Business commences; the Lords Ordinary take their seats--in places which make them look more like as if they were standing in the pillory than any thing else. But even there, advocates are drudging in their vocations; agents running backwards and forwards with briefs; clients watching the result with palpitating hearts; and the Athenian loungers hanging about, anticipating their Lordships in the decision of the several cases. The well-employed advocates now put you very much in mind of shuttle-cocks. They run from bar to bar, making motions here and speeches there, in the most chaos-looking style that can be imagined. Of the whole gown and wig mass, it is but a small portion, however, who are thus occupied; four-fifths of the whole keep trudging on from end to end of the hall, and seem never to expect or even to get a fee; while the bar clerks collected round the fire-places keep up a continual titter at the repetition of all the good jokes of the day; and the same scene continues day after day, and month after month. You are astonished that a place, the real business of which is so dull and so dry, should have charms for so many idle people; but except this Parliament-house there is not another in-door lounge in the whole Athens; and as the business of the courts forms the chief topic of the evening’s conversation, many attend for the purpose of qualifying themselves for displays upon a very different arena. It is long before a stranger can bring himself to relish this first and most favourite of all Athenian pleasures. I, for one, got tired of it in two or three days, and began to be of opinion that, however much this fondness for legal proceedings may sharpen the wits of the Athenian idlers, it is but a sorry treat for those who have no wish either to get rich by the acting, or wise by the suffering of the law. When the business of the day is over, you can perceive the veteran barristers taking council together as to where they may be joyous for the night; and the younger legal men of all descriptions hurrying off toward Princes Street, in order that they may show themselves to the Athenian fair, before they retreat to drown the daily badgerings in the nightly bowl. CHAPTER VII. LEARNING OF THE ATHENS. ----“As a dog that turns the spit Bestirs himself, and plies his feet, To climb the wheel, but all in vain, His own weight brings him down again, And still he’s in the self-same place, Where, at his setting out, he was; So, in the circle of the arts, Do they advance their nat’ral parts, Till falling back still, for retreat, They fall to juggle, cant, and cheat.”