mong American counties in the value of its agricultural products,
and the proportion of the value of the product to the value
of the lands. It was the spot on the face of the earth where
labor got the largest proportion of the joint product of labor
and capital. The farmers made an excellent living. They
made excellent legislators, excellent town officers, excellent
jurors, and excellent clients. I have been at some time or
other in my life counsel for every one of the fifty-two towns
in Worcester County. I had a large clientage among the farmers.
In the intimacy of that relation I got a knowledge of the
inmost soul and heart of a class of men who I think constituted
what was best in American citizenship, a knowledge which has
been a great educational advantage to me and valuable in a
thousand ways in my public and professional life.

From the first of December, 1849, until the fourth of March,
1869, I was diligently employed in my profession, save for
a single year's service in each house of the Massachusetts
Legislature. But during all that time I kept a very zealous
interest in political affairs. I was Chairman of the County
Committee for several years, made political speeches occasionally,
presided at political meetings, always attended the caucus
and was in full sympathy and constant communication with the
Free Soil and Republican leaders.

The Worcester Bar in my time afforded a delightful companionship.
It was like a college class in the old days. My best and
most cordial friends were the men whom I was constantly encountering
in the courts. The leaders of the Bar when I was admitted
to it,--Charles Allen, Emory Washburn, Pliny Merrick, Benjamin
F. Thomas, Peter C. Bacon,--would have been great leaders
at any Bar in the United States, or on any circuit in England.
Study at a law school is invaluable to the youth if he is
to rise in his profession; but there is no law school like
a court-house when such men are conducting trials. The difficult
art of cross-examination, the more difficult art of refraining
from cross-examination, can only be learned by watching men
who are skilled in the active conduct of trials.

The Supreme Court of Massachusetts at that day with Chief
Justice Shaw at its head was without an equal in the country
and not surpassed by the Supreme Court of the United States
itself. I can conceive of no life more delightful than that
of a lawyer in good health, and with good capacity