presume to calculate on the issue of an
action; that it was very lucky they had prevented the other party from
getting Serjeant Snubbin; and other topics of doubt and consolation
common in such a position of affairs.

Mr. Pickwick's lawsuit was to be tried in the Court of Common Pleas, a
division in which Serjeants-at-Law had the exclusive right to practise.
At this time, 1827, and indeed up till 1873, every common law judge was
turned into a Serjeant, if he were not one ere he was promoted to the
Bench. It was a solemn kind of ceremony. The subject of the operation
was led out of the precincts of the Inns of Court; the church bell tolled
as for one dead.

He was then admitted member of Serjeants' Inn; and the judge would
address the Serjeants who practised before him as Brother So-and-So.
Justice Lindley was the last judge who took the degree, a degree the only
outward visible sign of which is the black patch or coif which is
attached to the top of the wig. I do not know what kind of counsel
Serjeant Snubbin, retained by Mr. Perker for the defendant, was; but
Dodson and Fogg had retained Serjeant Buzfuz for the plaintiff, and we
all know that Serjeant Snubbin was no match for Serjeant Buzfuz. It has
been objected by a writer in _Fraser's Magazine_, to the account of this
trial, that it is full of inconsistencies. Serjeant Buzfuz' case, he
says, was absurd, and that he would not have been able to browbeat any
witness, and that no jury could have given a verdict on such evidence.
This criticism resembles many other criticisms of Pickwick. Had the
description in Pickwick been intended as a serious picture of the
proceedings in a court of justice, it would have been open to much
serious dissection and examination.

But the writer just quoted did not, it seems, possess a sufficient sense
of humour to enable him to see that this chapter of "Pickwick" was
intended for broad fun amounting to burlesque, and nothing more; and to
examine Mr. Buzfuz' proceedings by the light of the law is to strip them
of their meaning.

I mentioned just now that this trial took place in 1827. At that time,
as I daresay some of you are aware, the parties to the action could not
be called upon to give evidence; and Lord Denman did not, I think, till
1843 remove the Arcadian fetters which bound the litigants in this
fashion. But, ladies and gentlemen, what a fortunate thing it was for
Mr. Pickwick that he could not be called up