The late Mr. Peter Harvey used to tell with much zest a story
illustrating the hold which these early associations retained on
Webster's mind throughout his life. Some months after his removal from
Portsmouth to Boston, a servant knocked at his chamber door late in an
April afternoon in the year 1817, with the announcement that three men
were in the drawing-room who insisted on seeing him. Webster was
overwhelmed with fatigue, the result of his Congressional labors and his
attendance on courts of law; and he had determined, after a night's
sleep, to steal a vacation in order to recruit his energies by a
fortnight's fishing and hunting. He suspected that the persons below
were expectant clients; and he resolved, in descending the stairs, not
to accept their offer. He found in the parlor three plain, country-bred,
honest-looking men, who were believers in the innocence of Levi and
Laban Kenniston, accused of robbing a certain Major Goodridge on the
highway, and whose trial would take place at Ipswich the next day. They
could find, they said, no member of the Essex bar who would undertake
the defence of the Kennistons, and they had come to Boston to engage the
services of Mr. Webster. Would he go down to Ipswich and defend the
accused? Mr. Webster stated that he could not and would not go. He had
made arrangements for an excursion to the sea-side; the state of his
health absolutely demanded a short withdrawal from all business cares;
and that no fee could tempt him to abandon his purpose. "Well," was the
reply of one of the delegation, "it isn't the fee that we think of at
all, though we are willing to pay what you may charge; but it's justice.
Here are two New Hampshire men who are believed in Exeter, and Newbury,
and Newburyport, and Salem to be rascals; but we in Newmarket believe,
in spite of all evidence against them, that they are the victims of some
conspiracy. We think you are the man to unravel it, though it seems a
good deal tangled even to us. Still we suppose that men whom we know to