374 Memoir of Archihold Camj)hell Swinton. 



those which are published periodically now are substantially a 

 continuation of the original work. I look upon this achievement 

 as a very great boon to the science of criminal law ; and if 

 he had done nothing else in his career, Swinton would have 

 deserved to be honoured and remembered in the profession. 

 He continued to conduct these reports down to the end of 1841. 

 He also edited and published separate reports of two celebrated 

 criminal trials before the High Court of Justiciary — that of the 

 Cotton Spinners in 1839, who were tried for conspiracy, and 

 of the Claimant of the Stirling Peerage, in 1839. 



He had many qualifications for his profession, even apart 

 from his great power of eloquence and reasoning. He had 

 great assiduity, was rapid in his conceptions, had a clear brain, 

 and a lucid power of expression, and, in short, had the prospect, 

 at this time, of rising to distinction as a pleader. Fate, 

 however, I do not say maliciously, but unfortunately for his 

 opportunities of practice, interposed two obstacles. The first 

 was that, in 1842, on a vacancy occurring in the Civil Law 

 professorship in the University, he was induced to offer himself 

 as a candidate, and was successful. From 1842 to 1862 he held 

 that important office, coming to it at a very early age. I 

 believe that a more efficient professor never sat in a legal Chair; 

 and the many brilliant pupils, who came from his class to 

 practise at the Bar, remembered, with uniform satisfaction, the 

 clear, lucid, powerful expositions which they heard from him in 

 his lectures. It is not easy to be an effective professor of law. 

 The subject is one so entirely different from anything to which 

 the audience have been accustomed in their previous studies, 

 that a professor must sympathise very thoroughly with the 

 prevalent cast of thought on the part of the students, before he 

 can command their attention on such a theme. In this Mr 

 Campbell Swinton was more successful than most ; but, then, 

 professorships and practice seldom have walked hand in hand. 

 For Themis resents the divided allegiance. She is an inexorable 

 mistress ; and, unless her votary feels that she is all in all to 

 him, rarely bestows her favours. In other and plainer words, a 

 man seldom succeeds in rising to important practice at the 

 Bar if he has anything else to do. 



A second obstacle —not one to be regretted certainly, but still 

 tending in the same direction — interposed itself before long. 

 The estate of Kimmerghame, of which I have already spoken, 



