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PROFESSIONAL REMUNERATION. ] By George: F. Tucker. ' I ""HERE is as much misunderstanding ■*. as misrepresentation concerning the remuneration received by attorneys for the conduct of causes and the general transaction of affairs. That a few eminent lawyers re ceive large compensation in exceptional cases is true; but it is equally true that the aver age practitioner earns hardly more than a fair rate of interest upon the money ex pended upon his classical education (if he has received one) and his preliminary train ing in the study of the law. Indeed, all professional men, even the most faithful and conscientious, are held up to popular ridicule, while the acts and services required of them in the discharge of their duties are frequently stigmatized as evidences of gross incapacity and pretentious shallowness. If the lawyer is sometimes charged with du plicity and exactions, he is fortunate in es caping the reputation enjoyed by so many clergymen for a kind of dissimulation be gotten of audacity, and by so many physi cians for a want both of discernment and medical skill. The experience of most lawyers is that there are two classes of clients who are generally disinclined to the prompt pay ment of bills for legal services and advice, — the extreme rich and the extreme poor. The former are prone to defer the day of settle ment, in order that they may save inter est upon their money, knowing well that the charges are generally proportionate to the time employed and the labor expended; but with the latter adjustment is impos sible, because they are destitute of means, — and even were they to become the sud den possessors of fortunes, they would ques tion items which from their standpoint and experience seem of tremendous magnitude. This erroneous view of the fairness of charges springs from ignorance of the operation of

social and political laws. The client esti mates the services of a lawyer as of no more value than those of a blacksmith or wheelwright. It seems the extreme of ex travagance to pay a few dollars for a little piece of paper or for the benefit of a brief conversation with a lawyer. But this want of appreciation is not wholly confined to the classes alluded to; most thrifty people are deficient in proper regard for professional learning and skill. The following story, founded on fact, presents an amusing phase of the subject. A few years ago some New England peo ple purchased a large tract of land in East Tennessee, with the intention of starting a settlement after the nature of Rugby, which, it will be remembered, despite the many good wishes for its prosperity, failed to succeed. They intended to profit by the mistakes of their predecessors, and they were foolish enough to think that New England tact and energy could accomplish what English pluck and intelligence had failed to achieve. They had the merit of realizing that they could not establish an ideal community like that attempted by the old New England transcendentalists; so, as they apprehended dif ferences and embarrassments, they concluded to take a lawyer with them; and an invita tion was extended to and accepted by a young lawyer, an acquaintance of the writer. After the collapse of the enterprise, this young lawyer returned to New England, where he narrated to an audience of inter ested friends his experiences in his tempo rary home in the practice of law. The tract of land adjoined the property of an old farmer who, though not rich in a worldly sense, possessed means sufficient to liquidate all obligations and leave a consider able surplus. By the " cracker " community he was regarded as a capitalist, and a man