The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) | Page 6

as county gentlemen it was their
privilege to support, the noble champions of the art, especially when
they had their money on the event.
The magistrates, if their presence was ever discovered, said they went
to prevent a breach of the peace, but if they were unable to effect this
laudable object, they looked on quietly so as to prevent any one
committing a breach of the peace on themselves. Their individual heads
were worth something.
It was to one of these exhibitions of valour, between Owen Swift and
Brighton Bill, that a reverend and sporting magistrate took my brother
John, a nice good schoolboy, in a tall hat. He thought it was the right
thing that the boy should see the world. I thought also that what was
good for John, as prescribed by his clerical adviser, would not be bad
for me, so I went as well.
There was a great crowd, of course, but I kept my eye on John's tall
chimney-pot hat, knowing that while I saw that I should not lose John.
Presently there was a stir, for Brighton Bill had landed a tremendous
blow on the cheek of Owen Swift, and while we were applauding, as is
the custom at prize-fights and public dinners, a cunning pickpocket
standing immediately behind John pushed the tall chimney-pot hat

tightly down over the boy's eyes.
His little hands, which had been in his pockets, went up in a moment to
raise his hat, so that he might see the world, the big object he had come
to see; and immediately in went two other hands, and out came the
savings of John's life--two precious half-crowns, which he had shown
to me with great pride that very morning! When he saw the world again
the rogue had disappeared.
The famous place for these pugilistic encounters, or one of the famous
places, was a spot called Noon's Folly, which was within a very few
miles of Royston, where the counties of Cambridge, Suffolk, Essex,
and Hertfordshire meet, or most of them. That was the scene of many a
stiff encounter; and although, of course, there were both magisterial
and police interference when the knowledge reached them that a fight
was about to take place within their particular jurisdiction, by some
singular misadventure the knowledge never reached them until their
worships were returning from the battle. All was over before any
official communication was made.
* * * * *
I was entered of the Middle Temple on April 16, 1839, and remained
with Mr. Butt until I had kept sufficient terms to qualify me to take out
a licence to plead on my own account, which I did at the earliest
possible date. This was a great step in my career, although, of course,
the licence did not enable me to plead in court, as I was not called to
the Bar.
If work came I should now be in a fair way to attain independence. But
the prospect was by no means flattering; it was, in fact, all but hopeless
while the position of a special pleader was not my ambition. The
lookout, in fact, was anything but encouraging from the fifth floor of
_No. 3 Elm Court_--I mean prospectively. It was a region not
inaccessible, of course, but it looked on to a landscape of chimney-pots,
not one of which was likely to attract attorneys; it was cheap and lonely,
dull and miserable--a melancholy altitude beyond the world and its
companionship. Had I been of a melancholy disposition I might have

gone mad, for hope surely never came to a fifth floor. But there I sat
day by day, week by week, and month by month, waiting for the knock
that never came, hoping for the business that might never come.
Hundreds of times did I listen with vain expectations to the footsteps on
the stairs below--footsteps of attorneys and clerks, messengers and
office-boys. I knew them all, and that was all I knew of them. Down
below at the bottom flight they tramped, and there they mostly stopped.
The ground floor was evidently the best for business; but some came
higher, to the first floor. That was a good position; there were plenty of
footsteps, and I could tell they were the footsteps of clients. A few
came a little higher still, and then my hopes rose with the footsteps.
Now some one had come up to the third floor: he stopped! Alas! there
was the knock, one single hard knock: it was a junior clerk. The sound
came all too soon for me, and I turned from my own door to my little
den and looked out of my window up into the sky, from whence it
seemed I might just as well expect a brief as