been, that it was their duty to return a verdict of 'Guilty.' Throwing
themselves into the humor of the business, the Welsh jurymen, although
they were quite familiar with the facts of the case, acquitted the
murderer, much to the encouragement of many wretched Welsh husbands
anxious for a termination of their matrimonial sufferings.

[28] In the seventeenth century, lawyers usually called their clients
and the non-legal public 'Lay Gents.'

CHAPTER XXXVI.

STUDENT LIFE IN OLD TIME.

From statements made in previous chapters, it may be seen that in
ancient times the Law University was a far more conspicuous feature of
the metropolis than it has been in more modern generations. In the
fifteenth century the law students of the town numbered about two
thousand; in Elizabethan London their number fluctuated between one
thousand and two thousand; towards the close of Charles II.'s reign they
were probably much less than fifteen hundred; in the middle of the
eighteenth century they do not seem to have much exceeded one thousand.
Thus at a time when the entire population of the capital was
considerably less than the population of a third-rate provincial town of
modern England, the Inns of Court and Chancery contained more
undergraduates than would be found on the books of the Oxford Colleges
at the present time.

Henry VIII.'s London looked to the University for mirth, news, trade.
During vacations there was but little stir in the taverns and shops of
Fleet Street; haberdashers and vintners sate idle; musicians starved;
and the streets of the capital were comparatively empty when the
students had withdrawn to spend their holidays in the country. As soon
as the gentlemen of the robe returned to town all was brisk and merry
again. As the town grew in extent and population, the social influence
of the university gradually decreased; but in Elizabethan London the
_eclat_ of the inns was at its brightest, and during the reigns of
Elizabeth's two nearest successors London submitted to the Inns-of-Court
men as arbiters of all matters pertaining to taste--copying their dress,
slang, amusements, and vices. The same may be said, with less emphasis,
of Charles II.'s London. Under the 'Merry Monarch' theatrical managers
were especially anxious to please the inns, for they knew that no play
would succeed which the lawyers had resolved to damn--that no actor
could achieve popularity if the gallants of the Temple combined to la