Well, Kennedy, what do
you say?"
"Not much; I hope to be able to work when admitted. I mean to find
some good point further West, where there is an opening, and stop and
wait. I don't mean to be a failure."
"Ridgeley, what are your views?"
"Modest, as becomes me; I don't think I am to be counted in any
hundred, and so I avoid unpleasant comparisons. I don't mean to look
long for an opening, or an opportunity; I would prefer to make both.
I would begin with the first thing, however small, and do my best with
it, and so of every other thing that came, leaving the eminence and
places to adjust themselves. I intend to practice law, and, like
Kennedy, I don't mean to fail."
"Mr. Ranney," continued Bart, "what is the reason of this universal
failure of law students?"
"I think the estimate of Giddings is large," said Ranney. "but of
all the young men who study law, about one half do it with no settled
purpose of ever practising, and, of course, don't. Of those who do
intend to practice, one half never really establish themselves in it.
That leaves one fourth of the whole number, who make a serious and
determined effort at the bar, and one half of these--one eighth of the
whole--succeed; and that brings out about as Giddings estimated."
"Well, on the whole, that is not a discouraging view," said Bart, "and
for one, I am obliged to you."
Nevertheless, he pondered the whole matter, and turned to face calmly
as he had before, the time when his novitiate should end, and he
should actually enter upon his experiment.
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