them for his own life, and though he may be
seventy years of age, if he can come into the
hall he may surrender them to a very young
man, and if that young man should live he may
surrender them again at the same age." In the
event of a surrender not being made, the chambers
lapse to the society. The rest of the
chambers are let at a rack rent.

We are further informed that the members
dine in hall three days in term and three days
out of term. The dinners of the ancients are
paid for from the funds of the society, and as
the society has a cellar they have wine upon
the same terms. The witness could not remember
any time when the inn had a surplus over
expenditure, as it had to pay off a mortgage on
the property of eight thousand pounds. He
was not inclined to think that the society had
any connexion with an inn of court. The only
connexion of which he was aware between it
and Gray's Inn was that, when a serjeant was
called from Gray's Inn, that honourable society
asked the members of Staples Inn to breakfast.

Mr. Edward Rowland Pickering was the
second witness. He avowed himself the author
of a little publication upon the subject of Staples
Inn. He did not recommend the work as an
authority, however, as will be seen from his
answers to some of the questions addressed to
him.

A commissioner (apparently referring to the
work) said: "You state here that in the reign
of Henry the Fifth, or before, it (the society)
probably became an Inn of Chancery, and that
it is a society still possessing the manuscript of
the orders and constitutions?"

"I am afraid," answered the witness, "that
the manuscript is lost. The principal has a set
of chambers which were burnt down, and his
servant and two children were burnt to death,
seventy years ago; and I rather think these
manuscripts might be lost."

The historian of Staples Inn seems to have
improved upon the practice of the Irish gentleman
who wrote the theological work, and then
proceeded to look up his authorities; for he is
quite content to consider the authorities as
having had a probable existence at one time or
another.

In reference to the statement as to the inn
being at one time an inn of chancery, the
author of the work was asked if he knew himself
of any trace of a connexion between the society
and an inn of court. His answer is peculiar:

"Certainly, I should say not. It is sixty
years since I was there, boy and all."

And it is in this way that history is written—
as far as Staples Inn is concerned, at any
rate.

In reference to the association of the inn
with legal pursuits or legal education of any
kind, the witness knew nothing. In his time—
and we have seen that he had been connected
with the society, man and boy, for sixty years
—no attempt in such a direction had been
made, and he had never heard of the existence
of a reader or chaplain. He considered the
inn a purely voluntary institution, and extra-
parochial, because it had its pews in St.
Andrew's Church taken away, and had never been
able to get them back again.

The treasurer and secretary of Barnard's Inn,
Mr. Charles Edward Hunt, gave some information
concerning that society. It consists, he
said, of a principal, nine ancients, and five
companions. The principal and the ancients
choose the companions, who must be solicitors
and clerks in court. "We have two taxing
masters," said the witness, evidently impressed
with the dignity of the position. The
companions are chosen when the principal and
ancients so please. They never apply. One
gentleman—contemptuously named by the
witness as a Mr.——, had the impertinence to
apply for admission in 1827. "Of course we
refused him," said the witness, "and he applied
to the court, and after some difficulty he got a
rule nisi for a mandamus. It came on to be
tried before Lord Tenterden, and Lord Tenterden
said it could not be granted; that we were
a voluntary association, and the court had no
jurisdiction.

This infatuated man, it seems, based his
claims upon the ground that the inn was an inn
of chancery, and that he ought to be admitted
as a solicitor. The privileges to which he
aspired, however, are not very great, consisting
only of the right of dining in hall, and the
chance, under particular favour, of being made
an ancient. The advantages enjoyed by the
ancients are simply "their dinners and some
little fees." The principal is the only person
who is allowed chambers, and he holds his office
only for a term of three years. The inn is a very
old one, and the property worth only one thousand
pounds a year, of which two-thirds goes for
expenses. The society holds under the dean and
chapter of Lincoln, by a forty years' lease, and it
pays a fine of one thousand four hundred pounds,
whenever the lease is renewed. One of the
commissioners suggested that three hundred pounds
a year—something less than the third of one
thousand pounds—would give more than one
thousand four hundred pounds at the end of
forty years. The witness admitted the force of
the multiplication table to this extent, and
added, "We dine in hall; it is a kind of
convivial party." He stated in the course of his
evidence that the inn was in debt. It further
appeared that the property had been held under
the dean and chapter of Lincoln for nearly three
hundred years; the last renewal was in the year
1848. This was apparent from the books; but
there was no trace of the original holding. The
witness could not find, either, that there had
ever been any student of the law connected
with the inn. " The oldest thing I find,"
continued the witness, "is that a reader came
occasionally from Gray's Inn to read; but what he
read about, or who paid him, there is no minute
whatever." He may be excused for not
remembering when the reader last came from
Gray's Inn, for he thought it was about two