“Yes, my Lord, I do,” answered James, and as he said it every pair of eyes in that crowded assembly fixed themselves upon him, and a sort of audible smile seemed to run round the court.  The thing not unnaturally struck the professional mind as ludicrous and without precedent.

“And who appears for the defendant?”

“I understand, my Lord,” said the learned Attorney-General, “that all my learned friends on these two benches appear together, with myself, for one or other of the defendants, or are watching the case in the interest of legatees.”

Here a decided titter interrupted him.

“I may add that the interests involved in this case are very large indeed, which accounts for the number of counsel connected in one way or other with the defence.”

“Quite so, Mr. Attorney,” said the Judge:  “but, really, the forces seem a little out of proportion.  Of course the matter is not one in which the Court can interfere.”

“If your Lordship will allow me,” said James, “the only reason that the plaintiff is so poorly represented is that the funds to brief other council were, I understand, not forthcoming.  I am, however, well versed in the case and, with your Lordship’s permission, will do my best with it.”

“Very well, Mr. Short,” said the learned Judge, looking at him almost with pity, “state your case.”

James—­in the midst of a silence that could be felt—­unfolded his pleadings, and, as he did so, for the first time a sickening sense of nervousness took hold of him and made him tremble, and, of a sudden, his mind became dark.  Most of us have undergone this sensation at one time or another, with less cause then had poor James.  There he was, put up almost for the first time in his life to conduct, single-handed, a most important case, upon which it was scarcely too much to say the interest of the entire country was concentrated.  Nor was this all.  Opposed to him were about twenty counsel, all of them men of experience, and including in their ranks some of the most famous leaders in England:  and, what was more, the court was densely crowded with scores of men of his own profession, every one of whom was, he felt, regarding him with curiosity not unmixed with pity.  Then, there was the tremendous responsibility which literally seemed to crush him, though he had never quite realised it before.

“May it please your Lordship,” he began; and then, as I have said, his mind became a ghastly blank, in which dim and formless ideas flitted vaguely to and fro.

There was a pause—­a painful pause.

“Read your pleadings aloud,” whispered a barrister who was sitting next him, and realised his plight.

This was an idea.  One can read pleadings when one cannot collect one’s ideas to speak.  It is not usual to do so.  The counsel in a cause states the substance of the pleadings, leaving the Court to refer to them if it thinks necessary.  But still there was nothing absolutely wrong about it; so he snatched at the papers and promptly began: