The legal profession, too, has changed. Where are the greasy, drunken old solicitors that haunted the precincts of police-courts twenty-five years ago? Gone. But they were common enough in those days, and touted for five-shilling jobs, money down, or higher prices when payment was deferred. With droughty throats and trembling limbs, they hastened to the nearest public-house to spend what payment had been given in advance. Here they would remain till their clients were before the magistrate, and would then appear just in time to say: "I appear for the prisoner, your Worship." Horrid old men they were, the fronts of their coats and vests all stained and shiny with the droppings of beer. Frequently the magistrate, unable to tolerate their drunken or half-drunken maunderings, would order them out of court; but even this drastic treatment had little effect upon them, for the next day, or even on the latter part of the same day, they, apparently without shame or humiliation, would inform his Worship that they were in So-and-so's case, and ask at what time it would be taken--as if, forsooth, their engagements were numerous and important. The bullying solicitor, too, has disappeared or mended his ways. No longer is he allowed to bully and insult witnesses or prosecutors, and cast scurrilous and unclean imputations on the lives and characters of those opposed to him. Generally these fellows were engaged for the "defence." They one and all acted on the principle that to attack was the best defence. I once heard an athletic young doctor ask a solicitor of this kind, who had been unusually insulting, to meet him when the case was over, assuring him also that he would receive his deserts--a good thrashing. The pompous, ignorant solicitor, with neither wit, words, action, utterance, nor the power of speech--he, too, has gone. One wondered at the strange fate that made solicitors of such men; wondered, too, how they passed the necessary examinations; but wondered most of all why people paid money for such fellows to defend them. Invariably they made their client's case much worse; they always declined to let "sleeping dogs lie," and were positively certain to reveal something or discover something to the disadvantage of the person whose interests they were supposed to be upholding. I remember one magistrate, sitting impatient and fidgety while the weary drip of words went on, calling out suddenly: "Three months' hard labour, during which you can ruminate on the brilliant defence made by your solicitor!" All these have passed, and police-courts have been civilized; for law is more dignified, and its administration more refined. Magistrates are up-to-date, too, and quite in touch with the new order of things and with the aspirations of the community. Bullying, drunken, and stupid solicitors have no chance to-day. In all these directions great changes have come about, and great progress has been made.