heavier tongues, and take their one revenge
in poetry—should inspire, one would
think, the most tremulous of juniors with
fluency and boldness. Greatest of all
qualifications of the advocate—rather may
we say, summary of the advocate's art—
who ever rivalled a Frenchman in the "gift
of the gab?" So it was that the possessor
of this mighty gift in France won, in very
early days, a position and an importance that
the professional advocate has never had
elsewhere. They did everything, these
French barristers. There was one who
became a pope, under the style of Clement
the Fourth, and another who was made
(the very last dignity one might expect an
advocate to achieve) a saint, canonised, we
may be sure, with a flawless patent of
sanctity. D'Aguesseau, Pasquier, Berryer,
are at different times among the foremost
names of the French "tableau," or roll of
the bar; and if we look further for quaint
distinction, we shall find in France the
very youngest barrister on record, in the
shape of one Corbin, who appeared in court
and conducted a cause with much skill and
eloquence at the mature age of fourteen.
This was an exception, no doubt; but life
began earlier in those days. D'Aguesseau
made his bow as an advocate- general at
twenty-three; and Pasquier nearly left the
bar in disgust because he had to wait for
two months in a state of brieflessness. The
present day, which regards a barrister of
forty-five as little better than a babe in the
law, has less sympathy with the latter part
of Fuller's maxim, that "Physicians, like
beer, are best when they are old; and
lawyers, like bread, when they are young
and new."

The first French advocates were the
clergy—"nullus causidicus nisi clericus,"
was the motto of the day—who characteristically
distinguished themselves by making
what we may call their first corporate appearance
as defenders of the royal prerogative
against the encroachments of the Holy
See. It is somewhat startling to read of
a young lawyer, at the beginning of the
fourteenth century, drawing up a short
address to Pope Boniface the Eighth, in
answer to a claim of ecclesiastical patronage
in France, with this brief opening, " Sciat
tua maxima fatuitas," i. e., "Let your
honourable idiotcy be informed." Whilst
the parliaments of France continued to move
from place to place, the advocates moved
with them, on a sort of circuit; the pleading
of causes being part of the business of
the parliament.

We must think of the advocate of those
days as employed on the civil side only:
his employment in criminal cases is a very
modern institution in France; as, to our
shame be it spoken, in grave cases is true
in England also. It was in the reign of
Philip the Fair, that the parliament, and
with it the bar of France, was fixed in Paris;
and the advocate's office grew rapidly in
honour and importance. At first attached
to the parliament as a sort of " amicus
curiæ" to explain the law to the fighting
gentlemen who formed the court, he was
soon found too useful to be excluded from
a personal share in the deliberations; and
the next step was to raise the lawyer to
the soldier's level by making of him a
"chevalier ès lois." Philip the Fair was the
first to knight his foremost barristers; and
to bestow upon them the honours of nobility.
And it is an amusing comment on
the characteristics of the profession, ever
masters in the art of making ells out
of inches, to find that by the middle of
the fourteenth century they had succeeded
in establishing their right as a body to
the privileges of the "noblesse," to which
they had strictly no sort of claim. By
this time they had dubbed themselves
an "order," and vindicated their literal
title to the proud designation of " noblesse
de la robe," while at about the
same date the bar, by gradual divorcement
had separated herself from the
church. The glories of the French bar
culminated in the age of Louis the Fourteenth,
when the honours of advocacy were
transmitted from father to son, and regarded
as a great source of legitimate pride.

Amongst, its many vicissitudes the
greatest that befel the bar of France was
in the stormy times of the Revolution;
for, by a decree of the second of September,
1790, the National Assembly simply abolished
it altogether, duties, rights, dress,
name, honours, and all, and substituted a
class of procureurs, under the name of
"official defenders." To do the National
Assembly justice, it is clear from the report
of the select committee on which they
acted, that they believed that they were by
this measure advancing the ends of justice;
and it speaks highly for the French bar at
that period that they accepted their own
annihilation gladly, in preference to the
degradation which they anticipated for
their ancient order under the new régime.
One voice was heard in the Assembly,
almost alone, pleading in impassioned
language for the maintenance of the
advocate's office. "Whose is the right to
defend our citizens? Their own, or theirs