declared that he must immediately put himself again into harness.
"Ten weeks of idleness," said he, "is more than a man can well afford
who has to look to himself for everything; and I have now given
myself eleven."

"And what are you going to do?"

"Do! work all day and read all night. Take notice of all the dullest
cases I can come across, and read the most ponderous volumes that
have been written on the delightful subject of law. A sucking
barrister who means to earn his bread has something to do--as you
will soon know."

Bertram soon learnt--now for the first time, for Harcourt himself
had said nothing on the subject--that his friend's name was already
favourably known, and that he had begun that career to which he so
steadily looked forward. His ice was already broken: he had been
employed as junior counsel in the great case of Pike _v_ Perch; and
had distinguished himself not a little by his success in turning
white into black.

"Then you had decidedly the worst of it?" said Bertram to him, when
the matter was talked over between them.

"Oh, decidedly; but, nevertheless, we pulled through. My opinion all
along was that none of the Pikes had a leg to stand upon. There were
three of them. But I won't bore you with the case. You'll hear more
of it some day, for it will be on again before the lords-justices in
the spring."

"You were Pike's counsel?"

"One of them--the junior. I had most of the fag and none of the
honour. That's of course."

"And you think that Perch ought to have succeeded?"

"Well, talking to you, I really think he ought; but I would not admit
that to any one else. Sir Ricketty Giggs led for us, and I know he
thought so too at first; though he got so carried away by his own
eloquence at last that I believe he changed his mind."

"Well, if I'd thought that, I wouldn't have held the brief for all
the Pikes that ever swam."

"If a man's case be weak, then, he is to have no advocate? That's
your idea of justice."

"If it be so weak that no one can be got to think it right, of course
he should have no advocate."

"And how are you to know till you have taken the matter up and sifted
it? But what you propose is Quixotic in every way. It will not hold
water for a moment. You know as well as I do that no barrister would
keep a wig on his head who pretended to such a code of morals in his
profession. Such a doctrine is a doctrine of puritanism--or purism,
which is worse. All this moonshine