There is much of his character as a Judge which cannot be preserved, except in the faithful memory of those whose happiness it was to enjoy his judicial presence. I refer particularly to his mode of conducting business. Even the passing stranger bore witness to his suavity of manner on the bench, while all practitioners in the courts where he presided so long attest the marvellous quickness with which he seized habitually the points of a case, often anticipating the slower movements of counsel, and leaping, or, I might almost say, flying, to the proper conclusion. Napoleon's perception, at the head of an army, was not more rapid. Nor can I forget the scrupulous care with which he assigned reasons for every portion of his opinions, showing that it was not _he_ who spoke with the voice of authority, but the _law_, whose organ he was. In the history of the English bench there are but two names with combined eminence as Judge and Author,--Coke and Hale,--unless, indeed, the "Ordinances in Chancery," from the Verulamian pen, should entitle Lord Bacon to this distinction, and the judgments of Lord Brougham should vindicate the same for him. Blackstone's character as judge is lost in the fame of the Commentaries. To Story belongs this double glory. Early in life he compiled an important professional work; but it was only at a comparatively recent period, after his mind had been disciplined by the labors of the bench, that he prepared those elaborate Commentaries which have made his name a familiar word in foreign countries. They who knew him best observed the lively interest which he took in this extension of his renown. And most justly; for the voice of distant foreign nations comes as from a living posterity. His works have been reviewed with praise in the journals of England, Scotland, Ireland, France, and Germany. They are cited as authorities in all the Courts of Westminster Hall; and one of the ablest and most learned jurists of the age, whose honorable career at the bar has opened to him the peerage,--Lord Campbell,--in the course of debate in the House of Lords, accorded to their author an exalted place, saying that he "had a greater reputation as a legal writer than any author England could boast since the days of Blackstone."[117] [117] Hansard, LXVIII. 667.