erjeant-at-Law might pass
for a Master of Arts or a Bachelor of Divinity. The distinguishing
feature is the coif, and, wherever it is discovered, it may be safely
accepted as a criterion. Thus in Gosfield Church, Essex, there is an
interesting brass of Thomas Rolf (d. 1440), who is represented as
wearing a cassock, sleeved tabard, tippet, hood, and coif. The
last-mentioned forms a circle round the head, and attached to it are two
loops or lappets, which appear below the hood. Boutell has figured this
brass, which he states to be that of a serjeant-at-law. The inscription,
which has the words _legi professus_, already pointed to that
conclusion, Rolf being devoted to law, as, under the circumstances, he
might have been devoted to religion.

To anyone interested in the study of origins the symbolic value of the
coif is very considerable. Like the _pileus_, it may be traced back to
the ecclesiastical skull-cap, the corollary of tonsure. In the Dark Ages
the lawyers were almost invariably clergy, in the modern sense of the
term. By the thirteenth century the original skull-cap, while retaining
its general shape, had developed into a head-dress of ampler
proportions, and as such, might, and did, serve as a complete disguise
of the clerical calling. For that reason it was forbidden to the clergy
by Othobon's Constitutions (1268), except as a night or travelling cap.
Like the Serjeant's coif of more recent date, it was white in colour;
and, as an appanage of the legal profession, it was worn by judges and
pleaders alike. The strings were used to tie the coif to the head, and
were fastened under the chin. It has been plausibly suggested that the
Black Cap which judges assume, when passing sentence of death, was a
device for concealing the coif, ecclesiastical justices being debarred
from pronouncing capital sentence; and in this connexion we may recall
the constitutional tradition, which requires the Bishops to withdraw
when issues involving life or death come before the Parliamentary
Courts.

We have spoken of _graduation_ in relation to law. As an explanation of
the phrase, nothing could be more apt than a passage in Coke's "Third
Report," which, although somewhat lengthy, deserves to be cited _in
toto_:

"As there be in the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford divers degrees,
as general Sophisters, Bachelors, Masters, Doctors, of whom be chosen
men for eminent and judicial places, both in the Church and
Ecclesiastical Co