments. A fourth son, Leonard, was an officer in the Royal Engineers. He became the instructor in pho tography of that celebrated corps. He was also an earnest student and inquirer in sociology, and wrote a book on "Municipal Enterprises," which was for some years a standard authority. The youngest son, Horace, found his metier as a deviser and maker of the more delicate scientific in struments. While this most unusual group of sons was grow ing up and taking their own places in the national life, but still making their father's home their own, it happened that I saw a good deal of the home life. Charles Darwin — A Personal Sketch 135 Never once, in the give and take of lively converse did I hear one word of self-assertion or provocation. If any statement was doubted, and was to be contro verted or corrected, it was never denied or contra dicted. The formula in constant use was, "But, don't you think?" The four years' voyage on the "Beagle," entailing on Mr. Darwin constant seasickness, left him weakly for life, and needing constant attention to regular and simple habits of life. He lived a life of self-restraint. So much work. So much exercise. Such food, and no other. So much recreation and diversion. The epochs of his after life were the successive publications of his books. When once a book was in the publisher's hands it was Mrs. Darwin's habit to take her husband to the sea for holiday and rest. The volume and variety of work got through, year by year, in face of such bodily weakness and self- restraint is simply amazing, and a lesson to all. After the family's late dinner was over it was Mr. Darwin's habit to take a little rest, and then to join the family in the drawing room. Mrs. Darwin and several of the children were very fond of music, and the grand piano was in very frequent use. I have often watched Mr. Darwin sitting by, with an inquiring expression on his face, as' a sonata of Mozart or Beethoven, or a nocturne of Chopin's was being played. I remember well his saying, "When I was young and after we had been for some time married, I took great pleasure in hearing music, and I was a good listener. But by degrees, and as I became more and more absorbed in scientific observation, the taste 136 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents for music lessened and fell off. I really believe the musical department of my brain became atrophied from want of use. I have often lamented it since, but it has gone too far to recall now. Depend upon it, it's a great mistake to lose interest in any art or hobby by disuse." Good authority, I think, for advice I have very often given, concerning music, especially, and, above all, to newly married girls. Have you given up hours of time and months of study until you have passed the rudiments and begun to learn the charm of your instrument, whatever it may be? Then per severe with it, even if occupations multiply and en gagements press. Make it a feature of your life, and depend on it, future years will justify you, for music will stay with you to bless you to the end. It was a great pleasure to Mr. Darwin, in these later years, to receive an address, or epistle, in Hebrew from a learned Jewish Rabbi, in Posen, I think. Being translated into English it proved to be a testimony from the writer that he had carefully ex amined Mr. Darwin's books, and had found there nothing to shake his faith in God, or in his revelation of himself to his chosen people. Nothing had he found hostile to religion or to its influence on human life. The rabbi went on to say that, on the other hand, he could quote from those books the best evi dences in support and explanation of the Mosaic record in the book Genesis. This incident led to an interesting conversation with Mr. Darwin on this subject. He was well aware of the storm of hostile criticism directed at him, and following the publica tion of "The Origin of Species," and "The Descent Charles Darwim — A Personal Sketch 137 of Man." He was accused of substituting the evolu tion or development of Man from a less highly organ ized form of life for the creation of Man by a divine edict, as recorded in the Bible, and this by the oper ation of natural causes working throughout the earth from far-distant ages. "But," he said, in effect, "I am but a searcher after facts — a student of life in its origin and in its after history. It is not for me to attempt to reconcile the results of my observations with theology. It is for the theologians to do that." I know of no passage in his books wherein he dis putes the existence of an All Powerful and Eternal First Cause, by whom laws were framed and set in motion which have caused the universe and all that is therein; from whom came the soul of man, and to whom all men owe allegiance. I have recalled a noble passage in one of his books wherein he upheld the grandeur of the idea of the preparation of the physical man through the ages of the dim past for the inbreathing into the de veloped being of that spirit that makes man Man. I am aware that each and all of the deductions drawn by Mr. Darwin from the mass of his detailei observations has passed through the fire of both adverse and friendly criticism. Many minor points have received modification, scarcely any of his sub stantive teachings disavowal. In after years, when, in a far-distant land, my mind has run back over the outlines of a friendship that I do, and shall, cherish as a possession for my self and a heritage for my children, my memory goes back to my first sight of this great man. It was in one of my afternoon rides from our 138 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Beckenham home, when no idea of leaving it had yet been entertained. I had crossed the corner of Kes- ton Common, and my horse was slowly walking up the steep hill that leads into the Village of Down. The road is rough and narrow. An elderly man was walking slowly down. Seeing me he turned aside and stood as I moved along the road, with his back to me, studying the face of the chalk quarry in the hill, from which the road material of chalk and flints had been dug. The action was that of a shy and nervous man, and I looked curiously at him as I passed. I saw, in side view, a slender and somewhat bowed man, with a "drawn face," heavy white eye brows and beard, under a soft black hat. He wore black clothes and a cape, with a gray plaid shawl wrapped round his shoulders. There was something familiar in the general outline, and I wondered if I had met that man. Suddenly recognition came to me. It was the pictures of the author of the "Origin of Species" I had in mind, the original of which I had passed, looking at the chalk quarry on the road to Down. I should like to add that we resolved to call one of our American-born sons "Darwin," and wrote to him from Oregon to that effect. We soon received from him a very warm and appreciative letter giving his assent. I understood, I think, from Frank Dar win, that such action was as near "Godfathering" as he ever went. PART II LIFE IN THE NEW WORLD CHAPTER I A LAWYER'S EXPERIENCE ON TWO CONTINENTS ONE afternoon in the late spring of 1877 a very friendly Jew client of mine came to see me and told me that a well-known firm of Jewish bankers and capitalists, having headquarters in Paris, were in terested largely in land grants in Oregon, and wished to be introduced to a law firm in London, with a view of enlisting British capital in the enterprise. He said that he had suggested me to them, and that if I approved, one of the French firm would make a trip to London to see me. Accordingly, a few days later my friend came again to see me, accompanied by a French gentleman of middle age, whom he in troduced to me. This Frenchman spoke excellent English, and told me that he had spent some time at their New York office. I learned that their partner in the enterprise was an ex-Confederate colonel, who was then in Paris, but who would accompany him to see me at any time I appointed.So they came — a queerly assorted couple. The Frenchman stout, suave, smiling, the American rather tall, lean, nervous, with curly brown hair, a full beard, good forehead, large pale-blue eyes, a re pressed manner at first meeting. The American at once took up the burden of the conversation. 141 142 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents He said that after the war, that left him a prisoner at Fort Alcatraz, in San Francisco Bay, he spent some time in hospital recovering fully from wounds and sufferings in war, and then he found himself at loose ends, all his property in New Orleans, where he was a merchant, having disappeared. He said that he had heard of large Government grants of lands in Oregon for road construction, and that, more to give himself an object in his travels than with any definite ideas about values and possibilities, he had journeyed northward from San Francisco, being financed by his brother, a well-known Govern ment contractor there ; and, he added in a smiling parenthesis, as strong a Northerner as he was a Southerner. His travels covered, he said, the tract included in the grants, being the alternate one-mile sections in a belt across Middle Oregon, twelve miles wide from east to west. As to the resources of the country, he said that there was a, port on the Pacific Ocean, about a hundred miles south of Astoria, that needed harbor improvements at the entrance before big ships could use it, but that the United States Gov ernment would undoubtedly do that work when set tlement and commerce demanded it. That the cli mate of the whole section was temperate and health ful; that there was abundant water, and that such parts of the grant as were included in the tract mis named the Oregon desert in the maps of that day, would, when irrigated from the rivers issuing there from the Cascade mountains, prove to invite home making by thousands of new settlers. Further, that the grants included many thousands of acres of the finest timber in the new world, both of the Douglas, A Lawyer's Experience on Two Continents 143 or Oregon, fir, of sugar pine, and some spruce and cedar. That the eastern region, reaching the State boundary on the Snake River, gave now feeding grounds for both sheep and cattle, but would eventu ally be developed into ranches and farms. He said that there were now two prosperous towns, Albany and Corvallis, along the course of the grant through the great and widely known Willamette Valley, and several smaller towns and settlements. At the close of an interview that had covered some hours the Colonel added that each section of the grants had special opportunities of its own, demanding opening out and developing. He was an interesting talker, evidently a man of foresight and imagination. I named an early day to see them again, intending, in the interval, to check off the many points sug gested by calling into council some friends and clients, one of whom was Governor Douglas, formerly of the Hudson Bay Company, whose jurisdiction ex tended over those parts of Oregon previous to its surrender by Great Britain to the United States. So, at the adjourned meeting about a dozen men were assembled, including not only the Hudson Bay ex-governor, but several who were stockholders and directors in two or three of the Australian and Colonial development Companies, most favorite and successful investments of British capital. It seems to me, looking back across more than forty years, to have been a dramatic scene, with great issues involved. I introduced Colonel T. Egen- ton Hogg, stating succinctly the purpose of the gathering. He made his talk, and, as I watched, I saw that the first impression was favorable. He answered innumerable questions, passed to him from 144 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents all corners of the room. Then I said, we have here to-day by good fortune Governor Douglas, late of the Hudson Bay Company. We should like to hear what he can tell us of his own knowledge of this well nigh fairyland of which we have been hearing. Then, from a corner by the door rose a tall gaunt, gray-haired Scotchman, and proceeded to trace the history of his many years' acquaintance with the Oregon territory, when his Indians took him in canoes up the Willamette River, and when he travel led across Oregon through the Harney and Mal heur valleys to the Snake River. He verified all we had been hearing of the possibilities of settlement and population, and of the many industries which should there find development. Then questions of finance were raised, and espe cially of a new and full examination of and report on the territory in question before any action should be taken. It was suggested that the present owners should pay the cost of such investigation, and the meeting stood over for results. That proposal was at once agreed to. An informal meeting took place when it was put up to me to go out and make the examination during the coming long vacation, with liberty to choose such others, not less than two, as I might select to accompany me. We will suppose these arrangements made and the party ready to leave Liverpool for New York on the coming first of July. I consulted Mr. Darwin about an expert and he suggested H. M. Moseley, F. R. S., lately the naturalist to the "Challenger" expedition, who was then at liberty — and he readily consented to join me. The tale of the journey was told shortly after A Lawyer's Experience on Two Continents 145 our return in "Oregon, There and Back in 1877." I will not repeat it here. I ought to say that the book was very kindly reviewed in nearly all the press no tices, exception being made of the "Saturday Re view," a paper whose specialty was to dip the pens of its writers in vitriol. The "Saturday Review" said that it was all very well for the author to paint a paradise, and to invite his fellow countrymen to ven ture themselves there, but the advice would carry more weight if it were backed up by his leaving his comfortable chair in a London office and taking his own medicine — or words to that effect — which rankled, although I had then no idea of making the expedition. I may add that on our return to London a com pany was formed, on the model of those colonial com panies that I mentioned, and that several associates of ex-Governor Douglas were subscribers in it. To that company was transferred a half interest in the land grant of the Corvallis and Yaquina Bay Wagon Road Company, Colonel Hogg retaining the other one-half. The acreage was about 60,000 and the tract lay in alternate sections between Corvallis and the head of tide on the Yaquina River. I considered then that the alternate sections being largely already settled and, to some extent, improved, it was better to make that the starting point in our operations rather than to undertake then the great land grant crossing Oregon from Albany to the Snake River, where a practically virgin country was in question. Corvallis was, and is still, the county seat of Benton County, in which all the land grant lands were found. All the members of our little expedition made the trip to Yaquina Bay, and gazed out to and over 146 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents the Pacific on the sunset of our arrival at the infant settlement of Newport at the mouth of the estuary. There were, even then, two little hotels, one on the bluff above, the other on the street facing the wharf at which the boats of the settlers on the shores of the bay were tied up. Beside the "Abbey House" stood the one dark litttle general store, to supply the little community. I remember well that after supper that evening we three Englishmen went into "Bush" Hammond's store to chat and smoke. A smoking wall lamp lighted the place. As the door bell jingled a couple of Indians came in out of the dark, one carrying slung over his shoulder, some long, dark beast, which he jerked on the counter before the store-keeper. Moseley pricked up his ears and came to take notice. From nose tip to tail the animal was about four or four and a half feet long, plainly of the otter type — the fur dark brown and glossy: but the feet were webbed. "I have never met this before," said Moseley to me. "It is the sea-otter of the Pacific." The Indian began to dicker with "Bush" for the hide : the bidding started at two hundred dollars, and Moseley's face fell, for, by slow degrees it went to four hundred, and changed hands at that. The price was too high for him, and he had to content himself with the skeleton, which we arranged to have cleaned by the ants at a neigh boring ant-heap in the wood. In due time that skele ton followed him to Oxford, and took its unique place in the Museum of Natural History. Even then these sea-otters were rare — now they are all but extinct. They live in the great kelp fields along the ocean front. There they are shot from the shore with A Lawyer's Experience on Two Continents 147 long range rifles. One otter means a year's work for white or Indian hunters. If one is seen disport ing itself in the kelp, it is followed up or down the coast for miles until the chance for a shot comes : then all is staked on success, which is much rarer than failure. Our way back to Corvallis lay through the Siletz Reservation, where the remnants of twelve or thir teen tribes of the coast Indians have been collected. We were camped on the bank of the Siletz River, one of the finest trout streams that I know. Near by camp, but nearer the river, stood an Indian hut, low and rude — fir brush its material, fir branches its roofing. Smoke issued from its whole structure, roof, door, and window. Evening was closing in, as we stood idly watching. Sounds of what some one doubtless thought melody were heard. The rough door was thrown open, and an old Indian, as naked as he was born, went quickly down the bank and plunged into the icy river. This is called the "In dian sweat bath," their cure for all diseases. A short time before this an epidemic of measles broke out in the reservation. Against the protests of the physician the sweat-bath was put into universal use, and death was a common penalty. When we returned to San Francisco on our way home we took passage on the "City of Chester." Such an old tub! About as wide as she was long, and twice as high above the water line as she should have been. The passage of the Columbia River bar was a penance to atone for a multitude of sins. She stood on end as a heavy roller caught her in the middle of the bar, and the old ship seemed to hang 148 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents undetermined whether she would come down right side up or roll over backwards into that mess of white waters. As always, the San Francisco people were hos pitality itself. Moseley was made welcome at the Lick Observatory by the courtesy of Mr. Flood, one of the observatory trustees and a great friend of the colonel's : by the same token he was a lieutenant on Semmes' "Alabama" during the bad days of the Civil War. In due time we safely returned to London with out adventure. Moseley made his report on Ore gon so far as we saw it. It was then printed and it confirmed the impression I had set forth in "Oregon, There and Back in 1877," as far as the suitability for English colonization and settlement, and the abundance of natural resources were concerned. I don't like to close this part of my life story without recording the friendship that I brought from my first journey to the Pacific Coast, and enjoyed until his life ended, with "Bush" Wilson of Corvallis, who held for twenty-six years the office of County Clerk and Recorder of Benton County. When I went into the clerk's office at Corvallis in the old and tumble down Court House there sat in the far corner, behind the long wooden counter on which the record books of titles to land in the county were displayed, a round faced, smiling man, with scanty black hair. He had a well-nourished look, as if the troubles of life sat lightly on him, and as if to do' a kindness was the pleasantest of tasks. He welcomed me, and answered fully and understandingly all my questions, and then opened those books, and helped me trace down all the titles, unerringly, and with A Lawyer's Experience on Two Continents 149 the fullest recollection of every transaction therein recorded. He was a perfect living lexicon of the lands that this man bought and the other sold, of who inherited this and bequeathed the other, of how many children this man had, and of what became of them. And of all this knowledge he considered himself a trustee for every one of the inhabitants of Benton County. Poor and rich, it was all the same to him. Verily he was no respecter of persons. He took the exact fees that the law allowed to his office and no cent more. He was a Republican, and scrupulously went on horseback the rounds of his county when canvassing day for the bi-yearly election came round. His pockets and saddle bags were stuffed with cigars and — save the mark — with whiskey, for those were the unregenerate days before prohibition was even in the air, much less on the statute books. He was no drinking man, though. What wonder that to oppose him at the election was an empty show, a perfect farce — he was invincible at the polls. He started in life as a seaman on a whaler and, to the day of his death, would tell all the yarns of the ocean, the whale boat and the harpoon. He landed, as a shipwrecked mariner on the Oregon coast, and, withstanding the lures of the gold-mining camps, he made his way slowly to Corvallis, teach ing school on the way here and there. Once having reached Corvallis he had landed in his appropriate and ordained harbor, and there he stayed until, many years afterwards, death took him. CHAPTER II THE INVENTION OF THE TELEPHONE 1 SUPPOSE that it became known in my small circle that I had visited America that year of 1877. Possibly it was that knowledge that brought several pieces of American business my way in the late months of that year. I helped to secure some bonded capital for an Indiana railroad, and aided an American inventor to introduce an ingenious machine to English purchasers and users. This last was noteworthy to me as an example of British slow ness and hesitation to take up obvious improvements simply because of their novelty. To stand on the ancient ways was the English business man's motto to a far greater extent forty years ago than now. Doubtless the great war has aided in its abandon ment. A few months afterwards we had a request from friends of ours who were, and are still, I sup pose, the solicitors for the General Post Office, to go to their offices about a new and probably an im portant matter. The senior member of the firm told me that they had been consulted by an American gentleman from Boston who had made an invention of world-wide importance, if his patent rights could be maintained. He said that an entirely new method of communication by wire was in question, and added that in view of possible relations with the Govern- 150 The Invention of the Telephone 151 ment in the near future they thought it best that he should have entirely independent representation. That a great deal of time and thought and effort must be given by whoever undertook this business, and that unless we were prepared for that the pres ent conversation must go on farther. I said that on that understanding I was ready to meet his Ameri can friend and discuss the matter fully. Accord ingly, the next day, I think, I was introduced to Alexander Graham Bell, then a tall, black-haired handsome and very attractive man of thirty. He invited me to his house in the West End of London, where the infant invention of the telephone was in stalled, which could there be more fully explained than was possible by word of mouth. The next eve ning I went there and was shown the miracle of vocal communication by wire. From that room I talked to his secretary in the basement of the house. Of course the mechanism of the instrument I neither could, nor was expected to', understand. I took home with me a copy of the original specifications and other printed matter, to be pondered over at my leisure. The language was new to me, the terms equally so. "Receivers, transmitters, diaphragm, telephone, magnetic telephone, and so on" might have been Greek for all I knew of them. But I was much interested in the man as well as in his great idea, and gave myself up to the study, to gain as soon as possible a theoretical acquaintance with the new subject. The lawyer's aptitude in reaching the telling points of a new proposition, cultivated by twenty years of practice, certainly helped me. In the suite of Dr. Bell were two Americans — Miss Kate Field, a writer and a business woman, and 152 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Colonel Reynolds, whose eyes were set on the com mercial side of the invention. I soon got to know them well, and made them welcome in my Queen Street of fice. The first duty before me was to have the Bell patent right secured by successful maintenance in the courts in face of all possible competitors or infringers. To this end test cases must be brought, or accepted and won. I retained the Attorney General Webster, whose specialty was in patent cases, and Mr. Cohen, one of Great Britain's coun sel in the Alabama arbitration, on Dr. Bell's behalf, and so got ready for our part in the battle. After the lapse of nearly forty years I could not, if I would, reproduce the exact issues then raised. Let it suffice to say that Dr. Alexander Graham Bell wears by full right the title of inventor of the tele phone^ — for his triumph in the courts was complete. While this was pending came the memorable meet ing in the rooms of the Society of Arts in the Adelphi, when Dr. Bell made his most successful de but before a crowded audience wherein the most widely recognized 'of British scientific men were prominent. The word had gone forth that a young American had come from Boston to London, an nouncing that he had solved the long sought mystery of the possible transmission of vocal sounds by wire. That the instruments used were also of his invention, and of so simple a construction and of so moderate a cost that the very early adoption of his system in English life of all classes was really certain. That his priority in this new field was asserted, and was so far admitted that no patent rights in conflict with those granted to him had been filed. The Invention of the Telephone 153 So, when the evening came the young lecturer found a very critical, but sympathetic, audience. The scene rises again before my eyes. The great room was hung round with large diagrams and pic tures, showing the construction and functions of the human ear: especially of the. drum of the ear and its connecting nerves. The lecturer's table was un usually long, for on it were displayed instruments of entirely novel make — and, I think, anatomical speci mens from dissections of the ear and its various parts. The young lecturer made a very pleasant impres sion, even when he began to talk, and his effective and pleasantly modulated voice reached every person present. He traced the history of his discovery and invention, and the series of experiments in which his early dreams took shape and practical success. I am sure that all present felt that such success was hardly and honorably won, and responded to his story of the first intelligible sounds to be carried by the wire to his anxiously listening ear. Since those days modern telephony has been de veloped, but its rise was from the Bell magnetic telephone described in that lecture and from the in struments which that audience saw and handled. The next questions were how to hasten the adop tion of the telephone into English family and busi ness life. Queen Victoria was much interested and needed no urging to allow a telephone to be installed at Osborne House, her seaside residence, and con nected with London by the telegraph wires parallel ing the London and South Western Railway. This was done, and the receiver was set in my Queen 154 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Street office, as a central spot in the city. On an early day after the Society of Arts meeting a small gathering of folks then or shortly to be interested met there and waited for the time set. Then we all in turn listened to talk over the telephone from Osborne House, and this was followed by the clear and unmistakable strains of the cornet, played in that same room. Various old ballads and songs followed, and we stood round with wonder in all eyes. The telephone was an accomplished fact. Then Colonel Reynolds and I started to get ex perimental instalments made by firms who had fac tories and shops in the outskirts and offices in the city of London. At once British antique notions were in the way, and it took quite a campaign to get the ice broken. I am sure that to American business men this is incredible, but I tell facts as we encountered them. Of course it was only a question of time for the advantages offered were obvious. I have watched the development of the telephone on two continents — and, last of all, its incalculable need on the bat tlefields of Europe. How many lives of the best and boldest have been poured out to keep those wires in operation no one can tell, but the price paid has been felt to be necessary to the nations by which it has been paid. There I leave the inventor of the telephone and his work. I have said nothing hitherto about my home and our domestic relations. It is necessary to break this rule now or else to leave the transfer of my family and myself to Oregon unaccounted for. No one could have had a happier home than I until some The Invention of the Telephone 155 months after returning from my visit in 1877 to the Pacific Coast. Then, without warning the blow fell — virulent scarlet fever entered the nursery, and three victims were taken in a week. My wife, broken in health and spirits, went with the survivors to the sea coast, where, after a severe attack of the same disease, the life of that one boy was spared. But life at Down had become impossible. All was changed, and we determined to move back to our old Becken ham home and to sell The Rookery as soon as pos- \ sible. My London office life was resumed, and the last month of 1877 and the year 1878 were times of the greatest activity. The m. s. of "Oregon, There and Back in 1877" was completed, and published in March, 1878, by MacMillans, after a final revision very kindly given to the proofs by our kind friend, Dinah Mulock Craik. My relations with the Ore gon Agricultural Company and with Colonel T. Egenton Hogg continued, and I hoped to see the land matters progress and that preparations for con struction of the new Oregon Pacific Railroad would soon be completed and work be begun. I heard that several wealthy capitalists of New York had taken interests in the railroad and that the prospects were good for subscription for bonds enough to build at once the first section of seventy miles, between Corvallis, in the Willamette Valley and the Pacific by way of Yaquina Bay. All this in the course of 1878. But settlers failed to come in to make homes on the Land Grant lands, while there was obvious need for new railroad legisla tion in Oregon to loosen the dead hand of the South- 156 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents ern Pacific on all new or extended railroad enter prises in the state and operating to forestall or pre vent their construction. So the question came to me, and returned unan swered times and again, whether, at forty we were still young enough to face removal from the old world to the new, and so to regain under new condi tions the health in body and mind that had been shaken for both of us in the sad events of the fall of 1877. I found my wife a willing listener when I broached the subject to her. In the end we con cluded to make our future home in Oregon, and to leave England in the spring of 1879. We held to our purpose through the storm of remonstrances from relatives, friends, and business associates, and sailed from Liverpool on April 17th, 1879. It was a complete migration. When it became known that we were going I was plagued by an invasion of fathers, uncles, and guardians of young men whom they desired to turn over to my care to be made farmers, stock raisers and sheep men in our new country. Some of the interviews were laughable enough. I had a formula of questions to put to these good men. Out of over a dozen of the more likely ones but one had any preparation for such a life, and he was an ex-pupil from the machine shops of the London and North Western railroad. The rest came neither from farms, orchards, or any kind of outdoor pursuit. Several were unsuccessful and unwilling clerks and office men in the cities. If I had been making up a cricket eleven — amateur or professional — I could have filled it up then and there with some over. Several of the boys came to see The Invention of the Telephone 157 me. I judged them to be not vicious, but untrained and unregulated in purpose and life. None of these relatives would bind themselves to provide any capi tal for the boys to buy land and start with after two years of apprenticeship. In the end I accepted the four I liked best, and they joined our party. I received from their relatives a moderate monthly payment for as long as they stayed in our house and under my control. But, within a year, I think, we had got rid of all of them and that not unwil lingly. I wondered at my failure with them, for I had never been without pupils, had got on well with them and had seen them prosper. On May 17th we arrived in Corvallis at the end of our month's journey from England. We travelled up the Willamette River from Portland on a stern wheel river boat, which carried a motley collection of passengers, some horses, a cow or two, more than one hack or buggy, some wagons and plows, and filled up with groceries and foodstuffs. The season was unusually late, and the streets of the little town were ankle deep in mud, crossed by planks a foot wide. From the boat landing we crossed to the board hotel on the far side — the mud- filled gutter being cluttered up with the just cut off heads of a dozen hogs from the butcher's shop ad joining the hotel, thrown in there to get them out of the way. No one took account of hogs' heads in those days, nor of calves' heads, nor of sweet breads, or other internal organs of the slaughtered animals. They were just thrown away regardless of where they might fall. We were a motley company. My wife and my- 158 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents self, three boys, a baby girl and her nurse : a cousin of mine — who developed into a hard working farmer, and who three years ago sent four sons into Kitchener's army — a highlander ex-guardsman — whom we found invaluable on the ranch, an old cook of my uncle's who had known me from boyhood and had no ties to hold her to the old land, and my four farm "pupils"— save the mark. I had forgotten a young lately married couple, not tied to us in any way, but desiring to make a start in Oregon. A house was being built for us on the slope above the town, but it was not quite ready. Meanwhile we stayed at the "Vincent Hotel," except our two selves who were taken to a friend's house who had been advised of our coming. And in the face of all this my wife lost neither her poise nor her courage, and actually prospered on hardships and discomforts. Mrs. Vincent proved to be a very friendly soul, and soon made the whole crowd welcome. They all ate heartily and there were no complaints of the food. CHAPTER III LIFE IN OREGON IN those days Corvallis consisted of a, wide street built up with one or two story stores, four saloons, and half a dozen churches: a court house, surrounded by oak and fir trees, and a two story school house for the public schools, and another school house and a church owned by the South Methodist Church, the school being called the Ore gon Agricultural College, and receiving the emolu ments provided by the United States. The majority of the store keepers were of Jewish nationality, as was commonly the case in Oregon of those days. Oregon was a young state indeed, 1859 being the year of her state-nativity : her population was small, and largely of recent immigration from the Southern States following the Civil War. To this day the people are wonderfully, and reasonably, proud of their pioneers, a group of whom still survive. In the community were several lawyers and physicians, a couple of dentists, some school teachers, many store keepers, four or five saloon keepers, two flour millers, two or three blacksmiths — and let me not forget the barbers, whose shops were, in winter and summer, the clubs of the community. There was a minister and his family for nearly every church, who eked out a living on the contributions of their church- 159 160 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents members. The Firemen's Club was an active organi zation and a Coffee Club auxiliary supplied coffee to' the firemen when there was a not infrequent fire. Saturday was the busy day of the week, when the neighboring farmers came into town and tied long rows of wagons to the hitching posts near the Court House. The most prosperous were the saloon keepers, for they took in the larger part of the farmer's earnings — and there were card games in nearly all the saloons. There were' two newspapers, and how they survived and managed to pay for paper, ink, and compositors' wages was a standing mystery to me. Every one welcomed us, for we brought not only liquid money into the community, but new faces, new styles of clothes, new institutions, new ways of living, and, it was told of me in advance, prospects of progress with the much-talked-of railroad. We soon got settled in our own house on the hill which the Colonel had had enlarged for us by my request. There was room for all — a productive and pretty garden outside, with a row of well-grown acacias, a good stable or barn — and, worth much to us, a magnificent view from the upstairs verandah, Eastward to the Cascade Mountains — Hood, Jef ferson, The Three Sisters, all snow peaks were gleam ing by turns in the Western sun. The course of the Willamette River was marked by dark lines of trees as far as eye could reach. The coast range of mountains overlooked the back of the house, with Mary's Peak wearing her bonnet of snow until July in each year. Both sunrise and sunset were glorious, and covered a multitude of shortcomings. Life in Oregon 161 So the stage was set for our future lives. Several of the English settlers who had lived for years in Oregon declined to take out citizenship papers, holding on to ties to the old and beloved country of their birth. I disagreed with them from the ground up, took out first papers at once, and final citizenship as soon as the Constitution allowed. Most of the early settlers had taken out "Donation land claims." Under those laws a man could settle on and claim 320 acres where he pleased and where ear lier claims did not conflict, and his wife an adjoining 320 acres. Surveys of the lands were in progress but by no means complete, and the earlier maps showed the oddest jumble of lines and crosslines. Conflicts of claims were not rare: but the settlers were not, as a rule, contentious and disputes were generally peace ably settled. The twelve-mile belt between Corvallis and Yaquina Bay had all been surveyed, the mile sec tions marked, and the alternate sections set apart for the Land Company. So my earliest duty was to ex amine these alternate sections and determine which should be prepared for immediate sale and settlement. Roads and byroads and wagon and horse trails must be opened up. Of course each of the boys must have a horse, and then the working party must be fitted out. This being done we all started for the section of land, some twelve miles west of Corvallis where the work would probably be begun. There were seven in the party besides myself, eight horses — one a pack ani mal — and a tent. An ax for everybody, a "grub- hoe" or two and a few shovels were the tools, and food for a week at least. Every boy had his rifle, 162 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents except the known workers — for the English set be lieved, I think, that Indians or at least bears and cougars, were lurking in every foothill wood. When we reached a settler's little house near by the land in question I stopped to learn the way. The door was closed. "Mac" went and knocked at the door, which was opened at once, and, as he said, "half a dozen children fell out!" Where they and the rest of the family found breathing room inside was a wonder. Within half a mile we found Section 23, a mass of tall wild cherry and hazel brush, with a few young fir trees on the edges. I had one expert with us, so the boys were all set to work chopping with their unaccustomed and tender hands, and I passed on to other lands. The clearing idea then was, in brush like that before us, to choose a square of about fifty or sixty yards, to cut out round it a belt ten yards wide, leaving the cut trees piled to wards the common center, and there leave it for sun and air in a few months to dry out the cut brush, and then to have fire set in each square, which would burn out the uncut wood. It was a slovenly way, but it was an early day, and some kind of quick result was needed. A wide trail led on to a valley at the head of Mary's River, and I passed out of sight to return to camp at supper time. When I got back, about six o'clock, I found the lot gathered round one of the rawest of the English boys with sympathetic faces. The reason? This boy had been left in camp to get supper. Seeing in the food stores a sack of dried apples — cut in rings, and clean and nice — he set in to nibble at this new food. He found it good and kept on eating and nibbling until he made quite Life m Oregon 163 a hole in the dish. Then he found himself very thirsty, and went down to the creek to drink. But instead of quenching thirst the dried apples inside him absorbed all the water and swelled up to their original dimensions. Result? A tremendous stom ach ache that brought him to rolling on the turf in anguish when his mates got back and Mac applied the remedy of pounding and rubbing him till doctors and patient were tired and sore. Another adventure for that night. The camp stood in a grove of fir trees, tall and lusty. Half a sheep was left over after supper and breakfast were provided for, so Herbert, my cousin, climbed a fir tree with the meat and hung it from a high branch, to keep safe from marauders. In the mid dle of the night was a tremendous outcry, every dog in the camp, of which there were four or five, barking at once, and all gathered in an excited heap round the meat bearing tree. A black mass showed dimly up there in the darkness. Herbert rushed for his new rifle and darted out to the dogs by the tree. He could not see to shoot whatever the beast was, and dodged about round the trunk to get a, shot. Stand ing there he let fly. Down came something on his shoulders, and bore him to the ground, clawing and biting at him and the dogs, who at once attacked it furiously. They made an end of what turned out to be the rare Oregon lynx, one of the boldest and most savage of the cat tribe. The dogs saved Herbert from a fearful mauling. A few miles further on there was a sign at the road side, nailed to a tree "Blacksmith Shop." At a settler's house of grey old boards and mossy shingles I found the blacksmith, old Mark Savage, 164 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents an ancient settler. He was not at all glad to see me. I wondered why. He made it plain when he said, "You fellers goin' to settle this place up?" I told him, "Maybe, but it won't be now." He an swered in soliloquy, "Well it don't matter much, I can move on in further, I guess — the darn place is getting too thick for me anyhow — there's folks within half a mile of me whichever way I turn!" I comforted him and he stayed on till the gangs of the railroad construction came on, and his old shop was much used, for he was a good workman. This was the first of many such trips that covered the tract from the head waters of Mary's River, over the Western divide to the head waters of the Yaquina River, and about fifty miles on to tide water and the ocean. In those early days before there was more than a very sparse settlement along the road that gained the land grant the wild country bore a special charm. Luxuriance and abundance were the types of the vegetation. The wild flowers and trailing vines bore flowers as large again as in the drier Willamette Valley. The memories of the great forest fire that swept the district fifty years and more ago remained in the part blackened and part silver trunks that still towered above the younger brush and succeeding firs that made the mantle with which a mild climate had hidden the fire's ravages. Although there were but patches here and there left of the big timber that attracts thousands to the forests of Oregon there was compensation in that the land was the more reachable and easily cleared for roads and farms. It was not much of a prophet who could not see the ranchers' houses by the road Life in Oregon 165 side, his cows in the farm corrals, with the big milk cans waiting by the road side for the passing wagon : the white school houses by the cross-roads, and even hear the whistle of the incoming train along rails laid by the natural right of way along the river valleys. At home in Corvallis much correspondence kept me busy in those early days in Oregon, and there was also the care of a large garden and of some thirty acres of a little farm adjoining our house which formed the greater part of the endowment of the Oregon Agricultural College before the State took it over and brought it into its true relations to the whole community. On Sunday mornings the silence was broken by the calls to service by five or six more or less cracked and untuned church bells — a sad change from the melodious chimes of the ancient bells of the English countryside. Church going was not much of a pursuit by the greater number of the masculine church people. There were several Sunday schools to which the young folks were more or less regularly sent. Near our house, on lots which were afterward the site of the new Corvallis public school, stood a two storied white boarded structure in which a week day school was held for pupils who paid a pittance for their teaching. The lots had been donated by an old resident to Bishop Morris, for the benefit of the Episcopal Church. The ground floor room was used for the school, the upper room given over for services of the Protestant Episcopal Church. It was bare enough, save for rough wooden benches, and an equally rough altar-rail. There was no or- 166 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents gan or other instrument, and a scanty supply of prayer and hymn books. Services were held when a minister of the church came over from his head quarters in Albany, twelve miles off. There was a small and irregular attendance from two or three families of dyed-in-the-wool Episcopalians, but the heads of those families were devoted to their church. Naturally, as members or attendants of the English church we found our way to that old building on the first Sunday after our arrival in Corvallis. For tunately the Albany minister had come over for the service so familiar to us. He preached and then made friends. Doubtless he advised Bishop Morris of the addition to folks of his church, and soon after the Bishop came to see us. That was the first of very many visits, when, for thirteen years he made our house his headquarters on his frequent rounds of Episcopal visitations. Once his friend always thereafter his friend, was the motto of the life of Bishop Morris, the second of the Bishops of Oregon. In the old country men of his rank in the church were rare birds to the com mon people, scarcely seen except in lawn sleeves and black cassock behind the communion rails, whether in cathedral or in the every-day church of the com mon people. Here we had a bishop of a new type. Shall I tell how he impressed us, both at first and after, until the end of our long friendship came by his death in harness? Well, he was, when we knew him, an elderly man of medium shape and build, a gentle face, blue grey eyes, uncut hair and beard. His hair was grizzled and rough, his manners very friendly and unassuming. Pretension was to him unthinkable, he was naturalness itself. His itinerary Life in Oregon 167 was laid out by him to reach the most distant homes of his people, across deserts, mountains, lumber camps, fishing stations, mines, and just one church family was attraction enough. He rode on railroads, stage coaches, mail routes, on horseback, in far mer's wagons. His equipment was his one bag, which held his Episcopal robes, neatly folded, and a black jacket by way of change from his every day long coat; this in addition to his night clothing filled it. He wore a soft black hat, and always carried a thick grey Scotch plaid. He was his own apparitor, and many times, he told me, put on his robes in a fence corner when he arrived at the cross-roads school- house where he was to preach. Even when his origi nal diocese had been halved by the setting apart of Washington his jurisdiction covered the whole 96,- 000 square miles of Oregon, arid his mind was ever on enlisting and providing for fresh soldiers in the very little army of ministers spread over that im mense domain. He bore with him the "care of all the churches," for he was the universal referee in all troubles of church and people, and what he could do for Oregon at large he did. In the truest sense he now "rests from his labor and his works do fol low him." If to-day we look out in Portland on the great Good Samaritan Hospital, and ask who founded and first built and established it ; the answer is Bishop Morris. If we see the efficient and well attended St. Helen's Hall in that city, with its scores of girls from all parts of Oregon, the same question meets the same reply. As in the great, so in the little: the town and village churches sprinkled over Oregon where the Protestant Episcopal prayer book sed, and an Episcopal Sunday school is collected, 15 auc / 168 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents most of them had Bishop Morris not only for their founder, but for their frequent visitor. An extra attraction to me was that the Bishop was a first rate and experienced fly-fisher. As prototype he would quote St. Peter, with a merry twinkle in his eye. I think he made an extra visit for a day now and again to friends living by the lovely Trask River in Tillamook County, doing his Sunday work, and putting in Monday on the pools and riffles of that stream second to none in the estimation of all good fishermen. The last few miles of the journey from Corvallis to Yaquina Bay were most interesting of all. The country grew more and more broken and rugged: but that is hardly the right word, for the rugged ness is covered by masses of tall ferns, by thickets of syringa and deutschia bushes — covered, in summer time with fragrant white flowers — and, in the lower levels, strung together by strands of the wild cu cumber. By the creeks the bottoms" are covered by the skunk cabbage, with immense leaves of bright and polished green. Tide water runs up some twenty miles. A few miles down we came, in early days, to a group of houses by the river, where Big Elk River joins the Yaquina, and one of those houses was the little hotel that Marsh Simpson kept. It was then, and for many years, a fisherman's paradise. Big sea trout came up in shoals from the ocean and lay in the river pools, while the brook trout of Oregon haunted both the rivers. Salmon there were in plenty in the Yaquina, to be caught by hook and line in the upper Life in Oregon 169 estuary, and to be netted by the professional fisher men in the lower waters down to the bar. Shortly after we came to Oregon to live the first appropriation for harbor improvement of $40,000 had been won by Colonel Hogg in an arduous cam paign in Congress. This sum was to be devoted to plans, soundings, surveys and estimates and the first of many parties of United States engineers was at work when we got there. Their original plans were completed. They found three channels in over the bar, south, middle, and north. There was also' a big reef of black rocks about a mile from the bar, in deep water, and protecting to a great extent the northern entrance. But in all the shore harbors of the Pacific Coast there is a great inwash and deposit of sand from the north, driven by the northwest gales. Sand lies along the coast, in the bay and its shores between Yaquina Bar and the great headland of Cape Foulweather. It is of not much use to dredge the bar, for the next gale destroys the work. It is necessary so to contract the entrance as to intensify the outpour of the tidal water at each tide from the rivers and estuary within so as to scour the bar entrance and permanently prevent the deposit. I remember that the early surveys showed twelve million cubic feet of tide water to operate on the bar at each tide. Experts reported that such quantity of water duly directed would suffice for the intended purpose. I think also that there are twenty-six square miles of tidal area inside to create the out flow. I found the engineers quite happy on their prospects of success, and making estimates and pro visional contracts for materials for construction of north and south jetties to contract the entrances. 170 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents They "proposed to stop the jetties when they got out side the bar, relying on the north and south currents along the coast to maintain the work and keep mov ing whatever sand was still brought to the bar. I ventured to doubt then, and my doubts were con firmed in very many after visits, if it would not be necessary to carry out the jetties to the outer reef and so into fifty feet water at the least.. The engineers were then planning for eighteen or nineteen feet on the bar at low tide, and the average rise there is seven feet nine inches — unless my mem ory fails me. I write this much since the future his tory of a "wrecked enterprise" hung on the depth of water on the bar. CHAPTER IV A WRECKED ENTERPRISE THE inception of the whole lay in the bold pro posal of a group of Oregonians who were part holders of the land grant for building the wagon road from Corvallis to tide water on Yaquina Bay. Against many obstacles they had got the wagon road through and had won the lands. Thus came to them the faith that moves mountains. If the wagon road why not a railroad in its place? True it was that the day of railroads in Oregon had not fully come. The main line through the State from Portland southwards towards San Francisco was struggling along, bit by bit. Money was being wrung out from unwilling bondholders, who were urged to invest more to save their first ventures. First franchise holders were struggling desperately to hold on to some jumping off place where they might get off and sell out to some greater power. But the Corvallis people took courage as they saw that the big railroad was getting built, even though men were sweating blood to do it. Our valley friends had absorbed the idea that a railroad might be built bit by bit — say ten miles at a time, and that if once started by the first ten miles being built, that could be mortgaged, or bonded, and so money could be found to finish the second ten miles, and so on. Thus 171 172 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents men who between them had, possibly, fifty thousand dollars, boldly marched forward to spend a hundred and fifty thousand. They must have failed if two or three of them had not been dyed-in-the-wool politicians of the local, or small town, brand. They went ahead. They incorporated the "Willamette Valley and Coast Railroad Company." The capital was small, but the name was big. So they went to the next legislature of Oregon that met at Salem and asked for a franchise and for State aid. The legislature also was as young in years as it was old in faith. The answer to our friends was simple and apostolic in its form. "Silver and gold have we none," said the Legislators, "but such as we have we give unto you !" And the gift took the shape of a contract between the State and the infant company whereby in con sideration of the company carrying the men and munitions of the State whenever called on, it was given outright the tide lands in Benton County. And the young company had won State recognition. So they came back to Corvallis and went to work on the first ten miles westward. Money was scarcer than labor — so they enlisted all the farmers along the line with their wagons and teams, scrapers and shovels. The women fed the men, the barns opened out with oats, and dirt flew. These directors of a moneyless railroad knew, I suppose, that a railroad meant rails and sleepers and cars, and especially en gineers — but they Hterally took no thought for the morrow. This was summertime, and until the au tumn rains set in all went well. The County Sur veyor set out the line, and such trifles as blasting in rocks and cuts they left out and passed on. The A Wrecked Enterprise 173 Mary's River had to be crossed, but the bridges also were a future task. They had got quite a number of holes in the ground when the rains came on as usual and most of the farmers went home. Just then entered the Deus ex machina, for Colonel T. Egenton Hogg came on the scene. He was on his travels north from San Francisco; he heard of the road grant lands and visited Corvallis. He found not only the lands but this infant railroad and was both amused and interested. He went on to Yaquina Bay, saw its possibilities for improvement and for future commmerce. He went up and down the Willamette Valley, already settled and prosperous, he travelled up into the great forests of the Cascades, he visited the flour mills, and studied the possibilities of locks at Oregon City, to open Portland to the trade of the valley, and then returned to Albany with mind made up. His great friend there was the old banker, to whom he had brought introductions from San Fran cisco friends, and In that town he was very kindly received. With credit so established he returned to Corvallis, met the owners of the road grant and di rectors of the railroad, and made conditional terms all round. Then he got to know what money it would take to seriously complete the ten mile section of the railroad, and set about providing it. He com pleted the purchase of the grant lands, and so was in position for further advance. He returned to Al bany, the local headquarters of the great land grant across Oregon from the valley to the Snake River, which meant the ownership and control of 430,000 acres of land and illimitable timber. Having brought his knowledge of facts up to date he re turned to San Francisco, made terms with the San 174 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Francisco house of the French bankers, who owned the big land grant, and then sailed for England, where, as I have said, I met him. While he was in San Francisco the Colonel had found ten miles of cheap railroad iron, also a small but efficient locomotive and a couple of passenger cars, a baggage and mail car, and he had the offer of, I think, fifty freight cars. All except the freight cars he bought, and had sent up to Oregon, and the freight cars he arranged to rent when needed. This was the condition of affairs when I visited Cor vallis for the first time, and accounted for the hope fulness with which the people, big and little, made friends with me. Almost the first thing that happened after my arrival in Corvallis as a resident was that we got certified to the State of Oregon the completion of the first ten miles of the Willamette Valley and Coast Railroad. Thus the contract with the State in the Legislative act was fulfilled and became a living force. Then came the incorporation of the Oregon Pa cific Railroad, which took over the Willamette Valley and Coast bodily and completely, and started in to construct that as the first portion of a road cross ing the State of Oregon from West on the Pacific Ocean to the State boundary on the Snake River' — where a trans-continental railroad already in process of construction would meet it. Naturally Colonel Hogg took the office of presi dent, his San Francisco brother — a man of large property and much personal energy and business ex perience — became first vice-president and general A Wrecked Enterprise 175 manager, while I filled the office of second vice-presi dent and counsel. In those days railroads were built from the pro ceeds of bonds sold, stock being treated as a reserve of no immediate value, and indeed of no value until after the road should be completed. In the mean time it was the symbol of ownership and the qualifi cation for voting at stockholders' meetings. Of the first importance to any young railroad it was that a group or groups of New York capitalists of standing and character should undertake to pro vide funds for its construction by buying and hold ing its first mortgage bonds. In the case of the Ore gon Pacific no road could start under fairer aus pices. In view of later history I will not give here details of the names of those interested. They proved their faith by their works, since, for several years, funds were provided without stint. That larger mileage could not be shown and earlier profits earned was solely the result from the peculiar circumstances of the case. The first section, from Yaquina Bay to Corvallis, of seventy miles or thereabouts, would join the port with the Willamette Valley, and was the key to the whole position, since a considerable traffic was in sight. The main feature was the wheat of the val ley, stored in warehouses up and down the river, and in the towns along its course. At Yaquina this wheat, and much other produce, would be shipped to the San Francisco market, en route to the wide world. The rails for that seventy miles were bought in England and brought from England to the Pa cific Coast in sailing ships, which ships would return to Europe with cargoes of wheat. But the Yaquina 176 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Bar was not then deepened sufficiently to admit these ocean-going ships of deep draft. So transshipment of the rails was necessary. But every facility for this transshipment to Albany from Portland by rail road or river boat was refused outright or quibbled about by the Southern Pacific, and we had not then our own ships from San Francisco to Yaquina which might have solved the difficulty, and the laws of Ore gon at that time did not provide compulsion for transfer from one road to another on an incom pleted journey. We fought through and got, and laid, the rails at the cost of much time, money and temper. Moreover the sparsely settled road between - Yaquina and Corvallis provided very little traffic from the country yields on their little farms. So the traffic books could hardly be opened until the seventy miles was complete. Then, also, the seventy miles held much costly work. It was cut, fill, tun nel and bridge until the road emerged from the hills within ten miles of Corvallis. Then we sailed hap pily across the Willamette Valley for forty miles or so, until we encountered the foothills of the Cas cades. But more money and yet more had to be provided. By this time three new sternwheel boats on the Willamette River had been built and set to work, connecting at Corvallis with the Oregon Pacific. The farmers and warehousemen welcomed them, as they were ground under the heel of the Southern Pacific. The Oregon Pacific already was in possession of one steamship on the route between Yaquina and San Francisco, and two others were to follow. The United States engineers were hard at work on the harbor. Quarries had been opened and train- A Wrecked Enterprise 177 loads of mighty blocks were delivered in quick pro cession to the jetties, fast reaching out towards the big reef, and on each side of the harbor. Meanwhile the Willamette River boats were gath ering up rapidly the wheat to load the ship. Mer chants had already entered the trade and were pay ing the farmers five cents a bushel more than those still using the Southern Pacific lines could afford to pay. When the Southern Pacific refused to deliver from their cars wheat to us at Corvallis the valley farmers within twenty or thirty miles loaded up their wagons with the wheat. Strings of thirty or forty wagons at a time could be seen through the dust clouds hauling to Corvallis and the cars there. The two trains, Oregon Pacific and Southern Pacific, ran alongside each other at the Albany depot of the older line which already adjoined land provided by the city for the O. P. R. Still the Southern Pa cific refused to allow any connection, or any trans fer of commodities from one road to the other: and forced all imaginable obstructions in our way. Of course a day of reckoning for them was at hand, as the next session of the Legislature was fast approaching. Meanwhile I admit that our lives were made a burden to us, though construction work across the valley was pushing on towards the Haystack Pass, where our surveys showed the easy entrance into the promised land of Eastern Oregon. At that stage of the game we had a visit of in spection in Oregon from the chiefs of the group of financiers who had shown their faith in Colonel Hogg and his enterprise by their generous provision of the necessary funds. There were about five in the party, 178 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents two at least of whom bore names to conjure with in the New York market. The Colonel had prepared a house in Corvallis for their headquarters during their stay in Oregon. There they were established after their three thousand mile journey. They were all experienced railroad men, and most competent critics of any railroad plans and of their execution. The next day they travelled westward to Yaquina. Their Pullman was attached to the day train and passed safely through tunnels and over bridges. The harbor and the ocean looked their best in that eve ning sun, and the sight of the green hill slopes and clustered fir trees whence we looked down and across the harbor estuary out to the bar was indeed a fair one. There was one specially beautiful hill over looking the bay that was a part of a quarter sec tion bought by Colonel Hogg for the special benefit of himself and his friends. Here some sites were picked out for summer cottages for the New Yorkers, and here it was proposed and carried that an acre should be set apart and presented to my wife, and two other acres for other officers of the company. Next day we all went out in the company's tug to the harbor works, and then to and out over the bar and to the big reef. The United States engineer was in the party. The boat was stopped and soundings taken on the bar that verified the figures previously given. Then we returned to Corvallis. The follow ing day we went East as far as the car could get on the road under construction, and there took two car riages for the further trip to and over the Pass. The toll road of the big land grant was reached, and then followed. Up and up we went, even up Seven Mile Hill. A Wrecked Enterprise 179 Not until late in the day we emerged from the shade of the great firs into the shady little valley where we found the shallow Fish Lake, and the inn. Lots of trout were on the supper table. Next morning we de layed starting until most of the party had seen the nearby Clear Lake. We broke through the screen of thick bushes and ferns on to the green shores of the lake itself. The trees and ferns were reflected in the still, deep waters. The lake stretched out three or four miles in front of us, and there were looking down the snow covered Three Sisters, and the glacier that filled the space between the northern sister and her neighbor. Masses of dark firs filled the space between mountains and lake. So still was it that not a leaf quivered and the silence of the mountains was com plete. We pursued our journey on the eastern side and over the lava beds, where only the special ferns grew in the crevices : then back by Big Lake northward to the Haystack Pass, and the trail carried us through the giant firs. We got out and walked. Close as orchard trees these great lords of the forest grew — their stems clear of branches for a hundred feet, while their tops interlaced in one thick canopy of green. The pass lay somewhat higher yet, and there the right of way had been cleared and the view opened out right to and over the Eastern Oregon plains. The big trees fell away. Blue Lake lay far below us on the left, while we climbed the slope of Haystack Mountain, but only to the right of way. There we stood and gazed — the great trees behind us and the forward view only bounded by the blue lines of illimitable distance. Old Mr. Blair stood by me, and he looked North, South and East, and said 180 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents not a word. As he turned to go he said to me in a steady voice, "Many railroads I have built: some of them I would have built five hundred miles just to reach the timber we have seen: but this road? It has resources also for through traffic that will de velop through years to come!" So we went back to Fish Lake to sleep. There were several fishermen in the party and we returned to Clear Lake to fish before the evening meal. There was a rough boat on the lake and we rowed slowly out. We looked down, down, into the clear waters and the bottom of glistening white sand seemed near at hand: but I made my neighbor detach his reel and let it down. The line went slowly out as the reel sank, but the bottom was not touched. Trunks of big trees, encrusted with crystalline growths, stood on end in the blue water. As we looked down a big school of great trout slowly swam past on a level many feet below our boat, and was met and passed by a like school lower down, bent east instead of west, and neither fish touched or took notice of the other. After supper we came back, and put on flies and threw diligently for half an hour. From all over the lake sounds came of rising fish: it might have been thunder drops that fell, but the air round us was clear and calm. Not a fish took our flies, change as often as we might, and we were going home. In desperation I took from my fly book a big white moth, and threw it as far from the boat as I could, and laid it quietly on the water. In an instant came a dash and a strike and I was fast in a three pound trout. After a game struggle I hauled him to the side of the boat. I slipped my hand under him to A Wrecked Enterprise 181 lift him out, and his flesh was cold, icy indeed, so that my hand that touched him tingled. We travelled quickly back to Corvallis. The fol lowing day our visitors left for the East. That was the high water mark of the fortunes of the Oregon Pacific. CHAPTER V THE OREGON PACIFIC FAILS. WHY? I WENT with our visiting friends to Portland, and introduced Mr. Blair and Mr. Pyne to Mr. Harvey Scott, editor of the Oregonian, our local Jupiter. I told him that these gentlemen — whose names spoke for themselves — had just made a thor ough inspection of the Oregon Pacific Railroad, and had seen as much as we could show them in their limited time of the district to be served by the road, and its resources. With a view to the future of the road and to its right estimation by the public of Oregon we desired that he should talk with them and gain their impressions. Both spoke freely and very fully in a long inter view, and declared that previous favorable opinions had been confirmed by their observations. They talked of the timber specially, but also strongly of the harbor and its possibilities. They added that much money had already been spent, especially as it was no cheap road to build. They added that whatever money was needed to complete and to bring the enterprise into a money earning condition would assuredly be provided, as the present investors were amply able to carry it through. Mr. Scott asked many questions and took divers notes before they shook hands and parted. And that was the last 182 The Oregon Pacific Fails. Why? 183 that he, and I also for that matter, saw of them. A two column editorial in the Oregonian of the following day was the result of, and gave the pith of the interview, and with all that episode I was well satisfied. The first rock ahead for us was the holding up of further Congressional appropriations. Money had been grudgingly granted, but only in such sums as could be expended by the United States engineers in the then following biennium. Generally there was not sufficient to keep the work going to advantage, and construction was by a series of spurts and flur ries. A good percentage of the year's appropria tions went in repairs and reinstatements of the tres- tling, which got more costly and more unreliable the further the jetties were advanced into the storm- swept waves. In all some six hundred thousand dol lars had been spent, but .the end was not yet in sight. It was resolved to face the question of completion of the north jetty at least, to the outer reef, to have estimates made for completion, and get the Chief of Engineers' endorsement of the plan and to have him advise a continuing contract for the whole. At last this was done. Estimates were prepared and contracts advertised for and proposals obtained. This was all accomplished in process of many months. But before the contracts were signed the Oregon Pacific went into a receiver's hands, and the matter was indefinitely held up. Bad times were upon us. A near panic was in the air. Old enterprises were suspended and new ones turned down. Calamity fell on our railroad when a fine steamship, having been safely brought out from the East and actually into the Yaquina harbor, .was 184 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents led on to the rocks inside the entrance by the mis management, to say the least, of the tug captain, who was supposed to pilot her way in and to her berth with his tug, but succeeded in obstructing the ship's progress until her way was lost, and she just drifted onto' the rocks of the jetty. This, unfortunately was the second catastrophe at the entrance. The second ship that the Colonel bought went on to the rocks at the south of the channel on the south beach and became a total loss. For this there was at least the excuse of storm and" no lives were lost in either case. Then railroad construction was well into the big and costly work on the western side of the Pass. For many yards Chinamen were hung by ropes over the face of the rock until working places could be hewn out. One of the contractors who had received his monthly check failed to pay his men and disap peared. So we had the pleasure of seeing three hundred and more railroad men of all nationalities march into Corvallis one day and take possession of the town, announcing that unless they got their money from the company within twenty-four hours they would hang the railroad officers and burn the place. Most of them could neither speak nor under stand English. They appealed to the Governor of Oregon to see that they got their money, and he ordered us to pay them, regardless of the previous payment we had made as defined in the contract. So we had to scratch round and provide this already paid money. It was done and our visitors departed. Next, the New York funds stopped, because bonds were no longer salable at any price: and the usual The Oregon Pacific Fails. Why? 185 recourses in such emergencies from other kinds of securities were quite unusable. Next the half yearly interest on issued bonds fell due, and there was no cash to meet it. We had through all maintained our local credit, but at last this gave way also. But why all this in face of the assurances given by the big bondholders that funds for completion would be found? It can be imagined what plight Colonel Hogg, one of the proudest of men, was in. Just then Mr. Blair chose the time to stop the Colonel's applications to him by charging that his management was unsatis factory, and that he must resign the presidency, which he, Mr. Blair, would fill. This took place on the floor of a big New York banking house. The Colonel flatly refused and demanded reasons. His adversary recalled his refusal to construct the rail road shops and so on at a point six or seven miles East of Albany and to move, stock and branch, from Albany there. This in face of the Albany folks having found, I think, fifty acres for the shops East of the city, and of the Colonel's acceptance of the provision. Anyhow, it went from bad to worse until two high tempered men were publicly miscalling each other with every name they could lay their tongues to. It ended by Mr. Blair's shaking off the dust of his shoes against the Oregon Pacific, its officers, and all its works, and threatening vengeance, even though he destroyed all value in his own bonds — and that his friends and associates should do likewise, and he was as good, or as bad, as his word. 186 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Probably in ordinary times a man as resourceful as Colonel Hogg had proved himself would have found some way out. But Mr. Blair's attacks caught him between wind and water, and all his many efforts broke down in quick succession. The next thing was the appointment of a re ceiver, pending the result of the Colonel's efforts to rally other bondholders to hold the fort. The Colonel was named, but he could then make no suc cess. Then another receiver was appointed and or ders for sale of first one and then another part of the company's property were made, and they were sold for a song. The last stroke was the putting up for sale of the poor Oregon Pacific as a whole, roll ing stock and all. It was bought in for two hun dred thousand dollars by a small syndicate of in terested parties represented by Justice Chas. E. Hughes. When the day for confirmation came I appeared in court for some thirty thousand dollars' worth of employees and local creditors and opposed the sale to Mr. Hughes' associated creditors. He did his best for them, but the judge, in the end, upheld my end of the argument, and my great antagonist re turned to New York, leaving his spoils behind him. Let me say that he paid me the comphment soon afterwards of asking me to represent in the Oregon court the principal one of his clients. And this I did as best I could, and that amounted to very little. Bad as things were, worse was to come. The then Receiver had done absolutely nothing towards reor ganization, or helping the road out of its troubles, nor even towards making the best of its operation. Nor would he, or the local judge, make any move The Oregon Pacific Fails. Why? 187 towards borrowing any specially protected money for urgent needs, as commonly done in railroad re ceiverships, but all hands let matters drift. So the judge made up his mind he would sell the thing, stock and block, and get what he could at auction, and close matters up without any more delays. No pro tests moved him. He was one of those men who mistake obstinacy for firmness and resolution. Whether any effort was made to advertise the sale in Eastern or commercial papers I know not. Only, on the sale day, in front of the Corvallis Court House, no buyers were present save one unknown man from Missoula, Montana. He bid one hundred thousand dollars for the Oregon Pacific and its pos sessions, and the sheriff's hammer fell. The bidder obtained full title to 136 miles of complete railroad, about 30 more miles of partial construction — com plete outfit of rolling stock, including twice as many locomotives as his full money should have covered, three Willamette River steamboats, worth about $20,000 each, machine shops at Albany and Yaquina, with $10,000 worth of tools and outfit, and in numerable costly appurtenances to a railroad in operation, and, to complete the tale of that day's iniquities, one ocean steamship, and a costly sea going tug, were thrown in. And the judge confirmed the sale against the pro tests of many creditors, including myself, for sums largely in excess of that pitiful $100,000. Of course appeal to the Oregon Supreme Court against the judge's confirmation was at once taken. Eastern bondholders, outside of Mr. Blair and his friends, but including Colonel Hogg, who was indi vidually the largest bondholder, were all up in arms. 188 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents I held their brief, and that for the great majority of local creditors, when the Supreme Court heard the appeal. The obvious injustice amounted to an atrocity. But in spite of all arguments and denunciation the Supreme Court held that they could not interfere with the discretionary control of a Circuit Judge over the disposition by sale of property held by a receiver in his jurisdiction — unless absolute fraud by the judge was urged and proved. And so it went. The buyer had neither means nor experience to justify his running the railroad, and it was ulti mately atold to Mr. E. H. Harriman, and by him to our old enemy, the Southern Pacific, he making, it was understood, two million dollars by the resale. To the last Colonel Hogg continued his efforts to organize new buyers. He had friends in Philadel phia who were joining him. He was in that city to complete his arrangements, as he hoped. Apoplexy seized him in a. street car and he died without regain ing consciousness. A dramatic ending to a spectacular career. He passed through four years of the Civil War, and carried on his body the scars of many wounds. He was an "unreconstructed Southerner," to the end of his life, being well known and highly regarded by many of the leaders of the South. After his death it was found that he was the owner of three million dollar's worth of Oregon Pa cific bonds, bought with all property and profits that he could pile together, and held to the end. Hoping against hope I secured an option on the Oregon Pacific before Mr. Harriman purchased it, being assured by those who then controlled the prop- The Oregon Pacific Fails. Why? 189 erty that neither Mr. Harriman nor the Southern Pacific wanted it. I went to New York and sub mitted it to parties who were actively at work in opening Eastern Oregon to railroads. They enter tained the proposition, and I was on my way to their headquarters. The conductor of my train woke me early with a telegram from a New York associate of mine, saying that Mr. Harriman had closed the purchase outright the previous afternoon and had paid a deposit. So ended for me the second lesson. CHAPTER VI THIRTY-FIVE YEARS IN OREGON TOWN, CITY AND RANCH IT is a long vista through which memory looks back to the time when, in the prime of life and health, we landed at Corvallis, the Uttle city on the banks of the Willamette. I have told to the best of my ability what the city and its inhabitants were like. I have not told of the bulk and outline of the four thousand feet mountain to' the west, that dominated the other heights of the Coast Range, and, in varying shades from dawn till eve kept watch over the neighboring city. We lived on the west slope above the town, and always, winter and summer, storm and calm, we faced the mountain as we walked home after the day's work was done. To> me the mountain brought calm and was the emblem of peace, for its contours never changed. Through the gap in the range to the North came from the Western ocean the daily sea breeze, that tempered the summer heat, but was a danger to the newcomer in the work of the fields. The roads and trails to the West, and so to our lands, crossed that gap some way up towards the higher levels of what was almost a pass. I loved to stop my climbing horse and, looking back, face the great white sentinels of the Cascades topping the 190 Ranch in the Foot-hills Thirty-Five Years m Oregon 191 black forests of the lower ranges, which outlined the valley stretching from North to South much farther than eye could reach. Or, in earlier mornings, as the valley was filled with a dense white sea of mist, above which the tops of distant buttes rose as islands, and recalled far distant ages when as yet the alluvial valley floor had not been raised, and while the mas todon and mammoth, the giant tiger and the wide- horned elk, fed in the great rushes and weeds of the lake levels. The hills along the western edge of the wide Wil lamette Valley are generally of basalt, being eroded a little by every winter storm, and slowly washed into the farming lands, below, SO' yielding a really inexhaustible fertility. Few other states have such an asset as that great valley, on which seven counties have been carved out, and of which the limits of suc cessful cultivation have not been nearly reached. My first aim when I began my travels over Ben ton County was to choose lands for a new ranch and range where I might have a place for my very own. In 1877 I was one of the party that found its way from the Willamette Valley and by King's Valley and the Luckiamute River to the watershed between the Willamette and the Siletz. It was a very rough trail that we followed, overgrown since General Sheri dan as a young lieutenant in charge of remnants of a dozen Indian tribes, cut it out to make a prac ticable road for his army wagons to the reservation. At the very head of the watershed we halted, for the view to the West had opened out and several hill ranges lost themselves in distance. The nearer hills were a mass of greenery, fern and brush, but at our feet several miles away lay a green valley in the 192 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents heart of this wilderness. We judged it to be of many hundred acres in extent, rough of course, but not obstructed by green timber, old or young, and with a main watercourse, and many side-hill streams marked here and there throughout its length. The road led us down to and through it from end to end, and we followed the main creek along till it became_a river and joined the Siletz River near the Indian Re serve. The picture I have drawn lasted in my memory. When I set out to find myself a ranch I retraced our course in 1877, and found myself again in my happy valley. Soon after I claimed a homestead there, and afterwards an additional homestead, as then per mitted by the law. I selected two sections of the land grant lands lying along the south side of my valley, and then bought a section of school land be tween those two, and so had the main features of a very respectable ranch. The outlines could be after wards extended at our leisure, but I had there several years' work ahead. I sent my friend the County Surveyor on a roving commission to find the best way out and in from the wagon road and the main Yaquina Valley, and authorized him to survey out the section lines of this tract. A road-making party of a dozen men from the neighboring hill ranches began work on the road as soon as it was laid out, and in process of time the five miles of road was built. I wasted much more time and money than I should afterwards have done. My hill neighbors considered me, rightly, as an easy mark. When the weather was good they left my work for their own farms and ranches. When clouds hung round and rain fell back they came to my road Thirty-Five Years in Oregon 193 work till the wet spell was over. My superintendent feared to send them off, for men were very scarce in those days, and he thought it was a case of them or none. To finish the story of the Rock Creek ranch. A couple of good English carpenters and builders had followed me from the old country. I told one of them to build us the house that we designed, the cedar logs on two of our hillsides being the material. I gave him what men he wanted, native and foreign. A sawpit after the old English model was dug and the cedar boards sawed out. In process of time the house was built, and inhabited by our family for nearly thirty years. My family went there when school was out, and the boys ran wild in the hills until the fall term came round again. I tried to spend my week ends there during those summer months. It was a place of health and happiness. The boys learned to shoot and to fish, to camp out and never to fear losing themselves in that maze of wilderness. They grew up into all farm work, and the animals on the ranch were their friends and pupils. I can say little about profits from the several thousand dollars I invested, but the home farm is still in our possession. Our two youngest boys still live there, and prosper. The younger of those boys has built for himself and wife and baby girl a home on a neighboring knoll. His elder brother has re placed the old ranch house by a modern home — and there their mother and I have retired to live, and there these lines are written. Bald Mountain and Grass Mountain look down on us from the next ridge of the encircling hills, and each season, as it 194 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents passes from the grey brown of the winter fern and wild grass to the bright green of spring and the more sedate green of summer, has a beauty all its own. Our boys are modern, even if their father be not. The wagon shed next the big barn holds mowers, reaper, thrasher, new plows, drill, horse rake, and the rest of the equipment of the farmer of to-day. The silo next the barn is being filled, and the cheer ful hum of the steam engine fills the air. Not a contrast to but a development from the brushy and ferny fields that we first cut out of the valley bottom, while* the wild cherry and the vine maple and hazel disputed for the surrounding land. The alder was a subsequent arrival, and a present nuisance on the outlying slopes. Their stock flourishes. Among the milk cows are good Jerseys, and in yesterday's mail I saw the last report of the American Shorthorn Breeders' Asso ciation. Many causes have been at work to yield vast changes in the social life of Oregon since the be ginning of our lives as Oregonians. I was struck at first by the abundance of country newspapers, which one used to see lying on the table of every Willamette Valley farmer's home. At our first Independence Day at Corvallis I was asked to speak. I was introduced, I remember, by the honorary Colonel's title. The chairman looked startled as I began by disclaiming that rank, saying that my highest claim to be called a soldier was as the Color Sergeant of the Sixth Herts Volunteers. But he forgave me as I went on to enlarge on the beauties we had in two months found in the Wil- Thirty-Five Years in Oregon 195 lamette Valley and the solid worth of its inhabitants. I was followed by the president of the nearby Nor mal School. He told us that the Willamette Valley held the highest specimens of educated culture, not only in Oregon, but in all America. "As proof," he said, "remember that the daily or weekly newspaper is the gauge of the highest civiUzation, and that while the common average number of newspapers is in America less than four hundred to the hundred thou sand it is in the WiUamette Valley 1,165 to the same number." I think those were the figures that he gave : anyway I am sure that the proportion is cor rect. I could well beUeve it as we read the papers of that day. Of news, except the minute happenings of the countryside, there was painfully little: but Emma Harris' new bonnet, and Jimmy Evans' cut finger, and the school's half holiday were fully re corded. There was but smaU pretence of leading articles — and of telegraphic news, even though copied from the Portland papers, there was none. When election day drew on the candidates would spend a few dollars in retaining the editors of the country press : and this was a welcome addition to their income. I suppose they must have had influ ence, but where the proof was I knew not. Home life was as carried down from grandmother to granddaughter. Cooking was by ancient recipes. Hygiene was an undiscovered study, as was domestic child nurture and the frying pan was the chief and almost the only kitchen implement. I remember that first year in Oregon, when re covering from the first and only sickness that I had for many years, my wife and I were travelling by a hired carriage to the Upper Soda Springs in the 196 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Cascade Mountains. We stayed for the night at the Lower Cascades, a very decent roadside house, pro viding board and lodging. The breakfast table was surrounded by ten or a dozen guests, including the father of the family and two hulking sons of 14 and 16 years. The mother and sole provider for the whole crowd was a pale, delicate looking and fragile woman of 45. She set the table, then served all with mush: then followed hot bread, then bacon, eggs, and potatoes. Then she fetched and poured out the coffee. My wife had watched the whole per formance, sitting between me and the biggest boy. When the poor laxly was asked for more coffee to fill her husband's and sons' empty cups my wife boiled over. Looking the big boy in the eye she burst out, "Don't you see how tired your mother looks? Are you not going to fetch that coffee for her, and carry it round? A great strong boy Uke you? I'd be ashamed to do nothing to help my mother if I were you!" Every one stared and the boy colored, but made no move, nor did the father say a word. Times to-day are, I know, far better than in those days, but there is vast room for im provement in caring for the mothers of famiUes still: and this especially in country districts. The Oregon Pacific went into receiver's hands in 1893. Fortunately I had my own profession to re sume. I opened a law office in Corvallis and had im mediate introduction into the life of the country lawyer. Much was new, and I was often more at a loss than I showed, although I had been making care ful study of the Oregon Code and reports and prec edents. If it had not been for the court work about the Oregon Pacific Receivership I should not have Thirty-Five Years m Oregon 197 made both ends meet. Thinking to change the place and thereby cure the pain the next year we moved to Albany, and the then following year to Portland where we cast anchor for some years. When I visited Portland in 1877 the city held but 17,000 people. It has now a quarter of a million, and is still growing fast. In early days it was es sentially a country town. Now it puts on metro- poUtan airs, and wears them gracefully, as all visi tors say. While the Oregon Pacific was in building between the ocean and Corvallis it was one of my duties to attend at Salem the biennial sessions of the Oregon Legislature. The Grange in Oregon was in its lusty youth, and from its ranks the legislators of the "cow counties" were mostly recruited. Farmers nearly aU, they had special views and interest of their own, and the piles of bills they brought in were indeed samples of their ideas of class legislation. Their aims were first of all to create and confirm special privileges for the farmers and stockmen, and, second, to fight the railroads in whatever legislation they asked for, and, third, to fight Portland as the only large and growing city in the state, which always sent a full delegation of the citizens from Multnomah County. So there were lively times at Salem and really needed laws were hard to pass. I was between the devil and the deep sea. I earnestly sought legisla tion to enforce on all railroads in the state the duty of receiving and forwarding all goods tendered to them by other roads without delay or favor, and to use rates for all such traffic depending solely on the proportion of mileage that they controlled. Also 198 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents to provide or allow physical connection in depots or terminals between roads reaching them, for the transfer of cars from one to the other. The question of rates I proposed to turn over to a commission of three citizens appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate. BiUs for these ends were, naturally, bitterly fought by the Southern Pacific and other younger roads in alli ance with them. But the "cow county" legislators were our warm friends, and held the majority in the House, and a large and fighting minority in the Senate. But I was compelled to> fight my friends' bills asking for defined maximum rates for goods and passengers, special privileges about cars, and stoppings, about warehousing, and every thing that a prejudiced and uninstructed man could devise to help his class and obstruct aU others. And such legislation would scare off any intending investors from outside Oregon. So, it was what the Highlander called "a very pratty fight." It was winter time. The Oregon Pacific's first division was just completed and opened for traffic. The Colonel was at Washington, in the thick of one of his periodical struggles for more appropria tions for Yaquina Harbor. He wired us to secure a memorial from the Oregon Legislature praising the harbor and urging the appropriation. This mes sage was turned over to me at Salem. Our general manager and I were agreed that if the legislators could be induced to accept an invitation to go to Yaquina on Saturday, and spend Sunday, and be taken out over the bar in our big tug, they could be returned to Salem by special train on Monday Thirty-Five Years m Oregon 199 morning in time for business. Thus they would see for themselves the road and the harbor, and would cheerfully sign a good, stiff endorsement of the ap propriation. All the country boys jumped at the invitation like a trout at a fat fly, and soon there were about five and twenty names on my list and a few over. Of course I was to chaperon the party. On the Saturday the journey went weU and the party were all assigned rooms at the company's hotel at Yaquina, and they dined in comfort, played a few games at cards and went happily to bed. They were up in good time, and the tug was ready for them, and out over the bar we went merrily, the U. S. engineer going with us to give official infor mation about depths and progress and prospects and cost of completion. Most of our guests had never been on the ocean, none of them on a tug boat. Higher and higher the big waves tossed the vessel, whiter and whiter grew the legislators. Two or three rollers on the bar finished the business, and they prayed me to quickly order the return. Then the rain clouds massing in the West broke in tor rents and every one was drenched. A procession of drowned rats landed at the dock, and the after noon passed mostly in drying clothes and sipping brandy and water. We had the evening to provide for and we cleared out the big dining room and organized an entertainment. I remember making a long story about the siege of Paris, and the Franco- Prussian War. Songs were sung and we had a jovial time. Meanwhile the rainstorm had full sway outside. It let up not one moment, and water was already running high in all the culverts. All night I heard the pelting of the rain against the windows. 200 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents and I got up anxious indeed about the new and hardly consolidated roadbed and the new bridges, of which there were more than twenty in that seventy miles. When the first reports from the road came in to me my worst fears were realized. The general manager wired that one or two bridges were already showing signs of weakness, and several of the big cuts in the Summit Division were commencing to slide in. We dared not start the train, for in a dozen miles we should reach the bridge most in peril, and it would take hours to organize transfers across the washes already in sight. And it rained and rained: and the Legislature of Oregon could not organize for busi ness until these marooned members should report. Putting on a bold face I gathered all these good fellows together and told them the whole story as it was. Being asked for suggestions, I said "We have seventy miles to cross. We have our train here to take us the first twelve, and the last fifteen miles a train will be sent to meet us, for there the line is in tact and will so remain. We will walk through tunnel No. 3 and on the further side we shaU find two hand cars and men to operate them. So by rid ing and tieing we shall cover the next fifteen miles and then get dinner. By that time there wiU be more hand cars ready, and so we shall reach the wash outs at the Summit which I am wired to expect. Across them we shall have to walk, say two miles : then more hand cars to meet the waiting train. So I hope we shall get to the end of our journey before the day is over and you can sleep in peace, and get to Salem in time for an early session to-morrow, and that is the best we can do." Would you believe it? The whole twenty-five and Thirty-Five Years in Oregon 201 over got up and cheered, and set to framing a tele gram to President of the Senate and Chairman of the House to explain and promise. And so ended the Yaquina session of a large pro portion of the Legislature of Oregon. Not one grumbled nor lost his temper. The whole Legisla ture signed the strongest memorial to Congress that I could frame, and the Colonel in Washington was fully appreciative. No one was the worse for the day's hard travel over a busted railroad, for there were twenty-one slides, and four temporary bridges to show what a sudden Oregon rainstorm could do to a new railroad. As for me, I went with them back to' Salem, and resumed our fight. On railroad legislation proposed for that session I was invited to address the Senate, and the S. P. R. first officer in Oregon — the repre sentative of the German bondholders — stood behind me and endorsed my speech, for, after all, they stood to lose more if the Legislature took the bit between their teeth and passed some of those fool laws than from one or ten rival, legitimately run, railroads. Affirmatively, the laws we had prepared were passed, and no farther railroad legislation was put onto the statute book for several years. The Yaquina legislators always met me with a smile and a handshake, and several cigars were smoked over the voyage to the Yaquina Bar, and the ride-and-tie trip in the teeth of the great storm. CHAPTER VII THE OREGON AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE AND THE GREAT WAR WITH my wife I paid a visit to CorvaUis last January. We walked out westward from the town over smooth concrete roads. The big house we Uved in had disappeared, its place being filled by "Waldo Hall," which held 150 girl students of the college. The little farm house on the thirty acre farm had also gone, and with it the farm and outbuildings, crops, fences, and rushy fields where our boys used to wait for wild ducks in the winter afternoons. Now we saw in front of us a great green campus, bounded and dotted over with handsome trees and shrubs, with a large, red brick building in the center of the view, with flagstaff and the Stars and Stripes above it catching the breeze. Other large and costly buildings showed at intervals round the campus, tiU we counted thirteen of them, hous ing the many departments of a great college. That was not all, for on lower ground to the left was the rounded roof of the great drill hall and armory, three hundred feet long, and wide to match, where 1,500 men could maneuver in comfort when winter rains swept the outside parade ground. A big new library stood some way behind the ad ministration building, with workmen just clearing 202 The Oregon Agricultural College 203 out for a near at hand opening. In an extension of the campus to the west we found the Y. M. C. A. house, a memorial to one who made it possible. Then came the forge house, and the machine shops, for wood and iron, with an electrical annex — all fuUy equipped, machinery "funning smoothly, and all filled with shirt-sleeved students and their instructors. Farther away was still another building fined with agricultural machinery, tractors, plows, drills, and all the rest — many sent there for exhibition and trial — all of them object lessons for the students. So we went round again to Waldo HaU, passing a great hall, where we were next evening to see six hundred guests fed with a "Hoover" supper, cooked and served by the Household Economy girls. By that time it was noon, and the bugles sounded the assembly for the students' parade and driU. The boys marched on to the music of their band, and we saw four companies of as well drilled youngsters as could be matched only by equally well drilled regu lars. And this is vouched for by better qualified judges than I. Here then were the outward and visible signs of fulfilment of the best promises of thirty years ago — the rise and progress of the Oregon Agricultural College — as I will shortly tell. How gladly I write this may be judged from the grievous story of the fall and wrecking of another enterprise which had absorbed me body and soul for a dozen of the best years of my life. The rise of all was in the old Corvallis College of 1868, to which the Legislature of that day attached the magic name of the O. A. C. that the State might thereby make good a claim to gifts and endowments 204 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents that Congress had set aside for each State in the Union. The CorvalUs CoUege of the South Metho dist Church was a good school in its day, with many young pupils and about ten or twelve students in agricultural college classes. The three professors were abundantly able to handle the number of pupils and students attending. But one of the conditions of the national gift was that each State accepting it should provide adequate buildings and equipment. This the South Methodist Church was quite unable to do. During those fif teen or sixteen years it dawned on the people of Oregon that in their State Agricultural College they had an inheritance of untold value, but that no ade quate growth was possible while the then existing conditions endured. So by the year 1884 the Legislature let it be known that if the citizens of Cor vallis and their friends desired the continuance of the Oregon Agricultural College in their city, and would prove their faith by their works by subscrib ing about $30,000 for new buildings and equipment it would be found that the South Methodist Church would surrender their control, and that the State could thereafter own and operate its own agricul tural coUege. It took a hard pull to raise that $30,000. To it Colonel Hogg and his friends contributed freely. But it was accomplished, and then we joined to frame the new constitution of the coUege and to get the Legislature to pass it into law. We had good help. Justice Strahan of Albany, afterwards one of the Supreme Judges, and Judge Pipes, a Circuit Judge, still and for years past a well known member of the Portland bar, were associated with me in that The Oregon Agricultural CoUege 205 work. The Legislature duly passed it: the South Methodist Church ultimately, and not very gra ciously accepted it, and the Governor nominated and the Senate accepted the first Board of Regents, of whom I was one, holding office for a maximum term of nine years, the Governor, Secretary of State, and Superintendent of Public Instruction being ex- officio members. So we had a title, thirty acres of land near Cor vallis, and thirty thousand dollars in the bank, on which to construct the "Oregon Agricultural Col lege." The Congressional Acts defined the scope of these, coUeges — their charter being known generally as the "Morrill Act," after Senator Justin Morrill of Vermont, the father of them all. These coUeges were "to give instruction in agri culture and the mechanic arts, not forgetting sub jects necessary for a liberal education." But a most important proviso was added to' the curriculum, "in cluding military tactics." From the first miUtary tactics have been taken very seriously by college regents throughout the United States, and officers of the Regular Army have been detailed to give instruction and act as mili tary commandant. As the result 30,776 young men were receiving that instruction in 1915 throughout the United States, in a four years' course, and stiU larger num bers in 1916 and 1917. The Legislature of Oregon has been through all these years a kind foster father to the college. Its pleas for appropriations have been acceded to even when times were bad and the cry of economy was 206 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents everywhere heard. The aggregate approaches, if not exceeds, the milUon doUar mark. With even steps that first board of ours set out to erect the administration building, and to enUst a corps of qualified instructors. This last task, as secretary and one of the committee of three, chiefly fell to me. Letters were written to every agricultural college in the United States, asking for their latest reports, for details of their faculties, their duties and pay, their income and legislative appropriations, and any notes of their experience that might be of use to us. Nothing could exceed the fulness and the kindness of the repUes that poured in. The fact that members of the present faculty, who came then to' Oregon at our invitation, or foUowed the first engaged in the early years, still hold their positions, testifies to my statement that we have held through the years a wise, loyal, and contented faculty. So, in 1887 the doors of the college were opened and about 76 students responded. The growth has been steady and remarkable. This specially since the election of the present president, Dr. Walter Jasper Kerr, who came to us from Utah some ten years ago. The advance from the original 76 in 1887 to upwards of 400 in 1907 was more than pro portionate to the growth of population and resources of Oregon. But what shall we say to the figures given to the Board of Regents by Dr. Kerr in Oc tober of 1917? The enrolment of students in that year so far was 1,802, as against 1,848 on the corresponding date in the previous year. The slight decrease was due to' the enlistment of several hun- The Oregon Agricultural CoUege 207 dred of 0. A. C. boys as officers in the service of the nation, of whom 204, cadet officers, responded to the first call. After the reports of the inspecting military officer on the annual tests of 1917 were submitted, the Ore gon CoUege was admitted to the list of "distinguished college institutions." It seems almost incredible to-day that, in the early days of the college it took two years' hard work in the Board of Regents to have the department of Household Economy and Hygiene added, and the first incumbent chosen. We were fortunate in the selection, since Dr. Margaret Snell came to us. For 18 years she held her place and over 3,000 Oregon girls passed through her kind hands. It was a pretty sight in those days to see, when her class time was up, a great group of girls clustering round her on the green campus, and choosing study places under the shade of the big trees. Her influence rose beyond her teaching, for it was personal. She taught the dignity of household work, and that in dealing with the home and the house there is no such word as menial or degrading, since aU depends on the spirit with which it is accomplished. While Miss SneU's sewing classes were in progress some girl read aloud, and each day some quotation, in prose or poetry, passed from book to memory. My daughter told me that she carried away 'three hundred quo tations when the year's classes were over. What vital work to Oregon has been accomplished in this department is proved, I think, by this that in October of 1917 it was announced that the enrol ment of women for the then current year was 585, an increase of 128 over the previous year. 208 A Lawyer's Life on Two Continents Space faUs me to teU of the Experiment Station that meets and solves the difficulties of the farmer, the orchardist, and stock raiser, and adapts the progress of the investigator along these lines to' the special needs of Oregon. Nor of the extension serv ice, the latest advance of the Department of Agri culture, and the most important. A resident agent is stationed in every county. He is the friend and adviser of his constituents and his knowledge and service is without pay. The nation divides with the county the moderate expense. As usual the United States was slow to adopt this mark and agency of progress. Having started she has already passed Germany, France, and England in this new field. As during the Farmers' Week at the college in January last we marched in slow procession from one lecture room to the next in the fuUy fiUed pro gram, I remembered the day of smaU things, and felt a modest pride in the history of the growth of Oregon in thirty years. She is still but a young and sparsely settled State. But her name stands high in her response to the nation's demands in this year of trial — be it in Liberty Bonds, in abundant gifts to the Red Cross, in answer through her residents and sons to the repeated calls for soldiers and navy men, or for the manning of the shipyards in her ports and rivers. A few weeks ago we were once again on the Pacific Coast. We had passed through Newport to the little inn, standing on the brink of the rough rocks overhanging the beating waves many feet below. Cape Foulweather and its lighthouse stood ten miles to the South of us, and we had passed it on our drive along the sands. But our inn was in the edge of the The Oregon Agricultural CoUege 209 forest of giant spruce that stretched North, South, and East, to the limits of Lincoln County. We ran across camp after camp of the timber men in khaki that were spread here, there, and everywhere, over that forest treasure land. Centuries had served to store up for the United States' service in the Great War those reserves now at last available. At last the Yaquina harbor and bar were being improved by the joint provision of the nation and of our Oregon ports. At last two new railroads were being rushed across the tide flats to carry the air-plane spruce to the great mills just ready to be set to work. More than two thousand workers for Uncle Sam had already been sent here. The steamboats on the bay and every scow, barge, and launch were taken into use. The trains on our railroad were crowded. The resources of the bay region were at last unlocked and in the service of the nation. What mattered it that I had spent my own years in a wrecked enterprise? But I looked back and wished that the Colonel had been spared to see the fruits of his wasted energy, for I am all but the sole survivor of those who believed in and worked for the Oregon Pacific. INDEX Articles to study of law in London, IS Ancient London, 114 Advocates of the first rank at the English Bar, 54 Agricultural College of Ore gon of to-day, 207 Brewers and Distillers as clients, 39 Beckenham: a suburban vil lage and its people, 71 Charles Dickens as a reader, 34 Consultations with English Counsel: how conducted, 54 Christian lawyers, 56 Church Organ: the new. A catastrophe, 71 Conveyancers in England, 56 Cricket and cricketers, 75 Canon Liddon: » great preacher, 125 Craik, Mrs. Dinah Mulock, 123 Charles Darwin, personal re miniscences, 130 Charles H. Spurgeon, 126 Commencing work in a great law office, 20 Continental trips, 44 Corvallis to Yaquina: a jour ney, 118 Destruction of an old cellar, 30 Death of E. W. Field, 64 Devon superstitions, 80 Dartmoor and Jem Perrott: a day on the Moor trout streams, 80, 82 Hunting Moor game. Some dogs, 83 Early years, 13 Edwin Wilkins Field. A sketch, 19 English suburban life. Work and play, 68 English vacations, 77 Foreign business, 42 French law business, 47 Horrors of Unlimited Liabil ity, 23 Heintz of the new "Cheque Bank," 50 Henry Labouchere as a client, 40 Ipswich — a. typical English town, 28 Inventors and patentees, 57 Inspection of a railroad and country, 177 Jenny Lind — a singer, 35 Judah P. Benjamin and the English Bar, 51 London notabilities, 49 "Little Miss Flite," 55 Legislature of Oregon: bills and an excursion, 197 211 212 Index Lubbock — Sir John, and his strange pets, 123 Lesson in realities, 21 Limited Liability: framing the new law and its results, 24 Long distance telephone and its introduction to England, 63 Life in the new world: In troduction to Oregon, 141 Life in Corvallis, 159 Music in England, 118 Music and Herbert Spencer, 122 Mary Elliott, the village nurse, 71 Marsh, Miss: the apostle to the Navvies, 74 Morris D., Bishop of Oregon, 166 Miscellanies in business, 26 Move to Oregon, 155 New York Financiers, 177 New Law Courts and E. W. Field, 27 Otter hunting in Devon, 85 Otters, sea, 146 Oregon — my first trip, 144 Oregon Agricultural College: growth and development, 202 O. A. C. of to-day, and the great War, 206 Oregon Pacific Railroad Co. is formed, and construction begun, 172 Oregon Pacific fails: Why? 182 Purchase of a practice in London, 37 Panic in Banks, and its conse quences, 24 Playgrounds of Europe: travel in Switzerland and Belgium, 100 Paris fashions in business, 48 Paris visits, 111 Return to London from Suf folk, 36 Receiverships and sale of Ore gon Pacific, 186 School and College, 14 Suffolk homes, 33 Social Life in London, 117 Suffolk Lane and old offices, 37 Solicitors' business in City of London, and some clients, 39 Sunday in London: three no table services, 124 Sweat baths of Indians, 147 Spruce forests of Lincoln County, 209 Telephone in England: its in troduction and success, 150 Thirty-five years in Oregon: city, town, and ranch, 190 The fatal quarrel, 185 Vacations in Norway: four of them: travel and sport, 88 Wilson, Bush: of Corvallis, 149 Wrecked enterprise, 171 Yaquina Bay, 169 and 209 iiimfiiViKSSITV ub"ary 3 9002 02802 6418