The most difficult part of a judge’s duty consists in trying criminal cases at the sessions. When an accused person is committed by a magistrate on a charge of murder or any other offence with which the magistrate cannot deal finally, he is tried by the sessions judge and by a jury of his countrymen. The prosecution is usually conducted by the Government pleader, whilst the accused retains the services of the best counsel that he can afford to pay. The judge records the evidence in English with his own hand, being himself the interpreter of the actual words in the native language in which it is delivered, whilst simultaneously a native clerk records, or is supposed to record, the actual words spoken by the witness. This imposes a severe task on the judge. He has to listen to what the witness says in the vernacular, he has to interpret and record its meaning in English, and he has to consider the effect of each successive question and answer on the whole of the witnesses’ evidence. This triple mental operation is very severe, and imposes too hard a strain upon the judge. When the evidence for the prosecution and the defence is completed, and the counsel on either side have exhausted their eloquence, the judge has the pleasure of summing up the evidence and directing the jury in their vernacular language, a rather arduous task, but we have heard many men do it with much credit to themselves. Perhaps some of our judges in England would not be quite at ease if they had to sum up the evidence and address an English jury in French, or in dog-Latin; but the suggestion may convey to the reader some idea of the difficulty to which an English judge in India is subject. Finally, the judge records his decision elaborately in English, in case the prisoner, if convicted, should appeal to the High Court against his sentence.