In his earliest days Mr. Webster used to draw
on one Parker Noyes, a mousing, learned New Hampshire lawyer, and freely
acknowledged the debt. In the Dartmouth College case, as has been seen, he
over and over again gave simply and generously all the credit for the
learning and the points of the brief to Mason and Smith, and yet the glory
of the case has rested with Mr. Webster and always will. He gained by his
frank honesty and did not lose a whit. But in his latter days, when his
sense of justice had grown somewhat blunted and his nature was perverted by
the unmeasured adulation of the little immediate circle which then hung
about him, he ceased to admit his obligations as in his earlier and better
years. From no one did Mr. Webster receive so much hearty and generous
advice and assistance as from Judge Story, whose calm judgment and wealth
of learning were always at his disposal. They were given not only in
questions of law, but in regard to the Crimes Act, the Judiciary Act, and
the Ashburton treaty. After Judge Story's death, Mr. Webster not only
declined to allow the publication by the judge's son and biographer of
Story's letters to himself, but he refused to permit even the publication
of extracts from his own letters, intended merely to show the nature of the
services rendered to him by Story.
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