Justice had nothing to blush for in the Rome of those days, and the poor could obtain it as promptly and easily as the rich. There were three separate institutions devoted entirely to the legal defence and protection of persons who could not pay for the services of a lawyer. One was the Arch-Confraternity of St. Ives, thus named after the Saint still so dear to the people of Brittany, the lawyer who was a priest and who devoted all his talents to the defence and protection of the poor. But long before his time (he died on May 19, 1303) St. Gregory had instituted in Rome seven official defenders of the poor, one for each Region of the city. They were called _defensori_; some eight hundred years later their official descendants, the College of Procurators, took the title of “the Rights of the Poor,” and there was also a civil office established by Urban VIII, of which the holder, who had to be a noble and a layman, took the title of “Advocate of the Poor,” exercising his powers in cases that came outside any ecclesiastical administration. The congregation of St. Ives remained the great stand-by of the lower classes down to my own time. It was partly a religious sodality, comprising both prelates and lawyers, who met every Sunday for pious exercises, which were followed by a careful examination of such appeals as had been laid before them during the week. They took up all just and genuine claims and defended them at their own expense. Besides looking after the rights of their humble fellow-countrymen, they undertook the cases of all poor strangers who got into trouble in the city. There was a third body, the Arch-Confraternity of the San Girolamo, that devoted itself to the defence and aid of prisoners, and more especially of poor widows. The gentlemen composing it—and they were the flower of the aristocracy, ecclesiastical and social—made it their business to assist impecunious prisoners in every possible way, paying their fines, if such had been imposed on them, and arranging matters with their creditors if they had been imprisoned for debt. The members had free access to all the prisons, and they took their duties very seriously, some of their number examining the food every day of the year, and inquiring into all matters connected with the treatment of the prisoners. Indeed some of the most important prisons were confided to their sole charge. They did no end of good, particularly in bringing about amicable settlements of disputes which would otherwise have caused fierce litigation.