On the last night of 1929, George Allen and Thomas Overy put all the files on which they were working into a London taxi and headed for an office they were about to open the next day in the heart of the City of London. There were so many files in the taxi they had their faithful clerk stand on the running board of the taxi to stop the files from spilling out into the street. Nearly 100 years before, in 1838, John Linklater qualified as a solicitor, having joined a small firm that had carved out a name for itself advising banks that had become insolvent (sound familiar?). He and his brother, James, quickly became the leading lights in a rapidly growing firm. adding to their client base merchants and businessmen trading with the British empire.