As I jot down these random reminiscences I am impressed in a singular fashion with the fact that my career consisted entirely in the making, or rather getting, of money and the spending of it. I had no particular professional ambitions and never but once sought distinction as a constitutional lawyer; and, however unworthy of an officer of the court such a confession may be, I am quite ready to admit that a seat upon the bench would have afforded me neither amusement nor sufficient compensation to satisfy my desires. Let other men find their gratification and emolument in the supposed honor of wearing the ermine! I have never found that a judge became any the less an erring human being after his elevation to the dais, and I could rake out of one good semi-criminal case twice the salary of any judge on the supreme bench. What is popularly regarded as respectability is oft-times in reality—if the truth were known— merely stodginess and stupidity.

I am compelled to admit that in my early days, before I had formed my affiliation with Gottlieb, I had different ambitions, although they were none the less worldly. Then I wanted to be a judge because I supposed a judge was the king-pin of the profession. Now, as Pat Flanagan says, "I know different." The judge is apt to be no less a tool of the boss than any other public officer elected by the suffrages of a political party. He is merely less obviously so. There are a few men in Wall Street who can press a button and call for almost any judge they want—and he will come— and adjourn court if necessary to do so—with his silk hat in his hands. And if any young aspirant for legal honors who reads these fugitive memoirs believes that the road to the supreme bench leads via Blackstone, and is lighted by the midnight oil of study, let him disabuse himself of that idea, but seek rather the district leader; and let him make himself useful in getting the boys that are in trouble out of it. Under our elective system there is no more honor in being a judge than in being a sheriff or a hog-reeve; but, when one is young—and perhaps starving—it may seem otherwise.

If any of my lay readers believe that the practice of the law is a path of dalliance, let him but hazard his fortunes for a brief space on the good ship Jurisprudence—he will find the voyage tedious beyond endurance, the ship's company but indifferent in character and the rations scanty. I make no doubt but that it is harder to earn an honest living at the law than by any other means of livelihood. Once one discovers this he must perforce choose whether he will remain a galley slave for life or hoist the Jolly Roger and turn freebooter, with a chance of dangling betimes from his own yard-arm.

Many a man has literally starved at the law. And most of the profession nearly do so; while some, by merest luck, have managed to struggle on until they stumbled upon some professional gold mine. I have heard many stories of how some young men managed to pull success out of disaster when the odds seemed overwhelming. One which has particularly appealed to me I shall call the anecdote of The Most Capable Young Lawyer in New York.

Some years ago there came to the great city a young fellow who had always lived in a country town where the neighbors were all such good friends that they never went to law. He was able and industrious, but in his native place found it almost impossible to earn a living; and when by chance he met a well-known and prosperous attorney from New York who advised him to seek his fortune in the whirlpool rather than in the back eddies of life, he decided to follow the suggestion.

"I will endeavor to throw you something from time to time," said the prosperous lawyer, for it made him feel his own success to see such a poor young man and it tickled his vitals into benignity.

The country boy sold all his possessions for a few hundred dollars and came to New York. His friend was very kind in his manner and prolific of advice, but, unfortunately, he had no room in his own office for a junior or even an errand-boy. So Peters, for that was the young man's name, dragged himself up and down the city trying to find an opening, no matter how small. He was too old to begin as a clerk and too much of a bumpkin for anything else, and he found that nobody had any use for a young man of his particular type and training. At last, in despair, he hired desk-room in an office, shared jointly by half a dozen young men like himself, and waited for something to turn up; but nothing came. His bank account fell lower and lower, and he became more and more shabby. Moreover, he was eating his heart out with disappointment, for he could not return to his native town and confess himself a failure.

From time to time he would drop into his prosperous friend's offices, but the latter never had anything to turn over to him and he would return dejectedly to his own solitary desk. At last he was forced to give up lunch and get along as best he could on two scanty meals a day; he grew thin and haggard, his Adam's apple projected redly above a frayed collar, his trousers grew wrinkled and shiny, and he looked ready to take his place in the "bread line." Finally he spent his last cent on a pretzel and made ready to "turn in his checks."

At this point Peters paid a last visit to his friend, who was visibly shocked at his emaciated appearance, for his eyes burned with the fever of starvation and his jaw was set in a pitiful determination to keep going until he dropped.

"Mr. Banks," said he grimly, "unless you give me something to do

I'll go under. The fact is, I'm starving!"

Mr. Banks look at him critically.

"Pretty near ready to give up, eh?" he remarked. "Better chuck it and go back! I guess I was wrong when I told you to come down here."

"Not yet," answered Peters doggedly. "When I go back it'll be in a wooden box."

"Well," replied Mr. Banks, "I'm sorry; but there isn't a thing in the office I can give you." He pondered a minute. "I've got a lot of old judgments against a fellow named Rosenheim—in the cigar business, but he's no good—judgment proof—and they aren't worth the paper they're written on."

"Give them to me!" almost shouted Peters.

Mr. Banks laughed.

"You can have ninety per cent. of all you collect," said he as he bent over and, pulling out a lower drawer, removed a bundle of soiled documents. "Here they are. My blessing to you!"

Peters grabbed the transcripts and staggered down the stairs. It took him less than ten minutes to find Mr. Simon Rosenheim, who was sitting inside a brass fence at a mahogany desk, smoking one of the best of his own cigars.

"Mr. Rosenheim," said Peters, "I have some judgments here against you, amounting to about three thousand dollars."

"Yes?" remarked Rosenheim politely.

"Can you let me have the money?" inquired Peters.

"My dear fellow," retorted Rosenheim, with an oily sneer, "I owe the money all right, but I don't own a thing in the world. Everything in this room belongs to my wife. The amount of money I owe is really something shocking. Even what is in the safe"—he nodded to a large affair on the other side of the room—"belongs to somebody else."

Rosenheim had been through this same performance hundreds of times before, but not with the same dénouement.

Suddenly he saw a lean young man, with hollow cheeks and blazing eyes, leap over the brass railing. In another instant horny hands grasped him firmly by the windpipe and a voice hissed in his ear:

"Pay me those judgments or I'll strangle you here and now!"

With bursting veins and protruding tongue he struggled helplessly to escape as his assailant dragged him toward the safe.

"I mean what I say!" half shrieked Peters. "I'm starving! I'd as lief die one way as another; but before I die you'll pay up those judgments—every cent!"

Rosenheim was on his knees now before the safe, his eyes starting from his head.

"Open the safe!" commanded Peters.

Rosenheim, the sweat of death on his brow, fumbled with the combination; the tumbler caught, the door swung open. Peters lifted his captive enough to permit him to reach in and take out the bills.

"Count 'em out!" he ordered.

Rosenheim did as he was told, shaking with fear. Peters stuffed the money into his pocket.

"Now do your damdest!" he shouted. "I've had one piece of law business before I died. Good afternoon!"

Rosenheim crawled back to his desk, relit his cigar and endeavored to pull himself together. He had a half-scared, half-puzzled look on his face and once in awhile he scratched his head.

Meantime Peters repaired to the nearest hotel and ordered a dinner of steak and fried potatoes, washed down with a pint of champagne. He then purchased a new suit of clothes, a box of collars, a few shirts, and a hat. When he entered Mr. Banks' office an hour later the latter with difficulty recognized his visitor.

"I owe you three hundred dollars, I believe," remarked Peters, laying down the bills.

"Owe—me—What? You didn't get that money out of Rosenheim?" stammered Banks.

"Why not?" asked Peters casually. "Of course I did. Every cent of it."

Banks looked at him in utter amazement. He, too, scratched his head.

"Say," he suddenly exploded, "you must be quite a feller! Now, look here, I've got a claim against the Pennsylvania and Susquehanna Terminal Company for two million dollars that I wish you'd come in and give me a little help on. What do you say?"

Peters hesitated and pursed his lips.

"Oh, I don't mind if I do," said he carelessly.

You may have heard of the celebrated law firm of Banks & Peters— who do a business of about four hundred thousand a year? Well, that is Peters. Banks says he's "the ablest young lawyer in New York."

Peters, however, does not deserve the same credit as another young fellow of my acquaintance, since in Peters' case necessity was the parent of his invention; whereas in the other the scheme that led to success was the offspring of an ingenuity that needed no starvation to stimulate it into activity.

Baldwin was a youth of about thirty, who had done pretty well at the bar without giving any evidence of brilliancy and only moderate financial success. He perceived the obvious fact that the way to make money at the law is to have money-makers for clients, but he had no acquaintances with financiers and had no reason to advance to himself why he should ever hope to receive any business from such. Reading one day that a certain young attorney he knew had received a large retainer for bringing an injunction in an important railroad matter, it occurred to him that, after all, it was merely chance and nothing else that had sent the business to the other instead of to himself. "If I'd only known Morgan H. Rogers I might have had the job myself," thought he.

So he pondered deeply over how he could get to know Mr. Morgan H. Rogers and at last conceived the idea of pretending that he had a client who—without disclosing his name for the time being— desired to create a trust for the benefit of a charity in which the railroad magnate was much interested. With this excuse he found no difficulty in securing an interview and making an agreeable impression. The next step was more difficult.

Finally, having learned through a clerk in the banker's office with whom he had cultivated an acquaintance that Mr. Morgan H. Rogers was going to Boston at a certain hour that very afternoon, he donned his best funeral suit and boarded the same train himself. As he passed through the drawing-room car he bowed to the great man, who returned his greeting with the shortness characteristic of him, and passed on to the smoker, where he ensconced himself in a chair near the door, depositing on the seat next to him a pile of magazines and his coat. Half an hour passed and the car filled up, save for the seat next the young lawyer. Presently the bulky form of Morgan H. Rogers filled the door-way. He already had a black unlit cigar in his mouth and he scanned the rows of seats with ill-concealed disappointment. Then his eye caught the one occupied by our friend's coat.

"Let me have this seat!" said he abruptly.

"Oh, how are you, Mr. Rogers!" exclaimed the young lawyer.

"Certainly! Let me give you a light."

"Your name's Baldwin, isn't it?" inquired the banker as he took up a magazine. "Saw you about that trust matter last week, didn't I?"

"Yes," answered Baldwin. "Nothing has occurred in connection with it since then."

And he returned to his paper without paying any further attention to his companion. At Bridgeport a telegraph boy rushed into the car and yelled: "Baldwin! Mr. Baldwin!"

Mr. Baldwin held out his hand, in which lay half a dollar, and without much apparent interest opened the envelope and scanned its contents.

"H'm!" he remarked, half inwardly, and thrust the paper into his pocket.

At New Haven another boy boarded the train, calling anxiously for Everitt P. Baldwin—this time there were two telegrams; and just as the train pulled out a third arrived.

Mr. Baldwin read them all with the keenest interest and could hardly conceal an exclamation of satisfaction; but the magnate gave no sign. At New London there was another flurry and, in spite of himself, Mr. Baldwin slapped his knee and muttered: "Good enough!"

As the train started again Morgan H. Rogers let fall his magazine and growled half-facetiously:

"What the devil are all those telegrams about?"

"Just a little injunction suit," the young man answered modestly, "in which my firm has been quite successful." And, without giving any names—for, indeed, there were none—he sketched rapidly a hypothetical situation of the greatest legal delicacy, in which he had tied up an imaginary railroad system with an injunction, supposedly just made permanent. Morgan H. Rogers became interested and offered Mr. Baldwin a remarkably big cigar. He had been having a few troubles of his own of a similar character. In a few moments the two were deep in the problems of one of the financier's own transcontinental lines and a week later Baldwin was on Rogers' regular staff of railroad attorneys.

It is pleasant to reflect upon such happy incidents in the history of a profession that probably offers more difficulties to the beginner than any other. Yet the very obstacles to success in it are apt to develop an intellectual agility and a flexibility of morals which, in the long run, may well lead not only to fortune, but to fame—of one sort or another. I recall an incident in my own career, upon my ingenuity in which, for a time, I looked back with considerable professional pride, until I found it a common practice among my elders and contemporaries of the criminal and even of the civil bar.

It so happened that I had an elderly client of such an exceedingly irascible disposition that he was always taking offence at imaginary insults and was ready to enter into litigation of the fiercest character at the slightest excuse. Now, though he was often in the right, he was nevertheless frequently in the wrong—and equally unreasonable in either case. He was turned over to me in despair by another and older attorney, who could do nothing with him and wished me joy in my undertaking. I soon found that the old gentleman's guiding principle was "Millions for defence, but not one cent for tribute." In other words, as he always believed himself to have been imposed upon, he litigated almost every bill that was presented to him, with the result that three times out of five judgment was given against him. He had himself studied for the bar and had a natural fondness for technicalities; and he was quite ready to pay handsomely any one he believed to be zealously guarding his interests.

He was, at the time I became acquainted with him, nearly seventy years of age and his chief diversion was to sit in my office and harangue me upon his grievances. Being a sort of sea-lawyer himself he was forever devising quaint defences and strange reasons why he should not pay his creditors; and he was ever ready to spend a hundred dollars in lawyers' fees in order to save fifty. This is the most desirable variety of client a lawyer can have.

One trifling weakness, common to mankind in general, gave him much encouragement; for he soon discovered that, rather than incur the trouble of hiring lawyers and going to court, his creditors would usually compound with him for considerably less than their just claims. This happened so frequently that he almost never paid a bill in the first instance, with the natural result that those who had sent him honest bills before, after one or two experiences with him, made it a practice to add thirty per cent. or so to the total, in order that they might later on gracefully reduce their demands without loss. Thus my client, by his peevishness, actually created the very condition regarding which, out of an overactive imagination, he had complained originally without just cause.

It so happened that the first matter in which he required my services was a dispute over a tailor's bill that he regarded as excessive. He had ordered a pair of trousers without inquiring the price and was shocked to discover that he had been charged three dollars more than for his last pair. The tailor explained at great length that the first had been summer weight and that these were winter weight; but to no purpose.

"You think you can take advantage of me because I'm an old man!" he shrieked in rage. "But you'll find out. Just wait until I see my lawyer!"

So down he came to my office and fumed and chattered for an hour or more about the extra three dollars on his trousers. If he had been less abusive the tailor might have overlooked the matter; but even a tailor has a soul, and this time the man swore to have the law on his cantankerous customer.

"Fight to the last ditch!" shouted the old man. "Don't yield an inch!"

A day or two later the tailor served my client, whose name was Wimbleton, with a summons and complaint; and I was forced to put in an answer, in which I took issue upon the reasonable value of the trousers. By the time I had drawn the papers and listened to my client's detailed history of the transaction, as well as his picturesque denunciation of his opponent, I had already put in about a hundred dollars' worth of my time without any prospect of a return. I knew that if the case were tried it would mean a day lost for myself and a judgment against my client. The old fellow had a large amount of property, however, and I was willing to take a loss if it meant future business. Yet the time involved and the trifling character of the suit annoyed me and I resolved to take it upon myself to settle the matter over my client's head.

On my way home I stopped in at the tailor's and told him to take his three dollars and discontinue his action, which he was glad enough to do. The next day I wrote Mr. Wimbleton that I had forced his enemy to capitulate—horse, foot, and dragoons—and that the suit had been withdrawn. My embarrassment may be imagined when my client arrived at the office in a state of delirious excitement and insisted not only on inviting me to dinner, but on paying me fifty dollars for services in giving him the satisfaction of beating the tailor. Instantly I saw a means of entirely satisfying the old man and earning some good fees without the slightest exertion.

The same method—although for another purpose—will be recalled by my readers as having been invoked by the unjust steward who called his lord's debtors to him and inquired how much they owed. One, if I remember correctly, said a hundred measures of oil.

"Take thy bill," said the steward, "and sit down quickly, and write fifty."

Another, who confessed to owing a hundred measures of wheat, the steward let off with eighty. On discovering what he had done his lord commended him for having done wisely, on the ground that the children of this world were wiser than the children of light.

Thus, it will be observed, my early Biblical training stood me in practical stead; and the only difference between the unjust steward and myself lay in the manner in which we were each eventually treated by our respective masters. Indeed, I found this Scriptural scheme so profitable and effective that soon my client swore I was the cleverest lawyer he had ever employed.

Some one would commence a suit against him for damages for breach of contract amounting to a couple of thousand dollars, where he thought he ought to pay only fifteen hundred, but where he really had no defense. I would file an elaborate answer setting up all sorts of defences, move for an examination of the plaintiff and of his books and papers, secure a bill of particulars and go through all sorts of legal hocus-pocus to show how bitterly I was contesting the case as a matter of principle. Before the action came to trial, however, I would settle it for one thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars, telling my client that we had brought the other side to his terms, and charge him seven hundred and fifty dollars for my services—thus netting five hundred dollars in fees.

Often, when the amount sued for was small—say, fifty or one hundred dollars—and where my client had absolutely declined to pay anything, I paid the claim in full, simply for the satisfaction of leading him to believe that he had been successful in resisting what he regarded as an unjust or excessive demand.

This went on for several years, until, quite by chance, one of his creditors, with whom I had settled over his head, either out of forgetfulness or an evil wish to do me a bad turn, wrote him a letter thanking him for his generosity. The next day he appeared, purple with rage, and for some unaccountable reason, instead of "commending" me, denounced me for a shyster. And this in spite of the undoubted fact that my pacific methods had probably saved him hundreds of dollars!

It was about this time that Gottlieb devised a truly brilliant scheme, which had to commend it the highly desirable quality of being absolutely safe.

There is a very wise provision of our law to the effect that, where a wife desires to bring an action against her husband for divorce and is without means for the purpose, the courts will allow her a counsel fee and alimony pendente lite. The counsel fee is to enable her to pay a lawyer and prepare for trial, and the amount usually varies from one hundred to one thousand dollars.

One morning my partner came grinning into my office and showed me a very soiled and wrinkled paper.

"What d'ye think of that?" he laughed.

The document, which turned out to be an affidavit executed in

Chicago, read as follows:

"STATE OF ILLINOIS )

"COOK COUNTY, CITY OF CHICAGO ) ss.

"LIZZIE YARNOWSKI, being duly sworn, deposes and says that she is over twenty-one years of age and engaged in the employment of making artificial flowers; that in the year 1881 the defendant induced her to leave her home in New York and journey with him in the West under a promise of marriage, representing himself to be a traveling salesman employed by a manufacturer of soda fountains; that they were married on July 5, 1881, in the town of Piqua, Ohio, by a justice of the peace under the names of Sadie Bings and Joshua Blank, and by a rabbi in Chicago on August 17, 1881; that two weeks thereafter defendant deserted plaintiff and has never since contributed toward her support, and that she has since learned that the defendant is a banker and a broker, doing business on Wall Street in the city of New York."

The affidavit then went on to state that the defendant had given the plaintiff good grounds for seeking for a divorce and that she was without means to engage counsel or prepare for trial. The contents of the paper was skilfully worded so as to convey the impression that the deponent was a woman of somewhat doubtful character herself, but that on the other hand she had been tricked by the defendant into a secret—and what he intended to be a temporary—marriage. Attached thereto was another affidavit from the justice of the peace to the effect that on the date in question he had united in the holy bonds of matrimony a man and a woman who had given the names of Sadie Bings and Joshua Blank.

"Well, Gottlieb," said I, "this is interesting reading, whether it be fact or fiction; but what is its significance to us?"

"Why," answered my associate, "these are the papers I propose to use on a motion for counsel fee and alimony in a divorce action brought against Mr. Chester Gates, a broker downtown—and, I may add, a very rich and respectable young gentleman. Of course, I have no personal knowledge of the matter, as the case has been sent to us by one of our legal friends in Chicago; but I am quite sure that the court will grant me a counsel fee in order to enable the poor woman to prepare her case and bring it to trial."

"But," I replied, "we have made just such applications a thousand times before, have we not?"

Gottlieb gave me one of his long, slow winks.

"Not just like this," said he, and went back into his room, while

I pondered on what I had read.

A few days later Gottlieb served the complaint in an action for absolute divorce upon Mr. Chester Gates, to the young man's great indignation and annoyance; and shortly thereafter a very respectable and prosperous old family lawyer called upon us to explain that the whole matter was a mistake and that his client had never, never been married, and knew no Miss Lizzie Yarnowski, either as Sadie Bings or under any other name.

Gottlieb and I treated him with the greatest deference, explaining that we had no option but to go on with the matter, as we were only acting for our Chicago correspondent. At this the old lawyer grew very indignant and muttered something under his breath about perjury and blackmail, to which, however, neither Gottlieb nor I paid any attention. A week or so later we made our motion for alimony and counsel fee pendente lite, and in spite of the vehement affidavit of Chester Gates, Esquire, that he had never seen or heard of the plaintiff nor been married to anybody in his life, the court granted us two hundred and fifty dollars as counsel fee.

This was made payable at our office, as the attorneys for plaintiff; and a day or two later Mr. Gates himself called and asked to see us. He was a rosy-cheeked, athletic young fellow, who could, I fancy, have knocked both our heads together had he chosen to do so.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," said he, closing the door and seating himself at Gottlieb's invitation. This is a very interesting experience you are putting me through. I am made the defendant in a divorce action and ordered to pay you two hundred and fifty dollars on affidavits that I know are perjured from start to finish. Well, if that's law I have nothing to say. Of course, you can't win your case, because you can't prove that I ever married anybody —which latter fact, of course, you very well know. I would never pay you a cent to settle this or any other unfounded suit, and I never did anything for which you or any other scoun—beg pardon, I mean lawyer—could blackmail me. But this is a new one on me. You have got a court order that I am to pay you two hundred and fifty dollars to bring a bogus action against myself. Well, here's my check for it. I congratulate you. Now, I'm amused to see what you're going to do next. I want to get something for my money."

Gottlieb took the check and rang a bell for the office boy.

"Take this over to the bank and cash it," he directed. "That's the first thing I'm going to do," turning to Gates. "The next is this." He opened the top drawer of his desk and took out a legal paper. "Here," said he, "is a discontinuance of the action, which I received this morning from Chicago. I suppose you have no objection to having the matter disposed of in that way? You'll take it?"

Mr. Gates looked at him for a moment and then burst out laughing.

"By George!" he exclaimed. "Take it? Of course I'll take it. I have no particular desire to go on with the litigation, I assure you. I fully expected to be adjudged the father of a large family of little Yarnowskis. But, now that the matter is settled, would you mind telling me who the lady really is?"

Gottlieb looked at him very solemnly and, to my horror, gave an imperceptible wink.

"All I can tell you, sir," he replied, "is that her name is Lizzie Yarnowski, and that you married her under the name of Sadie Bings before a justice of the peace at Piqua, Ohio."

At one time Gottlieb and I represented a very objectionable old party who ran a scurrilous "society" paper, chiefly for the opportunity it gave him to blackmail people. His method was the very simple one of publishing some unfounded scandal without using any names, and then to print a paragraph immediately following in which the real names of the parties appeared, ostensibly with relation to some other item of news:

"It is a well-known fact that a certain young society couple, both of whom have, to say the least, led rather lurid lives, are no longer on good terms and are carrying on—sub rosa—independent establishments. Mr. – prefers the upper West Side, while Mrs. – has a tidy little Louis XVI flat on Eleventh Street. Incidentally the family mansion remains at – Fifth Avenue.

"Mr. and Mrs. Kopeck Louis d'Or Jones are not going to Newport this summer. There is a persistent rumor that Mrs. Jones will remain with her mother on the Hudson, while her husband's plans are quite indefinite."

In point of fact it was Gottlieb who had invented this neat method of publishing scandal without any of the usual attendant risks. Generally what would happen would be that the day after the issuing of the number in which the objectionable article had appeared, Mr. Kopeck Louis d'Or Jones would call up the white-haired editor of Social Sifting on the telephone and tell him that he proposed to sue him for libel unless he printed an immediate retraction. Our client would thereupon refer him to Gottlieb, who would explain to Mr. Jones that the libel in question had no reference to him whatsoever; that he could hardly expect favorable items to appear about him unless he took a financial interest in the paper; and end by offering to negotiate a purchase for him of some of the stock. In many instances the injured parties would instantly take this means of insuring that no further publications of such a character should appear. The stock usually cost about ten thousand dollars, which went into the pocket of the "General," as he was called; and from that time on none but the most pleasing reflections could be found in the columns of his paper in regard to its new stockholder.