SUN-DIAL IN THE TEMPLE
The writer in Blackwood before referred to alludes to the strict silence enjoined at the Inner Temple dinners, the only intercourse between the several members of the mess being the usual social scowl vouchsafed by your true-born Englishman to persons who have not the honour of his acquaintance. You may, indeed, on an emergency, ask your neighbour for the salt; but then it is also perfectly understood that he is not obliged to notice your request.
The old term of "calling to the bar" seems to have originated in the custom of summoning students, that had attained a certain standing, to the bar that separated the benchers' dais from the hall, to take part in certain probationary mootings or discussions on points of law. The mere student sat farthest from the bar.
When these mootings were discontinued deponent sayeth not. In Coke's time (1543), that great lawyer, after supper at five o'clock, used to join the moots, when questions of law were proposed and discussed, when fine on the garden terrace, in rainy weather in the Temple cloisters. The dinner alone now remains; dining is now the only legal study of Temple students.
In the Middle Temple a three years' standing and twelve commons kept suffices to entitle a gentleman to be called to the bar, provided he is above twenty-three years of age. No person can be called to the bar at any of the Inns of Court before he is twenty-one years of age; and a standing of five years is understood to be required of every member before being called. The members of the several universities, &c., may, however, be called after three years' standing.
THE TEMPLE STAIRS