play of talent, is the high opinion of his abilities entertained by his schoolmaster. Two letters have been preserved written in Latin to Yorke by Mr. Morland. The first of them is dated 1706, the second 1708, and even so early as the former period, the preceptor, after dwelling with affectionate complacency on the talents of his disciple, confidently predicts his future celebrity; and declares that to have been the happiest day of his life wherein the cultivation of so happy a genius was first committed to his charge. This letter is addressed, "Juveni præstantissimo Philippo Yorkio."

His first initiation into the study of the law took place under the auspices of an eminent attorney named Salkeld, who had been agent for his father, and was prevailed upon to take the son into his office upon very easy terms. The coincidence of names afterwards occasioned the report that he had for his instructer serjeant Salkeld. This is an error; but if we are to judge of a system of education by the fruits it produces, we may safely assert that it would have been impossible for him to have been more advantageously situated for acquiring a knowledge of his profession than in the office of Mr. Salkeld the attorney, since we know that in that very office, and nearly about the same time, were Jocelyn, afterwards lord chancellor of Ireland; Parker, who became chief baron of the exchequer; and Strange, who died master of the rolls. Among such fellow-students as these, it was likely that there would be severe and arduous competition and it is no trifling testimony in favor of the zeal, the assiduity, and the talent of Yorke, that he recommended himself to the favor and esteem of a man who must have been in the habit of witnessing a constant and unremitting display of all these qualities. So steady, however, was his perseverance in study, and so rapid his progress in the knowledge of the law, that Mr. Salkeld did not fail to distinguish him; and with a view of procuring him a wider

field for the future exercise of his abilities, he caused him to be entered of the Middle Temple as a preparatory step towards the bar. The date of his admission, in the books of the society, is 25th November, 1708; he being then in the eighteenth year of his age.

It does not appear that the talents of the young clerk were equally well appreciated by the wife of Mr. Salkeld, or possibly she conceived, that, however distinguished they might be, they ought to be no hindrance to the exercise of the more homely qualities of nimbleness and agility, which nature had conferred upon Yorke, and which she conceived the law had placed at her disposal. Making therefore a full use of her fancied right as a mistress over her husband's apprentice, she was in the constant habit of despatching him from her house in Brook street, Holborn, to the neighboring markets, either for the purpose of carrying home her own bargains, or of acting in the double capacity of purchaser and porter. These journeys occasionally extended as far as Covent garden, so that her emissary had to return through some of the crowded streets of London, bearing under his arm, perhaps, the ignoble burthen of a basket of fruit or a bundle of green vegetables. Such humiliation was not to be borne patiently, especially when the messenger had begun to hold a certain rank in the office of his master, and no doubt, also, to attach some degree of importance to his personal appearance, which, it must be allowed, was not likely to be advantaged by the appendages just mentioned. But what was to be done? The lady laid claim to his services; and the terms on which he had been received an inmate of her house were such, as might authorize her to demand of him some such compensation for the expense of his maintenance. In this awkward dilemma, Yorke, with great presence of mind, hit upon an expedient which had the desired effect both of saving appearances for the time, and of putting a stop to his errands in future. He pro

ceeded as usual to market, and made his purchases as before; but, on his return, did not scruple to indulge himself and his packages with the accommodation of a hackneycoach. It may be supposed, that the fare of this vehicle made a conspicuous item in the bill of charges, which, on his arrival at the house, he was in the habit of presenting to Mrs. Salkeld; and that notable lady, wisely considering that it was a flagrant instance of bad housewifery to pay more for the carriage of her goods than the value of the goods themselves, resolved thenceforward to choose a messenger who would be likely to be content with a less expensive mode of conveyance.

It was after he had become a student of the Middle Temple, that Yorke formed an acquaintance to which he may be said to have been mainly indebted for the unprecedented rapidity of his advancement when called to the bar. It was altogether a remarkable illustration of Roger North's argument in behalf of the advantages to be derived from connexions originally formed from casual meetings in the hall of an inn of court. During the time when he was keeping his terms, it was his lot to dine more than once at the same mess with Mr. Parker, one of the sons of lord chief justice Macclesfield; and his conversation was so agreeable as to produce from his neighbor an invitation to his father's house. It is said, that about the same time the chief justice, being desirous of securing for his sons a companion, whose legal knowledge might be an assistance to them in their studies, applied to Mr. Salkeld to point out some young man of competent abilities for that purpose, and that Mr. Salkeld warmly recommended his pupil. Whether this took place before or after the first introduction of Yorke to his lordship does not appear; but it seems most probable that the inquiry was made respecting Yorke himself, in consequence of his having been presented to lord Macclesfield. At all events, it is very certain that the young student had not long obtained

a footing in the house of the legal dignitary, before he secured to himself a very good place in his good graces. He was at that time, as indeed he remained long afterwards, distinguished for a certain pliancy, if not suppleness of manner, which possibly went far towards finding him favor in the eyes of his new patron. He had also the advantage of a handsome person, which he improved by strict attention to his dress, insomuch that some of his contemporaries report him to have been the handsomest young man in England. Whether these minor recommendations, or the more elevated qualities of talent and proficiency in his studies, had the greatest weight with lord Macclesfield, the favorable impression he had first made was so well improved, that the result was a degree of friendship, and of almost paternal attachment, to which, it has already been intimated, the success of Yorke's after career might chiefly be attributed.

On the 27th of May, 1715, Yorke was called to the bar. Possessed as he was of much more ample stores of legal knowledge than falls to the lot of most lawyers of his years, and having the cordial support of a very eminent solicitor, besides the avowed favor and patronage of lord Macclesfield, he acquired at the very outset an extensive practice; and it is not to be supposed that his rapid and extraordinary success was looked upon without jealousy by the other members of the bar. Indeed the favoritism of lord Macclesfield was so conspicuous, even in court, that they might well feel themselves offended and aggrieved by it. Serjeant Pengelly, one day, was so much irritated by an observation which fell from his lordship, that he threw up his brief, and openly protested he would no longer practise in a court where it was evident that Mr. Yorke was not to be answered. Some time after the resignation of the great seal by the earl of Cowper, lord Macclesfield was promoted to the woolsack (1719); and his influence, no longer confined to a court of

law, was exerted to procure his young favorite a seat in the house of commons. Accordingly, within four years after his first appearance in Westminster Hall, Yorke took his seat as member for Lewes in Sussex, the whole expenses of his election being defrayed by the ministry, among the partisans of whom he of course enrolled himself.

The bench did not fail to share in the astonishment occasioned by his extraordinary professional success. Judge Powis in particular was amazed at such a phenomenon. His lordship was much more notorious for certain peculiarities of manner and speech, than for penetration or clearness of intellect so much indeed was he generally thought to be deficient in the latter qualification, that the duke of Wharton inditing a copy of verses, wherein he adopted the hackneyed mode of expressing his affection for his mistress by protesting that, when this, and that, and the other impossible event should occur, then and no sooner should he cease to adore her, did not hesitate to include among his enumeration of impossibilities that of judge Powis's summing up a cause without a blunder. This ornament of the bench, then, being determined to discover, or rather thinking he had already discovered, the cause of Yorke's success, appealed to the successful barrister himself, to learn whether he had arrived at the right solution of the mystery. "Mr. Yorke," said he, at a dinner party composed chiefly of members of his own profession, "I humbly conceive you must have published some book or other, or must be on the point of publishing one; for look, do you see, there is scarcely a case before the court, but you hold a brief for either plaintiff or defendant." It may readily be supposed this explanation surprised the person appealed to, no less than the extraordinary circumstance it was meant to account for had at first surprised the judge. Yorke, however, not perhaps altogether displeased at the opportunity of quizzing his lordship, replied, "that in fact it was his