PRELIMINARY, INTERMEDIATE AND FINAL EXAMINATIONS FOR SOLICITORS. Mr. J. ERLE BENHAM Takes his Classes daily at his NEW Chambers, 3, PUMP COURT, TEMPLE, E.C. Preliminary Examination Journal AND STUDENT'S LITERARY MAGAZINE. CHAPTER I. SPECIAL EXAMINATION NOTICES. Preliminary Examination for Solicitors. PURSUANT to the Judges' orders, the next Preliminary Examination in General Knowledge will take place on Wednesday the 14th, and Thursday the 15th of July, 1875. In addition to the ordinary subjects (including an elementary knowledge of Latin), the Special Examiners have selected the following books in which candidates will be examined :: In LATIN: Sallust, Jugurtha, or Ovid, Fasti, Book I. In GREEK: Homer, Iliad, Book XII. In MODERN GREEK: Βεντοτῆς Ἱστορία τῆς ̓Αμερικῆς βιβλίον ζ. In FRENCH: Emile de Bonnechose, Bertrand du Guesclin, or E. A. Gask, Select Fables of La Fontaine. In GERMAN: Goethe, Egmont, or Schiller, Die Jungfrau von Orleans. In SPANISH: Cervantes, Don Quixote, cap. xv. to xxx. both inclusive, or Moratin, El Sí de las Niñas. In ITALIAN: Manzoni's I Promessi Sposi, cap. I. to vm. both inclusive, or Tasso's Gerusalemme, 4, 5 and 6 cantos, and Volpe's Eton Italian Grammar. Each candidate will be examined in one language only, according to his selection. Candidates will have the choice of either of the abovementioned works. Intermediate Examination, under 23 & 24 Vict. c. 127, s. 9. The works selected for the year 1875 are-CHITTY on Contracts, chapters 1, 2 and 3, with the exception, in chapter 3, of section 1, relating to Contracts respecting Real Property; 8th or 9th edition. WILLIAMS on the Principles of the Law of Real Property; 8th, 9th or 10th edition. HAYNES' Outlines of Equity; 3rd edition. Candidates will also be examined in Mercantile Bookkeeping generally. Final Examination for Solicitors. Candidates will be examined in-Common and Statute Law and Practice of the Courts; Conveyancing; Equity and Practice of the Courts. These are optional:-Bankruptcy and Practice of the Courts; Criminal Law; and Proceedings before Magistrates. Preliminary Examination for the Bar. The Preliminary Examinations for the Bar are held every Saturday during each legal term, and once in the week next preceding each legal The subjects of Examination are-(a) The English language; (b) The Latin language; and (c) English history. term. For further particulars as to all the above Examinations, Forms of Notices, &c., see No. XI. of this Magazine. CHAPTER II. ORIGIN OF THE MATERIALS OF WRITING. IT is curious to observe the various substitutes for paper before its discovery. Ere the invention of recording events by writing, trees were planted, rude altars were erected, or heaps of stone, to serve as memorials of past events. Hercules probably could not write when he fixed his famous pillars. The most ancient mode of writing was on bricks, tiles, and oyster-shells, and on tables of stone; afterwards on plates of various materials, on ivory, on barks of trees, on leaves of trees.* Engraving memorable events on hard substances was giving, as it were, speech to rocks and metals. In the book of Job mention is made of writing on stone, on rocks, and on sheets of lead. On tables of stone Moses received the law written by the finger of God. Hesiod's works were written on leaden tables: lead was used for writing, and rolled up like a cylinder, as Pliny states. Montfaucon notices a very ancient book of eight leaden leaves, which on the back had rings fastened by a small leaden rod to keep them together. They afterwards engraved on bronze: the laws of the Cretans were on bronze tables; the Romans etched their public records on brass. The speech of Claudius, engraved on plates of bronze, is yet preserved in the town-hall of Lyons, in France. Several bronze tables, with Etruscan characters, have been dug up in Tuscany. The treaties between the Romans, Spartans and the Jews were written on brass; and estates, for better security, were made over on this enduring metal. In many cabinets may be found the discharges of soldiers written on copperplates. This custom has been discovered in India. A bill of feoffment on copper has been dug up near Bengal, dated a century before the birth of Christ. Among these early inventions many were singularly rude and miserable substitutes for a better material. In the shepherd state they wrote their songs with thorns and awls on straps of leather, which they wound round their crooks. The Icelanders appear to have scratched their runes, a kind of hieroglyphics, on walls; and Olof, according to one of the sages, built a large house, on the bulks and spars of which he had engraved the history of his own and more ancient times; while another northern hero appears to have had nothing better than his own chair and bed to perpetuate his own heroic acts on. At the town hall, in Hanover, are kept twelve wooden boards, overlaid with bees'-wax, on which are written the names of owners of houses, but not the names of streets. These wooden Specimens of most of these modes of writing may be seen at the British Museum. No. 3478 in the Sloanian library, is a nabob's letter, on a piece of bark, about two yards long, and richly ornamented with gold. No. 3207 is a book of Mexican hieroglyphics, painted on bark. In the same collection are various species, many from the Malabar Coast and the East. The latter writings are chiefly on leaves. There are several copies of Bibles written on palm leaves. The ancients, doubtless, wrote on any leaves they found adapted for the purpose. Hence the leaf of a book, alluding to that of a tree, seems to be derived. At the British Museum we have also Babylonian tiles, or broken pots, which the people used and made their contracts of business on; a custom mentioned in the Scriptures. |