And as technicalities in law and procedure were gradually abolished so we find the pictures of lawyers in contemporary fiction becoming less ignoble, though there will always be more romance in the story of a fraudulent lawyer leading a double life than in the career of a blameless practitioner who serves his clients honourably during office hours and returns punctually to his accustomed suburb at the appointed dinner hour. Though we have done away with much legal fiction and cumbrous technicality we cannot greatly boast of the simplicity of our legal procedure. Take the County Court Practice for instance. Here is a Court primarily designed to adjudicate on the simple disputes of poor people. There are two practice books. They cost over a guinea apiece, they consist of hundreds of pages and are absolutely incomprehensible except to the trained lawyer. This being so it is clear that the lawyer is as necessary to the poor man as he is to the rich. It is a sign of grace in the matter of procedure that whilst this chapter is in the writing we have some new rules issued about giving poor people assistance in High Court actions. Up to now the procedure _in forma pauperis_ has not been of practical benefit to the poor except in enabling an occasional important appeal to reach the House of Lords. It is too soon to say whether these new rules will meet their object. Shortly, the scheme is that a poor person--meaning one who can satisfy the judge that he is not worth fifty pounds--will have counsel and solicitor assigned to him from a rota. After that his case will be conducted free of costs or fees. If he succeeds the solicitor--but in no case the counsel--will get costs. Much depends of course on the spirit in which this is worked, but it only refers to the High Court--which is not, speaking generally, the poor man's Court--and it seems unlikely on the face of it that a scheme of this kind, with no one in particular to look after it and advertise its existence, will do away with the undesirable activity of the speculative solicitor. One wishes it well, but except perhaps in relation to divorce cases it does not appear on paper to be of great practical use.