Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 4.djvu/98

 nised official status. But his countrymen regard him with distrust such as used to attach to the "lawyer,closing quote missing in the original [sic] in Anglo-Saxon communities. Old prejudice is partly responsible. But the barrister himself is also to blame. The fact is that law is a very cheap luxury among the Japanese. People who would not venture within the shadow of a law court in Europe, enter boldly in Japan. The barrister has to adapt himself to his circumstances. He must be prepared to conduct a case for a fee of a few shillings. It is difficult for him to preserve the dignity of his profession when handling such petty issues, and competition forbids him to stand aloof. Nearly a thousand names of graduates from the eight law schools of the Empire or from the Imperial University, are added yearly to the roll of barristers. The struggle for existence does not allow them to be fastidious about the work they undertake. An eminent writer says that the study of the law seems to have for the Japanese a sort of abstract and theoretical interest. That is probably true, but if a Japanese is asked to explain frankly why so many choose law as a profession, he assigns two reasons: first, that the bench can easily be reached from the bar; and secondly, that the possession of a diploma confers official rank. Whatever the truth may be, the Japanese bar threatens to become overcrowded, and the shifts to which its members are driven to earn a liveli-