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.