missing, both in the Inner and the Middle Temples.[73] One result of
these losses is that there is nothing to show when the two Inns became
separate societies, on the assumption that they were not independent
bodies from the outset. Chaucer's well-known description (about 1390) of
"a gentil manciple of the [or perhaps the true reading is 'a'] Temple"
is not decisive.

"Of maisters had he mo than thries ten
That were of lawe expert and curious,
Of which there was a dosein _in that hous_
Worthy to ben stewardes of rent and lond
Of any lord that is in Englelond."

An entry in the books of Lincoln's Inn incidentally mentions the Middle
Temple in 1422, and in one of the _Paston Letters_, dated 1440, we read
"qwan your leysyr is, resorte ageyn on to your college, the Inner
Temple." It is generally admitted now that neither society can establish
any claim of priority or precedence over the other. Appeal has been made
to the badges, but they throw no light on the question. The Agnus of the
Middle Temple is apparently not mentioned till about 1615, and the
Pegasus of the Inner Temple not before 1562. It is still a matter of
dispute whether the Templars' emblem of a horse with two knights on its
back can have been altered into a horse with two wings by the ignorance
or ingenuity of some workman.

We try in vain to reconstruct with any fullness the life of the lawyers
and their apprentices at the Temple in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries. But it is clear that, together with the buildings, they
inherited some of the traditions. The old church remained their place of
worship. In the old refectory they were served by "panier-men" on wooden
platters and in wooden cups, as the Templars had been before them. The
penalties inflicted for small misdemeanours, such as being "expelled the
hall" and "put out of commons," were much the same as those prescribed
in the "Rule" of the Templars, as drawn up by St. Bernard.

It is a curious coincidence that not long after the coming of the
lawyers a change was introduced in the legal profession which recalls
the organisation of the old military brotherhood. In 1333, according to
Dugdale, the judges of the Court of Common Pleas received knighthood,
and so became in a sense successors of the Knights Templars. The
creation of sergeants-at-law (now abolished) goes further back, but it
has been suggested that they were representatives of the _freres
serjens_, the _fratre