Chapter 3

There were some matters of procedure which have since been changed--such as Mr. Skimpin "calling for" Winkle, and the latter answering. This is now done by an Officer of the Court. Skimpin also asks Winkle his name, as a first question, though he had been sworn and had given it. And the _mal-entendu_ as to "Daniel Nathaniel" could not then have occurred, as the Officer would have obtained the name correctly. Another unusual thing was that Buzfuz, after his long and rather exhausting speech, should have examined the first witness. Now-a-days the junior would do this. We may note that at this time it was always "my Lord," and "your Lordship," with the full natural sound--we had not yet got to the clipped "M'lud,'" and "your Ludship." Perhaps this form _was_ actually used by the Counsel but was not noticed by Boz, or seemed to him the right thing. The King's Counsel were behind and could stoop down to consult their solicitors.

This minute observation and particularity of Boz is further shown in his noting the very places where the Attorneys sat, and which he describes. They had the seats next the table:

"You are quite right," said Buzfuz later on, answering the whisper of Dodson and Fogg, after Sam's awkward revelation. How often have we seen these hasty communications, which are not without their dramatic effect.

THE JUDGE.

Mr. Pickwick, unfortunate in his Counsel, his Solicitor, his Jury--one of prejudiced tradesmen--was also to be unlucky in the Judge who tried his case. No doubt Perker had comforted him: "no matter how it goes, however unfair Buzfuz may be, we have a judge to hold the scales fair and keep the jury straight. The Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, the Right Hon. Sir NICHOLAS CONYNGHAM TINDAL is a man of immense reputation at the Bar. We are most fortunate in having him." Judge then of the disappointment when on coming to court it was found that Sir Stephen Gaselee was to take the case "owing to the absence of the Chief Justice, occasioned by indisposition." (I protest that at times one does not know whether we are following out a course of real events, or tracing the incidents of a fiction, so wonderfully does Boz make his fiction blend with reality.) This was a serious blow. Tindal was an admirable judge. Did not his chroniclers write of him: "His sagacity, impartiality and plain sense, his industry and clear sightedness made him an admiration of non-professional spectators: while among lawyers he was very highly esteemed _for his invariable kindness to all who appeared before him_. He retained to the last their respect and affection." With such a man presiding Sergeant Buzfuz's eccentric violence and abuse of the defendant would have been restrained ("having the outward appearance of a man and not of a monster.") Mr. Skimpin's gross insinuations, to wit, that Winkle was "telegraphing" to his friend, would have been summarily put down, and all "bullying" checked; more, he would have calmly kept Counsel's attention to the issue. This perfect impartiality would have made him show to the Jury how little evidence there was to support the plaintiff's case. Instead came this unlucky indisposition: and his place was taken by "my Brother Gaselee:" with what results Mr. Pickwick was to learn disastrously.

It is curious, however, that the Chief Justice, in spite of his indisposition, should still be associated with the case; for he had tried the momentous case of Norton _v._ Melbourne, and had heard there letters read, which were parodied in the "chops and tomato sauce" correspondence, so Boz had him well before him. The case had to be tried at the Guildhall Sessions; so a fair and rational judge would have spoilt all sport. Further, as Boz had seen the fairness and dignity of the Chief Justice he was naturally reluctant to exhibit him unfavorably. The only thing was to make the Chief Justice become suddenly "indisposed," and have his place taken by a grotesque judge.

The Judge who was to try the case, Mr. Justice Stareleigh, as is well known, was drawn from Sir Stephen Gaselee, of whose name Stareleigh is a sort of synonym. Serjeant Gaselee was once well known in the prosecutions directed against Radicals and so-called Reformers, but _Pickwick_ has given him a greater reputation. The baiting he received from patriotic advocates may have inflamed his temper and made him irritable. He is described by one author, in a most humorous, if personal fashion. He was "a most particularly short man, and so fat that he seemed all face and waistcoat. He rolled in upon two little turned legs, and having bobbed gravely to the bar who bobbed gravely to him, put his little legs under the table, when all you could see of him was two queer little eyes, one broad, pink face, and somewhere about half of a big and very comical-looking wig." All through he is shown as arrogant and incapable, and also as making some absurd mistakes.

It will be a surprise to most people to learn that this picture is no more than an amusing caricature, and that the judge was really a person of high character. He is described as "a very painstaking, upright judge, and, in his private capacity, a worthy and benevolent man." Thus, Mr. Croker, who, however, supplies a sound reason for his being the subject of such satire. "With many admirable qualities both of head and heart, he had made himself a legitimate object of ridicule by his explosions on the Bench." Under such conditions, the Bar, the suitors and the public had neither the wish nor the opportunity to search for extenuating excuses in his private life. They suffered enough from the "explosions" and that was all that concerned them. He had been fourteen years on the Bench, and, like Stareleigh, belonged to the Common Pleas. He was suffering too from infirmities, particularly from deafness, and appears to have misapprehended statements in the same grotesque fashion that he mistook Winkle's name.

Boz's fashion of burlesque, by the way, is happily shown in his treatment of this topic. Another would have been content with "Daniel," the simple misapprehension. "Nathaniel, sir," says Winkle. "Daniel--any other name?" "Nathaniel, sir--my lord, I mean." "_Nathaniel Daniel_--_or Daniel Nathaniel_?" "No, my lord, only Nathaniel, not Daniel at all."

"What did you tell me it was Daniel for, then, sir?"

"I didn't, my lord."

"You did, sir. _How could I have got Nathaniel in my notes_, _unless you told me so_, _sir_?"

How admirable is this. The sly satire goes deeper, as Judges, under less gross conditions, have often made this illogical appeal to "my notes."

Though not gifted with oratorical powers which were likely to gain him employment as a leader, Gaselee's reputation for legal knowledge soon recommended him to a judge's place. He was accordingly selected on July 1st, 1824, to fill a vacancy in the Court of Common Pleas. In that Court he sat for nearly fourteen years "with the character of a painstaking judge, and in his private capacity as a worthy and benevolent man." Thus Mr. Foss, F.S.A.

The reader will have noted the Judge's severity to poor Groffin, the chemist, who had pleaded the danger of his boy mistaking oxalic acid for Epsom salts. Could it be that the Judge's experience as the son of a provincial doctor, had shown what class of man was before him? Later, unexpectedly, we learn that the Judge was a steady member for fourteen years of the Royal Humane Society, of which institution he was also a Vice-President.

But we now come to a most extraordinary thing--the result of the young author's telling and most sarcastic portrait of the irascible little judge. It is curious that Forster, while enumerating various instances of Boz's severe treatment of living persons, as a sort of chastisement for their defects of manner or character, seems not to have thought of this treatment of the judge--and passes it by. Nor did he notice the prompt result that followed on the sketch. The report of the trial appeared in the March number, 1837--and we are told, the luckless judge retired from the Bench, shortly after the end of Hilary Term, that is in April or the beginning of May. We may assume that the poor gentleman could not endure the jests of his _confreres_ or the scarcely concealed tittering of the Barristers, all of whom had of course devoured and enjoyed the number. We may say that the learned Sergeant Buzfuz was not likely to be affected in any way by _his_ picture; it may indeed have added to his reputation. I confess to some sympathy for the poor old judge who was thus driven from the Bench. Sam Foote was much given to this sort of personal attack, and made the lives of some of his victims wretched. Boz, however, seems to have felt himself called upon to act thus as public executioner on two occasions only. After the fall of the judge in June, 1837, he wanted a model for a tyrannical magistrate in _Oliver Twist_--and Mr. Laing, the Hatton Garden Magistrate--a harsh, ferocious personage, at once occurred to him. He wrote accordingly to one of his friends that he wished to be _smuggled_ into his office some morning to study him. This "smuggling" of course meant the placing him where he would not be observed--as a magistrate knowing his "sketches" might recognise him. "I know the man perfectly well" he added. So he did, for he forgot that he had introduced him already in _Pickwick_ as Nupkins--whose talk is exactly alike, in places almost word for word to that of "Mr. Fang."

These palliations, Boz, a young fellow of three and twenty or so, did not pause to weigh. He only saw a testy, red-faced old fellow with goggle eyes, and seventy-four years old, and past his work. His infirmities already made him incapable of carrying through the business of the Court as the mistake, "Is it Daniel Nathaniel or Nathaniel Daniel?" shows. It is curious, however, that this weakness of misapprehending names is described of another judge, Arabin--a strange grotesque. Theodore Hook gives an amusing specimen in his Gilbert Gurney.

From the general description in the text, it is evident Stareleigh was the prey of gouty affections--which swelled him into grotesque shape, and he found himself unequal to the office. He died two years after his retirement at No. 13, Montagu Place, Russell Square; so that the Judge in Bardell _v._ Pickwick was living close to Perker the Attorney in the same case. Here we seem to mix up the fictional and the living characters, but this is the law of _Pickwick_--the confines between the two worlds being quite confused or broken down. The late commander of our forces in China, Sir A. Gaselee, is of this family. It should be remembered, however, when we think of this judge's frowardness, that judges in those times were dictatorial and carried matters with a high hand. There were often angry conflicts between them, and members of the Bar, and Stareleigh was really not so very tyrannical. He did what so many judges do--took a side from the first, and had decided in his own mind that Mr. Pickwick could not possibly have a case. That curious form of address from the Bench is now no longer heard--"who is with you, _Brother Buzfuz_?" Judges and sergeants were then common members of the Guild--both wore the "coif."

THE COURT.

When the swearing of the jury is going on, how good, and how natural is the scene with the unfortunate chemist.

'Answer to your names, gentlemen that you may be sworn,' said the gentleman in black. 'Richard Upwitch.'

'Here,' said the greengrocer.

'Thomas Groffin.'

'Here,' said the chemist.

'Take the book, gentlemen. You shall well and truly try--'

'I beg this court's pardon,' said the chemist, who was a tall, thin, yellow-visaged man, 'but I hope this court will excuse my attendance.'

'On what grounds, sir?' replied Mr. Justice Stareleigh.

'I have no assistant, my Lord,' said the chemist.

'I can't help that, sir,' replied Mr. Justice Stareleigh. 'You should hire one.'

'I can't afford it, my Lord,' rejoined the chemist.

'Then you ought to be able to afford it, sir,' said the judge, reddening; for Mr. Justice Stareleigh's temper bordered on the irritable, and brooked not contradiction.

'I know I _ought_ to do, if I got on as well as I deserved, but I don't, my Lord,' answered the chemist.

'Swear the gentleman,' said the judge, peremptorily.

The officer had got no farther than the 'You shall well and truly try,' when he was again interrupted by the chemist.

'I am to be sworn, my Lord, am I?' said the chemist.

'Certainly, sir,' replied the testy little judge.

'Very well, my Lord,' replied the chemist in a resigned manner. 'There'll be murder before this trial's over; that's all. Swear me, if you please, sir;' and sworn the chemist was, before the judge could find words to utter.

'I merely wanted to observe, my Lord,' said the chemist, taking his seat with great deliberation, 'that I've left nobody but an errand boy in my shop. He is a very nice boy, my Lord, but he is not acquainted with drugs; and I know that the prevailing impression on his mind is, that Epsom salts means oxalic acid; and syrup of senna, laudanum. That's all, my Lord.' With this, the tall chemist composed himself into a comfortable attitude, and, assuming a pleasant expression of countenance, appeared to have prepared himself for the worst.

One who was born in the same year as Boz, but who was to live for thirty years after him, Henry Russell--composer and singer of "The Ivy Green"--was, when a youth, apprenticed to a chemist, and when about ten years old, that is five years before Bardell _v._ Pickwick, was left in charge of the shop. He discovered just in time that he had served a customer who had asked for Epsom salts with poison sufficient to kill fifty people. On this he gave up the profession. I have little doubt that he told this story to his friend a dozen years later, and that it was on Boz's mind when he wrote. Epsom salts was the drug mentioned in both instances.

It must be said that even in our day a defendant for Breach, with Mr. Pickwick's story and surroundings, would have had small chance with a city jury. They saw before them a benevolent-looking Lothario, of a Quaker-like air, while all the witnesses against him were his three most intimate friends and his own man.

We have, of course, testy judges now, who may be "short" in manner, but I think it can be affirmed that no judge of our day could behave to counsel or witnesses as Mr. Justice Stareleigh did. It is, in fact, now the tone for a judge to affect a sort of polished courtesy, and to impart a sort of light gaiety to the business he is transacting. All asperity and tyrannous rudeness is held to be out of place. Hectoring and bullying of witnesses will not be tolerated. The last exhibition was perhaps that of the late Dr. Kenealy in the Tichborne case.

All the swearing of jurymen before the court, with the intervention of the judge, has been got rid of. The Master of the Court, or Chief Clerk, has a number of interviews--at his public desk--with important individuals, bringing him signed papers. These are excuses of some sort--medical certificates, etc.--with a view to be "let off" serving. Some--most, perhaps--are accepted, some refused. A man of wealth and importance can have little difficulty. Of course this would be denied by the jurists: but, somehow, the great guns contrive not to attend. At ten o'clock this officer proceeds to swear the jury, which is happily accomplished by the time the judge enters.

SERJEANT BUZFUZ.

Mr. Pickwick, considering the critical nature of his case, was certainly unfortunate in his solicitor, as well as in the Counsel selected by his solicitors. The other side were particularly favoured in this matter. They had a pushful bustling "wide-awake" firm of solicitors, who let not a point escape. Sergeant Buzfuz was exactly the sort of advocate for the case--masterful, unscrupulous, eloquent, and with a singularly ingenious faculty for putting everything on his client's side in the best light, and his adversary's in the worst. He could "tear a witness to pieces," and turn him inside out. His junior, Skimpin, was glib, ready-armed at all points, and singularly adroit in "making a hare" of any witness who fell into his hands, _teste_ Winkle. He had all the professional devices for dealing with a witness's answers, and twisting them to his purpose, at his fingers' ends. He was the Wontner or Ballantyne of his day. Mr. Pickwick's "bar" was quite outmatched. They were rather a feeble lot, too respectable altogether, and really not familiar with this line of business. Even the judge was against them from the very start, so Mr. Pickwick had very poor chances indeed. All this was due to that old-fashioned and rather incapable "Family Solicitor" Perker.

[Picture: Serjeant Buzfuz, K.C.]

Serjeant Buzfuz is known the world all over, at least wherever English is known. I myself was once startled in a fashionable West End church to hear a preacher, when emphasizing the value and necessity of Prayer, and the certainty with which it is responded to, use this illustration: "As Serjeant Buzfuz said to Sam Weller, '_There is little to do and plenty to get_.'" Needless to say, an amused smile, if not a titter, passed round the congregation. But it is the Barrister who most appreciates the learned Serjeant. For the topics he argued and his fashion of arguing them, bating a not excessive exaggeration, comes home to them all. Nay, they must have a secret admiration, and fondly think how excellently well such and such topics are put, and how they must have told with a jury.

Buzfuz, it is now well known, was drawn from a leading serjeant of his day, Serjeant Bompas, K.C. Not so long since I was sitting by Bompas's son, the present Judge Bompas, at dinner, and a most agreeable causeur he was. Not only did Boz sketch the style and fashion of the serjeant, but it is clear that Phiz drew the figure and features.

"I am the youngest son of Serjeant Bompas," Judge Bompas writes to me, "and have never heard it doubted that the name Buzfuz was taken from my father who was at that time considered a most successful advocate. I think he may have been chosen for the successful advocate because he was so successful: but I have never been able to ascertain that there was any other special resemblance. I do not remember my father myself: he died when I was eight years old. But I am told I am like him in face. He was tall (five feet ten inches) and a large man, very popular, and very excitable in his cases, so that I am told that Counsel against him used to urge him, out of friendship, not to get so agitated. A connection of mine who knew him well, went over to hear Charles Dickens read the Trial Scene, to see if he at all imitated him in voice or manner, but told me that he did not do so at all. I think, therefore, that having chosen his name, as a writer might now that of Sir Charles Russell, he then drew a general type of barrister, as he thought it might be satirised. My father, like myself, was on the Western Circuit and leader of it at the time of his death."

"I had a curious episode happen to me once. A client wrote to apply to the court to excuse a juror on the ground that he was a chemist and had no assistant who understood the drugs. It was not till I made the application and the Court began to laugh that I remembered the Pickwick Trial. I believe the application was quite bona fide, and not at all an imitation of it." An interesting communication from one who might be styled "Buzfuz's son;" and, as Judge Bompas alludes to his own likeness to his sire, I may add that the likeness to the portrait in the court scene, is very striking indeed. There is the same fullness of face, the large features. Buzfuz was certainly a counsel of power and ability, and I think lawyers will admit he managed Mrs. Bardell's case with much adroitness. His speech, besides being a sort of satirical abstract of the unamiable thundering boisterousness addressed to juries in such cases, is one of much ability. He makes the most of every topic that he thought likely to "tell" on a city jury. We laugh heartily at his would-be solemn and pathetic passages, but these are little exaggerated. Buzfuz's statement is meant to show how counsel, quite legitimately, can bring quite innocent acts to the support of their case by marshalling them in suspicious order, and suggesting that they had a connection with the charge made. Many a client thus becomes as bewildered as Mr. Pickwick was, on seeing his own harmless proceedings assuming quite a guilty complexion.

Serjeant Buzfuz-Bompas died at the age of fifty-three, at his house in Park Road, Regents Park, on February 29th, 1844. He was then, comparatively, a young man, and must have had ability to have attained his position so early. He was called to the Bar in 1815, and began as Serjeant in 1827, in Trinity Term, only a year or so before the famous case was tried.

So dramatic is the whole "Trial" in its action and characters, that it is almost fit for the stage as it stands. There have been a great number of versions, one by the author's son, Charles "the Younger," one by Mr. Hollingshead, and so on. It is a favorite piece for charitable benefits, and a number of well-known performers often volunteer to figure as "Gentlemen of the Jury." Buzfuz has been often played by Mr. Toole, but his too farcical methods scarcely enhanced the part. The easiness of comedy is essential. That sound player Mr. James Fernander is the best Buzfuz that I have seen.

There is a French translation of _Pickwick_, in which the general spirit of the "Trial" is happily conveyed. Thus Mr. Phunky's name is given as "M. Finge," which the little judge mistakes for "M. Singe." Buzfuz's speech too is excellent, especially his denouncing the Defendant's coming with his chops "_et son ignoble bassinoire_" i.e., warming pan.

THE OPENING SPEECH.

Buzfuz's great speech is one of the happiest parodies in the language. Never was the forensic jargon and treatment so humorously set forth--and this because of the perfect _sincerity_ and earnestness with which it was done. There is none of the far-fetched, impossible exaggeration--the form of burlesque which Theodore Hook or Albert Smith might have attempted. It is, in fact, a real speech, which might have been delivered to a dull-headed audience without much impairing credibility. Apart from this it is a most effective harangue and most plausible statement of the Plaintiff's case.

A little professional touch, which is highly significant as part of the pantomine, and which Boz made very effective at the reading, was the Serjeant's dramatic preparation for his speech. "Having whispered to Dodson and conferred briefly with Fogg, _he pulled his gown over his shoulders_, _settled his wig_, and addressed the Jury." Who has not seen this bit of business?

Again, Juries may have noted that the Junior as he rises to speak, mumbles something that is quite inaudible, and which nobody attends to. This is known as "opening the pleadings."

The ushers again called silence, and Mr. Skimpin proceeded to 'open the case;' and the case appeared to have very little inside it when he had opened it, for he kept such particulars as he knew, completely to himself, and sat down, after a lapse of three minutes, leaving the jury in precisely the same advanced stage of wisdom as they were in before.

Serjeant Buzfuz then rose with all the majesty and dignity which the grave nature of the proceedings demanded, and having whispered to Dodson, and conferred briefly with Fogg, pulled his gown over his shoulders, settled his wig, and addressed the jury.