STUDYING LAW.
Daniel had now successfully accomplished the first object of his
ambition. He was a college graduate. Though not the first scholar in
his class he was very near the head, and probably in general culture
stood first. There was a little misunderstanding which led to his
declining to appear at Commencement. His friends desired him to deliver
the valedictory, but the Faculty selected another, and Daniel remained
silent. There is a report that he tore up his diploma in anger and
disgust in presence of his classmates, saying, “My industry may make me
a great man, but this miserable parchment cannot.” Had this story been
true it would have done Daniel little credit. George Ticknor Curtis,
who has written the most elaborate and trustworthy memoir of Webster
states emphatically that there is no foundation for this story. Even if
not entirely satisfied with the treatment he received at that time,
Daniel’s loyalty to his Alma Mater was never doubted.
And now the world was before the young graduate. What was he to do?
His thoughts had long been fixed upon the legal profession. This was
no proof of a special fitness for it, for at least half of the young
men who graduate from our colleges make the same choice. But with
Daniel the choice was a more serious one, for he very well knew that
he could not afford to make a mistake here. Poverty was still his hard
taskmaster, and he leaned beneath its dark shadow.
My young reader will remember that at the age of fourteen Daniel
officiated as office-boy for a young lawyer in his native town—Thomas
W. Thompson. Now a college graduate of nineteen, he re-entered the same
office as a law student. Mr. Thompson was a man of ability. He was a
graduate of Harvard, where also he had filled the position of tutor.
While the boy was obtaining an education at Dartmouth, Thompson was
establishing a lucrative law practice. He became in time prominent
in State politics, and finally went to Congress. It will be seen,
therefore, that Daniel made a good choice, and that Mr. Thompson was
something more than an obscure country lawyer.
It is a little significant that the first law books which the young
student read related to the law of nations. He read also standard
literary works, and gave his leisure hours to hunting and fishing, the
last of which was always a favorite sport with him. He gained some
insight into the practical business of a law office. The reader will
be amused at a humorous account of the manner in which he was employed
during a temporary absence of his legal preceptor and a fellow-student.
“I have made some few writs,” he says, “and am now about to bring an
action of trespass for breaking a violin. The owner of the violin was
at a husking, where
‘His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet,’
made the girls skip over the husks as nimbly as Virgil’s Camilla over
the tops of the corn, till an old surly creature caught his fiddle and
broke it against the wall. For the sake of having plump witnesses the
plaintiff will summons all the girls to attend the trial at Concord.”
Here is another extract from a letter to the same friend which will
amuse: “I thank you for your receipt for greasing boots. Have this
afternoon to ride to the South Road, and in truth my boots admit not
only water, but peas and gravel-stones. I wish I had better ones. As
for ‘my new friend, tobacco,’ he is like most of that name has made me
twice sick, and is now dismissed.
“Heighho! a man wants a remedy against his neighbor, whose lips were
found damage-feasant on his—the plaintiffs—wife’s cheek! What is to be
done? But you have not read the law against kissing. I will write for
advice and direction to Barrister Fuller.”
So the young man appeared to be enjoying himself while pursuing
his studies, and would probably have wished nothing better than to
have gone on till he was prepared for admission to the bar on his
own account. But there was a serious obstacle. His good father had
well nigh exhausted his means in carrying Daniel through college,
and Ezekiel through his preparatory studies, and was now very much
straitened for money. It was felt to be time for Daniel to help him.
He, therefore, “thought it his duty to suffer some delay in his
profession for the sake of serving his elder brother,” by seeking
employment outside.
As a general thing when a college graduate is pressed by hard
necessity, he turns his attention to the task of teaching, and such
was the case with Daniel. Fortunately he soon found employment. From
Fryeburg, Maine, there came to him an invitation to take charge of the
academy there, and the young man accepted it. He was to be paid the
munificent salary of three hundred and fifty dollars per year, and he
felt that the offer was too dazzling to be rejected.