their college, he told them plainly they had not taken one right step; for as they had proceeded, the law was every way against them. But if they caused an information or bill in Chancery in the name of Mr. Attorney General to be preferred, as for having the benefit of a pious and charitable use (in all which, the crown is interested, and may by the attorney in that manner, call for a due application of it) the court, by virtue of an original jurisdiction of charities, will decree it, and no battle, nor other impedimental forms of law, shall stand against that equity. They took the course he directed, and obtained a decree for the estate, which they hold at this day, and have owned his lordship's good advice to them as the greater benefaction of the two. This counsel now would seem no great reach; because that course is become more frequent: but, before that time it was a learning that lay out of the common road, and had been very rarely practised; and I presume it might be gathered by his lordship, in his dealing under Sir Jeoffry Palmer ; for there is little directly in the books tending to it.

veyancer.

I shall recite no more of these particular cases, A good conwherein his lordship signalized himself, but proceed to another head; and that is, conveyancing. I can with assurance say, that he was no less expert, at that sort of practice, than any one of his

time, although professing no other. And he dispatched a great deal, especially of the most intricate kind, that is, settlements in noble families who entirely relied upon him. And in these are commonly found so many entails, trusts, terms, powers, jointures, rents, &c. that it is very difficult to clear the way to come at a new settlement; and then to compile it so as to answer all the ends and exigences of the families, will always require a workman. But besides his knowledge of the law, gained by reading, he had, as I must always remember, the benefit of many useful notions and hints from Sir Jeoffry Palmer, not one iota of which was lost upon him.

Methods of He had a comprehensive turn of thought and a dispatch.

dexterous application of it to the subject before him; and he always crept as near to the truth of things as was possible; and as he had a great command of language and words, he had also a judgment to choose the most apt and intelligible, and withal a natural clearness of disposition and method; all which, as I said, rendered him a conveyancer inferior to none. At the beginning of his business he had no clerk, and not only drew but ingrossed instruments himself, and, when he was in full practice, he scrupled not to write any thing himself. A lady in Norfolk told me he made up some agreements for her; and, at the sealing, a bond was wanted, and there was no

attorney, or clerk, at hand to draw it, so they were at a stand and then he took the pen, and said, "I think it will not foul my fingers if I do it myself;" and thereupon he made the bond, and it was sealed. I have often heard him complain of the community of the conveyancers, and say that some of them were pack-horses, and could not go out of their road. After his bar practice grew up to ingross his whole time, and the business of the crown in Westminster Hall began to lean upon him, he only superintended in the conveyancing province; leaving searches, perusals, and extract-making to others that he thought fit to recommend, and, after he had directed, took the finishing to himself. By this way of committing clients to certain practisers, on whom he could rely for the working part, he helped them into credit and business; and particularly one Mr. Thomas Syderfin (an author of reports) was introduced, and, under his lordship, and in very important concerns, in some families, relied on.

derfin. A

But strange mis

fortune of

This Mr. Syderfin was a Somersetshire gentle- Character man, and proved a very good lawyer, as the book of Mr. Sytwo volumes in folio of Reports of his shows. he was not a better lawyer than a kind and good- his widow. natured friend; having very good qualities under a rustic behaviour and more uncouth physiognomy. He used at the Temple to be described by his hatchet face, and shoulder of mutton hand,

and he walked splay, stooping and noddling. His lordship used his conversation chiefly for his assistance in matters of law, wherein he was of great use and service to him. For when his multiplicity of active business would not allow him to consult in cases that he wished well to, as well for friendship and relation as for fees, he usually substituted Mr. Syderfin to consult the books for him, as he himself had done before for Sir Jeoffry Palmer. And this leading the persons concerned to attend him by Mr. Attorney's direction, they, finding him industrious, careful, and learned, continued to use him as their immediate counsel in other smaller concerns, wherein Mr. Attorney was not concerned; which brought him into very considerable business, as well in conveyancing as at the bar. For his probity, and exact justice to his clients, was a great recommendation of him; for he had no tenters to hang their dependences upon, to make them drop fat, as some have had and done. But he died before his friend Mr. Attorney was made the chief of the Common Pleas; else, it is probable he might, by his means, have been taken into the wheel of preferment. The only thing which I ever heard him blamed for, was the marrying a lady, that was his ward, before her minority was expired; which, by the world's allowance, makes her entirely capable to dispose of herself. And it

seems an ill use made of a trust, and the authority of a guardian, to take advantage of a minor's being a great fortune much above him, and anticipate her free choice, by influencing her to marry him. But the lady had no cause to repent; for he was so good a man, as could not but make her happy; and that probably, young as she was, she was satisfied of, by experience of his general behaviour towards her and others; which might make her determine so early. For she had a very good understanding, and had occasion to serve herself of all her thinking and judgment under an immense misfortune that befel her when she was a widow. For, being a great fortune, one Sarsfield ran away with her, and carried her over into France, where, by the greatest accident, the abuse was discovered, and the raptor seized, she protected, and both sent home; and the former, upon her most ingenious relation of the fact, sworn in a trial at the King's Bench bar, convict and punished.

relation.

His lordship, having taken that advanced post, Assisted a and designing to benefit a relation, (the honourable Roger North,) who was a student in the law, and kept him company, caused his clerk to put into his hands all his draughts, such as he himself had corrected, and after which conveyances had been ingrossed, that, by a perusal of them, he might get some light into the formal skill of con