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nursed which soon afterwards burst forth and astonished 

 the world. 



Among the legal giants of those days Austin and 

 Talbot stood supreme. There was something grand as 

 well as merciless in the power wielded by those men in 

 entangling and ruining a hostile witness ; and yet it 

 often seemed to me that a clear-headed fellow, who had 

 the coolness, honesty, and courage not to go beyond 

 his knowledge, might have foiled both of them. Then 

 we had the giants of the civil engineers Stephenson, 

 Brunei, Locke, Hawkshaw, and others. Judged by his 

 power of fence, his promptness in calculation, and his 

 general readiness of retort, George Bidder as a wit- 

 ness-was unrivalled. I have seen him take the breath 

 out of Talbot himself before a committee of the House 

 of Lords. Strong men were broken down by the strain 

 and labour of that arduous time. Many pushed through, 

 and are still amongst us in robust vigour. But some 

 collapsed, while others retired, with large fortunes it is 

 true, but with intellects so shattered that, instead of 

 taking their places in the front rank of English states- 

 men, as their abilities entitled them to do, they sought 

 rest for their brains in the quiet lives of country gentle- 

 men. In my own modest sphere, I well remember the 

 refreshment occasionally derived from five minutes' 

 sleep on a deal table, with Babbage and Callet's Loga- 

 rithms under my head for a pillow. 



It was a time of mad unrest of downright mono- 

 mania. In private residences and public halls, in 

 London reception-rooms, in hotels and in the stables of 

 hotels, among gipsies and costermongers, nothing was 

 spoken of but the state of the share market, the pro- 

 spects of projected lines, the good fortune of the ostler 

 or pot-boy who, by a lucky stroke of business, had 

 cleared ten thousand pounds. High and low, rich and 



