Merchants' Sons Are Sometimes Initiated Into The Same
Business Their Fathers Follow; But If They Find An Estate Gotten To
Their Hands, Many Of Them Choose Rather To Become Country Gentlemen.
As to the lawyers or barristers, these also are frequently the
younger sons of good families; and the elder brother too is
sometimes entered of the Inns of Court, that he may know enough of
the law to keep his estate.
A lawyer of parts and good elocution seldom fails of rising to
preferment, and acquiring an estate even while he is a young man. I
do not know any profession in London where a person makes his
fortune so soon as in the law, if he be an eminent pleader. Several
of them have of late years been advanced to the peerage; as Finch,
Somers, Cowper, Harcourt, Trevor, Parker, Lechmere, King, Raymond,
&c., scarce any of them much exceeding forty years of age when they
arrived at that honour.
The fees are so great, and their business so engrosses every minute
of their time, that it is impossible their expenses should equal
their income; but it must be confessed they labour very hard, are
forced to be up early and late, and to try their constitutions to
the utmost (I mean those in full business) in the service of their
clients. They rise in winter long before it is light, to read over
their briefs; dress, and prepare themselves for the business of the
day; at eight or nine they go to Westminster, where they attend and
plead either in the Courts of Equity or Common Law, ordinarily till
one or two, and (upon a great trial) sometimes till the evening. By
that time they have got home, and dined, they have other briefs to
peruse, and they are to attend the hearings, either at the Lord
Chancellor's or the Rolls, till eight or nine in the evening; after
which, when they return to their chambers, they are attended by
their clients, and have their several cases and briefs to read over
and consider that evening, or the next morning before daylight;
insomuch that they have scarce time for their meals, or their
natural rest, particularly at the latter end of a term. They are
not always in this hurry; indeed, if they were, the best
constitution must soon be worn out; nor would anyone submit to such
hardships who had a subsistence, but with a prospect of acquiring a
great estate suddenly; for the gold comes tumbling into the pockets
of these great lawyers, which makes them refuse no cause, how
intricate or doubtful soever. And this brings me to consider the
high fees that are usually taken by an eminent counsel; as for a
single opinion upon a case, two, three, four, and five guineas; upon
a hearing, five or ten; and perhaps a great many more; and if the
cause does not come on till the next day, they are all to be fee'd
again, though there are not less than six or seven counsel of a
side.
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