with Maine, and
begins to perceive that he has really got a permanent footing. He used
to tell a story which I cannot perfectly recollect, but which was to the
following effect. He had felt very doubtful of his own performances;
Cook did not seem at first to be cordial, and possibly his attempts to
'form a style' upon the precedents of conveyancing were not altogether
successful. Feeling that he did not quite understand what was the style
which would win approval, he resolved that, for once, he would at least
write according to his own taste and give vent to his spontaneous
impulses, even though it might be for the last time of asking. To his
surprise, Cook was delighted with his article, and henceforward he was
able to write freely, without hampering himself by the attempt to
satisfy uncongenial canons of journalism.[68]

However this may be, he was certainly writing both abundantly and
vigorously during the following years. The 'Saturday Review,' like the
old 'Edinburgh,' was proud beyond all things of its independence. It
professed a special antipathy to popular humbugs of every kind, and was
by no means backward in falling foul of all its contemporaries for their
various concessions to popular foibles.

The writers were for the most part energetic young men, with the proper
confidence in their own infallibility, and represented faithfully enough
the main current of the cultivated thought of their day. The paper had
occasionally to reflect the High Church proclivities of its proprietor,
but the articles showing that tendency were in odd contrast to the
general line of argument, which more naturally expressed the contempt of
the enlightened for every popular nostrum. Fitzjames, in particular,
found occasions for energetically setting forth his own views. He had,
of course, a good many chances of dealing with legal matters. He writes
periodical articles upon 'the assizes' or discusses some specially
interesting case. He now and then gets a chance of advocating a
codification of the laws, though he admits the necessity of various
preliminary measures, and especially of a more philosophical system of
legal education. He denounces the cumbrous and perplexed state of the
law in general so energetically, that the arguments have to be stated as
those of certain reformers with whom the paper does not openly identify
itself.

As became a good Saturday reviewer, he fell foul of many popular idols.
One regular chopping-block