themselves to impose; and that the regular universities, corporations, and societies, into which these various orders subsequently merged, merely carried on under more settled rules. that system of conferring degrees which they ages before practised.

The higher order of common lawyers, we know, were during many ages, in accordance with the feudal institutions of Normandy, generally called by writ to the service of the crown, and we find therefore this higher class of pleaders at one period almost uniformly designated by the name of servientes ad legem. This circumstance, however, obviously affords no proof that serjeants-at-law were at any period the only pleaders or advocates known to the law of England, nor does it in fact appear to prove more than this, that in accordance with the genius of the feudal institutions, the practice of the law in the royal courts was at one period deemed a service, and that the serjeants selected by the crown from the general body of pleaders became members, as the attornies admitted by the judges from the inferior class became officers of the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster.

The countors or banci narratores, mentioned by Matthew Paris as the pleaders recognised by the Common Law, do not seem in any way to have been engaged in the royal service, or entitled on that account to the designation of Serjeants.' Indeed, the coif itself appears to owe its origin to a circumstance incompatible with the fact of its wearer being in the service of the crown; and whatever veneration may be yet entertained for that peculiar badge of legal rank, it must never be forgotten that its wearers were at no period the only professors of the Common Law of England.

Matthew Paris, whose authority is relied on for the fact of

1 Mr. Serjeant Manning, a great enthusiast in the question of the antiquity of the degree of Serjeants-at-law, observes, "The fees payable by the 'Countor' appear to have induced the Conqueror, or some of his more immediate successors, to treat the office as a serjeanty in gross, and to assume, if they did not possess it before, the right of appointing to this serjeanty." (Preface, p. ix.) Originally all serjeants-at-law appear to have been servientes regis ad legem." (Id ib. note (b).) See also 2 Inst 422. to the same purport; and Co. Litt. 106 a., as to the tenure of the office of serjeant-at-law.

66

the order of pleaders (the conteurs et sages gents) already alluded to being distinct and independent of the serjeants, fixes the date of the story of William de Bussy, who wearing the coif claimed the benefit of his orders or clergy, as A. D. 1259, or 43 Henry 3. From this it clearly appears that he was not a serjeant in the modern sense of that term, and we know that the very next reign witnessed the foundation of the Inns of Court expressly devoted to an order of advocates from whom the serjeants were selected, but from whom, on being promoted, they immediately retired to another inn, expressly set apart for them.

In this reign of Edward I. the term apprentice appears; and in a statute where they are mentioned, the king's justices are directed to admit to the office of attornies certain of the apprentices of the Bar; and we thus find a new forensic degree, apparently before unknown, as we do afterwards in that or utter barrister and inner barrister, and, many ages subsequently, in that of Queen's Counsel: but whatever degrees the crown, or the Bar themselves may in their universities create, it is certain that these degrees could only be conferred on a member of the independent order of the Bar, to which order the crown had at no period the power of compelling admission; and with what advantages to the public this independent and exclusive privilege has been enjoyed may be gathered from the fact that in no recorded case of the exclusion of a candidate for admission into, or his expulsion from the order, has the charge of sinister motives for the decision been imputed.

The Inns of Court, the legitimate representatives at the present day of the order of barristers recognised by the Common Law, do practically admit, as a student, any one of good character to graduate for the Bar, and after the requisite course of probation has been gone through, call him to the degree of barrister; so that whatever defects there may be in the modern system of education prescribed by the rules of these societies, and however capable of improvement in other respects those rules are, little objection can be made to them on the ground of exclusiveness or of expense.

The Inns of Court have been termed by Lord Mansfield Voluntary societies, which for ages have submitted to go

vernment analogous to that of other seminaries of learning."1 Lord Tenterden, commenting on this, observes that "the very term voluntary society imports in it a discretion in the individuals composing it to admit or reject members as they please. It is true that the twelve judges are the visitors of the Inns of Court, but in that character they have jurisdiction only over actually admitted members." He further observes that Lord Mansfield must be understood to have meant that they submit to such rules and regulations as they themselves ordained for the internal government of the society, but not that they submit to any foreign jurisdiction as to the persons whom they are to admit as members2; and in this the other judges3 seemed to concur, Mr. Justice Bayley saying it was analogous to the case of a college in which no individual has an inchoate right to be admitted.

The decision in this case accords with the received opinion that the Inns of Court have not the incidents of ordinary corporations. Either in consequence of charters of incorporation or of direct grants from the crown of the possessions which they at present hold, by whatever title however they

Rex v. Gray's Inn, 1 Dougl. 354.

* Rex v. Benchers of Lincoln's Inn, 4 B. & C. 855., 7 D. & R. 351. Bayley, Holroyd, and Littledale.

If the crown grants lands to a vill, they have thereby a corporate capacity to take if a rent be reserved.

1 Rol. 513. 1. 40. And hence the old order of Templars were said to be incorporated. 10 Co. 33. The benchers and ancients of the Inns of Court certainly appear to have taken grants of land in a collective capacity. The following is a translation of the original grant of the Temple by James I, A. R. 6., from a copy in the Rolls Chapel, and used by Serjeant Talfourd in Mr. Hayward's case, p. 66. : —

"To all to whom these presents may come, &c, Whereas our kingdom of England, most flourishing in the arts of peace for so many ages, and devolved on us by the singular Providence of God in his good time by hereditary right, is indebted for a great part of its felicity to the ancient and peculiar laws of that kingdom, proved by a long series of ages to be best adapted to that warlike and populous nation: And whereas the inns of the Inner and Middle Temple, being of the number of those four most famous colleges of all Europe, frequented by students and proficients in the said laws, have been, for a long time, by the gratuitous munificence of our progenitors kings of England, dedicated to the use of the students and professors of the said laws; to which Inns, as the best seminaries of learning and morals, very many youths, excelling in lustre of descent as well as in the endowments of mind and body, have continually resorted from all parts of this realm; and from which many, as well in our times as in those of our predecessors, have been taken by reason of their exalted me

originally derived their important privileges, it is probable they would be held to be included in the various statutes for the general confirmation of liberties and franchises1; and in one case we find the constitution of the Inns of Court as voluntary societies subject to appeal, pleaded to the jurisdiction of the Court of Chancery and the plea allowed.2

The Court of Queen's Bench has hitherto invariably refused to interfere by way of mandamus with the discretion of the benchers as to calling to the bar or the admission or expulsion of members3; and in almost every case where it has been thought advisable to appeal from the decision of the benchers to the judges as visitors, the decision of the benchers has been confirmed. It must not be imagined, however, that either the Inns of Court in their collective capacity, or the individual members as barristers or legal

rits, to discharge arduous offices cf state and justice, in which they gave great examples of prudence and integrity, to the honour of the said profession and the ornament of this realm, and the good of the whole state: Know, therefore, that we desiring, so far as in us lies, to perpetuate the happy state of this kingdom, flourishing for so many ages through the administration of the said laws, and compassing not so much the continuation of the former celebrity of the said Inns as an accession of new splendour, and in order that we may have our benevolence and munificence towards the profession and professors of the said laws confirmed to all posterity, of our special favour and mere motion we have given and granted, and by these presents do give and grant, for ourselves, our heirs and successors, to our well-beloved and faithful counsellor, Julius Cæsar, alias Adelmar, Knt., Chancellor and Under Treasurer of our Exchequer ; Henry Montague, Knt., Recorder of our City of London, and one of our counsel in the law, &c., the said inns and capital messuages, with the appurtenances, called or known by the names of the Inner and Middle Temple, London; and all halls, cloisters, chambers, gardens, &c.; which inns, messuages, &c. we will, and by these presents for ourselves and our successors, order to be applied for the lodging and education of the students and professors of the said laws sojourning for all time to come in the said inns."

19 Hen. 3. c. .; 1 Ed. S. c. 9.; 14 Ed. 3. c. 1. ; 1 H. 4. c. 1. ; 7 H. 4. c. 1 ; 9 H. 4. c. l.; 13 H. 4. c. 1.; 3 H. 5. s. 2. c. 1. ; 2 H. 6. c. 1.

* Cunningham v. Wood, 2 Bro. Ch. Ca. 24. Townsend's case, T. Raym. 69., 2

353; Rex v. Lincoln's Inn, 7 D. &

Show. 178.; Rex v. Gray's Inn, 1 Dougl.
R. 351 ; S. C. 4 B. & C. 855.

Rex v. Gray's Inn, 1 Dougl. 353. Re H. H. Pyke.

In the recent much-controverted case of Mr. Hayward, Q. C., relating to the mode of electing Benchers in the Inner Temple, the Judges held that they had no legal power to interfere, but recommended, in their character of visitors, a different mode of election for the future.

practitioners, are free from the control of her Majesty's Courts at Westminster.

There are records of a series of ordinances made by the Chancellor and Judges for their government and regulation with regard to the admission of members, keeping commons, calling to the Bar, &c.1 Whether, however, these ordinances are in force at this day may perhaps be open to argument; considering, on the one hand, the unsettled notions of the extent of the royal prerogative at the time when they were passed, and on the other, the Act of Henry VII., as to ordinances made by masters, wardens, and fellowships of crafts, which might perhaps be construed to extend to the ordinances of the masters of the Bench of the Inns of Court.2

The Benchers of the Inns of Court, with an honourable anxiety to avoid shielding themselves under the designation of mere voluntary associations, some years ago adopted a resolution that "the Judges are requested to entertain the application of any gentleman who may be refused admission into this Society; this Society being willing to be bound by the decision of the Judges upon such application;" and to avoid the influence of mere caprice in the admission or rejection of members, each Inn of Court has fixed regulations on the subject, and indeed some of these have been sanctioned by the concurrence of the whole of the four Inns, e. g., that

1 See Dugdale's Origines Jur., 141. 147. 191. 193. 274-5. 311-327. See Orders of the Lord Chancellor and the Judges, 16 Car. 2., reporting the orders 12 Jac. and 6 Car. 1. Pearce, 426.

? No masters, wardens, and fellowships of crafts shall make any acts or ordinances in diminution of the profit of her Majesty, or against the common profit of the people, unless examined and approved by the Chancellor or Chief Jus tices of either Bench, on pain of forfeiting 201. 19 H. 7. c. 7. s. 1.

The interposition of the Judges as Visitors of the Inns of Court, and of the Chancellor, Privy Council, &c., as to the regulations for calling to the Bar, probably gave rise to the dictum in Rex v. Gray's Inn, that all the power the Inns of Court have concerning the admission to the Bar is "delegated to them from the Judges." The power of the Judges as Visitors of the Inns of Court, in revising their rules, &c. is, it is obvious, very different from that of conferring on them any original power. The term delegation is obviously an improper one, for the Judges themselves never had the power which they are said to have delegated.