reverend seigniors of the bench, who did not scruple themselves to join in the performance. There used to be a dance at least once or twice every term. The judges, Serjeants, and benchers danced first a peculiar measure of their own, in the course of which they circled several times the sea-coal fire. While the elders were recovering their breath, one of the gentlemen of the Utter Bar favoured them with a song; and then a few representatives of the Inner Bar “presented the house with a dance.” On one occasion, some of the students of Lincoln’s Inn flatly refused to dance when called upon, to the dismay and indignation of the bench, and were only brought to reason by the expulsion of every tenth mutineer for a certain time from “commons” in hall, and a threat that continued contumacy would entail perpetual excommunication from the bar. We may presume, therefore, the benchers agreed with M. Jourdain’s dancing-master that “il n’y a rien qui soit si necéssaire aux hommes que la danse?” and that if any one made a false step in the world, it could only be from ignorance of that precious art and mystery. Indeed there can be no doubt that it has enabled many a briefless barrister to put his best foot foremost. If I wished to be personal, I might point to several leaders of the bar, and ornaments of the bench, who owe their eminence in the profession to their dexterity in the ball-room. How would . ever have got his silk gown and large practice, or * * * his justiceship and knighthood, had not the one fascinated an heiress, whose brother was a Secretary to the Treasury, by his proficiency in the valse à deux temps, or had the other not been able to bear the somewhat stout Polly Peachem (daughter of the eminent attorney) in triumph through the polka? To avoid personalities, and to go back long beyond the memory of the oldest inhabitant, did not Sir John Davies, who rose to be Chief Justice, first distinguish himself by a poem on dancing? And we all know by what steps Sir Christopher Hatton advanced to the woolsack.
His bushy beard and shoe-strings green,
His high-crowned hat and satin doublet,
Moved the stout heart of England’s Queen,
Though Pope and Spaniard could not trouble it.
Surely, therefore, it was a great mistake that the proposal to bring the recent festivities in the Middle Temple to a close by a ball, at which the benchers were to dance, as of old, round the fire, was overruled. What a sight it would have been for Mr. Spurgeon to have seen the Lord Chancellor and the Treasurer of the Inn, hand in hand, tripping it on the light fantastic toe, with the other veterans of the law in their rear! But, alas! benchers now “have thews and sinews like their ancestors, but woe the while their fathers’ minds are dead.” Depend upon it their predecessors knew what they were about in placing dancing in the curriculum, and I would advise no young aspirant of the woolsack to neglect the noble art. Besides galliards, corantas, and other dances, the “post revels” often included masques and plays, for the splendour as well as wit of which the Inns of Court were celebrated. Even the gravest condescended to take part in these amusements. Bacon was one of the “getters-up” of a masque in Gray’s Inn, and Hyde’s name appears on a similar occasion in the reign of Charles I. Generally these days were performed by members of the Inn; but sometimes regular actors were engaged, as when Shakespear’s “Twelfth Night” was represented in Middle Temple Hall. About the last revel in any of the Inns was in the Inner Temple, in 1773, when Talbot was raised to the woolsack: on that occasion the benchers danced, and there was a play by the actors from the Haymarket, “who came in chairs ready dressed.” It was only at Yule-tide that the Lord of Misrule was in office: and the madcap pranks which were played in that privileged period by his subjects, were regarded with no little alarm by the sober citizens though they excited the admiration and envy of the Court gallants. The buffoonery and riot which were practised at such times appear to have been carried beyond all bounds, at least Evelyn has recorded the disgust with which he witnessed the “revels” in Charles II.’s reign.
The benchers not only shared the dances and gambols of the other members of their Inn, but exercised a sort of fatherly control over them. In the old byelaws, very particular regulations as to costume are laid down. As one might suppose from their proximity to Alsatia on the one hand, and to the Court on the other, the Templars caught some strange fashions both of dress and manner. They seem to have been tremendous swells in their own way, some of them emulating the bushy beards, scandalous long swords, and swaggering air of their neighbours in Whitefriars, and others adopting the more elegant, but not less fantastic mode of the Court gallants. The benchers observed both styles with dislike and prohibited all long beards, curled hair, great ruffs, wide slashed hose, whether of Dutch or Spanish cut, and all other extravagant dresses, the members of the Temples being specially enjoined to “order their hair to decency and formality.” One can imagine also the somewhat boisterous character of commons in those byegone times, when no one was allowed to bring any weapon into hall, except a little dagger to cut his meat with, and when dice and shove-groat were played at table. The unruly conduct of the Templars in some of these respects contrasts singularly with their submission—not to say servility—on others. The benchers and judges on “grand days” were always waited upon by students, and when Charles II. honoured the Inner Temple with a visit, the royal table was served by “fifty select gentlemen of the Society in their gowns.”
It must not be supposed, however, that the benchers neglected the legal part of the students’ training. “Headers” were appointed to lecture on the leading principles of the law: and the dinner in hall was usually followed by the “mooting,” or “bolting” of some argument between two members of the Utter Bar. The students were thus informed not only of the doctrines of English law, but of the mode of debate practised in the courts, and had themselves to perform a “moot” before they were called. The terms which had to be kept extended over seven years, and more continuous attendance was required than now. No dinner
