This is a step of doubtful wisdom to most men in the legal profession, for it is generally looked upon as the end of a man's career or the beginning. I had no doubt about the propriety of the step; it had been the object of my ambition, and I believe I should unhesitatingly have acted as I did even if it had been the termination of my professional life. My idea was to go forward in the career I had chosen. The junior work, if it had not lost its emoluments, no longer possessed the pleasurable excitement of the old days. It was never my ambition merely to "mark time;" that is unsatisfactory exertion, and leads no whither. But enough; I took silk, and a new life opened before me. I was a leader. My business rolled on in ever-increasing volume, so that I had to fairly pick my way through the constant downpour of briefs, but was always pressed forward by that useful institution known as the "barrister's clerk." Whatever business overwhelms the counsel, no amount of it would disconcert the clerk, and it is wonderful how many briefs he can arrange in upstanding attitude along mantelpieces, tables, tops of dwarf cupboards, windows--anywhere, in fact, where there is anything to stand a brief on--without that gentleman feeling the least exhausted. It would take as long to wear him out as to wear to a level the rocks of Niagara. The loss of a brief to him is almost like the loss of an eye. It would take a week after such a disaster to get the right focus of things. My clerk came rushing into my room one day so pale and excited that I wondered if the man had lost his wife or child. He did not leave me long in suspense as soon as he could articulate his words. "Sir," said he, "you know those Emmets that you have done so much for?" I remembered. "Well, sir, they've taken a brief to another counsel." It was a serious misfortune, no doubt, and I had to soothe him in the best manner I could; so to lessen the calamity I made the best joke I could think of in the circumstances, and said the Emmets were small people, almost beneath notice. I don't wonder that he did not see it with tears in his eyes; his distress was painful to witness. The poor fellow was dumbfounded, but at last shook his head, saying,-- "We've had a good deal from those Emmets, sir." "But you need not make mountains out of ant-hills." He did not see that either.