meeting, I say 'eyther;' but if I am address ing a jury, I say 'eether.' For the jurymen are drawn from the common walks of life, and if I were to say 'eyther,' 'some juryman's at tention might be directed from my line of argument or reasoning, by turning over in his mind the question why I should say 'eyther' instead of 'eether,' and in that way I would lose my grasp upon him and fail to lead him to the conclusion to which I desire to bring him." Mr. Hendricks greatly loved the practice of the law; and no part of it better than the trial of a case. "In capacity for rapid absorption of a case," said Judge Walter Q. Gresham, after ward Secretary of State under President Oeveland, "arrangement of facts in their proper relation, and application of principles to facts, Mr. Hendricks greatly excelled. While he justly stood in the front rank of the profession, perhaps his real sphere was that of the advocate. In this line he had no superiors, perhaps no equals. As a lawyer (he was self-reliant and courageous, and when a case took a sudden and unexpected turn, and defeat seemed almost inevitable, he ex hibited rare skill and great reserve power. It was on such occasions he appeared to best advantage. His style of speaking was ad mirable; while he was earnest—at times vehement—he was always graceful and digni fied, and therefore pleasing and persuasive. His equanimity and uniform courtesy to the court and bar, in defeat as well as victory, was worthy of all praise." "The law to me has always been a fascinat ing business," Mr. Hendricks said upon one occasion. "I never go into a court room to try a case but it seems picturesque ground to me. I like to watch a case begin and ex pand, and see the various kinds of charac ters that attend it." "His deportment toward his brethren of the bar," said Judge Turpie at the bar meet ing held after his demise, "the jury, his
auditors and especially toward the officer pre siding, was the model of courtesy and com plaisance. . . . He was especially able in adaption. Fact was closely fitted to fact, and the whole structure of circumstances dove tailed into the law of the case. The parts matched like mosaics in the most highly fin ished mechanism. To this was united a suave plausibility and a subtle economy which made much—the most—of the little that fell to his side. He had a copious command of familiar terms and expressions, even upon obstruse topics, which became his interpreters to the jury, and this kind of interpretation had for itself the choicest medium, a voice which Persuasion herself had attuned to the very touch." "He had many natural advantages," said Thomas M. Browne, Congressman from In diana, "a voice of melody, a pleasing coun tenance, a cultivated intelligence, a clear and easy elocution. There was in his manner in court and before the jury that which was captivating. When he spoke he had no re course to rambling epithets, stilted metaphor, or frenzied declamation. He wasted no time in his exordiums, but grappled the point in controversy without delay. His ideas were never trivial nor his language inflated. His words were generally of simple Saxon, his logic elevated and forcible; there was neither extravagance of expression nor of gesticula tion. Some of his contemporaries at the bar were more picturesque and vehement, but none were more graceful or adroit. He was at times touchingly eloquent, his pathos mov ing the feelings and moistening the. eye of the most obdurate. He resented an assault upon the instant, and sometimes with mar velous bitterness, but he always maintained a perfect mastery over his passions. He was both dignified and courteous in his bearing, and commanded the most respectful attention from all." About 1860 he and William M. Evarts were engaged, with others of great ability, in the
