Records of the clan and name of Fergusson, Ferguson and Fergus

250 CLAN FERGUSSON
runs a note by him, ' was not fully pleaded at first, and some
judges are like the old Bishop, who having begun to eat
the asparagus at the wrong end, did not choose to alter.'
' Servate terminos quos patres vestri posuere is Lord Pit-
four's answer to doubts suggested on the point.' Lord
Hailes, after reporting Pitfour's statement as to a certain
case, ' Erskine had a feeble antagonist in myself and yet was
unsuccessful,' adds, ' This affected modesty is disgusting, for
every one knows that Lord Pitfour is a great lawyer, and that
he is zealous beyond measure in support of his own opinions.'
In an important case in which the authority of their opinions
was appealed to, Lord President Blair referred to Pitfour and
Lockhart as ' two of the greatest lawyers that ever did honour
to this Court, men who stood long unrivalled at the head of
the bar, and whose character was equal to their legal know-
ledge.'
Pitfour always wore his hat on the bench on account of
weak eyesight, and the Court of Session Garland pictures
him as citing cases in illustration
' With a wink and his hat all agee.'
He is said to have owed his judgeship to the ' astute manage-
ment ' of Lord Mansfield in spite of Jacobite proclivities.
' The king asked whether he was not objectionable on political
grounds, and Lord Mansfield in reply said, in a matter of
course way, that the Duke of Argyll, who was present, would
vouch for Mr. Ferguson's loyalty. The Whig Duke, deprived
perchance of presence of mind by the unexpected appeal,
merely bowed.'
' James Ferguson, afterwards Lord Pitfour,' writes Ramsay
of Ochtertyre, 'was one of the greatest and most popular
lawyers of that period, and also a man of probity and amiable
disposition. . . . Though his small shrill voice and awkward
person prevented him from being an elegant speaker, yet so
deeply learned was he in the philosophy of the law, and so
well acquainted with the springs that actuate the human
heart, that few barristers were heard with more satisfaction.
His metaphysical turn combined with common sense enabled
him to set every subject in a new and striking point of light.