xvi Proceedings of Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
“ To the efficient administration of Justice, not even the purity 
of the Bench is more requisite than the independence and integrity 
of the Bar.” 
This is not the place to enlarge on his character as an advocate ; 
but it may be proper to mention, as the law occupied the largest 
share of his life, that his knowledge and practice embraced every 
department — Civil, Criminal, and Ecclesiastical ; the conduct of Jury 
Trials; the examination of witnesses, which was strict hut never 
rude, and knew when to leave off as well as how to begin ; the com- 
position of written pleadings (in his time still in frequent use), 
and the delivery of oral arguments, in which he was equally 
able in the statement of the case and in reply. His distinctive 
excellence as a pleader was concise, clear, logical, and dispassionate 
reasoning. It is almost impertinent to say that he never used 
the artifices which the satirist and the playwright sometimes 
associate with successful advocacy. But he scrupulously abstained 
even from the arts of the rhetorician, which few speakers in public 
altogether avoid. Sound sense, grasp of principle, accuracy in 
detail, ready memory, and practical as distinguished from schol- 
astic logic, orderly arrangement, and an apt choice of words, were 
the qualities he cultivated and matured by constant industry and a 
wide experience of men and business. 
In 1858 he became Lord Advocate for the second time. On the 
death of Lord Justice-Clerk Hope in the summer of that year, he 
was promoted to the Presidency of the Second Division of the Court 
of Session, and on Lord Colonsay’s appointment as the Scottish 
legal member of the House of Lords in 1867, he became President 
of that Court, and Justice-General of the Court of Justiciary, offices 
which he held till his death. He had thus the long judicial experi- 
ence of thirty-three years, during which he gained and held the 
complete confidence of the whole legal profession, of the public, 
and, so far as is possible, of the parties to litigation, by assiduous 
attention to the duties of his office, and the ability and fairness of 
his judgments. 
From what has been said of his character as an advocate, it almost 
follows that he was still more eminent as a judge. Though not free 
on certain points from strong convictions, which appeared to those 
who did not share them strong prejudices, the chief characteristic of his 
