Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/120

 graduated from some college, but three months had not gone by before they all habitually came to me for help when they were puzzled over the Norman French of Littleton and the Latin citations of the law books. I went to the office sometimes as early as six o'clock in the mornings. When the rest went away for their vacations in the summer, I had the office to myself. I read the course prescribed, and very much more—the whole of Coke's Commentaries on Littleton, the three volumes of Addison on Contracts, Fearne on Remainders, Sugden on Vendors, Sugden on Powers and I dabbled in the Year Books. One hot summer day I sat with a book in a comfortable old Spanish chair at the window of the back room. Presently some one appeared at the door. I thought it was a tramp, the room being somewhat darkened, and I went on with my reading. The intruder came slowly over to my chair and said: “Will you kindly tell Mr. McCall, when he returns, that Joseph R. Ingersoll called and that no one arose to receive him?” Then he turned on his heel. The situation was uncomfortable, for Mr. McCall held him in the highest respect, and so had my father who corresponded with him.

An Irish woman named Margaret took care of the offices. She had a son, Willie, about sixteen years of age, an only child, who grieved her heart by hunting up wild companions and getting drunk. Ashenfelter, who had been in the office a short time with me, suddenly concluded to go on a sailing vessel around Cape Horn, and at the suggestion of Mr. McCall, Willie went with him. Margaret sadly let him go, and at the last moment tying a crucifix around his throat told him never to take it off. In a storm off the Rio de la Plata, Willie, for some purpose, went to the prow of the vessel and was washed overboard and lost. He had removed the crucifix and it lay on the deck. I still have it, and his poor mother never knew this part of the tragedy.

At that time the method of training lawyers for the work of the profession was to have the student read upon the 110