To be eligible for the office of Committeeman, one must have been a member for at least five years. The office is and always has been honorary, but now and again it is suggested that the Committee should consist, at least partly, of paid experts. Its duties are arduous, and it frequently has to settle points of the most delicate nature, whereas it is frequently complained that it does not consist of the best or most experienced members of the Stock Exchange, who do not see in the honour and dignity of the position sufficient inducement for the sacrifice of the time its duties involve. However, generally speaking, the members are held in high esteem, and seldom, indeed, does it occur that there is even an expression of disloyalty to the dictates of the Committee even on the part of those who most desire its reform. It is questionable whether throughout the whole world any body of men so constituted is endowed with more important functions or with more arbitrary power. The Committee can make practically any additions to or alterations in the code of rules, which was originally based on the deed of settlement of the Stock Exchange. Those rules have become more drastic than the law of the land. Practices which would be perfectly legal, although not very reputable, constitute a contravention of the rules of the Stock Exchange which would bring dire consequences upon any member who indulged in them. Members have been expelled the House by the Committee under the rules for an offence of which the law of the land would not take cognisance. The rules of the Stock Exchange, as administered by the Committee, are a code of honour rather than a code of law.