Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 09.pdf/24

 A Quintette of Legal Nestors. torney throughout his term as Recorder, and can therefore bear full testimony to his deep knowledge of criminal jurisprudence; to his judicial tact in tempering justice with mercy; and to the steady hand with which he ever held the scales that Justice entrusted to him. Before his elevation to the Bench he had been in company with Ambrose L. Jordan, the Graham Brothers, James T. Brady, and Henry L. Clinton, an acknowl edged leader of the New York criminal Bar. It is one of Smith's tributes that he lost a renomination because in his firmness and integrity he had displeased the leaders of his party. Albert Mathews may be practically con sidered as the only member of the quin tette of Nestors against whose name some might be tempted to write the word " re tired." But by no means " on half pay"; for his forty years' practice at the Bar brought him deserved independence, and has allowed him leisure in late years to prepare and publish a delightful volume of essays under the nom de plume of Paul Siegvolk, — essays that now remind of the vivacity of Elia, again of the philosophy of De Quincey or of the critiques of William Hazlitt; and anon of the sparkle of Sydney Smith, that witty canon of old St. Paul's in London. In the younger days of Mathews at the New York Bar, when Chancery practice was in vogue and bills were to be drawn at so much a folio to become taxed costs, those bills that came under his drafting as a member of the great law firm of Blunt, Brown & Mathews, whereof he is Nestorial survivor, became although founded on fact, as enticing in style as if founded on fancy and fiction. He was then in appearance an elderly young lawyer; the while his antique gold spectacles beamed persuasively on jurors and judges; but he can now be called reversely a youthful elderly so far as head and heart and still juvenile inspiration are accounted. He began prac tice in the era when Prince Albert of England was a celebrity, and the familiars of

Mathews dubbed him by virtue of his christian name Prince Albert. To one extent the name was appropriate; for he had a German bearing like the Prince Consort and was equally diplomatic in conduct; the which latter quality made him an excellent office-adviser with clients. His partner Blunt was the orator of the firm and owed much of his fame in courts to the elaborate briefs which Prince Albert prepared. John Townshend as a septuagenarian — although none would think him one to see his vigorous English stride — is to my mind the most legal-looking member of the New York Bar. Tall and stately, he has a lean, but not a hungry, Cassius-like appearance, as betokening laborious days and nights with study that prevented undue atten tion to creature comforts. His Roman face is lined with thought, and his piercing eyes suggest a man pursuing a constant crossexamination of things, men and measures. You would find replicas of his face in the prints of many ancient lawyers. He exhib its a stern countenance until something oc curs to soften it with smiles. Antagonistic and assertive of rights in court, he is in pri vate life genial, tender, kind and courteous. But let no one in pronouncing his surname omit sounding the " sh " in it. Towns-end is a later-day patronymic, while Town-shend goes back to earliest Saxon times. The last syllabic has a meaning of " to over power or surpass." Wherefore the poet Spenser lines it thus: — "She passed the rest, as Cynthia doth shend The lesser stars."

This application can appertain to Nestor Townshend, for no one can possibly surpass him as a conveyancer or delver in the lore of the law appertaining to realty. Of Brit ish birth, he was an English solicitor before emigrating to New York, and naturally brought with him that leaning toward the Coke upon Lyttleton doctrines of real estate which English solicitors, to whom are