and this sum was awarded. A few days later his client received the following letter: "Madame, I am happy to say we have suc ceeded in obtaining the provision of 2,000 francs. I have handed 1,000 francs to your attorney, who has given me a receipt, and I am much obliged to you for the surplus in settlement of fees. In the early colonial days not much encouragement was offered to lawyers to come across and practise their profession here. The first Boston lawyer, Thomas Lechford, who hung out his shingle here in 1638, was not allowed to take fees as advo cate. Three years later things were no better, for the Body of Liberties declared that "every man that findeth himself unfit to plead his own cause in any court, can employ any man against whom the Court doth not except to help him, provided he give him no fee or reward for his pains. Virginia had also strict laws on this matter. In 1658 any lawyer who took compensation for pleading there was liable to a fine of five thousand pounds of tobacco. But in this regard a few hundred years has wrought a mighty change. A recent article in one of the popular magazines shows us to what vast proportions lawyers' fees have developed, and enlightens us also on the modern method of figuring them out. In one of the big law firms in New York "every employee is required to. keep a record of the time spent on each client's affairs, and the exact amount of work done by each member of the firm is also registered. There is even a record of the time each client spends in the office. These things go to the fee clerk, who determines how much the case costs the office, including the office expenses. To this is added a regular percentage of profit, and the client's bill then goes to the auditor, who decides whether the result to the client justi fies the charge." Quite frequently nowadays we hear of single fees which are enormous—fees in fact
which exceed the entire earnings of some oí the most distinguished lawyers of twenty years ago. Take, for example, the astound ing fee received by William G. Moore, of Chicago—no less than five million dollars. This was for bringing together all the American tin plate manufacturing concerns and uniting them in one immense corpora tion. The task involved an almost incredible amount of thought, labor, patience, courage, and even audacity; but it fell into the right man's hands and he carried it through most successfully. It should be said that a con siderable portion of his reward was in the form of stock in the new company. Lawyer James B. Dill seems to come second, with a tidy little fee of one million in cold cash. Mr. Dill was called upon to settle a dispute between Andrew Carnegie and his chief associate, Mr. Henry C. Frick. After a quarter of a million had been swallowed up in litigation, and millions threatened to go in the same way, Mr. Dill succeeded in convincing the litigants that by patching up their difficulties and reor ganizing an enormous profit would result for all concerned. They took his advice, and he their very handsome check. Half a million dollars is an encouraging compensation, and this was received by Mr. Levy Mayer for his services in safely steer ing the Ogden Gas Company into the Chicago Gas Trust. Several two hundred thousand dollar fees might be mentioned, among them the one paid to Edward Lauterbach for reorganizing the Third Avenue Railroad Company, and that paid to Messrs. Cromwell and Sullivan by the Northern Pacific Railroad. Perhaps the most easily earned fee on record was the quarter of a million dollar une paid to the late William M. Evarts a few years ago. He was asked a single ques tion, viz.: Whether or not a certain great corporation had the legal right to exist. He answered it with a single word, "Yes.
