This is so much the case, that when the London Times turns in despair from a government of lawyers and looks about for an alternative, the first figure that presents itself is that distinguished advocate Sir Edward Carson!

But there is a difference between recognising that some sort of lawyer-politician is unavoidable and agreeing that the existing type of lawyer who is so largely accountable for the massive slowness, the confused action, the slovenliness rather than the weakness of purpose, shown by Great Britain in this war, is the only possible type, The British system of education and legal organisation is not the last word of human wisdom in these matters.

The real case we British have against our lawyers, if I may adopt an expressive colloquialism, is not that they are lawyers, but that they are such infernal lawyers.  They trail into modern life most of the faults of a mediaeval guild.  They seem to have no sense of the State they could develop, no sense of the future they might control.  Their law and procedure has never been remodelled upon the framework of modern ideas; their minds are still set to the tune of mediaeval bickerings, traditionalism, and State blindness.  They are mystery dealers, almost unanimously they have resisted giving the common man the protection of a code.

In the United Kingdom we have had no Napoleon to override the profession.  It is extraordinary how complete has been their preservation of barbaric conceptions.  Even the doctor is now largely emancipated from his archaic limitations as a skilled retainer.  He thinks more and more of the public health, and less and less of his patron.  The more recent a profession the less there is of the individualistic personal reference; scientific research, for example, disavows and forbids every personal reference.

But while everyone would be shocked at some great doctor, or some great research institution, in these days of urgent necessity spending two or three weeks on the minor ailments of some rich person’s lapdog, nobody is scandalised at the spectacle of Sir Edward Carson and a costly law court spending long days upon the sordid disputes that centre upon young Master Slingsby’s ear—­whether it is the Slingsby family ear or the ear of a supposititious child—­a question that any three old women might be trusted to settle.  After that he rests for a fortnight and recuperates, and returns—­to take up a will case turning upon the toy rabbits and suchlike trifles which entertained the declining years of a nonagenarian.  This, when we are assured that the country awaits Sir Edward as its Deliverer.  It is as if Lord Kitchener took a month off to act at specially high rates for the “movies.”  Our standard for the lawyer is older and lower than it is for other men.