d Lord Eldon; "he sent me a message on his death-bed, to
request that I would make a point of attending public worship every
Sunday, and that the place should be the Church of England."

An excellent anecdote, illustrative of the advantages of knowing some
thing of every thing, is given on a trial at Carlisle. Bearcroft, a
celebrated advocate, was brought down on a special retainer of three
hundred guineas, in a salmon fishery cause. Scott led on the other side;
and at a consultation held the evening before, it was determined to
perplex Bearcroft, by examining all the witnesses in the dialect of
Cumberland, and, as it appears, in the _patois_ of the fishermen.
Accordingly, when Scott began to cross-examine his first witness, who
said a good deal out the salmon good and bad, he asked whether they were
obliged to make _ould soldiers_ of any of them. Bearcroft asked for an
explanation of the words, which Scott would not give him. He then asked
the judge, who answered that he did not know. After a squabble, the
phrase was explained; but nearly every other question produced a similar
scene. The jury were astonished that neither judge nor Bearcroft
understood what they all understood so well, and they inferred from
Bearcroft's ignorance that he had a rotten cause. The consequence was,
that Bearcroft lost the cause; and he swore that no fee should ever
tempt him to come among such a set of barbarians as the Cumberland men
again.

An _ould soldier_ is made by hanging up in a chimney a salmon caught out
of season, when the fish is white instead of red, and it acquires by
hanging the colour of an old red coat.

Cross-examination may sometimes produce peril to the performer. At the
assizes, Scott once examined a barber severely. The barber got into a
great passion, and Scott desired him to moderate his anger, and that he
should employ him to shave him as he passed through Kendal to the
Lancaster assizes. 'The barber said, with great indignation, "I would
not advise you, lawyer, to think of that, or risk it."

Scott's reputation was now rising year by year, in both Parliament and
his profession; and Lord Mansfield's resignation, in 1788, of the
chief-justiceship of the King's Bench making a general move in the
higher orders of the bar, Scott was appointed solicitor-general, Kenyon
being appointed to the chief-justiceship, and the attorney-general,
Arden, succeeding to the Rolls. On this occasion he was knighted. A
melancholy ev