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PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF ENGLISH LAW COURTS. II. By Baxter Borret.

THE COURTS OF THE COMMON LAW IN THE SIXTIES. IN those days the Thames embankment had not been commenced; the quickest way of getting from the Temple to the old Courts then standing at the side of historic Westminster Hall, was by steamboat; and great lawyers of the day could be seen on board these hansoms of the river. At that time one of the judges of the three common law courts, the Queen's Bench, the Common Pleas, and the Exchequer, attended at three o'clock in the afternoon of each day at Judges Chambers, Rolls Gardens, off Serjeants Inn, Chancery Lane, to hear summons. Such a bear garden as the place was, the Stock Exchange is nothing to it; office boys shouting, and elderly chamber clerks push ing and fighting; confusion on every side; the judge's clerk guarding the door of the judge's room, and admitting only the elect to the august presence. Once admitted, you could see the judge sitting clothed like an ordinary mortal, disposing of important questions of pleadings or practice, one after another with marvellous rapidity. Hither came the old pleaders to argue questions of pleading before the very men who but few years before had been their pupils. Here have I seen old Chitty, Dodgson and Welch, whose chambers were the nursery of many a judge, past and present. Of all the judges, Baron Martin got through his chamber work the quickest; he made very short work of artificial plead ings, and was ruthless in cutting down fishing and irrelevant interrogations. Baron Martin was hasty, but seldom wrong in the long run.

He was an Irishman, and many were the "bulls " he perpetrated; the best of all was in the Liverpool Assize Court, when he had to complain of too much noise. " If people want to talk in court, they must go outside." And once again, sentencing a man for forgery, " If you had been con victed of this crime before me, thirty years ago, you would have been hanged to morrow." When I first knew Westminster Hall in 1860, the shining light was Sir Alexander Cockburn. I do not say he was then the greatest of the judges, though he afterwards became such. The growth of a great judge is gradual. Many brilliant advocates make but second-rate judges. Sir W. Bovill was an excellent advocate and a most successful leader before special juries of city mer chants; as a judge he was a failure. The late Lord Coleridge, blessed with every grace of voice and manner, and with every natural gift which goes to make an eloquent advo cate, and a successful leader, was a dismal failure as a judge. I remember Coleridge making his d£but as an advocate in the early sixties. It was in the notorious inquiry de hu1atieo re Wyndham, heard before Sam War ren, the author of " Ten Thousand a Year." Coleridge was briefed on behalf of the vestal (?) who had induced Wyndham to marry her; and a striking speech he made. Sir Hugh Cairns appeared for the alleged lunatic Wyndham (a most uncongenial task for a man of his high personal character it must have been) and to the astonishment of every