hich has settled all similar questions ever since. He then had an omen
of his prosperity. As he left the hall, a solicitor of some note touched
him on the shoulder, and said, "Young man, your bread and butter is cut
for life."

He then had another golden opportunity. Fatigued with waiting for
fortune, he was on the point of leaving London, and taking up his abode
at Newcastle, of which he was offered the recordership. A house was even
taken for him, when, one morning at six o'clock, Mr, afterwards Lord,
Curzon, and four or five other gentlemen, came to his door, mentioning
that the Clitheroe election case was to come on that morning at ten
before a committee of the Commons; that one of their counsel was
detained at Oxford by illness, and their second was unprepared and would
not appear; and that they were sent to him as a young and promising
counsel. Scott told them that, on so short a notice, all he could do
would be to give a dry statement of facts. The cause thus put into his
hands went on for fifteen days. "It found me poor," said Lord Eldon,
"but I was to be rich before it was done. They left me fifty guineas at
the beginning; then there were ten guineas every day, and five guineas
every evening, for a consultation--more money than I could count. But,
better still, the length of the cause gave me time to make myself
thoroughly acquainted with the law." After all this, the side on which
Scott was, was beaten by a single vote. But Mansfield, (afterwards Sir
James,) on hearing his speech in the committee, came up to him in
Westminster Hall, and strongly advised him to remain in London. Scott
answered that an increasing family compelled him to leave London.
Wilson, a barrister, advised as Mansfield had done, and even generously
offered to make up his income to L.400 a-year. He received the same
answer. "However," said the chancellor, with natural selfgratulation, "I
did remain, and lived to make Mansfield chief justice of the common
pleas, and Wilson a judge." Moreover, his sagacity gave him additional
triumphs on the northern circuit, where he soon took the lead. He was
counsel in a cause which depended on his being able to make out who was
the founder of an ancient chapel in the neighbourhood. "I went to view
it," said Lord Eldon. "There was nothing to be observed which gave any
indication of its date or history. However, I remarked that the ten
commandments were written on some old plaster, which, from its position,