force and intelligence. By the means of various written exercises he is trained to exactness, to put the result of his labor and investigation into writing, to make a brief in clear, precise and forceful English. The law school has done all this, but it is not enough. The law school of the future must do all this and more. It must teach practice. The law is not only a science, it is an art. And no instruction in its principles is complete, that does not include the practical application of those principles. The student leaving the law school must be ready to practice his profession. He must not be left groping for a practical application of the principles he has mastered. The law school course in procedure must include trial practice, as well as the principles of pleading and the rules of evidence. The law school, like the office, must teach of the various jurisdictions of the different courts, and the practical method of invoking each. It must familiarize the student with writs, the issue and service of process, and its due return; with thte method of keeping and certifying records and the original files and the general machinery of the clerk's and sheriff's offices. Not only must the law school teach the principles of contracts and the law of conveyancing, but it must, like the office preceptor, impart a practical familiarity with the various legal instruments in ordinary use, and a reasonable facility in drawing them. It must not only teach the law of constructive notice, but it must also give the student some practical acquaintance with the offices for the registration of deeds, the enrollment of judgments, the assessment and levy of taxes and with the methods of recording and indexing pursued. Some of this training, though purely practical, seems to be essential to a proper grasp of the principles of pleading, evidence and jurisdiction and to a ready apprehension of the rules of nisi prius and appellate practice. But the want of even the unessential and superficial knowledge of the external machinery of justice and public business, embarrasses the law school graduate, gives him a sensation of groping his way, and robs him of that self-confidence, which his really thorough training in principle might very properly inspire.

Just how such practical training is to be given to a large body of young men assembled in a law school is a question of grave difficulty. Perhaps it is incapable of solution. But the matter is of so much importance that the effort to find a solution should not and will not be lightly abandoned. Many attempts

to systematically teach procedure, in its more practical aspects, have heretofore been made in law schools, but none of them with entire success. Moot courts, an ancient institution, have been very generally adopted by the modern law school; and more recently the practice court has been instituted. The moot court usually amounts only to an oral and written argument, by selected counsel, on a legal question previously stated for the purpose, followed by the decision of the presiding judge. It is a valuable exercise, and affords a training in the investigation of legal questions, the framing of briefs and of oral arguments; it tends to give the student readiness and confidence. But it is in no sense a means of teaching practice. The practice court is more elaborate. The students are required to draw their own pleadings; there are demurrers and motions, and arguments, followed by proper rulings. When the issues are finally made, there is a trial, and students participate as counsel, witnesses, jurors, clerk, bailiff, and stenographer. The counsel open the case, examine witnesses, raise and argue questions of evidence, draw the instructions, and argue the case to the jury. Much good may be accomplished by this means, and doubtless the plan is capable of development; but the practical difficulties are great; there is an unavoidable element of make-believe and unreality, that discourages even the imaginative student. Such a practice court, at its best, is but a dead thing; its most successful session is, in effect, a demonstration of legal anatomya very good thing in its way. But the student of practice needs. a clinique. He should have an opportunity to see the actual living force, of the principles he has dug from the books, in its actual operation, in live legal contests between real contestants. The office student may do this daily. So common is the priv ilege that he fails to enjoy it with method and beneficial effect. How may the law school afford the same opportunity to its pupils, upon a plan sufficiently systematic to insure the best results?

Many persons advise students to attend the courts and sit through the trials. Such attendance may, or may not, be the means of valuable instruction. If the student drops into the court room at random, knowing nothing of the facts of the case, or of the issues presented by the pleadings, much that he hears will seem trivial and be incomprehensible. He will soon be wearied and his interest will flag. His time is lost and he is

baffled by a sense of mystery. Perhaps he begins to doubt the reality of his interest in the law. Being only human, although a law student, he either discontinues his attendance, or is present only to drink in the details of sensational trials. That may be a study of society, or it may be a mere mental dissipation. It certainly is no way to learn practice.

If, however, the student attends a trial, being informed in advance of the issues of fact and of law, by a study of the pleadings, much that transpires, which would otherwise seem inexplicable, will straightway become pregnant with information and suggestion. If he is an acute and judicious youngster, he may even see things, at times, which he will mentally resolve to avoid. Of course, if he is familiar with the case from its inception, if he has looked into the law of the questions which seem to be presented, his interest will be quickened and the benefit materially enhanced. The opportunity for such clinical study of law is the chief advantage of office training. That the student of the law school should be shut out from such opportunity is a misfortune so grave as to justify thought, and experiment, and labor, and expense to find a remedy.

I have never heard of a law school which systematized attendance upon court, and made it a required part of its course of instruction. Yet I am clearly of the opinion, that the law school, having attracted the student from the precincts of the court, must, for the purpose of instructing him in practice, become peripatetic, and lead him thither again. I do not mean that he is to be sent, in a haphazard fashion, to outsit the trials. The work must be done systematically, and the class carefully prepared by previous study of the general principles of procedure, as well as of the questions of law arising in the particular case. The trial of which is to be the legal clinique. The case must be carefully selected. It must, in the first place, be reasonably certain to be tried. It must be valuable as illustrating principles of general legal interest. And the counsel ought to be eminent as trial lawyers, for the student will consciously or unconsciously imitate much that he sees and hears. The case having been selected, the record should be printed, beginning with the process and including all motions and the rulings thereon, whether a part of the record proper or not, together with the pleadings. These printed records should be distributed among the class long before the trial. There should then be a

systematic study of the code, and of the decisions; a comparison of the corresponding principles of common law and equity pleading and practice. If any peculiar rules of evidence are involved, they must receive attention. The questions of substantive law, presented by the issues in the case, must be carefully investigated; the authorities collected and arranged. This preparation of the case should be directed and assisted by the instructor, and accompanied by frequent quizzes and class-room discussions. Finally, each student should be required to draw, as best he can, proper instructions for the jury, and have them present in his note book at the trial. Then the law student would be quite ready for his clinique.

Would the judges and the bar relish such an invasion of the court room, by a whole class of law students at a time? I feel very sure there would be no objection. The older lawyer is always sympathetic and helpful to the earnest law student. Most of the law faculties of the country are largely made up of judges and lawyers who give laborious services for the good of the cause. Every one can recall, too, many individual instances of assistance and encouragement, extended at the expense of personal inconvenience and trouble, by members of the bar to law students. The law class in the court room would ask, after all, only that toleration which is not withheld from the very idlers and vagrants on the back benches.

Nor would any right of counsel, or of parties, be infringed by the study of the case. The necessary information could, be obtained from the public files of the court, which are never withheld from inspection by the general public except for special reasons. The newspapers resort to them habitually, and make merchandise of the information there gleaned. Of course the wishes of counsel ought to be respected; but I feel sure there would be no difficulty in procuring their ready consent to make a study of any proper case.

The plan seems very feasible in spite of several objections which obtrude themselves. After a case had been carefully prepared by the class and they were all ready to attend the trial with profit, counsel might be so inconsiderate as to settle the controversy out of court; or the court might enter a non-suit. In neither event, however, would the time and labor of the student be lost. The expense of printing, no trifle in the finances of a law school, would be the only loss.

Some time would be consumed in watching the docket and waiting for the case to be called. But that would be no great matter. So much time might very profitably be spent by students in the atmosphere of the court room.

Such study could hardly be undertaken by the student until his course of instruction was somewhat advanced; and usually the remaining period of the course would not be long enough to witness all the steps in a well-contested case from the first service of the process to the decision in the court of final resort. For this reason the class should take up at the same time the study of several cases, in the nisi prius and appellate courts and covering the several jurisdictions.

In the appellate court the class should make briefs, and afterwards carefully study those of counsel; they should hear the arguments, and perhaps decide the case, writing opinions and entering judgment in their note-books, in advance of the decis ion of the court. When the opinion is finally handed down, copies of it should be distributed among the class and carefully studied. Each student's labor upon that case would then be over. The clinique is completed.

That such a plan is practicable, I firmly believe. That it would be an effective method of teaching procedure, I think can not be doubted. Two or three such cases, preceded by adequate instruction in the questions of substantive law and procedure involved, would leave the student with a very definite idea of how to go to work to overcome the difficulties of practice. Nor, indeed, would this peripatetic method of teaching law be neces sarily limited to attendance upon trials. I fancy a very effective lecture could be delivered upon the "Record" as a topic in the clerk's office of a dull Saturday afternoon, with the files, the minute book and the record book present for purposes of illustration. Indeed I have, in my time, known clerks learned in the law who could themselves deliver such a lecture with the best results.

A visit might well be paid to the office for the registration of deeds, and to other public offices. But such tours should always be preceded by a study of the statutes and decisions relating to the business of the office and accompanied by appropriate commentary and explanation.

Such a method would be a marked advance upon mere the oretical teaching of the rules of practice from books; and, for