Page:Eminent English liberals in and out of Parliament.djvu/93

 's Inn, where he would have been duly "called" had not the terrible calamity to which I have already alluded intervened.

In the autumn of 1858 he was one day out with a small party engaged in partridge-shooting. A covey rose, and flew over a slight elevation, on the remote side of which Mr. Fawcett had momentarily disappeared. A companion unfortunately fired at the instant his head topped the rising ground; and two pellets, with something like diabolic precision, neatly perforating the spectacles he was wearing, lodged themselves in the retinæ of the eyes, and "at one stride came the dark." From that day to this,

The pain of the accident was soon over, and it remained for Mr. Fawcett to consider how far so irreparable a mischance had necessarily affected his habits of life and future prospects. His invincible pluck did not desert him for a moment. Luckily his academic training was completed; and the benchers of Lincoln's Inn, on hearing the sad facts of the case, considerately offered to "call" him to the bar without further to-do. He might succeed as a counsel in spite of his blindness. Armed with logic, imperturbability, and physical endurance such as his, one might undoubtedly accomplish much. Still, the drawbacks to a successful professional career were undeniable; and Mr. Fawcett, wisely it seems to me, resolved not to encounter them, but to take a straighter cut to Parliament.