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is way to a large and

lucrative practice, behind his compeers in this particular, any

more than in the drier parts of the legal race.

A favourite at the Old Bailey, and eke at the Sessions, Mr.

Stryver had begun cautiously to hew away the lower staves of the

ladder on which he mounted. Sessions and Old Bailey had now to

summon their favourite, specially, to their longing arms; and

shouldering itself towards the visage of the Lord Chief Justice in

the Court of King’s Bench, the florid countenance of Mr. Stryver

might be daily seen, bursting out of the bed of wigs, like a great

sunflower pushing its way at the sun from among a rank gardenful

of flaring companions.

It had once been noted at the Bar, that while Mr. Stryver was a

glib man, and an unscrupulous, and a ready, and a bold, he had

not that faculty of extracting the essence from a heap of

statements, which is among the most striking and necessary of the

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

advocate’s accomplishments. But, a remarkable improvement

came upon him as to this. The more business he got, the greater

his power seemed to grow of getting at its pith and marrow; and

however late at night he sat carousing with Sydney Carton, he

always had his points at his fingers’ ends in the morning.

Sydney Carton, idlest and most unpromising of men, was

Stryver’s great ally.