k's conjecture be correct, they are the clerical
members of the choir. Two of them have a scarf over a surplice or, as is
more likely, a loose-sleeved cassock. Lowest in rank are the surpliced
choristers wearing hoods, with, in some instances, a liripipe depending
from them behind.

JUDICIAL

CHAPTER X

THE ORDER OF THE COIF

Between the Universities and the Judiciary of England in ancient times
there existed a close link, which is to be found in the _serviens ad
legem_ or Serjeant-at-Law. He was at once a graduate and a public
official concerned with the administration of justice either as a
recognized pleader or as a judge, for, whether in the higher or lower
grade, he owed his credentials to the Crown.

We will consider the Serjeant-at-Law in the first place in his academic
character, in which he might rank as a B.C.L. or as a Doctor Legum,
though this is not quite what we intended by graduation. Law, like the
other liberal professions, has always been regardful of outward and
visible signs. This being so, we trust we have committed no very serious
sin of plagiarism in borrowing as the heading of this chapter the title
of a well-known work by Serjeant Pulling, one of the last survivors of
the order. At any rate, the plagiarism is open and avowed.

Though the most significant, the coif was not the only exterior note of
the Serjeant, in contradistinction to the laymen; and, in order to show
how he appeared, when in full professional attire, we think we cannot do
better than quote from a fifteenth-century lawyer, one of our greatest
authorities on such matters--Serjeant Fortescue. Writing about 1467, he
says of his class that they were "clothed in a long robe, priest-like,
with a furred cape about the shoulders; and therefrom a hood with two
labels, such as Doctors use to wear in certain Universities, with the
above-described quoyf." The "long robe"--the proverbial emblem of the
legal profession--evidently corresponds with the cassock, the "furred
cape" to the tippet, and the "labels" probably belonged, not, as
Fortescue seems to intimate, to the hood, but were rather the strings of
the coif, which were the attribute of Doctors of Laws. Here we have all
the marks of graduation--that is, the process necessary for the lawful
exercise of a learned calling--and graduation might be equally
accomplished in the schools of Oxford and Cambridge and the Inns of
Court.

As regards the remainder of his dress, the S