ught, and that this is the one recollection
remaining of his early tendency in speculation. The other is more
trustworthy, and exhibits that inventiveness which was characteristic
of his mind. He tells us in the _De Augmentis_ that when he was in
France he occupied himself with devising an improved system of
cypher-writing--a thing of daily and indispensable use for rival
statesmen and rival intriguers. But the investigation, with its call on
the calculating and combining faculties, would also interest him, as an
example of the discovery of new powers by the human mind.

In the beginning of 1579 Bacon, at eighteen, was called home by his
father's death. This was a great blow to his prospects. His father had
not accomplished what he had intended for him, and Francis Bacon was
left with only a younger son's "narrow portion." What was worse, he lost
one whose credit would have served him in high places. He entered on
life, not as he might have expected, independent and with court favour
on his side, but with his very livelihood to gain--a competitor at the
bottom of the ladder for patronage and countenance. This great change in
his fortunes told very unfavourably on his happiness, his usefulness,
and, it must be added, on his character. He accepted it, indeed,
manfully, and at once threw himself into the study of the law as the
profession by which he was to live. But the law, though it was the only
path open to him, was not the one which suited his genius, or his object
in life. To the last he worked hard and faithfully, but with doubtful
reputation as to his success, and certainly against the grain. And this
was not the worst. To make up for the loss of that start in life of
which his father's untimely death had deprived him, he became, for
almost the rest of his life, the most importunate and most untiring of
suitors.

In 1579 or 1580 Bacon took up his abode at Gray's Inn, which for a long
time was his home. He went through the various steps of his profession.
He began, what he never discontinued, his earnest and humble appeals to
his relative the great Lord Burghley, to employ him in the Queen's
service, or to put him in some place of independence: through Lord
Burghley's favour he seems to have been pushed on at his Inn, where, in
1586, he was a Bencher; and in 1584 he came into Parliament for Melcombe
Regis. He took some small part in Parliament; but the only record of his
speeches is contained in a surly note of Rec