Edward Fry — 'Specific Performance'

Ward's full-length chromolithograph places Sir Edward Fry, Lord Justice of Appeal, behind the bench in full judicial costume: black silk robe, white collar bands, and the grey barrister's wig that had become standard court dress. He holds a pair of pince-nez with easy authority, one hand tucked behind his back — the composed professional rather than the pompous grandee. The caption, 'Specific Performance,' is a lawyer's joke: the equity doctrine requiring a party to fulfil a contract rather than merely pay damages, and a neat comment on Fry's reputation for exacting, literal-minded jurisprudence. Ward's caricature is comparatively gentle — a slightly elongated jaw, an air of arid self-satisfaction. The portrait treats Fry as the epitome of Victorian legal rectitude.