Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI | Page 8

his solemn precision of language: but
nothing that had passed between us gave me the idea of his being a
person of superior ability or acquirements. He was, indeed, a very shy
and modest man. It was not, for instance, till after a seven years'
intimacy, that I knew of the distinction which he had obtained at
college; and on my asking him, one day, whether it was true that he had
obtained the gold medal, he blushed, slightly moved his head aside, and,
after a pause, said, in a tone rather even of displeasure than gratification,
"Possibly I did!" and we dropped the subject. In the year 1830, he
entered the chambers of Richard Grainger Blick, Esquire, one of the
most eminent special pleaders in the Temple, and who has assured me,
that he always considered Mr. John William Smith to be a remarkable
man. Probably there never before entered the chambers of pleader or
barrister, in the character of novice, a man of more formidable legal
aptitude and acquirements. We have already seen the substantial and
extensive character of his law-reading at college; but, between leaving
it, and entering Mr. Blick's chambers, Mr. Smith read carefully over
"from cover to cover"--such were his words to me--"Tidd's Practice," a
standard book, in two closely printed, large octavo volumes, and also
"Selwyn's Nisi Prius," in two similar volumes. He had not been long in
chambers before he found that "he had not a sufficient knowledge of
pleading, to get any benefit from the business, which he saw;"
wherefore he absented himself from chambers for some time, to enable
him to read through the first volume of "Mr. Chitty's Treatise on
Pleading;" and some time afterwards he again withdrew, for similar
reasons, to read "Phillips on Evidence." Having obtained such an
acquaintance with these two works, as to a person of inferior intellect
or discipline might seem a complete mastery, he returned to chambers,
able better to avail himself of the advantages afforded by Mr. Blick's
extensive practice; very frequently surprising that gentleman by his

mental vigour, and accurate and extensive legal knowledge. "I was very
cunning," he has more than once said to me, "at chambers; for I soon
saw how to go to work, better than the other pupils. They would be all
for the 'heavy papers,' the great cases that came in, not caring for the
shoal of small things that were continually appearing and disappearing.
Now it seemed to me, that these constituted three-fourths of a lawyer's
business, and that to be able to do them, was three-fourths of the battle:
so I very quietly let my fine gentlemen take all the great papers, while I
did nothing but these same despised common things, till at length I
really began to feel that I was improving, and learning a good deal of
law. But, as to the other sort of cases and papers, as soon as my
fellow-pupils had done, puzzling their brains over them, and written the
opinions, or drawn the pleadings, and Mr. Blick had revised them, and
given them his imprimatur, I then read them over very diligently, and
with great profit: but you must remember that this was before the late
revolution in pleading." All this he repeated to me one day, only a few
months before his death.--He never studied under any other practitioner
than Mr. Blick, with whom, moreover, he spent only one year: yet such
was his close application, his wonderful memory, his clear, vigorous,
and disciplined understanding, and the soundness and extent of his
previously acquired law, that on quitting Mr. Blick, Mr. Smith was
really an able pleader, and had laid the basis of an extended, profound,
and scientific knowledge of the law. Even at that early period, I
frequently heard his opinion deferentially asked by men far his seniors,
and of considerable standing in business. On quitting Mr. Blick, Mr.
Smith read a number of other law books, in his usual attentive and
thorough manner, completely mastering both them and the "cases"
contained in them, and of which, generally speaking, they were little
else than digests or epitomes. He was a very keen and acute logician,
and felt great satisfaction in balancing the pros and cons of the reported
cases, and testing the soundness of the judges' decisions, and the
relevancy and force of the arguments of council which had led to them.
Among the books which he read about this time, he enumerated to me
"Sanders on Uses and Trusts," (which, he said, he found to be a
difficult book to master practically;) "Fearne on Contingent
Remainders," which he represented as likely to prove interesting to any
educated man of intellect, fond of exercising it, who would take the

trouble to read it; Sir Edward Sugden's Treatises on