purpose in enabling the future barristers to form each other's acquaintance. With what mingled feelings these dinner must be looked back upon in after life! Of two boon companions in student days one may, perhaps, be judge of the High Court, while the other is still struggling for a precarious livelihood in the County Court.
Students coming from the Universities are only expected to eat twelve dinners a year. The reason for this distinction is shrouded in mystery, but perhaps some solution may occur to the ingenious mind of the reader. It is usual for students to read with junior counsel in large practice, to whom they pay a hundred guineas a year. In return for this they have the run of the papers, from which they are no doubt enabled in some degree to familiarise themselves with the advocate's profession; if they require tuition, they must employ a regular coach. The examinations, however, are by no means severe. They secure a certain amount of legal knowledge on the part of the barrister, which can easily be acquired by a few attendances at the lectures held at the Inn, and a not very assiduous reading of Roman and Common Law. Upon the completion of his three years, the student is called to the Bar, by going through the solemn ceremony of taking a glass of wine with the Benchers of his Inn, and, together with a crowd of his compeers, listening to a friendly monition from the Senior Bencher, or some other venerable greybeard. Having purchased his wig and gown and a brand-new blue bag, the young barrister is then started on his career. He takes chambers in the Temple or Lincoln's Inn, which he probably shares with some other aspirants, and then proceeds on his way to the Woolsack.
Corridor, Inner Temple Hall.
The sensations of a young barrister when he first addresses the Court are usually somewhat agonising. Serjeant Ballantine describes his first experience as follows:—"I rose, but could see nothing; the court seemed to turn round and the floor to be sinking. I cannot tell what I asked, but it was graciously granted by the Bench."
He sat down with a parched throat and a sort of sickening feeling that he would never succeed. "Most successful advocates," he adds, "have experienced these sensations, and to this day I believe that many rise to conduct cases of importance with some of their old emotions."
The work of the Bar is divided into several sections, so that the beginner has a fairly wide choice as to which department of his profession he will make his own. There is the Parliamentary Bar, the Common Law Bar, the Equity Bar, and the Criminal Bar; and besides these, several barristers are exclusively occupied with Patents and Conveyancing.
But there are sections within sections, consisting of small coteries of specialists who devote themselves to the Divorce Court, to the Privy Council, or to Admiralty work.
While the majority of barristers pass the legal year in the Metropolis, except when on circuit, there are a good many who settle down in populous districts and become known in the profession as local barristers. Both Common Law and Equity men who are, through the pressure of competition, unable to make their way in London, or who perhaps have the advantage of being related
