Mr. Justice Bradley.

extent to which he ranged through the li brary of the college; for it is told of him that scarcely a book, pamphlet, or manu script was to be found there with whose con tents he had not gained some acquaintance. Among those of his classmates who subse quently reached distinction were Cortlandt Parker (his room-mate), the well-known lawyer of Newark; Frederick T. Frelinghuysen, late Secretary of State, both of them his devoted friends; and William A. Newell, afterward Governor of New Jersey. While at college he completed a course in theology, but before graduation he had given up the plan of becoming a minister, and had decided to study law as a profession. Consequently, in November, 1836, after a few months spent in teaching a classical school, he entered the law office of Archer Gifford, of Newark, a gentleman of respect able attainments, then Collector of Customs. Some of Mr. Bradley's friends, thinking per haps the example of his preceptor a good one to follow, managed to secure an appoint ment for the young student as an inspector in the Custom House, to aid in his support while gaining a profession. " I want to feel myself qualified to be Chief-Justice of the United States," said he to a confidant at this period. In 1839 he passed an examination before the full court at Trenton, and shortly afterward opened a law office at Newark. The incidents attending Mr. Bradley's thirty years at the bar differed but little from those that usually mark the career of the successful American lawyer. The win ter of 184 1 he spent at the State capital studying legislation and writing letters to the Newark " Daily Advertiser," a journal of which he long remained an occasional contributor. His letters from Trenton at tracted wide and favorable attention for ful ness and precision of statement. About this time the Camden and Amboy Railroad Company were obliged, in order to silence public clamor, to meet an investigation of their accounts. Mr. Bradley was recom mended as a young man skilful at figures

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and a good business lawyer. The officers of the company engaged his services; and so gratified were they at his management that they retained him as permanent counsel of the road, of which he became also a director. He was likewise made actuary of a mutual life insurance company, in which capacity he devised a new system of life-tables. Among the more important cases in which he was of counsel are the Meeker Will case, the Passaic Bridge case, the New Jersey Zinc and the Belvidere Land cases.1 His de fence of Harden, a Methodist minister, in dicted for wife-poisoning, and the still more celebrated case of Donnelly (tried for mur dering a friend at Long Branch), brought him into prominence as an intrepid and pow erful advocate. Mr. Bradley's admission to the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States was moved by Mr. Ewing, Dec. 27, 1848. Notwithstanding his large and constantly increasing law practice, Mr. Bradley man aged to set apart no inconsiderable portion of his time for the study of subjects outside of his profession. He applied himself to scientific investigation, to problems of the higher mathematics, to astronomy, physics, and mechanics. With the principles of bot any, chemistry, geology, and kindred sci ences he became thoroughly familiar; and he kept pace with the new discoveries that from time to time were being made in these departments. As if this were not enough, he added other foreign languages to those which he had already known, reading the works of many great authors in the original. He became, for instance, one of the most accomplished Biblical scholars in the coun try. So constant was he in his study of the Scriptures, that he always kept beside him a 1 As an instance of his indefatigable industry in mas tering every detail involved in a case, it may be mentioned that while preparing to argue a question relating to the water-power at Paterson, he set to work and with his own hands conducted a series of experiments to ascertain the pressure of a flow of water under varied conditions, as to size of orifice, and the like, reaching the result through mathematical calculations and formulas of his own.