272 PROFESSIONAL INSTITUTIONS. 



for others; those who are parliamentary agents; and 

 soon. 



698. In their general character, if not in their details, 

 the facts now to be named will be anticipated by the reader. 

 He will look for illustrations of the integrating tendency, 

 and he will not be mistaken in so doing. 



Very soon after the divergence of the legal class from 

 the clerical class had commenced, there arose some union 

 among members of the legal class. Thus we read that in 

 France 



&quot;En 1274, le concile de Lyon, dans quelques dispositions relatives 

 aux procureurs, les met a peu pres sur le rneme pied que les avocats. 

 C est que des lors les procureurs forment une corporation qui se 

 gouverne sous 1 autorite des juges d figlise.&quot; 



In England also it appears that the two processes began 

 almost simultaneously. When the deputies of the king in 

 his judicial capacity ceased to be wholly nomadic, and fixed 

 courts of justice were established at Westminster, the advo 

 cates, who were before dispersed about the kingdom, began 

 to aggregate in London, where, as Stephen says, they &quot; nat 

 urally fell into a kind of collegiate order.&quot; Hence resulted 

 the Inns of Court, in which lectures were read and event 

 ually degrees given : the keeping of terms being for a long 

 time the only requirement, and the passing of an examina 

 tion having but recently become a needful qualification for 

 a call to the bar. Within this aggregate, constituting the 

 collegiate body, we have minor divisions the benchers, 

 who are its governors, the barristers, and the students. This 

 process of incorporation began before the reign of Edward 

 I; and while certain of the inns, devoted to that kind of 

 law which has now ceased to be marked off, have dwindled 

 away, the others still form the centres of integration for the 

 higher members of the legal profession. 



Then we corne to the lower members, who in early days 

 became incorporated. 



