th lands of vast extent. Ladies with a little capital go
home content when he has invested their money in mortgage of real
property. Still the work goes on increasing; additional clerks have to be
employed; a fresh wing has to be built to the old house. He has, too, his
social duties; he is, perhaps, the head or mainspring of a church
movement--this is not for profit, but from conviction. His lady is carried
to and fro in the brougham, making social visits. He promotes athletic
clubs, reading-rooms, shows, exhibitions. He is eagerly seized upon by
promoters of all kinds, because he possesses the gift of organisation. It
becomes a labour merely to catalogue his engagements like this. Let the
rain rain, or the sun shine, the pen never stays work.

Personally he is the very antithesis is of what might be predicated of the
slow, comfortable, old-fashioned lawyer. He is in the prime of life,
physically full of vigour, mentally persevering with untiring
perseverance, the embodiment of energy, ever anxious to act, to do rather
than to delay. As you talk with him you find his leading idea seems to be
to arrange your own half-formed views for you; in short, to show you what
you really do want, to put your desire into shape. He interprets you. Many
of the clients who come to him are the most impracticable men in the
world. A farmer, for instance, with a little money, is in search of a
farm. Find him twenty farms just the size for his capital, he will visit
them all and discover a fault in each, and waver and waver till the proper
season for entering on possession is past. The great problem with country
people is how to bring them to the point. You may think you have got all
your witnesses ready for the train for London, and, as the bell rings,
find that one has slipped away half a mile to talk with the blacksmith
about the shoeing of his mare. Even the squire is trying when, he talks of
this or that settlement. Of course, as he is educated, no lengthy and
oft-repeated explanations are needed; but the squire forgets that time is
valuable, and lingers merely to chat. He has so much time to spare, he is
apt to overlook that the solicitor has none. The clergyman will talk,
talk, talk in rounded periods, and nothing will stop him; very often he
drives his wife in with him from the village, and the wife must have her
say. As for Hodge and his mortgage, ten years would not suffice for his
business, were he allowed to wander on. The proble