CHARLES DICKENS AS A LEGAL HISTORIAN By William S. Holdsworth. First published, September, 1928. Contents include: I. The Courts and the Dwellings of the Lawyers. II The Lawyers, Lawyers' Clerks, and Other Satellites of the Law 43. III. Bleak House and the Procedure of the Court of Chancery 79. IV. Pickwick and the Procedure of the Common Law 117. Index 151. Dickens as a Legal Historian I. The Courts and the Dwellings of the Lawyers. MANY of Charles Dickens's novels touch upon the law and lawyers, in some of them the law and lawyers play a considerable part, and in one of them, Bleak House, the legal atmosphere is all pervading. Dickens was born in 1812; and the dates of these novels range from 1835 to 1870; so that the law and the lawyers, which Dickens had observed and described, were the law and the lawyers of the first two-thirds of the nineteenth century. That is now a period which has passed into history, and is beginning to attract the atten tion of historians, legal and otherwise. In these lectures I intend to show you that the treatment by Dickens of various aspects of the law and the lawyers of his day, is a yery valuable addition to our authorities, not only for that period, but also for earlier periods in our legal history. The time at which the scene of many of Dickens's novels is laid dates, in many cases, be i Dickens as a Legal Historian fore the era of reformjiad, begun; and, when he began to write, it had only just begun. Pickwick set out on his travels in 1827, and the book was written in 1836. At the time when Dickens wrote his later works the Legislature had begun, tenta tively and cautiously, to make those reforms in the machinery of the law, and in the law itself, which were long overdue. But much still remained to be done. Bleak House was written in 1852-1853; and, though some of the abuses there de scribed had been remedied, there was still much which needed reform. Hence in Dickens's descrip tions of the courts, the lawyers, and the law of his day, we get an account of those many archaic sur vivals, which help us to understand earlier periods in the history of our law; we get an account of the way in which the curious mixture of ancient and modern rules, which made up the law of that time, were then worked and applied; and we get an ac count of the results which they produced. It is obvious that a series of pictures of this age of transition, painted by an exceptionally gifted ob server, is of unique value to the legal historian. There are two main reasons why Dickens's pic tures of the courts, the lawyers, and the law of his day have this unique value. In the first place, they

Holdsworth proves that historians should study the novels of Charles Dickens as source material about the workings of English law and legal institutions. He shows how Bleak House highlights the procedures of the Court of Chancery, and Pickwick Papers illuminates the procedure of the common law. The addresses contained in this book were delivered in the William L. Storrs Lecture Series, 1927, before the Law School of Yale University. "The distinguished English historian, Professor Holdsworth, has contrived even during his moments of recreation to render us his debtors. No two books outside the bounds of technical law are more worth reading for law students than Pickwick Papers and Bleak House. Even a trained trial lawyer however, is puzzled by some of the legal points brought up by Dickens, because they have fortunately passed forever out of the realm of living law. Professor Holdsworth has performed a valuable service to lawyers and laymen alike in explaining these obscurities. And he has done much more than this. He has increased our admiration for the genius of Dickens by proving his great merit as a legal historian." Zechariah Chafee, Jr. Harvard Law Review 42:286-8. Distinguished Vinerian Professor of English Law at Oxford University, Sir William Searle Holdsworth (1871-1944) is widely known for his seminal 17-volume History of English Law as well as others including The Historians of Anglo-American Law, An Historical Introduction to the Land Law, and The Law of Succession. CONTENTS: I. The Courts and the Dwellings of the Lawyers II. The Lawyers, Lawyers' Clerks, and Other Satellites of the Law III. Bleak House and the Procedure of the Court of Chancery IV. Pickwick and the Procedure of the Common Law Index

Text extracted from opening pages of book: CHARLES DICKENS AS A LEGAL HISTORIAN PUBLISHED ON THE FUND ESTABLISHED IN MEMORY OF GANSON GOODYEAR DEPEW The Storrs Lectures The addresses contained in this book were de livered in the William L. Storrs Lecture Series, 1927, before the Law School of Yale University. Other titles in this series, published by the Yale University Press, are: The Reform of Legal Procedure, by Moorfield Storey. The Judiciary and the People, by Frederick N. Judson. Concerning Justice, by Lucilius A. Emery. Woman's Suffrage by Constitutional Amendment, by Henry St. George Tucker. The Nature of the Judicial Process, by Benjamin N. Cardozo. An Introduction to the Philosophy of Law, by Roscoe Pound. LONDON Humphrey Milford: Oxford University Press CHARLES DICKENS AS A LEGAL HISTORIAN By William S. Holdsworth K. C., D. CJL~ Hon. LLD. Vinerian Professor of Law at Oxford University Bencher of Lincoln's Inn' NEW HAVEN Yak University Press 1929' C'opyrtgkV, 1928, by Yale University Press Printed in the United States of America First published, September, 1928 Second printing, January, 1929 I wish to thank my wife and Professor Smalley-Baker, Barber Professor of Law in the University of Birmingham, for seeing these Lectures through the press during my absence in India. W. S. E. Oxford April 1928 Contents I. The Courts and the Dwellings of the Lawyers i II The Lawyers, Lawyers' Clerks, and Other Satellites of the Law 43 III. Bleak House and the Procedure of the Court of Chancery 79 IV. Pickwick and the Procedure of the Common Law 117 Index 151 Dickens as a