LIBRARY 
 
 VMMtttSfTY OP 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 ^
 
 BLUFF'S GUIDE TO 
 THE BAR
 
 BLUFF'S 
 GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 BY 
 
 HILARY BLUFF, M.A., B.G.L. 
 
 OF BLACK'S INN, BAKRISTEK-AT-LAW 
 
 EXPURGATED AND EDITED BY 
 
 ST. JOHN LUCAS 
 
 METHUEN & CO. LTD. 
 
 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. 
 
 LONDON
 
 First Published in 1911
 
 DEDICATION 
 
 To you, O Junior English Bar, 
 And them who made you what you are, 
 I dedicate this pleasing tract 
 Where Fiction gilds the pill of Fact. 
 The book is small, the price is high, 
 The type fatiguing to the eye ; 
 But follow Duty's path, nor shirk 
 The purchase of a Standard Work. 
 Then, when your quickened wits attain 
 To drafting pleadings without pain ; 
 When through the Court your accents ring, 
 And judges stare like anything ; 
 When Carsons reel from your attack, 
 And Simons pat you on the back ; 
 When you attain the BENCH, in fine, 
 And Lords and Commons both decline 
 To pension you (at sixty-nine), 
 Then, sitting lofty in your ermine 
 Above the litigating vermin, 
 Remember when your robe was stuff, 
 And say, " I owe all, all to BLUFF ! "
 
 "A Barrister but quite respectable." WORDSWORTH. 
 
 "Get on ! Get on ! " THE L D CH F J ST CE OF 
 E D.
 
 WORKS 
 
 FOR THE USE OF STUDENTS 
 AT THE ENGLISH BAR 
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 1. Complete Code of the English Law. (Un- 
 
 avoidably postponed.) 
 
 2. Making a Splash, or the Art of Jettison. 
 
 3. Gossiping Guide to the Hotchpot Clause. 
 
 (Shortly.) 
 
 4. Roman Law. 3 vols. (Soon.) 
 
 Vol. i. The Praetor Urbanus : a polite 
 
 farce. 
 
 Vol. ii. Private Life of the Empress 
 Theodora, wife of the royal 
 legislator Justinian, illustrated 
 from contemporary mosaics at 
 Ravenna and elsewhere. 
 Vol. iii. Little Drops of Water, or the 
 Roman Law of Stillicide. 
 
 5. Constitutional Law and Legal History. 5 vols. 
 
 (Presently.) 
 
 Vol. i. Le Droit Administratif. Advice to 
 Tourists who encounter the Gen-
 
 viii BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 darmerie during a visit to France 
 or Belgium. 
 
 Vol. ii. The little red book of Bristol trans- 
 lated into English of two syllables. 
 
 Vol. iii. The Pie Powder Court and other 
 Essays in cheap cookery. 
 
 Vol. iv. The Law Merchant, or how Lord 
 Bacon sold his authority ; with 
 a chapter on Shakespeare's New 
 Atlantis. 
 
 6. Evidence, Procedure, and Criminal Law. 3 
 
 vols. (Anon) 
 
 Vol. i. The Cloud of Witnesses. Leading 
 questions in palatable form. 
 
 Vol. ii. Procedure. Coloured waistcoats, 
 sympathetic tears, desk thumping, 
 etc., with diagrams. 
 
 Vol. iii. Criminal Law. Battery or May- 
 hem ; a treatise on black eyes. 
 Modern Journalism, or Should 
 purple prose be punishable ? 
 With a letter from the Editor 
 of the D ly Ml. 
 
 7. Common Law. 30 vols. (Sept. 20, 1945.) 
 
 A complete synopsis of this obscure branch 
 of the English Law for the use of clergy- 
 men, minors, the mentally weak, and 
 women. Torts, their beneficial effect on 
 civilization, etc., etc.
 
 WORKS FOR STUDENTS ix 
 
 8. Real and Personal Property and Conveyancing, 
 
 31 vols. (Sept. 21, 1945-) 
 Piscary, Turbary, Estovers, and how to 
 avoid them. Mortmain, a melodramatic 
 fragment. Shack, a pastoral note. With 
 other complete essays on this melancholy 
 subject, and a glossary of mediaeval 
 English extending to 300 pages. 
 
 9. Equity. 70 vols. (Sept. 22, 1945.) 
 
 (The scheme of this work is not yet 
 definitely arranged. The first 15 volumes 
 will deal with the procedure of the 
 Chancery Division.) 
 
 10. How to earn ,\Q a year at the English jBar, 
 by one who has almost done it. 
 
 n. The Mayor's Court. A Study in Majesty. 
 
 12. Hints to the Bench. (looth edition.) 
 
 13. Hints to the Bar. (loth edition.) 
 
 14. Hints to Solicitors. (Suppressed.)
 
 PREFACE 
 
 "~T"*HE modest author does not wish 
 ** to claim for his little treatise a 
 place on the shelf beside such monu- 
 mental brochures as Mr. Justice 
 Darling's Scintilla Juris or the last 
 edition of Chitty's Statutes ; enough 
 for him if Bluff's Guide may, like 
 the Annual Practice, lie in unruffled 
 sleep year after year on the table of 
 every pupil room. In this admirable 
 epoch it is scarcely necessary for the 
 modest author to mention that his 
 work has no claim to originality ; any 
 student might have written it after a
 
 xii BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 week in chambers ; vix ea nostra voco, 
 as the solicitor so aptly observed when 
 he contemplated his costs before taxa- 
 tion. 
 
 H. B.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. How TO BEGIN . . . . . I 
 
 II. How TO READ IN CHAMBERS ... 15 
 
 III. How TO ATTEND BEFORE THE MASTER . 24 
 
 IV. How TO DINE IN HALL 35 
 V. How TO WRITE OPINIONS .... 49 
 
 VI. How TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE . . 64 
 
 VII. How TO REPORT A CASE .... 74 
 
 VIII. THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION . . 97 
 
 IX. CONCLUSION .118 
 
 APPENDIX A LIVING IN THE TEMPLE . . 127 
 
 ,, B AXIOMS FOR THE USE OF STU- 
 DENTS ..,.,. 132 
 ,, C THE TEMPLE ; AN ODE . . 134 
 
 xm
 
 BLUFF'S GUIDE TO 
 THE BAR 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 
 
 I HAD always possessed a beautiful 
 soul, and when I came down from 
 Oxford every one thought that I should 
 become one of the great literary men 
 of the time, and perhaps even edit a 
 halfpenny paper. Yet many suns went 
 down in red rapture beyond the Chelsea 
 wharves, many grey gallons of Thames 
 water met and mingled with the boister- 
 ous sea, and still I found myself without 
 an occupation. It is true that, in ad- 
 dition to living in Bayswater, I wrote 
 epic poems and Petrarcan canzoni for
 
 2 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 the evening newspapers, but I secretly 
 yearned for a more sensational exist- 
 ence. 
 
 It chanced that one morning, as I 
 was proceeding on an omnibus to 
 Liverpool Street station, my attention 
 was arrested by a large building in the 
 somewhat depressing style of Gothic 
 which, let us hope, will be only tem- 
 porarily associated with the reign of 
 the late Queen Victoria. The con- 
 ductor, a civil though obviously bilious 
 person, pointed out to me a young 
 gentleman in a long gown and a very 
 white wig who was at that moment 
 emerging from the austere portals of 
 this fabric. I gazed at him, and as I 
 did so the scales seemed to fall from 
 my eyes. I looked into the Face of 
 Destiny. I also would wear such a 
 wig, with its two dependent tails and 
 its so ridiculous curls. I would defend 
 the fatherless and the widow, and
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 3 
 
 subsequently receive gigantic fees from 
 their rich Australian uncles. I would 
 be a barrister-at-law. 
 
 I leapt suddenly from the omnibus, 
 and leaving my train to pant for me 
 fruitlessly at Liverpool Street, I entered 
 the romantic and slightly malodorous 
 by-way which is known as Middle 
 Temple Lane. As I passed beneath 
 the admirable facade that affords such 
 a graceful distraction to an eye wearied 
 by the arrogance of the comic dragon 
 which guards that modern Garden of 
 the Hesperides, the City, did not the 
 accelerated pulsations of my heart tell 
 me that this was one of the crises of 
 my life ? Already I seemed to be one 
 of the teeming millions of the Law. 
 Already the strange atmosphere, dim 
 with the dust of decayed sheepskins 
 and forgotten charters, penetrated my 
 lungs and claimed me as its own. Not 
 once did I pause irresolute, but with
 
 4 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 a firm step and compressed brow I 
 walked down to Temple Gardens. In 
 that so detestable example of Portu- 
 guese renaissance dwelt the man whom 
 I sought. His name was Williams; 
 he had been my contemporary at 
 Oxford, and he was about to be called 
 to the Bar. Fortunately, I remembered 
 the name of the barrister in whose 
 chambers he was dreaming the hours 
 away : it was Shinnock an appellation 
 unpleasing to the poetic ear, perhaps, 
 but to me replete with forensic ardour. 
 
 I found it inscribed in white letters 
 above some twenty others. In response 
 to my knocking, a pyramidal person 
 with large side-whiskers appeared, and 
 smiled in such a friendly manner on 
 perceiving me that I began to wonder 
 when and where I had done him an 
 unforgettable kindness. 
 
 " Is Mr. Williams in ?" I asked. 
 
 His smile increased. It swallowed
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 5 
 
 up his face as an advancing army 
 swallows the mighty plain. 
 
 " He is, sir," he answered gaily. 
 
 "But perhaps he is busy?" I 
 murmured doubtfully. 
 
 The strange man added several fur- 
 longs to his smile. 
 
 "Busy, sir?" he said. "Bless your 
 soul, sir, no ! He's a pupil." 
 
 "Ah ha!" I said brilliantly, but I 
 began to feel uncomfortable. The 
 pyramidal person contemplated me for 
 a moment, and then said suavely : 
 
 " May I do myself the extreme 
 honour of inquiring your name, sir ? " 
 
 I replied ; he disappeared, and a 
 moment after returned. 
 
 " Mr. Williams," he said, with a 
 grave face, " desires me to inform you 
 that he is very busy at this moment, 
 and will you therefore be good enough 
 to wait ? " 
 
 I followed him into a room which
 
 6 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 was gaily decorated with legal almanacks 
 and several teapots. With the manner 
 of a hypnotist performing a surprising 
 feat he waved me towards a chair, and 
 then sat down at a desk and began 
 to write assiduously with a shrill and 
 angry pen. Presently Williams appeared, 
 yawning slightly. 
 
 " Hullo," he said, when he saw me : 
 " I thought you were writing poetry 
 in the south of France. We'll go for 
 a walk." And he led me out of the 
 chambers. On the threshold he paused 
 as if struck by a sudden and brilliant 
 idea. He turned to the pyramidal 
 person. 
 
 " Tell Mr. Shinnock that I shall not 
 be back to-day," he said. Then he 
 shut the door and took my arm. 
 
 " Depression," he said, " is nine 
 points of the Law. What are you 
 doing in this unholy place ? " 
 
 I explained. To my disgust he
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 7 
 
 began to laugh loudly and rudely, and 
 said something about joining the ranks 
 of the unemployed which my offended 
 ear did not quite catch. 
 
 " I am quite serious," I said. "Even 
 an artist should have regular work of 
 another kind to do : it keeps his art 
 from becoming jaded and mechanical. 
 He associates it with his hours of 
 leisure rather than with his hours of 
 toil, and that gives it the right note 
 of ease." 
 
 "Rot!" said Williams. "In my 
 opinion, if a man's got a line let him 
 stick to it. Doing two things at once 
 is fatal. It's like having a secret 
 wound. Go away, my boy, and write 
 your horrible epics." 
 
 It was some time before I could 
 convince Williams that I was in earnest ; 
 I did so at last, however. 
 
 "Are you really going to join the 
 great majority?" he said, "You'll
 
 8 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 soon get sick of law. What kind are 
 you going to do ? " 
 
 " I haven't quite made up my mind," 
 I replied warily. 
 
 '' Try the Common Law," said 
 Williams. "You get a glimpse of life 
 now and then in the Common Law. 
 Criminal Law is Death, and Chancery 
 
 is " But I will not repeat the 
 
 perhaps too hasty stricture of my 
 friend upon an honourable branch of a 
 great profession. 
 
 "What do I have to do first?" I 
 asked. 
 
 " Pay money," he answered. " That 
 does for your account at the bank. 
 Then you pass the Bar exams., and 
 that finishes off your brain ; and 
 you eat dinners, and bang goes your 
 digestion. And then, if you really 
 mean to practise, you must read in 
 chambers. Why not come and read 
 in Shinnock's chambers ? He plays
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 9 
 
 golf, so he won't expect you to turn 
 up on Saturdays." 
 
 " Will he take me ? " I asked doubt- 
 fully. 
 
 " My dear fellow, he'll leap at you." 
 Williams paused ; a slow, benignant 
 smile illuminated his features. " He 
 loves poetry and all that," he said ; 
 " he had an uncle, or an aunt, I forget 
 which, who used to write. You talk 
 to him about all those funny French 
 fellows that you used to read at Oxford 
 when you were working for Schools in 
 the Bodleian." 
 
 My heart leapt within me. Shinnock, 
 in spite of his somewhat uncouth name, 
 was obviously a kindred soul. I turned 
 to Williams. " Take me to him now," 
 I said. 
 
 Williams began to look uncomfortable. 
 
 "You take time to think about it," 
 he said. " No good doing things in a 
 hurry. You had better pass the beastly
 
 io BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 exams, before you begin to read in 
 chambers." 
 
 " Oh, I can do them at odd 
 moments," I said magnificently ; " I 
 want to see the practical side of life 
 at once. Introduce me to him to-day." 
 
 The true reason of my friend's 
 hesitation now appeared. 
 
 " I can't go back," he said lamely. 
 " I've just gone away for the rest of 
 the day." 
 
 I tried to persuade him to return 
 with me, but he was obdurate. " I 
 tell you what, though," he said. "You 
 can go alone. I'll write you an intro- 
 ductory note in the library. They 
 supply excellent writing-paper in the 
 library." 
 
 He led me to an attenuated edifice 
 fashioned in the beautiful commercial 
 Gothic manner of the 'sixties. It 
 seemed to be full of gentlemen yawn- 
 ing in tall hats. Having entered his
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 11 
 
 name in a large book near the door 
 he wrote a note, addressed it to Mr. 
 Shinnock, and then gave me some 
 parting advice as we went down the 
 spiral staircase. 
 
 " You had better enter your name 
 as a student at once," he said. " Which 
 Inn are you going to join? Mine has 
 an Elizabethan hall, but the other 
 gives you a larger choice for lunch. 
 That's the only difference." 
 
 The reader will realise that I had 
 no hesitation as to which Inn I should 
 honour as a member. I decided in- 
 stantly. Then I said good-bye to 
 Williams and walked swiftly to Temple 
 Gardens. I sent in the note and my 
 card to Mr. Shinnock, and a few 
 moments later the pyramidal clerk 
 ushered me into that gentleman's 
 room. I admit that I experienced an 
 honest thrill of emotion as I entered 
 for the first time the chambers of
 
 12 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Counsel. Mr. Shinnock sat at a large 
 table in the centre of the room. He 
 rose as I entered. Easy courtesy, I 
 reflected, is one of the most delightful 
 features of the barrister's life. But he 
 did not remain standing ; he went out 
 into the passage and began to talk to 
 a telephone with extraordinary vigour. 
 The telephone, after a moment, gave 
 up the unequal contest, and then Mr. 
 Shinnock returned, and briefly wished 
 me a good morning. 
 
 If Mr. Shinnock's clerk was pyramidal, 
 Mr. Shinnock himself merited rather 
 the adjective octagonal. He wore gold 
 spectacles, and had a face like a fiddle 
 and a voice like a flute. 
 
 " I have room for another pupil," 
 he said, pointing to one of the empty 
 chairs. The other, I deduced, be- 
 longed to the elusive Williams. " Are 
 you called yet ? " 
 
 I replied truthfully, but in a manner
 
 HOW TO BEGIN 13 
 
 which hinted that the interesting cere- 
 mony which he mentioned was likely 
 to happen at any moment. 
 
 " Very well," said Mr. Shinnock. 
 " I will take you for a year. Come 
 to-morrow if you like. We don't smoke 
 in chambers, though to do so seems 
 to be permitted by statute throughout 
 the Temple. And don't imagine we 
 are on an equality here. I may talk 
 to you, but you mustn't talk to me. 
 Occasionally, of course, I shall discuss 
 interesting points for your benefit. 
 Good morning ! " He had the air of 
 suddenly ceasing to see me, and I faded 
 through the doorway like a mist. 
 
 The pyramidal clerk eyed me with 
 benignant interest as he opened the 
 door. I felt almost too emotional to 
 respond adequately to his effusive 
 farewell. 
 
 It was done ! I had embarked on 
 a career. . . . My breast swelled with
 
 14 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 peculiar importance. At that moment 
 a small boy with a ferret-like face came 
 whizzing up the stairs, and nearly 
 collided with me. He glanced at my 
 face. 
 
 "Are you Mr. Jones's clerk?" he 
 demanded breathlessly. 
 
 For a moment I was at a loss ; 
 then I drew myself up to my full height 
 and smiled benignantly. 
 
 " No," I said. " No ... I am only 
 a student-at-law."
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 NEXT morning, when I entered 
 Mr. Shinnock's chambers, I 
 found that gentleman seated at his 
 table reading the Daily Telegraph. 
 The mellow yet scholarly style of that 
 celebrated journal has always appealed 
 to all that is best in me, and as I 
 advanced towards my preceptor my 
 face must have shown appreciation of 
 the fact that his tastes were akin to 
 my own. I held out an effusive hand 
 to him. " Good morning, sir," I said. 
 
 He looked somewhat surprised. 
 
 Probably he was not accustomed to 
 
 pupils who possessed such a gift of 
 
 genial courtesy. "'Morning," he said, 
 
 '5
 
 16 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 after a moment. He shook my hand 
 perfunctorily, and then remarked, " After 
 to-day we don't shake hands." 
 
 Slightly abashed, yet smiling still, I 
 retreated to my desk. On it reposed 
 a bundle of papers tied with red tape. 
 I fingered them softly. Mr. Shinnock 
 glanced towards me. " Read that," he 
 said. " You can attend the summons 
 at 1.30." I untied the tape, thinking 
 as I did so that the stern bit of toil 
 was now in the mouth of the Pegasus 
 of my pleasures, and that I should be 
 obliged to forgo the little luncheon that 
 I had promised myself at the Trocadero 
 as a memento of my first morning of 
 labour. I glanced at one after another 
 of the papers ; they were couched in 
 an uncouth dialect, it seemed to me ; 
 the only human interest I could discover 
 lay in the names of the plaintiff and 
 the defendant, and even they were 
 called Tompkins and Bilks. One of
 
 HOW TO READ IN CHAMBERS 17 
 
 the documents, however, bore the words, 
 " Witness, Hardinge Stanley, Earl of 
 Hals bury," and as I read that great 
 name I began to feel that my lines were 
 indeed fallen amongst mighty things. 
 
 For the rest, I tired hugely of these 
 passionless documents, and was quite 
 relieved when Williams entered swinging 
 a stick jauntily. 
 
 "'Morning," he said, with a collective 
 nod to Mr. Shinnock's back and to me. 
 
 Mr. Shinnock turned round slowly. 
 
 "Enjoyed your lunch?" he asked. 
 The question seemed to me at the time 
 scarcely pertinent. (Williams, indeed, 
 when privately consulted, said it was 
 somethinged impertinent.) But I after- 
 wards discovered that it was typical 
 of Mr. Shinnock's method of sarcasm. 
 
 Williams sat down at the desk 
 opposite to mine. 
 
 " What are you reading ? " he 
 whispered.
 
 1 8 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 " Tompkins vee Bilks," I replied, in 
 the same mysterious manner. The 
 effect of my innocent murmur was 
 electrical. Mr. Shinnock bounced up 
 and down in his chair, and then turned 
 to glare at me. 
 
 " Never say that ; never dare to say 
 that ! " he shouted. 
 
 I was bewildered, but soon I came 
 charitably to the conclusion that he 
 was mad. I humoured him suavely. 
 11 I beg your pardon," I said. Then I 
 looked at Williams. To my surprise 
 he was contemplating me with an ex- 
 pression of mingled pain and contempt. 
 What, then, had happened ? Had my 
 whisper sounded like some dreadful 
 thing ? 
 
 Mr. Shinnock spoke. " I forgot," 
 he said to Williams ; "he has only just 
 come. Explain to him, please." 
 
 Williams leant towards me with a 
 pitying smile.
 
 HOW TO READ IN CHAMBERS 19 
 
 "You may say ' Against/ and 'And,' 
 and ' Versus,' but you mayn't say ' Vee.' 
 It's deadly sin." 
 
 I gasped, but it was interesting. 
 This, even this, was an example of 
 that mighty unwritten Code of which 
 I had so often dreamed the Etiquette 
 of the Bar! Not the mightiest Judge, 
 tower as he may in scarlet and ermine 
 above his throng of henchmen and 
 litigants, can add one jot or take away 
 one tittle from this superb garner of 
 noble custom ; not the least and swar- 
 thiest student of law may infringe it 
 without rebuke. I was indeed received 
 into the very heart of legal life. 
 
 My meditations on this profound 
 subject lasted for an hour. At the 
 end of that time Mr. Shinnock leant 
 back in his chair, stretched out all his 
 arms and legs, and yawned voluptu- 
 ously. Williams did the same, groan- 
 ing slightly, and I felt that the tension
 
 20 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 of toil had relaxed, and arranged myself 
 in a comfortable attitude. 
 
 At this moment a small piece of 
 paper leapt into my desk from the 
 void. I looked up. Williams nodded 
 towards it, and grinned. I opened it. 
 On it was written : 
 
 " Tackle him now about those French 
 poets" 
 
 I looked at Mr. Shinnock. Mr. 
 Shinnock looked at me. 
 
 "Getting along all right?" asked 
 Mr. Shinnock, quite genially. 
 
 " I find the prose a little obscure," 
 I said. "Talking of obscurity," I con- 
 tinued, " have you ever read ' Pelleas 
 and Melisande ' ? " 
 
 Mr. Shinnock adjusted his spectacles 
 carefully. 
 
 "H'm," he said; " H'm, h'm. No. 
 Where is it reported ? " 
 
 I gaped at him. It took me a mo- 
 ment to realize that the poor benighted
 
 HOW TO READ IN CHAMBERS 21 
 
 man thought I had quoted a legal 
 case to him. But I am always gentle 
 in my attitude towards the ignorance 
 of others. After all, the ignorance of 
 others is the black night across which 
 the beacon-flare of the higher intellect 
 flames so brilliantly. I looked at 
 Williams ; he was reading an inverted 
 White Book. Then I returned to 
 Mr. Shinnock. 
 
 " It is not reported," I said merrily ; 
 "though, if it were, I fear that it 
 would be in the Probate, Divorce, and 
 Admiralty Division. But perhaps you 
 disdain the moderns ? " 
 
 Mr. Shinnock seemed to be stupefied 
 for a moment. Then he wailed with 
 his reedy voice. 
 
 " What on earth are you talking 
 about?" he cried. 
 
 I looked again at Williams, and saw 
 that he was still absorbed in the mazy 
 mysteries of the Annual Practice.
 
 22 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 "Perhaps you prefer de Musset?" 
 I hazarded. " Barberine seems to me 
 the ideal, the type of all delicious come- 
 dies ; and as for le Chandelier . . . ! " 
 
 Mr. Shinnock gasped, and then rang 
 a bell on his table with extraordinary 
 vehemence. A small boy who looked 
 as if he were about a hundred years 
 old appeared. 
 
 " Bring me," said Mr. Shinnock, in 
 the suffocated manner of an injured 
 husband on the French stage, " bring 
 me Meeson & Welsby thirteen." 
 
 The boy disappeared like a phantom 
 at cockcrow. Mr. Shinnock glanced 
 at me with resentment. I began to 
 feel guilty. 
 
 " I must have misunderstood," I 
 murmured : " Williams said something 
 about . . ." But I got no further, for 
 an enormous and appalling grin com- 
 pletely absorbed all Mr. Shinnock's 
 features.
 
 HOW TO READ IN CHAMBERS 23 
 
 "Oh, Williams!" he said, as if that 
 explained everything. " Williams is an 
 ass." 
 
 Like Necessity, I know no Law, but 
 I am prepared to assert in the teeth 
 of all opposition that Mr. Shinnock's 
 remark did not then, nor ever at any 
 time could, constitute a slander.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 HOW TO ATTEND BEFORE THE MASTER 
 
 AT half-past one, after a ridiculously 
 inadequate lunch in the hall of 
 my Inn, I returned to chambers, and 
 thence proceeded with Mr. Shinnock 
 and Williams towards the Royal Courts 
 of Justice. I have already aired the 
 contempt which I shall ever feel for 
 the architectural style of this edifice, 
 yet as I entered its portals I could 
 not repress a certain emotion. Being 
 naturally epigrammatic, I turned to 
 Williams. "When talent comes in at 
 the door," I said, " injustice flies out 
 of the windows." Williams was less 
 impressed by the phrase than I could 
 have wished. " It can't," he replied 
 oracularly; "they won't open." 
 24
 
 ATTENDING BEFORE THE MASTER 25 
 
 Certainly the air inside the Courts 
 seemed heavy with the sighs of a thou- 
 sand litigants. I thought of the great 
 verse of Dante. 
 
 " Per me si va tra la perduta gente ; . . . 
 Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore," 
 
 I murmured musically, and, I hope, 
 not profanely. We began to ascend a 
 sombre stair. So did a great many 
 other hurrying persons, the majority of 
 whom succeeded in treading on my 
 toes. I was relieved when we emerged 
 at last into a fuliginous place that pos- 
 sessed all the attributes of a waiting- 
 room at a railway station and even 
 more repellent seats. Here a great 
 number of frenzied people were rushing 
 about in all directions ; a favoured few, 
 however, stood tightly packed into two 
 wooden sheepfolds at either end of the 
 hall. At intervals a weary-eyed official 
 uttered a staccato cry which caused the
 
 26 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 people inside each sheepfold to struggle 
 violently in the direction of a door 
 beyond it, which he opened. After 
 they had wrestled with each other for 
 a suitable time, the official shut the 
 door and smiled at them. Soon the 
 hall became quite full of small men 
 with crafty eyes, prismatic neckties, and 
 a generally restless manner. Williams 
 told me that they were the vultures 
 and vampires of the law. I did not 
 know what he meant by that remark- 
 able phrase, but their aspect saddened 
 me. I felt that Burne Jones would 
 have disliked them : I could not make 
 them coincide with my idea of an 
 earthly Paradise : I was certain that 
 they did not read enough Matthew 
 Arnold. 
 
 In fact, the atmosphere of the place 
 afflicted me with a vague misery. 
 Even the dim street, with its sonorous 
 wheels and grim, heavy-jowled mer-
 
 ATTENDING BEFORE THE MASTER 27 
 
 chants, seemed to possess an acute and 
 beautiful humanity when matched with 
 this depressing backwater of the mighty 
 stream of the law. I yearned to be 
 elsewhere. I thought of the mute, 
 immortal marbles within the British 
 Museum, of cool gardens in Oxford, 
 of Plato's prose and Botticelli's paint- 
 ing, of white and wind-swept Alps of 
 everything, in short, which was calm 
 and changeless and beautiful. Then a 
 beastly little boy bruised my elbow 
 with his head, and, sighing deeply, I 
 returned to sordid reality. 
 
 Mr. Shinnock, attended by Runnacles, 
 the pyramidal clerk, was standing near 
 me, and talked incessantly to a gaily 
 apparelled youth with a brown hat 
 which wounded my soul. This young 
 man, as I afterwards understood, was 
 managing clerk to the solicitors who 
 were instructing Mr. Shinnock. At 
 this moment, however, Mr. Shinnock
 
 28 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 seemed to be instructing him. Presently 
 a sinister-looking person with a black 
 bag joined the group, and made a state- 
 ment that appeared to cause annoyance 
 to every one. He then withdrew to a 
 corner of the hall and stared with fish- 
 like eyes into space. 
 
 Williams came slowly towards me. 
 " Blick's clerk says Blick hasn't turned 
 up, and he can't find him," he said. 
 Blick, it appeared, was the counsel 
 against Mr. Shinnock. 
 
 " Then that's all right," I said. " I 
 suppose we can go away. Can you tell 
 me the technical name of this place ? " 
 I added. 
 
 " It's called the Bear Garden," said 
 Williams. I was about to demand an 
 explanation, when a door behind one 
 of the sheepfolds was flung open, and 
 the weary official uttered once more 
 his strange and terrible cry. Instantly 
 Mr. Shinnock, Williams, Runnacles, and
 
 ATTENDING BEFORE THE MASTER 29 
 
 the sinister personage with the bag 
 began, with the aid of a few well- 
 directed blows from the elbow, to force 
 their way through the crowd. I fol- 
 lowed, and eventually found myself in 
 a large room bisected by a long desk, 
 behind which sat a terrified gentleman 
 with a brilliantly bald head. Before 
 him stood, or rather reclined, a very 
 stout man with curly hair, who balanced 
 his stoutness neatly on the desk, and 
 a saturnine opponent in robes. They 
 were the knights of the fray ; their 
 squires and attendants were grouped 
 around them. 
 
 I watched the scene with awe. The 
 stout man exuded words as a fir tree 
 exudes gum ; he spoke slowly, and 
 there was pomp, if not dignity, in his 
 impressive air. Also, he perspired : 
 it was obvious that he was dreadfully 
 in earnest. The bald-headed personage 
 behind the desk blinked and cowered,
 
 30 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 and the saturnine opponent occasionally 
 opened his lips to contradict the earnest 
 assertions of the speaker, who would 
 thereupon groan like a wounded elk, 
 and appeal pitifully to the Master for 
 protection. At last, but still long be- 
 fore I had grasped the subject of the 
 stout man's eloquence, the Master, with 
 a tremendous effort, conquered his 
 vague fears, polished his eyeglasses 
 assiduously, smiled, apologized to the 
 stout man, who at once assumed the 
 attitude of noble resignation, apologized 
 to the saturnine person, who protruded 
 his under-lip, and then began to scrawl 
 laborious characters on the documents 
 before him. The stout man and the 
 saturnine person interchanged forensic 
 pleasantries in a manner that seemed 
 to me curiously artificial. Had they 
 rehearsed the whole absurd scene in 
 private ? I did not know. The at- 
 mosphere oppressed me. I was about
 
 ATTENDING BEFORE THE MASTER 31 
 
 to ask the Master to order that the 
 windows should be cast open to the 
 sweet air of the Strand, when the stout 
 man, followed by his allies and 
 opponents, departed from the room. 
 His gait had all the majesty of an 
 immense procession. That of his allies 
 was less remarkable. 
 
 " Our turn now," said Williams. 
 The phrase seemed to me inappropri- 
 ate. Could anything be more unlike 
 the methods of the halls of mirth and 
 music than the present dingy pro- 
 ceedings ? However, imitating my 
 fellow pupil, I reclined in a pictu- 
 resque attitude at the end of the desk 
 whilst Mr. Shinnock, the youth with 
 the hat, and the sinister man with the 
 bag did obeisance before the Master. 
 I was spared a long period of weari- 
 ness, for Mr. Blick had not appeared, 
 and Mr. Shinnock applied for an 
 adjournment, or something of the sort.
 
 32 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 How triste it all was ! A great wave 
 of pity surged over my heart as I 
 looked round the room. The poor 
 fellows actually enjoyed this dim and 
 lifeless wrangling ; they smiled, they 
 were alert, their ardours were not 
 wholly feigned. How infinitely path- 
 etic ! To this, to this, the weary travail 
 of our giant Mother the Earth through 
 countless centuries has brought us at 
 last . . . l Alas! 
 
 Yet, like sunshine after a day of 
 grim rain, the one touch of nature 
 that makes the whole world fight with 
 weapons less cumbrous than those of 
 the law was not denied to my 
 experience. The young man in the 
 dreadful hat seemed to be delighted 
 with himself and the world : holding 
 
 1 The editor has omitted three folios of lamentation 
 on the ugliness of things in general. The writer's 
 philosophy is both noble and beautiful, but perhaps 
 it would be somewhat out of place in a work primarily 
 intended as a guide to the legal profession.
 
 ATTENDING BEFORE THE MASTER 33 
 
 a walking-stick, a pair of gloves, 
 and the aforesaid painful decoration, 
 he turned over papers rapidly, talking 
 all the time to Mr. Shinnock. The 
 sinister person with the bag (I think 
 even the lay reader will know that I 
 refer to the clerk of the absent Blick) 
 the sinister person stood near and 
 regarded him with disfavour. Now the 
 fingers of the young man were deft ; 
 but presently the papers, the hat, the 
 gloves and the stick, became as mixed 
 as their linguistic symbols in a child's 
 first French exercise, and it was then 
 that the young man thrust out his 
 overburdened hands towards the sinister 
 person. 
 
 " Here, catch hold ! " he said mag- 
 nificently, and then he continued to 
 talk to Mr. Shinnock. The sinister 
 person frowned, but at length took 
 some of the papers. The young man 
 looked down, "No! not those, con.' 
 3
 
 34 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 found it ! " he cried. " I want the 
 papers : hold my hat." 
 
 The sinister person's eye should have 
 blasted him where he stood. There 
 was a moment's silence, and then 
 
 " Hold your hat ! ! ! " exclaimed the 
 sinister person, emphasizing the aspi- 
 rates in a truly appalling manner. 
 "Hold your hat!! I WON'T hold your 
 hat ! ! ! What next, I wonder ! " 
 
 He became rigid with fury. His 
 eyes were lambent, frightful. Mr. 
 Shinnock disappeared hastily into the 
 robing-room. I walked into the sun- 
 light with Williams, and meditated on 
 the permanent nature of the elemental 
 passions.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 
 
 ^HE regulations of the Inns of 
 -L Court require the student of 
 English law to dine for a certain number 
 of nights during the Term in the hall 
 of his Inn. Being no archaeologist, I 
 am not aware of the reason for this 
 grim decree : I am told that it exists 
 in order to promote good fellowship 
 amongst the neophytes of the Bar, but 
 it seems to me that a harsh and re- 
 pellent apple tart, which reappears 
 night after night with the monotonous 
 regularity of a self-respecting ghost, is 
 scarcely the medium whereby men's 
 hearts are opened to one another ; and 
 I have seen the faces of strong men 
 grow dark with rage over the kind of 
 35
 
 36 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 earthwork that is dignified quite arbi- 
 trarily with the name of plum pudding. 
 Possibly the Inn dinners are devised 
 on the mistaken principle that plain 
 living leads to high thinking ; but 
 even if this be so, is high thinking 
 of any value at the Bar? Mr. Haldane, 1 
 it is true, is a distinguished philosopher, 
 but I prefer to think that he dismisses 
 all theories of the absolute from his 
 mind when he enters the Court, and 
 keeps the vexed question of Appearance 
 and Reality to beguile the tedium of 
 a debate in the House of Commons. 
 
 To my mind, the form of repast most 
 conducive to legal swiftness of thought is 
 a quick lunch at the American restaurant 
 in the Strand. This, at least, is my 
 prescription for the Common Law Bar ; 
 gentlemen who practise in the Chancery 
 Courts will probably find their most 
 appropriate tonic in a ponderous bun. 
 1 Now happily Lord Haldane.
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 37 
 
 If the food (thoroughly English and 
 wholesome, bien entendu) is of the 
 kind which, once eaten, is long re- 
 membered, it is, on the other hand, 
 possible for the student, by artfully 
 selecting teetotalers and other fanatics 
 as the members of his mess, to become 
 jolly on wines, as Mr. Hilaire Belloc 
 so pleasingly phrases that delightful 
 process. For the benefit of the mothers 
 and aunts of law-students who may 
 chance to gloat over this instructive 
 little volume, I may say that the diners 
 sit in messes of four men, and to each 
 mess a certain quantity of wine is 
 allowed. The captain of the mess is 
 a person who is pompous if he is old 
 and bewildered if he is very young. 
 On him devolves the duty of ordering 
 the wine. He also possesses certain ob- 
 scure powers of fining his subordinates, 
 which, if regularly exercised, are fairly 
 certain to ensure his general un-
 
 38 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 popularity. I will not mention the 
 appalling hour at which the dinners 
 of the Inns of Court punctually begin ; 
 suffice it to say that it is exactly when 
 the self-respecting viveur is comfort- 
 ably digesting his lunch at the club 
 with the help of the earlier evening 
 journals. 
 
 On the first occasion when I dined 
 in hall, I arrived only a minute before 
 the stroke of this hour, and had just 
 time to throw on a garment not unlike 
 the gown of an Oxford Commoner, 
 but greatly elongated, and to enter the 
 hall, where a large number of students 
 and a few barristers were standing. 
 Various menials, several of them bearing 
 a striking resemblance to some success- 
 ful barristers whom I knew by sight, 
 were carrying in large silver trays with 
 a pomp that would have made the high 
 priests of old shake all their bells and 
 pomegranates with envy. A moment
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 39 
 
 after there was a sound as of a conflict 
 of giants in the passage without, and 
 then a venerable person clad in a long 
 purple gown appeared, carrying a large 
 silver-headed mace. With this, when 
 he had reached the dais at the top of 
 the hall beneath the great Vandyck, he 
 powerfully smote the floor. I noticed 
 that some shy individuals had crept up 
 the hall in his wake. Grace was said 
 by one of them, and they took their 
 seats at the table. I remained standing 
 forlorn at the bottom of the hall. 
 
 Presently, however, a benevolent- 
 looking official with a white beard 
 beckoned to me, and indicated a vacant 
 place in a mess at one of the students' 
 tables. I took it, and found myself 
 opposite to a stranger from Afric's 
 sunny fountains, and a compatriot of 
 my own, who wore the most vivid and 
 wounding waistcoat that my eye had 
 ever beheld. On my right sat a stout
 
 40 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 and very solemn-looking person with an 
 aquiline nose and a bulging under-lip. 
 
 The person with the waistcoat nodded 
 briefly to me. 
 
 " 'Evening," he said. " Seen an 
 evening paper ? What's the latest 
 on Jardy?" 
 
 I brightened. At least there was no 
 sickening formality about one's relations 
 with one's messmates. I replied that I 
 had seen an evening paper, and was 
 unaware as to what was the latest on 
 Jardy. I had a dim idea that Jardy 
 was a Spanish politician, but I was not 
 sure, so I spoke cautiously. 
 
 " What has he done now ? " I asked. 
 
 The man with the waistcoat gave me 
 a keen glance. 
 
 " Coughing," he said. 
 
 This puzzled me terribly. Why should 
 the fact that a Spanish politician suffered 
 from catarrh be so awfully important ? 
 I went warily again.
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 41 
 
 " Serious? " I asked. 
 
 The man with the waistcoat pursed 
 out his lips and frowned. 
 
 "Serious!" he cried bitterly: "he 
 won't run." 
 
 Why should he ? I thought. Running 
 was a 'mode of progression scarcely 
 adapted to high dignitaries of State. 
 At that moment, however, the attention 
 of the man with the waistcoat was dis- 
 tracted by the question of wine, and I was 
 able to examine the two other members 
 of our quartette. The solemn person 
 with the nose and the lip sat in sphinx- 
 like silence ; the blameless Ethiopian 
 (did not Zeus himself banquet with his 
 forerunners ?) the blameless Ethiopian 
 was more demonstrative ; he discussed 
 the weather, and I resolved to draw 
 him out on the amelioration of native 
 conditions in Africa and the prismatic 
 wonder of the tropical forest. He had 
 been called to the Bar in the previous
 
 42 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 term, and from his conversation I con- 
 cluded that he found it very difficult not 
 to wear his robes throughout the day. 
 
 Presently the menu was handed to 
 us ; my friend with the waistcoat called 
 it the programme. It was a large 
 enough sheet of cardboard, but its con- 
 tents, though they seemed exciting and 
 Gallic at the first glance, became dread- 
 fully depressing on a closer inspection. 
 I append it. 
 
 MENU 
 
 Potages 
 
 Boiled Cod 
 
 Poissons 
 Roast Beef 
 
 Relevls 
 Boiled Beef 
 
 Entremets 
 Roast Mutton 
 
 Viandes Froides 
 Hot Apple Tart
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 43 
 
 Thus did the patriotic soul of an 
 English cook disdain the enervating 
 nomenclature of the Cordon Bleu. I 
 called the attention of my fellow diners 
 to the anomalies of the menu, but they 
 did not seem to be impressed by its 
 humour ; the swart son of the desert, 
 however, laughed immoderately, and told 
 me a rather unprintable anecdote con- 
 nected with his sojourn in Paris. 
 
 The wine came to us at length ; it 
 was port, a decoction that I could never 
 warmly praise. My travels in Italy 
 have taught me that a wine, to be 
 beautiful, must have a beautiful name, 
 like Valpolicella, Lagrima Christi, Asti 
 Spumante ; port always awakes in me 
 painful reminiscences of long Sunday 
 afternoons in the house of certain old- 
 fashioned relatives whom I used to visit 
 against my will when a small boy. We 
 toasted each other in the solemn and 
 complicated fashion prescribed by the
 
 44 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 custom of the Inn, and then silence fell 
 upon us again. I was able to glance 
 round the hall. The scene reminded 
 me of my beautiful grey Oxford, and it 
 was with a curious sensation of surprise 
 that I remembered suddenly how near 
 to the roaring Strand and the myriads 
 of the East End lay this curious sur- 
 vival of a more leisurely age. Then I 
 remembered my duties, and began to 
 make conversation. 
 
 I was not rewarded for my efforts, 
 except by the ample smile of the 
 Oriental's grotto-like mouth. With a 
 view to discovering common interests I 
 started many subjects the drawings of 
 Leonardo da Vinci, Herbert Spencer's 
 attitude to modern life, travel in France, 
 travel in Italy, steamboats on the 
 Rhine, modern journalism, and the last 
 musical comedy. But the man with the 
 waistcoat seemed still to be absorbed in 
 gloomy foreboding as to the fate of the
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 45 
 
 mysterious Jardy, and the sphinx was 
 sipping port very slowly and meditating 
 on his own secret. At last, and re- 
 membering with apprehension the 
 penalties exacted in Hall at Oxford 
 from those who talked shop, I men- 
 tioned Law. The sphinx became sud- 
 denly voluble. 
 
 He continued to be voluble for three- 
 quarters of an hour. The man with the 
 waistcoat watched him gloomily, and 
 drank most of the port. I was weary ; 
 it seemed to me that the sphinx was 
 reciting page after page of the Annual 
 Practice. I began to hate him. In 
 despair I turned to the Ethiopian. 
 
 "You are going to practise at the Bar 
 of your native land ? " I said. 
 
 He nodded. The man with the 
 waistcoat seized on the chance of escape 
 from the sphinx, and winked at me. 
 
 " He's going to dance the corroboree 
 in his robes," he said.
 
 46 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 I thought the remark in bad taste, 
 but I did ;not comment on it. The 
 sphinx at last ceased to unburden his 
 soul of its accumulated stores of erudi- 
 tion. The man with the waistcoat took 
 up the wondrous tale. 
 
 " Stroddinary thing," he said, " all 
 these Indians getting called. Strod- 
 dinary thing. Every one of them who 
 has been called goes back to his own 
 country and becomes a god. What 
 I like about it is that it's so respect- 
 able." 
 
 " Respectable ? " I asked vaguely. 
 " Do you mean that to become a god 
 is respectable ? " 
 
 The man with the waistcoat looked 
 surly. " No," he said, " of course I 
 don't. Of course I don't. What I said 
 was that being a barrister , makes a 
 fellow respectable." 
 
 The vulgar philistinism of his point 
 of view rather amused me.
 
 HOW TO DINE IN HALL 47 
 
 "Is that the reason why you are 
 going to the Bar?" I asked sweetly. 
 
 " Ho yes," he said. " I'm not going 
 to practise not me. I go to the Bar 
 to get a social status. It's a position. 
 It stamps you. It's respectable." He 
 drank more port. " If you're run in 
 at night you've got an answer ready 
 for the magistrate. Respectable man 
 Barrister-at-Law." His face became 
 pointed and crafty, and took on an 
 even greater resemblance than before 
 to the large gold-and-enamel fox's 
 head in his dappled tie. I loathed 
 him, but I was merciful. 
 
 " Surely," I said, " respectable is 
 hardly the word to apply to a pro- 
 fession. The art of acquiring the 
 respect of others is a personal quality 
 which neither money nor examinations 
 can avail to give us. The only pro- 
 fession, in my opinion, which approxi- 
 mates to real respectability, is (of course
 
 48 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 I do not mention the Arts) the metier 
 of a shepherd. The pastoral life has 
 a lovely dignity of its own. Read 
 Theocritus and the Georgics. Read 
 Wordsworth. Read Housman's Shrop- 
 shire Lad'' 
 
 The man with the waistcoat gazed 
 at me solemnly for some time, then 
 he grinned and turned towards the 
 sphinx. 
 
 The sphinx protruded his underlip 
 like a love-sick camel. 
 
 "Pooh!" he said. "A shepherd! 
 A shepherd belongs to the lower 
 
 classes." 
 
 
 
 As I went out, after grace had been 
 said, it was with a sigh of mingled 
 irritation and relief. There are some 
 points of view which are really utterly 
 intolerable to the artistic temperament. 
 
 But not all my dinners were so 
 terrible.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 FOR some weeks after my arrival 
 in Mr. Shinnock's chambers I 
 continued to experience a sensation 
 which I can only compare to that ot 
 a diver who adventures for the first 
 time into the uncharted depths of 
 perilous seas forlorn. Gradually, how- 
 ever, my early bewilderment forsook 
 me ; when I was suddenly questioned 
 concerning the case which I happened 
 to be reading, I no longer confused 
 plaintiff and defendant, or imagined that 
 the point at issue was a libel when it 
 was in reality a non-performance of 
 contract. With this new-found ability 
 of mine there came also a desire to 
 
 4 49
 
 50 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 turn my everlasting absorption of law 
 to account ; to perform some task which 
 might reasonably be called creative, if 
 that term can be merited by any part 
 of a system whose whole attitude seems 
 to me one of destruction. 
 
 It chanced that one morning, as I 
 was rather wearily reading how one 
 gentleman (of an unromantic tempera- 
 ment, to judge from the correspond- 
 ence) had annoyed another gentleman 
 (of a similar temperament, I think) by 
 breaking several drainpipes that be- 
 longed to one or the other of them, 
 Mr. Shinnock suddenly fixed me with 
 his penetrating glance and inquired if 
 I had ever written an opinion. I had 
 not done so, but I had read many ; 
 and to my mind the secret of their 
 construction seemed to lie in the re- 
 iterant use of certain non-committal 
 phrases : / think, in my opinion, unless 
 there is anything to the contrary, per-
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 51 
 
 haps, probably, possibly, and so forth. 
 Therefore I reassured Mr. Shinnock 
 by announcing that I thought myself 
 entirely capable of producing an opinion 
 that would not only satisfy the solicitor, 
 but afford himself also some valuable 
 food for thought. I softened the hard 
 truth of this announcement by veiling 
 it in somewhat obscure language ; but 
 Mr. Shinnock was not unsympathetic. 
 His smile told me that he understood. 
 
 To Williams, arriving at that moment 
 late as usual was allotted the same 
 task. He displayed no emotion on 
 hearing of it, but began to write a letter 
 even before Mr. Shinnock departed to 
 unearth precedents in the library. After 
 an hour, during which I wrote two 
 opinions, and tore them up in con- 
 sequence of vital errors due to my 
 too romantic conception of the facts, 
 Williams glanced through the instruc- 
 tions, wrote rapidly for ten minutes,
 
 52 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 and then flung what he had written 
 over to me. I admired him. I admired 
 him less when I had read what he had 
 written, but I felt that I liked him 
 better. 
 
 I must premise that the affair with 
 which we were concerned was of a very 
 commonplace nature ; yet eventually, 
 doubtless, the leading case of Blate v. 
 Waggonacles may acquire an additional 
 interest from having been quoted in 
 this book. The facts, stated briefly, as 
 solicitors say before they embark on a 
 narrative of twenty folio pages, were as 
 follows : 
 
 Mr. Ezdras Blate was a not unpros- 
 perous dealer in mushrooms who re- 
 sided near Bungay, a locality, if we may 
 believe the reports of the various Royal 
 Commissions of Inquiry into the State 
 of Mushrooms in General from 1800 to 
 1904, singularly favourable to the pro- 
 duction of that pleasing though treacher-
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 53 
 
 ous comestible. The world went very 
 well indeed with Mr. Blate until one ill- 
 omened day when his wife's nephew, Mr. 
 Waggonacles, a seedsman of Twicken- 
 ham, sighed for the larger air of a land 
 unsoiled by villas, and heard of the rapid 
 increase of income that attended the 
 labours of his uncle by marriage. Un- 
 deterred by the solemn warnings of 
 Mr. Blate, who stood, like a prophetic 
 angel, with his finger pointing direfully 
 in the direction of Bankruptcy Buildings, 
 Mr. Waggonacles sold the business at 
 Twickenham, and with the proceeds 
 rented a farm near Bungay with meadows 
 thereto attached, which meadows actually 
 lay next to those of Mr. Blate. Mr. 
 Blate resented this invasion extremely, 
 but for a couple of years Mr. Waggonacles 
 did not thrive at all, so that his uncle 
 began to feel happy again, and to offer 
 him humorous advice whenever they 
 met. Being goaded, probably, to a
 
 54 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 frenzy of labour by this kind of advice, 
 and as he possessed also a good deal of 
 dreadful business ability, Mr. Waggon- 
 acles rose up so early and toiled so hard 
 that by the end of the third year of his 
 tenancy his profits had almost equalled 
 those of his uncle, and three years later 
 he was the richer man of the two, and 
 was enabled to repay the humorous 
 advice with grinning interest. 
 
 Mr. Blate was furious, for in propor- 
 tion to the increase in his nephew's 
 wealth his own income steadily dimin- 
 ished ; the mushroom world was de- 
 throning its king, and a vile usurper 
 was about to reign in his place. The 
 white and wonderful harvest of his fields, 
 too, was less wonderful than of old, and 
 one of his chief grievances was that 
 tramps were able to enter his land by 
 means of a hole in a certain common 
 hedge which Mr. Waggonacles was 
 bound by agreement to keep in repair.
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 55 
 
 Mr. Blate brooded over this grievance 
 until he came to the conclusion that 
 Mr. Waggonacles left the hole in the 
 hedge unrepaired on purpose to allow 
 strangers to enter and ruin his neighbour's 
 mushrooms. He does not seem to have 
 ever accused or even suspected Mr. 
 Waggonacles of theft : theft, he held, 
 would not have been worth Mr. W.'s 
 while. But he was certain that Mr. 
 Waggonacles left the hedge unrepaired 
 to annoy and injure him, and he re- 
 solved to bring an action against him. 
 
 Having formulated this resolve, he 
 went away to Surrey for a holiday. 
 One morning he was leaning on a gate 
 by the roadside, contemplating a field 
 which to his poetic eye seemed like a 
 green heaven with myriads of mushrooms 
 for stars, when a labourer driving half a 
 dozen pigs came by him. The labourer 
 was an ordinary labourer, and the pigs 
 seemed ordinary pigs ; but suddenly, at
 
 56 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 the moment when they were passing 
 Mr. Blate, the largest of them uttered 
 an extraordinary series of squeals, rushed 
 between his legs, and attempted to get 
 through the gate. It was some time 
 after that the labourer, by using its tail 
 as a handle, induced it to return to the 
 road. Mr. Blate, who was always 
 interested in the devious designs of 
 nature, inquired the reason of this 
 sudden madness. " Mushrooms," said 
 the man. The pig had a passion for 
 mushrooms as insatiable as the thirst of 
 Falstaf Mr. Blate contemplated it for 
 some time, and then walked with the 
 man to the market for which the latter 
 was bound. When he returned to 
 Bungay a fine pig accompanied him, 
 and he noticed with satisfaction that the 
 hole in the hedge was still unrepaired. 
 The next evening he showed it to the 
 pig. That esurient animal was driven 
 forth with curses by Mr. Waggonacles
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 57 
 
 at daybreak, but not before its most 
 radiant dreams of gluttony had been 
 gratified. 
 
 These assisted visitations continued 
 for several days, until one evening when 
 the pig, finding that even Paradise could 
 grow monotonous, or, perhaps, too much 
 elated with a myriad mushrooms, pene- 
 trated into Mr. Waggonacles' garden 
 and fell through a cucumber-frame. An 
 acrimonious correspondence followed, 
 resulting in the issue of a writ by 
 Mr. Blate, who demanded damages on 
 account of his pig, which had been lost 
 through Mr. Waggonacles neglecting to 
 keep up the fence as he had agreed to 
 do, and on account of mushrooms stolen 
 by tramps because of the same negligence. 
 Mr. Waggonacles' solicitor then in- 
 structed Mr. Shinnock to give his 
 opinion on the case in general, and as 
 to the advisability of Mr. Waggonacles 
 putting in a counterclaim for the mush-
 
 58 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 rooms lost by the introduction of the 
 pig, whose tastes had been detected by 
 him on the last evening before its glassy 
 end. 
 
 Williams wrote another Opinion, 
 taking a line contrary to that on which 
 his first one was written, whilst I was still 
 thinking out my high argument. Here 
 is Opinion No. i by Williams. 
 
 Opinion 
 
 Waggonacles is wrong. Blate is right. 
 Blate should apply for summary judg- 
 ment under Order XIV. 2. 6. See 
 Ping v. Pong, 5 Q.B.D. 900 ; Huz v. 
 Buz, 18 L.J.Q.B. 333, 42 L.J. 1008; 
 Hophni v. Phineas, ex-parte Eli, 8 
 Q.B.D. 540. 
 
 " It's rather short," said Williams, 
 " but I saw one by a Silk the other day 
 which was shorter, and hadn't any 
 references. This is a better one, with
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 59 
 
 sound commonsense advice for the 
 defendant." And he read the second 
 document. 
 
 Opinion 
 
 " In my opinion both Mr. Blate and 
 Mr. Waggonacles are rogues. The first 
 question, then, in my opinion, to be 
 answered is, which of the two is the 
 greater rogue ? This, I think, is im- 
 portant, as the party who is the greater 
 rogue will probably win the action, for 
 it is a maxim of Law that the greatest 
 rogue is the person most skilful at 
 pretending that he is an honest man 
 when he is not in substance and in fact 
 (Blackstone, Commentaries', and Dar- 
 ling J., Scintilla Juris}, and in an action 
 the most honest-seeming man often wins. 
 The simplest plan, I believe, will be for 
 me to put the dishonest (in my opinion) 
 actions of both parties in tabular form 
 thus :
 
 60 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 " (a) MR. BLATE (b) MR. WAGGON ACLES 
 
 (1) Buys pig with (i) Neglects to repair 
 
 intent to gap in hedge ; 
 
 i n j u r e 
 
 nephew's (2) Lures pig into 
 
 mushrooms; greenhouse. 
 
 (? allege) ; 
 
 (2) Injures 
 
 nephew's (3) Puts greenhouse 
 
 mushrooms where pig can 
 
 by introduc- hurt itself 
 
 ing pig. against it. (? 
 
 allege, find out 
 about green- 
 house). 
 
 "It will thus be seen that Mr. Wag- 
 gonacles, as I think, goes one worse 
 than Mr. Blate ; but probably here the 
 great maxim of Equity would intervene 
 which lays down that a man who has 
 committed ten smaller crimes is not 
 necessarily more guilty than the man 
 who has committed one great one. In 
 my opinion Mr. Waggonacles should 
 pay 405. into Court, denying liability, 
 and counterclaim for injured mushrooms.
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 61 
 
 The roguery, in my opinion, is about as 
 equal as can be." 
 
 I listened to Williams's second opinion 
 with interest ; it seemed to me to have 
 hit the happy mean between the over- 
 pompous and the over-casual. But I 
 felt that my own opinion displayed a 
 subtlety scarcely granted by the gods 
 to my fellow-pupil. I read it to him 
 with pride. 1 1 ran as follows : 
 
 " Opinion 
 
 " The first question to be decided in 
 the present case is, What is a pig ? 
 Pigs may be divided into two classes 
 wild pigs (fer& naturce] and tame pigs 
 (porci domestici). Now if the pig in 
 question was a tame pig, it belonged 
 to its original owner under all conditions 
 by the jus civile ; but if it was a wild 
 pig, it did not belong to its original 
 owner, for it never had one, but it was 
 the property of the person on whose
 
 62 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 land it roamed, and as soon as it left 
 that land ceased to be his property. In 
 my opinion circumstances point to the 
 fact that the pig in question was prob- 
 ably a wild pig ; I think that its taste 
 for mushrooms, which it could not have 
 acquired in captivity, is (unless it can 
 be proved to be hereditary) evidence 
 of this, as also its desire to escape from 
 the man who was driving it and its 
 ignorance of the danger which attends 
 leaping into cucumber-frames. Now if 
 it was a wild pig, it ceased to be the 
 property of Mr. Blate as soon as it 
 left his land, and became any one's 
 property (e.g. if it had gone down to 
 the seashore and lived below high- 
 water mark it would have been its own 
 property) ; therefore when it entered 
 Mr. Waggonacles' land it became his 
 property, and so his mushrooms were 
 destroyed by his own pig, and he had 
 perhaps better not counterclaim for
 
 HOW TO WRITE OPINIONS 63 
 
 their value. I should advise Mr. Wag- 
 gonacles to defend the case, but not to 
 pay money into Court. The case, in 
 my opinion, should be helpful to the 
 mushroom trade. Mr. Waggonacles 
 would do well to go into partnership 
 with his uncle by marriage, Mr. Blate." 
 Williams appeared to be amused by 
 my opinion, but he pretended to think 
 that the law on which my argument 
 was based did not exist. Unluckily, 
 Mr. Shinnock never asked to see our 
 attempts, and we were far too modest 
 to produce them uninvited. The amus- 
 ing part of the affair was that Mr. 
 Blate and Mr. Waggonacles actually 
 did become partners, and now produce 
 gigantic mushrooms with the most 
 amiable co-operation.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 
 
 r I ^HE last six months of my sojourn 
 JL in Mr. Shinnock's chambers may 
 to some extent be regarded as the most 
 remarkable epoch during my life, for 
 during this period I had the supreme 
 good fortune of being able to witness 
 may I say in some degree to foster? 
 the gradual development of one of the 
 most fascinating of our modern causes 
 ce'lebres. I think I may assert that the 
 great case of Pilchard v. Lowenbaum 
 will always possess an interest for any 
 one who, from the point of view either 
 of literature or anthropology, devotes 
 any portion of his time to the study of 
 the gens irritabile vatum, or the almost 
 equally irritable race of actor-managers. 
 6 4
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 65 
 
 The history of the case up to the 
 time of trial was as follows. Mr. Simon 
 Pilchard, a sturdy young rhymer of the 
 Tennyson breed, as one of the half- 
 penny journals so aptly described him, 
 had written in his charming suburban 
 residence a drama which bore the title 
 of Philip of Macedon. In spite of 
 various ghostly interruptions (for it is 
 dangerous to write personalities even 
 of dead-and-gone Macedonians) and of 
 alarming conflicts with burglars, who 
 were probably jealous minor poets 
 in disguise, Mr. Pilchard finished his 
 tragedy and sent a type-written copy 
 to Mr. Lb'wenbaum, 1 the distinguished 
 manager of that annexe to the Marl- 
 borough Dining-room which is known 
 as The Unique Theatre. Mr. Lowen- 
 baum read and marked the play, and 
 afterwards proceeded to learn and in- 
 wardly digest it for the benefit of 
 
 1 Now, happily, Sir Rudolph Lowenbaum. 
 5
 
 66 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 humanity. In due course the play ap- 
 peared, and the first night was highly 
 successful : the dramatic critic of The 
 World wept like a widowed thing in 
 the second row of the stalls ; and one 
 of the most distinguished members of 
 the staff of the British Museum fell 
 into an ecstatic trance, and was still 
 in catalepsy bound when removed to a 
 four-wheeler by the finely liveried at- 
 tendants of the theatre. It is true that 
 a certain revolutionary, Mr. George 
 Bernard Shaw, muttered in his beard 
 and pouted contemptuously at the affect- 
 ing love scene between Philip and his 
 second wife ; and that Mr. Arthur 
 Balfour, always as tender-hearted as 
 true-souled (D ly T-l-gr-pti), shivered 
 apprehensively when Alexander threw 
 the drinking-cup (silver gilt) at Attalus, 
 and, unfortunately missing him, removed 
 the conductor of the orchestra some- 
 what swiftly from his seat beneath the
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 67 
 
 spreading palm-trees that form so pleas- 
 ing a feature in the ensemble of The 
 Unique Theatre. Save for these epi- 
 sodes the play was received with 
 extreme enthusiasm ; and Mr. Bernard 
 Shaw was ejected from the gallery by 
 a certain Robertson Nicoll, who mur- 
 mured triumphantly, as he performed 
 this salutary task, " Whaur's your Willie 
 Shakspeare noo ? " an epigram which 
 has since had no small success in the 
 Savile Club and the loftier literary 
 circles of Brixton and the provinces. 
 
 But alas ! amid the harmony of this 
 general rejoicing a jarring note was 
 suddenly sounded. At the fall of the 
 curtain, when Mr. Pilchard (in fashion- 
 able evening dress, with black trousers 
 and a white tie) advanced to the foot- 
 lights to acknowledge the applause of 
 the audience, and to receive the laurel 
 crowns secretly woven by the fair hands 
 of the Women's Literary Guild of
 
 68 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Peckham, the Intellectual Amazons of 
 Netting Hill Gate, and the Eclectic 
 Minds Society of Surbiton, it was 
 obvious that he was deeply moved, and 
 not even the fine Irish-grown potato 
 thrown on to the stage by Mr. Shaw, 
 who had returned by means of an 
 emergency exit, could avail to arouse 
 him from his melancholy. His speech 
 was short but brilliant. Fixing his 
 eyes on Mr. A. B. Walkley, he 
 murmured these words : ' ' TeXos, finis, 
 avayKr), oXwXa, oTaTOTarol, 01/1,01, at, 
 at, at." He then bowed, and with- 
 drew. There was some commotion 
 amongst the regular playgoers, but 
 thanks to the commendable skill dis- 
 played by Mr. Max Beerbohm in his 
 method of handling the fire-hose, the 
 audience at length withdrew. Mr. 
 Lowenbaum did not appear in response 
 to the call of the dripping but en- 
 thusiastic assembly.
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 69 
 
 Mr. Pilchard refused to make any 
 communication to the reporters who 
 besieged him at supper, and it was 
 not until the next morning that the 
 true reason of his remarkable epigram 
 was given to the world. In a letter 
 to the Daily Telegraph Mr. Pilchard 
 accused Mr. Lowenbaum of nothing 
 less appalling than the wilful murder or 
 deliberate suppression of some of his 
 finest lines. For instance, the great 
 speech in which Alexander prophesies 
 his own future in these burning words : 
 
 " Oh, I will be a flame to burn the world 
 And speed the Kalmuck to the Caucasus; 
 I, only I, will set the Thames afire 
 And all the rivers running to the sea; 
 Terribly will I thunder over Thrace 
 And lighten on the Lebanonian ; 
 Like Dionysus ride to India 
 Drawn by the tameless panthers of Ambition, 
 Yea, I will turn the courses of the world, 
 And thresh the foam-fruit of the fuming seas. 
 And Heaven shall be the toy of my caprice, 
 And Hell shall groan and render up her spoil."
 
 70 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 To which Philip replies in these 
 cynical yet immortal words : 
 
 " When, Alexander ? Alexander, when ? " 
 
 This line was omitted by Mr. Lowen- 
 baum on the first night possibly be- 
 cause he feared the effect which 
 reiteration of another actor-manager's 
 name would have on the audience. 
 Mr. Lowenbaum also omitted the great 
 line spoken by Olympias when she sees 
 Philip's dead body : 
 
 " I did not know the dead could have cold feet," 
 and the immortal simile : 
 
 "Great Babylon is babbling in old age, 
 And Nineveh nods like a grandmother, 
 Who warms her withered shanks athwart a flame." 
 
 Mr. Lowenbaum, in his reply, called 
 the lines padding surely a dangerous 
 remark from one who has played the 
 part of Falstaff. He also condemned 
 the prologue, which was a caustic
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 71 
 
 commentary on the dryness of modern 
 poetry spoken by Zeus, Athena, Poseidon 
 (who was especially nasty to Mr. 
 Rudyard Kipling), and Aphrodite (who 
 didn't think great things of Mr. Richard 
 le Gallienne). Personally I thought that 
 the last lines spoken by Zeus were 
 excellent : 
 
 "The cup! bright Gunnymede ! Ah! from the 
 
 first 
 The minor poet caused the major thirst." 
 
 And some of the lyrics which Mr. 
 Lowenbaum also quite arbitrarily re- 
 moved were beautiful. Philip's con- 
 fession of faith, for instance, spoken 
 after the banquet, (" swaying gently " is 
 the stage direction) : 
 
 "I hold it true, whate'er befall, 
 And if I don't, may I be shot ! 
 Tis better to have loved a lot 
 Than never to have loved at all." 
 
 And the lyric sung by the servant- 
 maid to her pet ostrich :
 
 72 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 " Fly, little birdie, over the sea, 
 And bring my lover back to me : 
 Though he be perjured, I be true, 
 And if he runs, why, so can you." 
 
 In fact, Mr. Lowenbaum certainly 
 seems to have exceeded his rights, for 
 though during the rehearsals of the 
 play he was careful to repeat all these 
 golden verses, yet on the first night 
 he left them out altogether. Can it be 
 that he observed Mr. George Bernard 
 Shaw's minatory eye in the gallery ? 
 
 Be this as it may (to adopt the 
 beautiful prose style of the solicitor's 
 clerk), the fact remains that Mr. Pilchard 
 was greatly grieved by the strange 
 behaviour of an actor-manager who had 
 been until this regrettable moment the 
 ideal entrepreneur of his ambition, and 
 he commenced an action against Mr. 
 Lowenbaum, claiming damages for 
 mutilation, distortion, and omission of 
 some of the most salient passages in
 
 HOW TO DESCRIBE A GREAT CASE 73 
 
 his play. The action proceeded rapidly 
 (for an action) through the preliminary 
 stages and was set down for trial. 
 Mr. Augustine Birrell, K.C.,the learned 
 and witty author of Obiter Dicta, and 
 Mr. Shinnock appeared for the plaintiff 
 The late Mr. W. S. Gilbert, author of 
 the charming and immortal Bab Ballads, 
 and the too-seldom-heard libretti to 
 Sullivan's operas, was made a King's 
 Counsel for the occasion, and appeared 
 with Mr. H. B. Irving for the defendant. 
 The case attracted considerable attention, 
 most of the witnesses called on both 
 sides enjoying more or less celebrity. 
 I was enabled to be in Court through- 
 out the trial, and took careful but 
 informal notes of the evidence, with 
 comments on the personal appearance 
 of the witnesses. I need scarcely add 
 that the case was tried before Mr. 
 Justice Smyles and a special jury.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 
 
 Pilchard v. Lowenbaum, before Smylcs J. and a 
 Special Jury 
 
 ACTION by playwright against 
 actor-manager who had cut, 
 wounded, and otherwise mutilated cer- 
 tain lines, tropes and metaphors be- 
 longing to and written by the said 
 playwright. 
 
 For the Plaintiff . . Birrell K.C. and Shinnock. 
 For the Defendant . W. S. Gilbert K.C. and 
 
 H. B. Irving. 
 
 Birrell, K.C., in opening the case, 
 commented on its important nature, as 
 representing the old quarrel between 
 the poet whose art was per se eternal, 
 and the reciter or actor of his poems 
 
 74
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 75 
 
 whose art was temporary, trashy, and 
 fleeting. (Sensation in gallery, where 
 the company of The Unique Theatre 
 had been accommodated with seats.) 
 The plaintiff, Counsel continued, was 
 a bard of some eminence, and though 
 he had the appearance of youth, his 
 experience and long record of success 
 must not therefore be forgotten by the 
 jury. 
 
 TJie Judge. It is impossible for an 
 immortal to look old, Mr. Birrell ? Is 
 that your opinion ? 
 
 Birrell, K.C. Quite, my lord, quite. 
 Continuing, the learned Counsel said 
 that the facts of the case were suf- 
 ficiently plain ; indeed, the defendant 
 to the best of his belief admitted that 
 he had left out many of Mr. Pilchard's 
 lines on the first night of the production 
 of Philip of Macedon, and the point at 
 issue, therefore, was were the lines 
 valuable, and did Mr. Lowenbaum do
 
 76 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Mr. Pilchard a serious artistic injury 
 by omitting them ? Counsel hoped to 
 call witnesses whose evidence would 
 convince the jury that this was the 
 true deduction to be drawn. Not 
 that, in his opinion, there was need of 
 witnesses, for to any student of poetry, 
 indeed to any sensible man, it was 
 obvious that Mr. Pilchard had been 
 shockingly maltreated. The practice 
 of pruning a man's play to suit the 
 Procrustean couch of any actor's idio- 
 syncrasy was as old as it was dis- 
 honourable. It had happened, pro- 
 bably, to Sophocles ; no doubt it had 
 happened to Shakespeare, who, in his 
 LXVIth sonnet has a bitter remark 
 about Art made tongue-tied by Au- 
 thority. Some, of course, were of 
 opinion that this complaint referred to 
 the Censor, but he himself believed 
 it to be aimed at the Actor-Manager. 
 Goethe, in 1795, too
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 77 
 
 At this point the foreman of the 
 jury, a person in a frock-coat who 
 was afterwards discovered to be called 
 Gosse, leant forward and murmured 
 " 1796, New Style," and was instantly 
 called to order by the usher. 
 
 Continuing, Counsel said that it was 
 obviously unnecessary to quote further 
 examples to so erudite a jury, and that 
 he was unwilling to waste the time of 
 the Court. (Mr. Andrew Lang, who 
 up to this point had been dreaming of 
 the 1745 period in the back row of the 
 jury-box, woke up and said " Hear, 
 hear.") The questions to be decided 
 by the jury were, first : was Mr. 
 Pilchard truly a poet ? and, secondly, 
 if Mr. Pilchard was truly a poet had 
 a mere mummer (hisses, suppressed) 
 he used the word in no derogatory 
 sense, but for alliterative purposes a 
 mere pantomimus or jongleur any right 
 to garble the divine and immortal
 
 78 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 phrases that drifted down from the 
 sunlit heights of Parnassus to the 
 lamplit depths of The Unique Theatre ? 
 (The learned Counsel resumed his seat 
 amid ironical applause from Mr. Bernard 
 Shaw and Miss Marie Lloyd.) Mr. 
 Simon Pilchard was called. 
 
 Counsel. You are Mr. Simon Pil- 
 chard, the great poet ? 
 
 Witness. I am. 
 
 [Mr. W. S. Gilbert (sotto voce) : 
 
 Then let me own 
 I'm a poetic sham.] 
 
 Counsel. You are the author of 
 many dramas, the last of which is 
 Philip of Macedon, produced by the 
 defendant on Saturday, November 5, 
 1904? 
 
 Witness. I am. I also wrote " Rous- 
 seau," " Benjamin Franklin," and many 
 other poetic rhapsodies. 
 
 [Mr. Bernard Shaw. Shame!
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 79 
 
 Mr. Sidney Colvin. Hail, poet! 
 
 Mr. A. B. Walkley. Xalpe. Macte 
 virtute, puer !] 
 
 The Judge. Are you not the author 
 of the "Epic of Hades "? 
 
 Witness (with extreme emotion). No. 
 Are you ? (Sensation.) 
 
 Birrell, K.C. Now, Mr. Pilchard, 
 will you kindly tell my lord and the 
 jury about your previous relations with 
 the defendant. 
 
 Witness. He was a true friend in 
 life, and in drama the Philip of my 
 dreams. 
 
 The Judge. Were they pleasant 
 dreams or nightmares, Mr. Pilchard ? 
 
 (Applause from Mr. Arthur Symons.) 
 
 Witness. They were flushed faint 
 with the fine air of dawn. 
 
 [Mr. Gilbert (piano] : 
 
 Sing pooh to you, boo-hoo to you, and that's 
 what I should say.]
 
 8o BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Counsel. I ineed not waste time in 
 continuing to prove to you that Mr. 
 Pilchard is a poet. 
 
 Cross-examined by Mr. Gilbert, the 
 plaintiff admitted that he could not 
 think of a rhyme to jocular sausages. 
 He had studied the English drama in 
 all its forms. 
 
 Counsel. Poor young man. Have 
 you ever seen Patience ? Be careful 
 how you answer. 
 
 Witness. Yes. And on the occasion 
 when I saw the opera of that name it 
 seemed to me that the Patience dis- 
 played by the actors was nothing to that 
 exhibited by the audience. 
 
 Counsel. Do you deny that the char- 
 acter of Rousseau in your earlier play 
 is a feeble imitation of the Duke of 
 Plaza Toro in The Gondoliers ? 
 
 Witness. Yea. . . Your beastly Bab 
 Ballads are cribbed from Dionysus the 
 Areopagite.
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 81 
 
 Mr. A. B. Walkley. Dionysius ! 
 Dionysius ! 
 
 Witness. Dionysius the Areopagite. 
 (To the Judge) My lord, I pray you 
 quench his insulting heat. His eyes 
 are like two beacons that devour. 
 
 The Judge. Scintillce juris, merely. 
 Let him rave. 
 
 Witness : 
 
 O ye immortal Gods, be witness how 
 Pilchard the immortal poet doth abide 
 In the lewd tumult of the fetid Court. 
 
 Counsel : 
 
 You see the kind of bad blank verse he talks, 
 Gentlemen of the jury. Oh great Gosse, 
 Stevenson's friend, Librarian of Lords, 
 Critical Kitcat, will you suffer this? 
 Confound it all, I've caught the plague myself. 
 
 (Sits.) 
 
 The next witness, a mysterious male 
 figure, wore a mask as he gave his 
 evidence. 
 6
 
 82 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Counsel. You are the Censor of 
 Plays ? 
 
 Witness. Yes. 
 
 Counsel. Do you know anything 
 about the modern drama ? 
 
 Witness. No. 
 
 Counsel. Do you know anything 
 about the classical drama ? 
 
 Witness. No. Oh yes, I remember ; 
 I read the Bacchce of Euripides when 
 I was a boy. 
 
 Counsel. In what place did you read 
 it? 
 
 Witness. In Bohn's translations. 
 (Sensation.) 
 
 The Judge. What is read in the 
 Bohn will come out in the witness- 
 box. 
 
 Counsel. Quite, my lord, quite. Do 
 you know anything about the Elizabethan 
 and Restoration drama ? Have you 
 read Shakespeare? 
 
 Witness was understood to murmur
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 83 
 
 that he did not quite catch the last- 
 mentioned name. 
 
 Counsel (loudly). Shakespeare. 
 
 Witness. Oh ! Shakespeare. No. 
 
 Counsel. Have you ever found any- 
 thing in the plaintiffs plays that could 
 rightly be omitted ? 
 
 Witness. I was about to forbid the 
 performance of a play by him called 
 David and Bathslieba, but he changed 
 the names of the principal characters 
 to Dan and Beersheba, so I could do 
 nothing. 
 
 Counsel. You never regarded Mr. 
 Pilchard as a dangerous writer? 
 
 Witness. Never. I forgot all about 
 him as soon as I had looked at his 
 manuscripts. In fact, I thought he was 
 a writer of musical comedy. I pass all 
 musical comedy. 
 
 Counsel. What sort of plays do you 
 not pass ? 
 
 Witness. Oh, plays by foreign writers
 
 84 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 with a European celebrity. I stopped 
 Maeterlinck's Monna Vanna. I believe 
 in protection. 
 
 Mr. Gilbert did not cross-examine the 
 Censor. The next witness was Mr. 
 Sidney Colvin. 1 He said that .he had 
 been a great friend of Robert Louis 
 Stevenson, and that the plaintiff was as 
 immortal as the sun and moon. He 
 was followed by Mr. William Archer, 
 who said that the plaintiff combined the 
 qualities of yEschylus, Sophocles, Euri- 
 pides, Aristophanes, Menander, Marlowe, 
 Shakespeare, Sardou, and Alexandre 
 Dumas the younger. He also remarked 
 that the plaintiff was as immortal as the 
 sun and moon and Ibsen. 
 
 Mr. W. B. Yeats was the next witness. 
 
 Counsel. You are Mr. William Butler 
 Yeats, the poet ? 
 
 Witness. Ceadrigh og Malarv. 
 
 Counsel. Speak up. 
 
 1 Now, luckily, Sir Sidney.
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 85 
 
 Witness. Du ceadrigh ap bhuol- 
 draich. 
 
 Here Mr. George Moore arose in the 
 well of the Court and explained that the 
 members of the Young Celtic School 
 were forbidden to speak English. He 
 was permitted to escort Mr. Yeats out of 
 Court on undertaking to see him safely 
 into a four-wheeler. Mr. Max Beerbohm, 
 who attracted all eyes by the length of 
 his frock-coat and the melancholy of his 
 expression, then gave his evidence. 
 
 Counsel. You are a half-brother of 
 Mr. Beerbohm Tree, 1 the famous actor- 
 manager ? 
 
 Witness. No. Beerbohm Tree is my 
 half-brother. 
 
 Counsel. You are the dramatic critic 
 of the Saturday Review ? 
 
 Witness (with a sigh). I am. But 
 I model my prose on that of the late 
 Walter Pater. Often, however, I am 
 
 1 Now, gloriously, Sir Beerbohm.
 
 86 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 bored by the so sedulous ritual of his 
 pages. 
 
 Counsel. Did you write a criticism 
 of Philip of Macedon ? 
 
 Witness. I have written criticisms of 
 all the plays of Mr. Pilchard which were 
 not produced at His Majesty's Theatre. 
 I found them a fair antidote to the 
 tedium of the twain of hours betwixt 
 dinner and supper. Continuing, wit- 
 ness said that he cared little for 
 tragedy of this kind. He preferred 
 the more obvious humours of melo- 
 drama, or the sombre pathos of modern 
 musical comedy. It was his ambition 
 to resuscitate the old style of music 
 hall. It might be that he saw a 
 possible ally in the plaintiff. He made 
 the remarkable statement that most of 
 the best acting in England was done by 
 mermaids. He referred to the Mermaid 
 Society. 
 
 The Judge. Dear me ! At that
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 87 
 
 theatre, at any rate, there must always 
 be a queue. 
 
 (Great laughter, during which 
 
 Mr. W. S. Gilbert was observed 
 
 to sing " We've got him on the 
 
 list, we've got him on the list." 
 
 The song touches on the attractions 
 
 of judicial humour.) 
 
 Mr. George Bernard Shaw was the 
 
 next witness. He was clad in a toga 
 
 of yellow Harris tweed, and wore the 
 
 red tie of anarchy and a little wreath 
 
 of laurel. 
 
 Counsel. You are Mr. George Bernard 
 Shaw? 
 
 Witness. I have that honour, 
 Counsel. You have some experience 
 of dramatic writing ? 
 
 Witness. Yes : I admit that I was 
 once a dramatic critic, but since then 
 I have learnt a great deal. 
 
 Counsel. In your opinion, what con- 
 stitutes a play ?
 
 88 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Witness. The platitudes of socialism 
 are the chief ingredient. The modern 
 audience regards them as paradoxes. 
 Continuing, witness said that he wrote 
 plays in order that he might enjoy the 
 felicity of hearing the audience laugh at 
 the wrong moment. 
 
 Counsel. Have you written poetic 
 drama ? 
 
 Witness. Yes ; I wrote the Admir- 
 able Bashville, a trifle. I rank it be- 
 tween King Lear and Hamlet. I have 
 no illusions as to its merits. It seems 
 to me rather poor stuff. 
 
 Counsel. Will you briefly give me 
 your opinion of the plaintiffs dramas ? 
 
 Witness. I think they are clotted 
 nonsense. (Sensation.) 
 
 Plaintiff. You would. 
 
 Counsel. What is your reason for 
 this opinion ? 
 
 Witness. The plaintiff thinks that 
 love is properly indicated by a man in
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 89 
 
 tin armour clanking round and round 
 a hysterical female in gradually narrow- 
 ing circles. Every one who has read 
 my plays and prefaces knows that this 
 kind of sentimentalism is the most 
 suburban form of mutual lunacy. 
 
 Counsel. What is your opinion as to 
 the relative merits of the plaintiff and 
 Shakespeare ? 
 
 Witness. I regard them as equally 
 ignoble. 
 
 Counsel. That is, you regard them 
 as equally meritorious dramatists ? 
 
 Witness. Yes, if you like to put it 
 that way. It is true that Shakespeare, 
 living in that purblind Elizabethan 
 epoch, hadn't the opportunity of be- 
 coming a Shavian. Mr. Pilchard has 
 had the chance and missed it. I 
 should be glad, sir, if you would ask 
 me no more questions. I have to 
 attend a vestry meeting at Primrose 
 Hill.
 
 90 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Mr. Gilbert, K.C., rose to cross- 
 examine Mr. Shaw. 
 
 Counsel. Why do you look like that? 
 Do your boots hurt ? 
 
 Witness. ? 
 
 Counsel. Have you ever been bitten 
 in the stomach by a mad monkey ? 
 
 Witness. ? ? ? 
 
 Counsel. I will not trouble you 
 further, Mr. Shaw. 
 
 (Mr. Shaw nods to the judge and 
 retires.) 
 
 Mr. G. K. Chesterton, who once 
 wrote an essay on Edmond Rostand, 
 the French dramatist, then rose to give 
 his evidence, but he spoke so fast that 
 I was unable to hear what he said. I 
 gathered that he drew some startling 
 comparisons between the plaintiff and 
 red toadstools in the New Forest, and 
 that, when the judge asked him a ques- 
 tion, he replied gaily, " Tra la la, tra la 
 la, tra la la la la la la,"
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 91 
 
 This closed the case for the plaintiff. 
 Mr. W. S. Gilbert, K.C., after briefly 
 alluding to the counsel and witnesses 
 for the plaintiff as dangerous madmen, 
 called the defendant, who was examined 
 by Mr. H. B. Irving. 
 
 Mr. Lb'wenbaum, who was dressed in 
 the manner of a rake of the Regency 
 period, and stood in his tenth or 
 theatrical garden-party attitude, said that 
 he was the manager of The Unique 
 Theatre. He had long believed in the 
 plaintiff as a medium for introducing 
 the classics, and possibly the Scriptures, 
 to the million. He believed in the 
 ennobling influence of the drama, even 
 when it was poetry. (Sensation.) The 
 Swan of Avon he alluded, of course, 
 to the mighty-mouthed Shakespeare 
 had at last come to his own nest at 
 The Unique Theatre. So had David 
 Belasco and John Luther Long, the 
 immortal Americans. (Loud cheers
 
 92 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 from the company of The Unique 
 Theatre.) 
 
 Counsel. For what reason did you 
 omit the more obviously blatant pas- 
 sages of Philip of Macedon ? 
 
 Witness. In the interest of my dear 
 public, the dear public that has to catch 
 a train to its cosy but distant home. 
 Philip of Macedon, unexpurgated, would 
 have ended at two in the morning. 
 (Groans.) Simon is a good lad, a good 
 lad but, oh Lord ! prolix, prolix as the 
 meandering measures of the snail. For 
 I love the public. Let others produce 
 the plays of my country, but let me en- 
 sure my country's comfort. What I aim 
 at is a feast to the eye, no effort to the 
 intellect, and bed at midnight even for 
 the dwellers in Walham Green. I was 
 sorry to curtail Simon's periods, but be- 
 fore the many one must bow. That is the 
 motto of every successful actor-manager. 
 The one who bows is the author.
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 93 
 
 Counsel (to the Judge). I congratu- 
 late the plaintiff on the fact that your 
 lordship is not Judge Jeffreys. Before 
 him, a play that ended at two in the 
 morning would have been a hanging 
 matter. 
 
 The Judge. You mean that the time 
 would have hung heavily on the au- 
 dience's hands. (Enormous applause.) 
 
 Mr. Arthur Symons is called. 
 
 Counsel. You are a critic ? 
 
 Witness. And a poet. I wrote 
 London Nights. 
 
 (Ladies in the gallery faint 
 unanimously.) 
 
 Counsel. What do you think of 
 the plaintiff's plays ? 
 
 Witness. I mark them not. ... He 
 is Tennyson and sugar. He reminds me 
 of the poet Bunn. Give me d'Annunzio. 
 Give me Verlaine. Give me any one 
 but Mr. Pilchard. The late Ernest 
 Dowson is the only modern English
 
 94 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 immortal. I have been faithful to him 
 after my fashion. 
 
 Counsel. Thank you, Mr. Symons. 
 Witness. Don't mention it. (Retires.) 
 Mr. Birrell, who had begun to read 
 one of the romances of Jane Austen 
 before Mr. Lowenbaum gave his 
 evidence, showed no inclination for 
 further exertions. Mr. Gilbert, K.C., 
 left the Court arm-in-arm with Mr. 
 Symons, and the learned Judge pro- 
 ceeded to sum up. Mr. Justice Smyles 
 said that the only fact that the jury 
 need consider seriously was this : namely, 
 whether if Mr. Lowenbaum had not 
 curtailed the play the audience would 
 have had time to catch the 11.15 to 
 Peckham. All questions of ^Esthetics 
 were out of place in a court of justice 
 at any rate in a court where special 
 juries were concerned. The question 
 was whether on this particular evening 
 the inhabitants of St. John's Wood
 
 HOW TO REPORT A CASE 95 
 
 would have been able, if the play had 
 not been curtailed, to see their Wood 
 for the Trees. 1 (Loud laughter.) The 
 suburb of Hampstead was important 
 on these occasions, but there was 
 another suburb more important still, 
 to which the minds of all playgoers 
 turn at 1 1 o'clock p.m. He alluded 
 to the suburb of Bedstead. (Immense 
 laughter. Usher carried out in con- 
 vulsions.) But though hitherto he 
 might have seemed to be summing 
 up in the defendant's favour, the jury 
 must remember that the curtailing of 
 the plaintiffs play might seriously 
 damage it in the eyes of the critics, 
 who were the watchdogs, so to speak, 
 of posterity. Their bark might be 
 noisier than their bite, but they were 
 important. Mr. Pilchard, to judge 
 from his poetic cloak and his serious 
 
 1 Possibly a punning allusion to the third syllable of 
 defendant's name.
 
 96 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 demeanour, conceived himself to be 
 writing for posterity, and it was even 
 possible that posterity might read him. 
 The learned judge then thanked the 
 Court for its well-timed applause, and 
 made a laughable allusion to the 
 spectators in the gallery. 
 
 The jury, without retiring, returned 
 a verdict for the plaintiff, and assessed 
 the damages at one trouser-button. 
 On being informed that trouser-buttons, 
 except in ecclesiastical edifices, were 
 not current coin, they awarded Mr. 
 Pilchard the usual farthing. No costs. 
 
 Such is a true and faithful report 
 of the evidence in Pilchard v. Lowen- 
 baum (2 K.B.D. 1905).
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 
 
 ALL the cultured will remember 
 the brilliant series of romances 
 which was given to the world in the 
 name of Flora Macginnis, and the 
 impenetrable armour-plating of mystery 
 which enfolded the personality of the 
 author. The wildest theories as to her 
 identity were advanced by the more 
 sensational literary papers ; the Ath-n-m 
 asserting that she was the Duchess 
 of Caithness (her Grace, it will be 
 remembered, once edited The Tea 
 Cosy), and the Sp-ct-tor being positive 
 that she was a braw Hielan' lassie 
 who tended her flock of seals on the 
 sombre shores of Dornoch Firth. All 
 7 97
 
 98 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 the usual lures which are dangled before 
 the successful author were offered in vain 
 to Miss Macginnis ; she was undazzled 
 by the prospect of publishers' tea-parties 
 in Vigo Street or literary lunches at the 
 Lyceum Club with cigarettes to follow. 
 Only her own publisher knew her, and he 
 was under an oath to guard her privacy. 
 It was worth his while. He would 
 answer no questions, but admitted that 
 she lived on an island not far from the 
 north coast of Scotland and that she 
 was a very remarkable woman. 
 
 Mr. Albert Pomander was a poet 
 with a hard, gem-like, flaming soul, and 
 a head of hair that resembled a prize 
 chrysanthemum. He was celebrated 
 even in the provinces ; he was beauti- 
 ful, he was young, and he always went 
 into a sixth edition. All was very well 
 with him until the fatal day when he 
 began to read the romances of Flora 
 Macginnis. He read them all, from Th$
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 99 
 
 Pibroch of Ballater to the Wandering 
 Sporran of Balmoral, and then he clasped 
 his passionate head in his nervous fingers 
 and wept floods of happy tears. Having 
 performed this function he took up his 
 fountain pen and wrote this note : 
 
 " OLYMPUS, 
 
 " BEDFORD PARK, S.E. 
 
 " Mr. Pomander presents his compli- 
 ments to Miss Flora Macginnis, and 
 begs her acceptance of his volume 
 of poems, Deliriums, a London Idyll, 
 which he offers as a slight return for 
 the pleasure which he has received from 
 reading her complete works." 
 
 He sent this note, with the book, 
 to Flora's publisher, and in due course 
 received the following reply : 
 
 " Moss HAGGS, 
 "EILAN RHON, 
 
 "ARCTIC OCEAN. 
 
 " Miss Flora Macginnis begs to 
 thank Mr. Pomander very much for
 
 ioo BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 the beautiful poems. There is only one 
 line of which she cannot make sense 
 p. 440, ' A hobnailed lover laid 
 him low.' Miss McG. sees the drift of 
 the poet's thought i.e. that he was 
 attacked by a rustic rival but ' hob- 
 nailed lover ' is a very daring though 
 brilliant use of English." 
 
 The poet lost no time in answering 
 this criticism. 
 
 "c/o VIPER & Co., 
 "LAIR STREET, W. 
 
 " DEAR Miss MACGINNIS, Please 
 forgive this sad, commercial paper. I 
 write in my publisher's office. The 
 word is a misprint ; it should be liver, 
 not lover. How beautiful your address 
 is ! I enclose my volume entitled 
 Pranks amid Patchouli. But I fear 
 it will savour too much of late mid- 
 nights and famishing morrows to be in 
 harmony with your pure ice-born air. 
 " Yours very truly, A. P."
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 101 
 
 An answer came by return of post, 
 i.e. in a fortnight. 
 
 " MY DEAR MR. POMANDER " (it 
 said), " How little you know me ! Ah, 
 if I had been a man, that is the life 
 I would have led ! How you have 
 lived ! Yet you are so young, so young ! 
 I saw your photograph in the Literary 
 World (we are all Nonconformists here 
 except me, and I am a nonconformist 
 in a sense, for I worship only the red 
 sun and the wild white moon), but I 
 will not say what I think of it. How 
 I envy you your youth, your hair, your 
 purple life ! You pass with laughing 
 lips from rose to rose, whereas I, 
 though still young (24 last birthday), 
 feel that sad sense of attainment which 
 comes from having written fourteen 
 books, all with big editions in America. 
 Dear friend may I call you that ? 
 if you are ever passing here on your
 
 102 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 way to Reykeyvik, perhaps you will 
 wave to me from the boat, and I shall 
 see you drift gradually away into the 
 setting sun, and ' all the wonder of the 
 stars.' You see that I know your 
 poetry. F. M." 
 
 When Mr. Pomander had read this 
 letter he sprang from his chair and 
 began to walk excitedly to and fro. 
 "God of Parnassus ! She is wonderful !" 
 he cried. Then he wrote to her. 
 
 " FLORA, You ask me if you may 
 call me friend. Dear Lady, call me 
 anything you will foe, friend, or even 
 Albert ('tis my name). From such as 
 use conventions shrink reproved ; our 
 souls are like twin stars that rush 
 together. Oh, Flora, Flora, flower of 
 the wild waste sea ; I hunger for your 
 gentle voice and hands ! 
 
 " P.S. I enclose Grief and a Grisette, 
 Pantaloons, and Girlie-Girlies"
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 103 
 
 When he had finished the letter he 
 noticed that it was in blank verse, 
 but he did not rewrite it. The answer 
 came in a telegram some days later. 
 
 " DEAR, DEAR ALBERT, I adore 
 Pantaloons. Slanch ava ! " 
 
 Mr. Pomander's aunt opened the 
 telegram in his absence, was immediately 
 visited with a dangerous and painful 
 attack of hysteria, and removed his 
 name from her will. Mr. Pomander 
 sent off Posies from Covent Gar den Ball, 
 Papillons de Montmartre, and Memories 
 of the Moulin Rouge (privately printed). 
 Then he wrote this letter : 
 
 " DEAR ONE, I must see you, touch 
 you. Will you marry me ? Marriage 
 is an empty form where souls like ours 
 are concerned, but if you insist on it, 
 I will gladly acquiesce. Flora, I love 
 you. Dear, shy, sweet island maiden
 
 104 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 with a man's genius, I adore your sun- 
 kissed brow and rain-washed neck and 
 ankles. I dream of you reclining on 
 your native whins, thinking grave and 
 beautiful thoughts. I yearn for you as 
 Tristan yearned for Isolde and Paolo 
 for Francesca and Abelard for Heloise. 
 I have flung roses, roses riotously with 
 the throng, but my heart is unsoiled. I 
 am like Alfred de Musset in that. O 
 flower of the Northern sea, let me come 
 to gather you. ALBERT." 
 
 To which Flora replied : 
 
 " DEAREST, You are perfect. I adore 
 you. There is one awful drawback. 
 If you see me you will realize it. Do 
 nothing rash. But I am yours eternally." 
 
 Mr. Pomander was puzzled by this 
 letter. " Is it possible ? Can she be 
 plain ? " he thought. Then he read a 
 chapter of self-description in one of
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 105 
 
 her books which was avowedly auto- 
 biographical, and was comforted. " A 
 pale, passionate face," it said, " with 
 dark hair drifting low on the broad 
 white brow, sad sweet lips and a neck 
 of ivory." This seemed good enough, 
 and he went round to Cook's office. 
 
 Later, he telegraphed : " I am coming 
 to gather you, fair flower of the North." 
 
 The answer (in a day or two), was: 
 " Come at your peril." 
 
 " She means the sea, I suppose," 
 thought Mr. Pomander, " and certainly 
 I am a wretched sailor. Or she may be 
 married. But what mere husband shall 
 dare to come between us ! " He took 
 a train to the extreme North of 
 Scotland, and there embarked on a 
 ship. The ship was small and dirty, 
 the sea was very rough, and Mr. 
 Pomander thought many times that he 
 was on the point of death, and wept
 
 106 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 when he imagined the world's loss. 
 At last, late in an afternoon that was 
 dark with fog and rain, the captain 
 informed him that they were approach- 
 ing Eilan Rhon. Soon afterwards he 
 perceived a desolate shore with a small 
 pier of grey stone projecting from it 
 into the sea. The steamer, after many 
 interesting and dangerous evolutions, 
 lay alongside the pier, and two planks 
 were thrust from her deck as a gangway 
 for Mr. Pomander. 
 
 Before landing, he looked along the 
 pier to see if an eager female form was 
 hurrying forward to meet him ; but 
 there was no sign of life anywhere ; he 
 might have been landing on a desert 
 island. He picked up his bag and 
 walked gingerly along the planks. The 
 wind howled, the rain poured in tor- 
 rents, the dismal grey sea danced up 
 and down, night was advancing rapidly, 
 and he knew that his hair was out of
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 107 
 
 curl. As he stepped on to the wet 
 stones, however, he heard a shout, and 
 a moment later a huge figure in yellow 
 oilskins came running down the pier. 
 Mr. Pomander went to meet it. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," he said politely, 
 
 " can you tell me " But the figure, 
 
 which belonged to an immense man 
 with fiery eyes and a vast red beard, 
 plunged past him and hailed the captain 
 of the steamer. 
 
 " Bide a wee, mon ! " he shouted (or 
 words to that effect). " There's a bit 
 cargo ye can tak' along wi' ye." Then 
 he came back to Mr. Pomander. " Eh, 
 mon ! " he said. " What are ye doing 
 on Eilan Rhon on sich a nicht?" 
 
 " I have come on a visit," said Mr. 
 Pomander. " Can you tell me where 
 Miss Flora Macginnis lives?" 
 
 The huge man gave a shout of 
 surprise, and peered through the dusk 
 at Mr. Pomander
 
 io8 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 "Is it Mr. Pomander?" he asked 
 very solemnly. Mr. Pomander nodded. 
 This was evidently some faithful re- 
 tainer belonging to his Flora. But the 
 huge man continued his inspection, and 
 then began to chuckle. 
 
 " It's the mon hisself ! " he said. 
 " I've seen your photographs." He 
 struck an attitude, and smote his bosom 
 loudly. " Eh, ye puir damned bleether- 
 ing philanderer, let this be a lesson to 
 ye," he cried. " / am Flora Mac- 
 ginnis ! " 
 
 Mr. Pomander's heart sank abruptly. 
 "You, you old satyr!" he shouted. 
 " Don't try to work off any of your 
 bestial Scotch humour on me ! I insist 
 on being taken to the house of Miss 
 Macginnis at once ! " 
 
 The red-bearded monster uttered a 
 beast-like yell, seized Mr. Pomander 
 by the scruff of his neck and the hinder 
 parts of his trousers, and ran him with
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 109 
 
 incredible swiftness along the gangway 
 into the steamer. Then he bounded 
 back to the pier, hurled Mr. Pomander's 
 bag into the vessel, kicked the planks 
 into the sea, and vanished into the 
 night. 
 
 Such are the facts of this distressing 
 affair. When Mr. Pomander returned 
 to London he entered an action for 
 breach of promise of marriage against 
 Miss Flora Macginnis. The case was 
 heard by Mr. Justice Foozle and a 
 special jury. Mr. Shinnock appeared 
 on behalf of the plaintiff and Mr. 
 Whales for the defendant, whilst Mr. 
 Horatio Bottomley watched the case 
 in the interests of public morality. 
 
 Shinnock (for the plaintiff). " At first 
 sight it may seem prejudicial in the 
 eyes of the jury that this case is a 
 reversal of the usual order of things 
 that it is brought by a young man 
 against a young woman. Facts, how-
 
 i io BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 ever, will show that no prejudice of 
 this kind can be allowed to exist, for 
 the defendant is not a young woman 
 at all, but a man (sensation), and there- 
 fore there is nothing ungallant in the 
 plaintiff's behaviour. But though the 
 defendant is not a woman, is he there- 
 fore to be exempt from the penalty of 
 having artfully posed as one, thereby 
 inveigling the plaintiff into sending him 
 presents, losing much time in fruitless 
 emotion, and making a long, expensive 
 and uncomfortable sea-voyage to no 
 purpose ? Gentlemen, the defendant 
 posed as a woman, wrote like a woman, 
 signed his books with a woman's name, 
 used all the arts (arts with which, 
 gentlemen, as men of the world, you 
 are doubtless not unfamiliar) of a 
 woman to entrap this poor generous- 
 hearted youth this 'poet, for he is a 
 poet, gentlemen, and I am proud to 
 be able to say it of him to entrap
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 1 1 1 
 
 this romantic lad into giving him rare 
 and choice works, to ensnare him, 
 perhaps, ultimately in the toils of 
 blackmail ! (I beg pardon, m'lud ? 
 Going too far, m'lud? Oh no, no, 
 no, no. But as your ludship pleases. 
 Quite, m'lud, quite.) Gentlemen, I 
 demand damages against this rascally 
 impostor damages, for there can be 
 no question of reparation by marriage 
 between the parties to this action. He 
 said he was a woman : very well ! let 
 a British jury show him how it is 
 accustomed to treat women of his type. 
 Look at him, gentlemen, without seeing 
 his red beard and his big feet and his 
 masculine aspect ; regard him as some 
 sly, serpentine, Parisian adventuress, 
 who has maddened a susceptible brain 
 and broken a faithful heart with her 
 cold treachery and monstrous wiles. 
 Think of him clothed in a hobble 
 skirt, blazing with diamonds, wrapped
 
 112 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 in priceless furs, and breathing out all 
 the perfumes of seduction. If you do 
 this, gentlemen, you will do your duty 
 and bring in a verdict for the plaintiff 
 for the poor young poet whose faithful 
 heart has been torn to pieces by the 
 claws of this wanton and malicious 
 siren and harpy. Gentlemen, I have 
 done." 
 
 After Mr. Shinnock's speech, one of 
 the jury, a highly susceptible green- 
 grocer, burst audibly into tears. When 
 calm had been restored Mr. Whales 
 rose to his feet. 
 
 Whales (for the defendant). So far 
 from there being any damage done to 
 the plaintiff by the defendant's amusing 
 little joke, the plaintiff had actually 
 derived benefit from it. He was a 
 writer, an artist, and the one thing needful, 
 the sine qua non to an artist's life, was 
 experience, excitement, emotion. Mr. 
 Pomander had obtained all the pro-
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 113 
 
 fessional advantages that ensued from 
 falling in love, and had been spared the 
 trouble, expense and inevitable disillusion 
 of matrimony. As to the emotional 
 crisis through which he had passed 
 being damaging to his intellect, the jury 
 had only to read his poems to realize 
 that his life was one long sequence of 
 such crises. There was another point : 
 it was extremely doubtful whether Mr. 
 Pomander contemplated marriage in 
 the full sense of that great term with 
 Miss Macginnis. Without wishing to 
 cast any aspersions on the character of 
 the plaintiff, counsel felt obliged to 
 tell the jury that the first poem in Mr. 
 Pomander's latest book began with the 
 ominous words : 
 
 I am a man of blood and sin and crime. 
 
 The jury must draw their own conclu- 
 sions from that piece of autobiography. 
 He need only remind them of the sad 
 8
 
 ii 4 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 case of the Scotch poet Burns. Further 
 on in the book Mr. Pomander wrote : 
 
 There are a thousand vampires in my soul, 
 And they must feast on beauty or be damned. 
 
 Was this the spirit in which a man 
 should undertake a respectable court- 
 ship ? Yet again, Mr. Pomander wrote : 
 
 Oh, curse convention ! 
 'Tis the invention 
 
 Of bloodless fools ; 
 
 Rules, rules ! 
 
 Rules of the schools, 
 Ye shall not keep me in detention ! 
 
 From which wild and anarchical outburst 
 the jury could see that Mr. Pomander 
 knew no law, but was even as the beasts 
 that perish. Even if Miss Flora Mac- 
 ginnis had really been the shy Northern 
 maiden that she was supposed to be, 
 what chance of domestic felicity would 
 she have had with a man of this sinister 
 type ? If there had in truth been an en-
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 115 
 
 gagement between them, would she not 
 have been perfectly justified in breaking 
 it off when she realized the previous 
 history mental rather than real perhaps, 
 but a poet's life is the life of the mind 
 of her lover ? The fact was that the 
 only real damage that Mr. Pomander 
 had suffered was damage to his pocket 
 from travelling expenses, and if the 
 jury would forgive the expression 
 damage to his stomach from the qualms 
 of nausea. But he had wilfully incurred 
 the former, against the telegraphic advice 
 of the defendant ; and as for the latter 
 every one knew that moderate sea-sick 
 ness, though unpleasant at the time of 
 its occurrence, was actually beneficial 
 to the system. He submitted that there 
 was no evidence of any damage which 
 was not wilfully self-inflicted by the 
 plaintiff and he exhorted the jury to 
 exonerate the defendant a rough, humo- 
 rous son of the mountains and seas who
 
 ii6 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 detested the amorous butterflies of an 
 exotic city life and wanted to teach one 
 of them a lesson to exonerate this 
 honest fellow from all blame. 
 
 Foozle, J. Baa. In my opinion each 
 of the learned counsel engaged in the 
 case has missed the true point at issue. 
 (" Hear, hear," from Mr. Bottomley.) 
 Baa. The true point at issue in my 
 opinion is : Would or would not the 
 plaintiff have profited by the union of 
 his own soul with that of another writer ? 
 The marriages of geniuses are primarily 
 intellectual affairs. Baa, baa. So that 
 the fact that the defendant is a man 
 seems to me immaterial. I suggest that 
 the learned counsel engaged in the case 
 confer together with a view to arranging 
 for the future collaboration of the plaintiff 
 and the defendant in all their works. 
 This will be, in effect, a spiritual 
 marriage which should satisfy all parties. 
 Baa. Baa. Atishoo.
 
 THE BREACH OF PROMISE ACTION 1 17 
 
 The learned counsel then withdrew 
 to confer. On returning into court they 
 announced that they could come to no 
 agreement, for the plaintiffobjected to the 
 defendant's prose style and the defendant 
 objected to the plaintiffs morality. The 
 jury were then directed to consider their 
 verdict. 
 
 Verdict for the plaintiff. Damages a 
 bawbee (sterling). Costs divided. 
 
 SOLICITORS : 
 
 For the plaintiff: The Incorporated Society of 
 
 Authors. 
 
 For the defendant : Colkitto, Macdonnel& Galasp, 
 Largs, N.B.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 CONCLUSION 
 
 \7EMO repente turpissimus fuit has 
 been translated by a certain 
 cynic it takes five years to become a 
 solicitor. Perhaps with equal truth 
 (and falsehood) it might be rendered 
 three years are occupied in becoming a 
 barrister. With such thrilling circum- 
 stances as I have endeavoured to de- 
 scribe in the preceding pages of this 
 handbook for students my epoch of 
 apprenticeship was occupied. 
 
 And now and now the curious and 
 often tedious period is over. No longer 
 do I handle briefs with delicate non- 
 chalance ; no longer do I lean wearily 
 on the desk and watch the mobile 
 
 features of the Master ; no longer in 
 us
 
 CONCLUSION 119 
 
 the Courts do I yawn over the details 
 of costs, or smile at the painful writh- 
 ings of witnesses or the solemn stupor 
 of the jury. In a word, the activities 
 of practice are not mine to share. I 
 have joined the great majority. My 
 name is written in the Law List so 
 that he who attorns may read. I am 
 a barrister-at-law. 
 
 The last scene of my student days 
 the scene that heralded my departure 
 from active life was not unamusing. 
 Some thirty students, clad in all the 
 mournful glory of brand-new wig and 
 gown, waited on a sunny afternoon in 
 the Hall of our Inn until the majestic 
 assembly of the Benchers was ready to 
 inspect us. The spectacle, as I said, 
 was amusing ; most of the students had 
 a curious air of having put on some 
 fantastic fancy dress, and one and all 
 put their hands in their pockets and 
 attempted gallantly to appear at ease.
 
 120 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 The sunlight filtered warmly through 
 the gules and azure pageantry of the 
 high windows, and lit up the pale or 
 dusky faces of the destined victims 
 below. How many bright young lives 
 were dedicating themselves that day to 
 silence and obscurity ! Of all these 
 ardent souls how few, comparatively 
 speaking, would become Lord Chan- 
 cellors ! how many might have sacri- 
 ficed nobler destinies on the grim altar 
 of the Law ! . . . One, at least, I knew 
 who might have attained to the divine 
 honours of the Poet Laureate. A sen- 
 tence of that immortal and complacent 
 book, the Autobiography of Gibbon, 
 returned to my memory : Nature had 
 not endowed me, wrote the great his- 
 torian of the Roman decadence, with 
 the bold and ready eloquence which 
 makes itself heard amidst the tumult 
 of the bar, and I should probably 
 have been diverted from the labour of
 
 CONCLUSION 121 
 
 literature without acquiring the fame 
 and fortune of a successful pleader. 
 Ah ! should I not have done better to 
 ensue his example ? Had I not for- 
 saken the bright phantom of my earlier 
 ambition only to follow another phan- 
 tom, equally illusory, but how dim and 
 hideous ! But for the fact that my 
 attire would have been absurdly incon- 
 gruous with such an action, I could 
 have wept over the ashes of the mighty 
 Might-have-been. 
 
 At length a sympathetic servitor of 
 the Inn put a period to our suspense. 
 We were led into a large airy room 
 in that secret portion of the building 
 which was sacred to the awful con- 
 claves of those who had grown grey, 
 and even obese, in the service of the 
 Law. There, amid the frowning busts 
 of dead Serjeants and forgotten Barons 
 of the Exchequer, we were marshalled 
 in order of seniority, and then we filed,
 
 122 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 a long and sombre band, back again 
 to the Hall. The Benchers, headed by 
 the Treasurer of the Inn, were await- 
 ing us. Their appearance was reas- 
 suring ; they smiled and looked kindly, 
 or else they appeared exceedingly bored. 
 Boredom, at any rate, is a human attri- 
 bute. None the less I was reminded 
 of the immolation of those who dedi- 
 cated their lives to the austerities of 
 La Trappe or the Chartreuse, and my 
 gown seemed the shroud of the monastic 
 neophyte. It was a relief when the 
 Treasurer began his speech. H e alluded 
 in glowing language to the scholastic 
 triumphs of the senior student (who 
 contrived to look during the progress 
 of these remarks exactly as if he were 
 about to be hanged), and then he spoke 
 sternly of the duties and privileges of 
 the profession. ... I noticed that he 
 found more to say about the duties than 
 about the privileges. His peroration
 
 CONCLUSION 123 
 
 dealt with the moral aspect of the legal 
 
 life, and seemed to me a fine example 
 
 of optimism. . . . We all felt better 
 
 after his speech. If it was a shade 
 
 pompous, it was full of kindliness, and 
 
 I admit that I was young and foolish 
 
 enough to feel a thrill of pleasure when 
 
 I discovered that a man may be an 
 
 enormously successful Chancery barrister 
 
 and yet preserve his sympathy with 
 
 youth. It had never occurred to me 
 
 that this could be possible. 
 
 The rules of the Inn obliged the 
 newly-made Barristers to dine in Hall 
 that night clad in all their panoply. 
 Williams and two other acquaintances 
 supported me. I use the phrase meta- 
 phorically, for after dinner it was 
 I who, literally, supported Williams. 
 They drank a great deal of wine 
 (sweet champagne which tasted oddly 
 of Germany) and were cheaply facetious 
 at the expense of their learned friend,
 
 124 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 as they called me. The scene, after 
 the expiration of a couple of hours, 
 reminded me of those mysterious re- 
 joicings of the Schoolmen at Oxford 
 which are known as Bump Suppers, 
 presumably because every one tumbles 
 up or down stairs after sharing in their 
 deafening pleasures. Many enthusiastic 
 young gentlemen arose, tried to make 
 speeches, and failed owing to the inter- 
 position of their friends, or from other 
 causes. Worse still, many voluble 
 gentlemen arose, tried to make speeches, 
 and succeeded. More than ever the 
 scene became a combination of a fancy- 
 dress dance and the Moore and Burgess 
 minstrels. At last we departed, and 
 saw Williams into a hansom. I regret 
 to say that we directed the driver to 
 take him to the Zoological Gardens in 
 Regent's Park. ... I heard afterwards 
 that the keepers of that place received 
 him without enthusiasm.
 
 CONCLUSION 125 
 
 It was done : the Rubicon was 
 crossed. As I leant from my window 
 that night and contemplated the furtive 
 eyes of the stars, I realized that another 
 great milestone was erected on the road 
 of my life. My careless youth was over : 
 I was a member of a profession which 
 people who know nothing about it are 
 wont to call learned. On the next day 
 perhaps the aching responsibilities of 
 my new life would begin to descend 
 upon me; the solicitors would jostle 
 each other at my door, I should hold 
 conferences with the wise and con- 
 sultations with the subtle . . . The 
 thought was fascinating, yet intolerable. 
 . . . Slowly I took off my wig and 
 gown. A large brown bag, well covered 
 with the labels of many foreign hotels, 
 suddenly became perceptible in the 
 gloom. ... I watched it ; I hesitated. 
 At length I packed, calmly, coldly, 
 carefully.
 
 126 BLUFFS GUIDE TO THE BAR 
 
 Next day I caught the 1.30 train at 
 Charing Cross. If any solicitors were 
 present at Dover or Calais to prevent 
 my departure I evaded them success- 
 fully, and early in the following day 
 I was thundering eastward where the 
 factories of Mulhausen breathe their 
 smoke across the great plain that lies 
 before Bale.
 
 APPENDIX A 
 
 LIVING IN THE TEMPLE 
 
 ( With acknowledgments to the Editor of " The Literary 
 Gent.") 
 
 THERE are some who assert that the 
 dwellers in the Inns of Court are the 
 most ill-advised of all mortals. Such people 
 will tell you terrible legends of aged men who 
 lived forgotten and died forlorn in Temple 
 Chambers, of water famines, of the dearth 
 in baths, of the microbes that lurk in 
 these brown and crumbling walls. To such 
 croakers I reply with nothing but the smile 
 of scorn. The Temple seems to me of all 
 abodes the most desirable. The mere fact 
 of living in a calm backwater of the whirling 
 torrent called Fleet Street possesses all the 
 fascination of an extraordinary romance, and 
 when, anchored in this haven, one thinks of 
 the tawdry comforts of those triumphs of 
 cheap labour and meaningless decorations 
 127
 
 128 APPENDIX A 
 
 which are known as flats, or draws a mental 
 picture of the wretched state of married 
 friends who live in houses at the mercy of 
 any irresponsible plumber, one may be for- 
 given for a little thrill of selfish satisfaction. 
 
 I can pardon, though I cannot approve 
 of, those married folk who have elected 
 to shun the snare of complete domesticity, 
 and instead to reside in Temple chambers. 
 One can pardon them, for their behaviour 
 argues that some faint residue of the great 
 primeval vagabond spirit still stirs in their 
 blood : to be married, and yet not to be 
 suburban this is indeed a triumph for the 
 comparatively young ; and the dweller in 
 the Temple will always claim kinship with 
 the nomad in his tent. But none the less 
 I cannot approve of the presence of these 
 wedded folk ; as a general rule I dislike a 
 woman's touch on the piano, and the mere 
 presence of the opposite sex has a strange 
 effect on the comfortable, dingy, celibate air 
 of the Temple, like a sun ray in a photo- 
 grapher's darkened room. 
 
 Also do I resent most heartily the presence 
 in the Temple of those who are not Barristers 
 or at least members of the Inns of Court. 
 Is it not monstrous that we who have borne
 
 LIVING IN THE TEMPLE 129 
 
 the dignity of legal robes and the indignity 
 of reiterated legal examinations should be 
 unable to dwell in our own precincts because 
 the abodes of the blessed are already occupied 
 by unlearned and interloping aliens? Was 
 I not myself goaded well-nigh to red mad- 
 ness by the proximity of a vile musician 
 who played the flute in the X Orchestra? 
 Was not poor Jones of Gray's Inn driven 
 to exile and so to matrimony by an eccentric 
 stranger who rilled the rooms above those 
 occupied by my friend with a colony of 
 intelligent parrots? The one consolation 
 that the Bar has to offer its disappointed 
 votaries is the right of dwelling in these 
 august and memorable walls ; why then 
 should any hireling of Fleet Street be allowed 
 not merely to share, but to anticipate our 
 right? I protest against the presence of 
 solicitors in the Temple. It is scarcely 
 decent ; and also, they know far too much 
 about Law. I loathe the merry Government 
 official who makes the Temple his residence 
 because of the daily walk to and fro along 
 the Embankment ; the only alien I would 
 tolerate in these walls is the architect. He 
 is, or should be, something of an artist, and 
 the environment is suitable to such folk. The 
 9
 
 i 3 o APPENDIX A 
 
 artist of any kind is of course the ideal dweller 
 in the Temple. Some day, when the whole 
 practice of law has lapsed into the eager 
 hands of the junior branch of the profession, 
 I hope to see all the Inns of Court preserved 
 as Prytanea for the true Knights of Beauty 
 the poet, the painter, the cunning artificer in 
 gold and jewels is it not prophetic that part 
 of the Temple is already known as Gold- 
 smith Building ? the architect who serves the 
 London County Council, but not, oh, not the 
 executant musician ; at least the musician 
 shall have an Inn of Court to himself. For 
 the artistic temperament Gray's Inn or the 
 Temple are better adapted than the flat- 
 ruined purlieus of Chelsea or the sleek 
 novelty of St. John's Wood. 
 
 Good it is at times to dwell within these 
 brown clusters of all kinds of architecture ; 
 good when the summer has come, and the 
 gardens are bright with flowers and the 
 pigeons murmur about the cool fountain ; good 
 in the wild October evenings when the great 
 wind sweeps up the river and booms through 
 archway and lane, and the lamps flicker and 
 turn blue. But if you would know the sober 
 antique warren at its best you must visit it 
 in the end of August or beginning of
 
 LIVING IN THE TEMPLE 131 
 
 September, when our legal machinery is 
 arrested so that judges may slay grouse, 
 when the barrister's clerk departs at I o'clock, 
 and only the religious and misanthropic feline 
 is left to wake the echoes around the Temple 
 Church. It is then that the Temple assumes 
 its most enthralling aspect. A mysterious 
 loneliness broods over it. The little laws and 
 lives of men, one feels, are nothing to its far- 
 seeing, stupendous antiquity, and the vague 
 roar of Fleet Street is only as the noise of a 
 faint sea beating on the shores of a far-distant 
 and forgotten world. 
 
 [All very fine, but see Appendix C.]
 
 APPENDIX B 
 
 AXIOMS FOR THE USE OF STUDENTS 
 
 LAW and Morality are two straight 
 lines, which being produced ever so 
 far in the same direction occasionally meet. 
 
 2. A. point of law is that which exists but 
 has no meaning. 
 
 3. A witness is a person who has some- 
 thing to conceal. 
 
 4. A dangerous witness is one who lies 
 steadily between the two points where his 
 evidence begins and ends. 
 
 5. A jury is a collection of good men and 
 true chosen at random from a printed list 
 consisting largely of bad men and false. 
 
 6. Judicial humour exemplifies the survival 
 of infant mirth under the most adverse con- 
 ditions. 
 
 7. The position of a barrister's clerk re- 
 presents the triumphs of the masses over the 
 classes. 
 
 132
 
 AXIOMS FOR USE OF STUDENTS 133 
 
 8. A solicitor is a person who splits 
 infinitives and grants favours. 
 
 9. No Barrister should write a book. Even 
 if it is a popular novel solicitors and other 
 critics will speak of him as one who wastes 
 his time on Literature. 
 
 10. One cannot be too careless in the choice 
 of a profession. 
 
 11. Depression is nine points of the Law. 
 
 12. The tenth point is depression also.
 
 APPENDIX G 
 
 THE TEMPLE : AN ODE 
 
 DARK Shrine of Themis, insalubrious 
 haunt 
 
 
 
 Where youthful ardour dies and men grow 
 
 gaunt 
 
 Waiting the tardy brief or tardier Muse, 
 Till heart and brain wax callous, nor refuse 
 To journalize, or even to report, 
 Accept this Ode, effluvial resort. 
 
 The insensate youth, unblessed with gold 
 
 or 1/01)9, 
 Who comes to Town from Balliol or the 
 
 House 
 
 To see Life's naked face and keep his terms, 
 Strolls through thy courts, inhales romance 
 
 and germs, 
 
 And, witless ! hires him an avcojecov 
 Here where men sit and hear each other 
 
 groan.
 
 THE TEMPLE: AN ODE 135 
 
 "This is the place," exclaims the youthful 
 
 bard, 
 " Where Maevius wrote, and drank extremely 
 
 hard ; 
 
 This is the calm and ever sacred shrine 
 Where Bavius forged his fulminating line, 
 Here happy Johnson roamed, a careless 
 
 swain, 
 Here N..b..lt toiled, and yearns to toil 
 
 again ; 
 
 Here Goldsmith trembled with divine afflatus, 
 And lies, (his tomb lies too ; the apparatus 
 That warms the church where W..lf..rd's 
 
 organ drones 
 
 Most probably gives shelter to his bones) ; 
 Here Z..ngw..ll (Isr.,1) entertained the Muse 
 (A trifle tired, poor soul) with all his views 
 On suffrage and the new Jerusalem ; 
 Here S..m..ns, M..re, and all the rest of them, 
 Like burning Sappho loved and sang, until 
 Apollo, sitting on his forked hill, 
 Grew jealous and bewitched them, so that 
 
 they 
 
 Got married or got bored and went away ; 
 Here Thackeray, Lamb enough ! I feel, 
 
 I see 
 This is the Muse's home, This is the Place 
 
 for Me!"
 
 136 APPENDIX C 
 
 Thus the poor fool who finds the truth too 
 
 late. 
 
 Not otherwise, the budding advocate 
 Gets him a wig and gown and bands, nor 
 
 blushes 
 
 To criticize the Is..cses and L..shes, 
 And in a cupboard on the second story 
 Aspires to bread and butter and to glory. 
 Presumptuous ! Weening not his cheek shall 
 
 pale, 
 
 His liver languish and digestion fail, 
 His eyes grow dim, and meshed with lines 
 
 his forehead, 
 
 His taste atrocious and his temper horrid, 
 Until he curse the place and fly, to take a 
 Widow of wealth, or judgeship in Jamaica. 
 
 Such is their fate, yet, O bacterial spot, 
 Gaol of my youth, although I love thee not 
 Though when I gazed upon thy Church, 
 
 there sang 
 
 Bare, ruined cats where late sweet voices rang ; 
 Though that historic flood which by thee flows 
 Breathes odours ill-adapted to the nose ; 
 Though men go up and down in formal 
 
 clothing 
 That Mr. B..rn..rd Sh..w would view with 
 
 loathing ;
 
 THE TEMPLE: AN ODE 137 
 
 Yet, Temple, rushing tourists transatlantic 
 Pause in thy shade, and vote thee most 
 
 romantic ; 
 
 And I forget at moments to be just- 
 ly grime, thy dampness, and thy legal 
 
 dust, 
 
 Thy pseudo-early-English, Benchers' Tudor, 
 And horrid, florid river- front (proh pudor !} 
 And feel that I might like thee, if again 
 The day returned when I, unfledged and 
 
 fain, 
 First passed the perilous gorge of Middle 
 
 Temple Lane. 
 
 So, without wrath, to thee, O grim abode, 
 I dedicate this valedictory ode.
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 HAZEIX, WATSON AND VINEY, LD., 
 LONDON AND AYLESBUXY.
 
 AUGUST 1910. 
 
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