Chapter 29

and orderly performance was rendered a continual scene of bickering and conflict, too often about the most trifling matters.

With every one else I got on happily and agreeably, my juniors loyally doing their very utmost to render me every assistance and lighten my burden.

Even the Claimant himself not only gave me no offence from first to last, but was at times in his manner very amusing, and preserved his natural good temper admirably, considering what he had at stake on the issue of the trial, and remembering also that that issue devolved mainly upon my own personal exertions.

Nor was the Claimant devoid of humour. On the contrary, he was plentifully endowed with it.

One morning on his going into court an elderly lady dressed in deep mourning presented him with a religious tract. He thanked her, went to his seat, and perused the document. Then he wrote something on the tract, carefully revised what he had written, and threw it on the floor.

The usher was watching these proceedings, and, as soon as he could do so unobserved, secured the paper and handed it to me.

The tract was headed, "Sinner, Repent!"

The Claimant had written on it, "Surely this must have been meant for Orkins, not for me!"

Louie's story of picking him up in the boat must have amused him greatly. If he was amused at the ease with which fools can be humbugged, he must also have been astounded at the awful villainy of those who, perfect strangers to him, had perjured themselves for the sake of notoriety.

I did what I could to shorten the proceedings. My opening speech was confined to six days, as compared with twenty-eight on the other side; my reply to nine. But that reply was a labour fearful to look back upon. The mere classification of the evidence was a momentous and necessary task. It had to be gathered from the four quarters of the world. It had to be sifted, winnowed, and arranged in order as a perfect whole before the true story could be evolved from the complications and entanglements with which it was surrounded.

And when I rose to reply, to perform my last work and make my last effort for the success of my cause, I felt as one about to plunge into a boundless ocean with the certain knowledge that everything depended upon my own unaided efforts as to whether I should sink or swim. Happily, for the cause of justice, I succeeded; and at the end, although nattering words of approval and commendation poured upon me from all sides, from the highest to the humblest, I did Hot then realize their value to the extent that I did afterwards. The excitement and the exertion had been too great for anything to add to it.

But I afterwards remembered--ay, and can never forget--the words of the Lord Chief Justice himself, the first to appreciate and applaud, as I was passing near him in leaving the court: "Bravo! Bravo, Hawkins!" And then he added, "I have not heard a piece of oratory like that for many a long day!" And he patted me cordially on the back as he looked at me with, I believe, the sincerest appreciation.

Lord Chelmsford, too, who years before had given me my silk gown, was on the Bench on this last day, and I shall never forget the compliment he paid me on my speech. It was of itself worth all the trouble and anxiety I had undergone.

Beyond all this, and more gratifying even still, my speech was liked by the Bar, from the most eminent to the briefless.

But greatest of all events in that eventful day was one which went deeper to my feelings. My old father, who had taken so strong a view against my going to the Bar, and who told me so mournfully that after five years I must sink or swim; my old father, who had never once seen me in my wig and gown from that day to this, the almost closing scene in my forensic career, came into court and sat by my side when I made successfully the greatest effort of my life.