"To make 'twixt words and lines large gaps, Wide as meridians in maps; To squander paper and spare ink, Or cheat men of their words some think."
In the following century the abuses consequent on the objectionable system of folio-payment were noticed in a parliamentary report (bearing date November 8, 1740), which was the most important result of an ineffectual attempt to reform the superior courts of law and to lessen the expenses of litigation.
More is known about the professional receipts of lawyers since the Revolution of 1688 than can be discovered concerning the incomes of their precursors in Westminster Hall. For six years, commencing with Michaelmas Term, 1719, Sir John Cheshire, King's Sergeant, made an average annual income of 3241_l._ Being then sixty-three years of age, he limited his practice to the Common Pleas, and during the next six years made in that one court 1320_l._ per annum. Mr. Foss, to whom the present writer is indebted for these particulars with regard to Sir John Cheshire's receipts, adds: "The fees of counsel's clerks form a great contrast with those that are now demanded, being only threepence on a fee of half-a-guinea, sixpence for a guinea, and one shilling for two guineas." Of course the increase of clerk's fees tells more in favor of the master than the servant. At the present time the clerk of a barrister in fairly lucrative practice costs his master nothing. Bountifully paid by his employer's clients, he receives no salary from the counsellor whom he serves; whereas, in old times, when his fees were fixed at the low rate just mentioned, the clerk could not live and maintain a family upon them, unless his master belonged to the most successful grade of his order.
Horace Walpole tells his readers that Charles Yorke "was reported to have received 100,000 guineas in fees;" but his fee-book shows that his professional rise was by no means so rapid as those who knew him in his sunniest days generally supposed. The story of his growing fortunes is indicated in the following statement of successive incomes:--1st year of practice at the bar, 121_l._ 2nd, 201_l._; 3rd and 4th, between 300_l._ and 400_l._ per annum; 5th, 700_l._; 6th, 800_l._; 7th, 1000_l._; 9th, 1600_l._; 10th, 2500_l._ Whilst Solicitor General he made 3400_l._ in 1757; and in the following year he earned 5000_l._ His receipts during the last year of his tenure of the Attorney Generalship amounted to 7322_l._ The reader should observe that as Attorney General he made but little more than Coke had realized in the same office,--a fact serving to show how much better paid were Crown lawyers in times when they held office like judges during the Sovereign's pleasure, than in these latter days when they retire from place together with their political parties.