WIGS.

Otago Witness, Issue 641, 12 March 1864, Page 21

WIGS.

[From the Canterbury " Press."]

A correspondent wrote us a curious rhapsody yesterday on the subject of wigs. We conclude his brain was set on fire by the claim which it is understood is being made by gentlemen who are not members of the English bar tJ wear wigs in Court. The claim may be stated very briefly. The Law Practitioners' Act says that persons admitted as barristers of the Supreme Court shall have all the privileges of English barristers. " We," say the cololonial practitioners, " have been admitted not only as attorneys and solicitors, but as barristers, and have paid a fee for both admissions. In the Supreme Conrt of New Zealand we are, therefore, entitled; to all the privileges of English barristers." On the other hand it is said— "the wig is a part of the uniform granted by the Honorable Societies of Lincoln's Inn, the Middle and Inner Temple, and so on, to those who are admitted to graduate as barristers." This, we believe, 19 a mistake. The gown is the symbol of the degree granted by the Inns of Court, as well as by the Universities. The wig is merely a remnant of the custom of wearing wigs once indulged in by all gentlemen. There were bishops' wigs, clergymen's wigs, doctors' wigy, judges' wigs, lawyers 1 wigs, coachmen's wig*, and so on. All these have disappeared except the judges' and lawyers' wigs. We have seen some bishops in wigs, but believe the species is now extinct. "Besides" say the Peris — solicitors at the gate of the paradise of wigs — •" a wig in court is a property— not in a theatrical, but in a commercial sense. We can't help it if people are fools, but they are ; we know — heaven, witness ! — from personal experience, how little wisdom lies in a wig ; but the public do not think so. It is all very well to sneer from the top of stilts at ' winning blue-shirted reverence,' but we want to win blue-shirted fees ; and we know that many persons, blue-coated as well as blue-shirted, would rather be defended by a man in a wig than by a man in crinibus naturalibvs. A wig, therefore, is an estate, having commercial value worth so much a year." " And if it be,'' replies the haughty barrister, "we bought the estate ; our English education has cost us so much hard money, and we are entitled to the profits. If you like, you can go and dip seven times in the Jordan of English law, and your hair too will grow into that copious and luxurian grey which is the object of your envy in us.

As Sir Lucius OTrig-?er says, " 'Tis a very pretty quarrel as it stands." But common sense will decide that it is the duty of the Judges combined to determine what shall be the official attire of the gen tlcmen practising in the Supreme Court ; and it is hardly to be expected that any one Judge should allow a departure from the previous practice of the colony, without consulting his brother Judges, so that a common rule may obtain all over the colony. Most men would say that the attire of all sqould be uniform.