Legal Reminiscences. hard circumstances of his childhood and youth — his total failure in all his under takings, until he commenced the study of the law — the death of the lovely girl who was his first and perhaps his only love — his early defeats as a candidate — his slow advance in the State Legislature, and more than all his bitter poverty, would have dis couraged the majority of men, and they made him melancholy and at times morose. He studied the role of the raconteur, not for the love of it, but as a means of getting business and of commending himself to his brethren of the profession. But in one point he never failed. When he had a case, how ever small, he studied and prepared it. He was consequently successful in the most of his cases, just as the reader of these notes may be if he will follow Mr. Lincoln's example. I shall refer to only two cases to illustrate my view of the reason of Mr. Lincoln's suc cess at the Bar, which I believe was the ground of his success in the higher posi tions to which he was called. One of them was the Armstrong murder case, or the trial of the son of his old friend on the charge of murder. Others have described the pathetic incidents of this case and its beautiful illus tration of the gratitude of the advocate. I refer to it as an illustration of Mr. Lincoln's thoughtfulness and studious preparation. The murder had been committed in the night time. A party of roughs, all armed, were at a camp meeting for the purpose of disturbing it. Armstrong was one of them. All had been boisterous and riotous. An attempt was made to quiet them; one of them fired a shot, the victim fell and died on the spot. When one of the companions of Armstrong declared that he plainly saw Armstrong fire the fatal shot and the victim fall, he apparently placed the hang man's noose around Armstrong's neck. It was not strange that the popular belief in his guilt was universal, that Armstrong would have been lynched if he had not secretly been removed to a distant county.
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A case is seldom so desperate that a sharp eye cannot find some crevice into which the point of the lever of truth cannot be driven. Lincoln found it in the Arm strong case. How, in the darkness, could the witness see who fired the shot? The hour was too late for any possible daylight. Lincoln ascertained that the atmosphere had been thick and murky. There was only one conclusion possible. If the wit ness saw the murder he must have been one of these described in the old ballad, who " see in the dark," for the moon did not rise until three hours after the murder was committed. livery one knows the result. To the alarm and distress of the mother of the accused, Mr. Lincoln seemed an indiffer ent spectator of the trial, until the false witness had given his testimony. He swore that he saw the murder by the light of the moon — he was confronted with the almanac, broke down, and there was a dramatic termination of the trial by a ver dict of acquittal. It was one of the few cases which occur where a single point made a conviction impossible. Whether considered as an illustration of character or in its influence upon the for tunes of the republic, one of the most important controversies ever brought into an American court, was an action which involved the validity of the early patents upon the harvesting or reaping machine, in which Mr. Lincoln and Edwin M. Stan ton were counsel on the same side. The title of the suit and the issues involved are unimportant. At that time (1858) Mr. Stanton had a high reputation as a patent lawyer. He was rude and incon siderate to his associates, overbearing to his adversaries, and no favorite of the judges. Mr. Lincoln by his age and posi tion was entitled to make the closing argu ment. He had made thorough and exhaus tive preparation to that end. Mr. Stanton deliberately forced him out of the way, and
