The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1885-02-07
BILL NYE AS ALAwYER.
The TrasicDeath Of His cIient-The sor-
row and Sadness Incident to an
Active Practice.

Active fractces
A dear friend ia Pennsylvania writes
me that he has learned casually that
some years ago 1 was member of the
legal profession, and he asks me to
state, if viii, publicly, whether that is
true, and, if so, why / abandoned the
profession.
1t is true that / did practice law in
the West for a short time, in a very
quiet kind of a way. After a few
months, however. abandoned my
lucrative practice to accept the port
folio of the Laramie City Postoflice.
During my brief but tempestuous career
as an attorney, paid out Sl20 for rent,
and drew chattel mortgage, which /
was never paid for. as near US l am able
to judge.
My principal reason, however, for
abandoning the profession, was the
sudden death of my client. When a
young lawyer has assiduously sat and
looked out of his Office window for two
months and client comes in and shows
signs of .intrusting business to him,
there springs up at once between the
two a warm friendship. Such was the
case with me. A middle-aged gentle
man came into my Office one day and
said he had been referred to me by a
party in town, and asked me if had
leisure to attend to him. / said that
would lay aside other matters and at
tend to him at once, if he wished. He
said it would be a great accommodation
if | would allow my other clients to ac-
cumulate in the hall for few moments,
and in the meantime do the business
that was on his mind. He had asked
Charlie Kitchen, at the Thoresburgh
House, to give him the name of some
poor young lawyer, and Kitchen had
told him that / was about the poorest
lawyer he knew of, SO he had come right
to me.
/ saw at once that he was a shrewd
business man, and l did all I could to
please him. He was delighted with
the promptness with which l had done
the work, and said he would have more
for me to do very soon, as he had pur-
chased the controlling interest in new
silver mine over at Jelm Mountain. On
the strength of this revival in trade, /
went down town and bought half ton
of coal.
then opened set of double entry
books, which / still retain, and which
are almost as good as new. had just
got my new client fairly on the books
when he was killed by falling down a
shaft distance of 200 feet in perpcn-
dicular direction. / then said that the
practice of the law was invested with
too much sorrow and sadness for me.
I could not endure the constant sunder-
ing of pleasant, friendly ties which an
active practice demanded. ] sold my
Revised Statutes to new Notary Public
at Last Chance, and gave my other law
books to a warm personal friend.
Having thus disposed of my library,
retired from the practice of my profess
sion by taking down my tin sign and
mailing it to the front door of the pest
house at the close of beautiful summer
day. There is nothing that will dam up
the flood of professional business SO
quickly as course like this. A young
lawyer may be ever so popular and
overworked; no matter, he can remove
his library to the smallpox hospital,
and in week he will have all the
physical relaxation and intellectual re-
pose he wants.
So like the swift flight of brilliant
meteor across black sky, l flashed
through the heavens, lighting up the
wide realms of space and then disap-
peared forever. With thousands of
other people to select from, death
sought out the only client ever had and
gathered him in. With world full of
the aged and the sick, to say nothing of
Cinnamon and Indians not taxed, the
grim reaper struck his sickle into man
in whom 1 felt a wonderful interest. No
one knows, who has not seem his sole
client cut down before his face, the
great sorrow that settles down upon the
heart at such a time How lonely my
office seemed after that. How still it
seemed / could not endure it. / at
once abandoned the profession to its
fate.
Contrary to my fears, however, it
soon rallied. Young blood entered into
the practice, and in three months after
/ had turned the key in my office door
one would hardly notice that so recently
bright light in the legal profession had
been squelched, and clarion voice that
had always rung out for eternal justice
and equity, at so much per equity, had
ceased to vibrate.
l was clear-headed and cool, but a
normally conservative attorney. Twas
not only conservative in my practice,
but in my gross receipts. / saw at once
that could not afford to pay forty dol
lars per month rent and depend upon a
book account of two dollars and fifty
cents to offset it. While / may say that
/ was passionately fond of the study
and the practice of the law, felt most
keenly the ostracism and the depressing
isolation which it seemed to engender.
Bill Nye, in Louisville Courier
Journal.