Young Bryant had the hard lot so common "among the hills;" but he had health, hope, courage, ambition, and the glow-fire of a fervid imagination, which enabled him to succeed when others
"By the wayside fell and perished,
Weary with the march of life."
Until ten years of age, he had the limited educational advantages afforded by the district school, gaining one term at a private school when about seven, by walking two miles and a half each way, daily, to attend it. At ten he entered the high school at Franklin, taught by Master Tyler of Andover, an author of some note and a teacher of high repute in those days, and remained for half a term,—all that the limited means of the family would permit. A similar privilege was accorded at eleven and again at twelve. At the age of fourteen he borrowed money enough of a relative to defray the expense of an entire term at Boscawen Academy, then under the charge of Mr. Ballard, of Concord, a graduate of Dartmouth, giving his note therefor, which he repaid with interest at the end of three years. Here he studied trigonometry and surveying, and for several years afterwards earned considerable sums to aid him in prosecuting his studies by surveying in his own and adjoining towns. When fourteen he "cast off the lines" and assumed the entire burden of his support and education. To aid in this work he commenced teaching when fifteen, and taught every winter until he left college. Thus lacking means, he drifted about, a term at a time, among the various academies in the state, at Concord, Claremont, Gilmanton, and New London, until he entered New Hampton, joining a class which was to fit for college in one year from that time. Here, through the kindness of the faculty, he took the studies of the freshman year, entered the sophomore class at Waterville at the same time his fellow-classmates entered as freshmen. At the academies and in college he developed an intense passion for debate, and took a leading part in all the lyceums at home and the societies connected with the various institutions of learning he attended, to which he undoubtedly owes much of the freedom and ease that have since characterized his efforts on the hustings and at the bar.
When he was about twelve, his father gathered at his house the debris of what had been an excellent town library. The son reveled in this feast of good things, reading everything from Goldsmith's "Animated Nature," to Paley's Philosophy. With boyish enthusiasm he devoured the pages of Rollin, without the slightest idea, that, except when the old Jansenist relied upon others, he was reading romance instead of history. This gave a new impetus to his desire for what was then termed a "liberal education." At twenty-two he entered the office of an eminent law firm—-Nesmith & Pike—at Franklin, and after something less than two years' hard study went to Harvard Law School, from which he graduated in 1848; was admitted to the bar of Grafton county at the November term of the same year, and, having opened an office at Bristol in that county in November, 1848, upon his admission, entered upon the active practice of his profession.
At twenty-five he was elected one of the commissioners of the county of Grafton and held the office for three years, being chairman of the board two years. At twenty-nine he was appointed prosecuting attorney (solicitor) for that county, and discharged its duties with marked efficiency. In 1853 he removed from Bristol to Plymouth; and from that time was engaged on one side or the other of nearly every important cause there tried by the jury.
The county of Grafton was created in 1771. It was a large county and had for its shire towns Haverhill on the Connecticut and Plymouth on the Pemigewasset. It had at the outset, as it now has, a bar of exceptional character and ability. Some of the greatest forensic and legal battles of the century—like the celebrated Dartmouth College case of national reputation—were lost and won here. Over the highest court, Smith, Richardson, and Parker, a triad of illustrious chief-justices presided, followed by Gilchrist, Woods, and Perley, but little less distinguished. Here, in the olden time, Jeremiah Mason, the foremost jurist of his day, Daniel and Ezekiel Webster, the Sullivans, and their compeers, "rode the circuit" after the custom in the mother country. These great advocates, after exhaustive preparation; spoke to crowded court-rooms, the people flocking to these entertainments like men to a feast. Then oratory was in demand at the bar; but now, in its place, is required a dry summary, as terse and pointed as an auditor's statement of accounts.
When Mr. Bryant became actively engaged in jury trials, the bar was not what it once was, for Livermore, Olcott,—the father-in-law of Choate,—Woodward, and others were in their graves; Woods and Wilcox were on the bench; Ira Perley had removed to Concord; and Joe Bell had left the state. But there were Goodall, with his varied experience and eventful life; Felton, active, precise and mathematical; Duncan, whose earlier efforts were regarded by competent critics as at least equal to those of his famous brother-in-law, Choate; Harry Hibbard, scholar, lawyer and statesman; that dark haired "giant of the mountains," Bingham; Bellows and Sargent, since chief-justices,—headed by their acknowledged leader, Josiah Quincy, one of the most practical, sagacious, and clear-headed men in the state. Here, too, occasionally came Perley, with combative blood, incisive speech, and immense law learning, to enter the lists with that child of genius and prince of cross-examiners and advocates, Franklin Pierce. It was no child's play for a young man to withstand the "cut and thrust" of such, and contest for supremacy with them before twelve men.
Lawyers know that those who are almost invincible before a referee, auditor, chancellor, or the full bench, are often failures before a jury. Nothing tests or taxes a lawyer's nerve, knowledge of men, tact, readiness, fertility in resource, and the power of reconstruction or combination, like a jury trial, and he only who has been through it—unless it be the woman who is so unfortunate as to be his wife—can fully appreciate the strain of the minute and laborious preparation which precedes, the anxious days without food and nights without sleep which attend the progress of the trial, and the collapse after the verdict, especially if it be an adverse one, when a young practitioner is pitted against one of the leaders. It is a hard experience; but it schools him in his work, and enures him to the hardships of campaigning. Mr. Bryant tried his first cause before a jury, against Mr. Quincy, and won. The veteran congratulated his youthful opponent and predicted his success at the bar. At the next term he was pitted against his old instructor, Mr. Pike, and one of the judges wrote his father a note highly complimenting the efforts of the son in that important and exciting trial.
In 1855, Mr. Bryant removed to Concord and entered into partnership with Lyman T. Flint, Esq., who had assisted him at New Hampton in fitting for the sophomore year. His practice soon extended to Belknap and Hillsborough, while he retained his hold in Merrimack and upon his old clients in Grafton, where he attended the courts as before.
Mr. Bryant had hitherto acted with the Democratic party, in whose faith he had been reared, but in 1856, in common with thousands more, in the whirlwind which swept the North after the passage of the Nebraska bill, and the troubles which had arisen in Kansas, he supported by voice and vote the nomination of John C. Fremont, speaking in all the large towns and in nearly every county in the state. From that time until he left the state in 1860, he probably made more stump-speeches than any other man in it. In 1857 he was elected representative from ward six in Concord, was re-elected in 1858 and 1859, and was speaker the last two years. He originated and carried through, against a violent opposition, the act making parties witnesses. At this day the act seems eminently proper; but then it was regarded by many as portentous of evil, subversive of social order, and revolutionary in the extreme. Its constitutionality as applied to pending suits was affirmed in Rich vs. Flanders (39 N. H., 304), against the dissent of two of the six judges, Chief-Justice Bell and Judge Bellows, who, as a member, had strenuously opposed its passage.