on of an intellectual
difficulty. When I was seeking some remedy at his hands,
especially in equity, I used to say that I thought I had a
just case, but I was afraid his Honor might think the legal
difficulties were insuperable and I did not know whether I
could get his Honor's approbation of what I asked. He would
instantly rouse himself and seem to take the suggestion as
a challenge, and if it were possible for human ingenuity to
find a way to accomplish what I wanted he would do it. He
preserved the sweetness and joyous spirit of boyhood to the
day of his death. It was delightful to catch him when he
was at leisure, to report to him any pleasant story that was
going about, and to hear his merry laugh and pleasant voice.
He was a model of the judicial character. It was a delight
to practise before him at _nisi prius._ I have known a great
many admirable lawyers and a good many very great Judges.
I have known some who had more learning, and some, I suppose,
though very few, who had greater vigor of intellect. But
no better Judge ever sat in a Massachusetts court-house. Dwight
Foster felicitously applied to him the sentence which was first
uttered of Charles James Fox, that "his intellect was all
feeling, and his feeling all intellect."

Dwight Foster came to the Bar just a week after I did. But
I ought not to omit him in any account of the Massachusetts
lawyers or Judges of my time. He rose rapidly to a place
in the first rank of Massachusetts lawyers, which he held
until his untimely death. He was graduated the first scholar
in his class at Yale in 1848. Before he was graduated he
became engaged to a very admirable and accomplished lady,
daughter of Roger S. Baldwin, Governor of Connecticut and
United States Senator, then head of the Connecticut Bar. This
lady had some tendency to a disorder of the lungs and throat
which had proved fatal to two of her brothers. Dwight Foster
was very anxious to get her away from New Haven, where he
thought the climate and her habit of mingling in gay society
very unfavorable to her health. So he set himself to work
to get admitted to the Bar and get established in business
that he might have a place for her in Worcester. He was examined
by Mr. Justice Metcalf, after studying a little more than
a year, and found possessed of attainments uncommon even for
persons who had studied the full three years and had been
a good while at the Bar. Judge Metcalf admitted him, a