persons who go to law.”  These regulations of Charles also limited the time in which officers of justice were to get through their business under a certain penalty; they also proclaimed that the King should no longer hear minor causes, and that, whatever might be the rules of the court, they forbad the presidents from deferring their judgment or from retarding the regular course of justice.  Charles VI., before he became insane, contributed no less than his father to the establishment on a better footing of the supreme court of the kingdom, as well as that of the Chatelet and the bailiwicks.

[Illustration:  Fig. 307.—­Bailiwick.—­Fac-simile of a Woodcut in the “Cosmographie Universelle” of Munster:  in folio, Basle, 1552.]

In the fifteenth century, the Parliament of Paris was so organized as not to require material change till 1789.  There were noble, clerical, and lay councillors, honorary members, and maitres de requete, only four of whom sat; a first president, who was supreme head of the Parliament, a master of the great chamber of pleas, and three presidents of the chamber, all of whom were nominated for life.  There were fifteen masters (maistres) or clerical councillors, and fifteen who were laymen, and these were annually approved by the King on the opening of the session.  An attorney-general, several advocates-general, and deputies, who formed a committee or college, constituted the active part of this court, round which were grouped consulting advocates (consiliarii), pleading advocates (proponentes), advocates who were mere listeners (audientes), ushers and serjeants, whose chief, on his appointment, became a member of the nobility.

The official costume of the first president resembled that of the ancient barons and knights.  He wore a scarlet gown lined with ermine, and a black silk cap ornamented with tassels.  In winter he wore a scarlet mantle lined with ermine over his gown, on which his crest was worked on a shield.  This mantle was fastened to the left shoulder by three gold cords, in order to leave the sword-side free, because the ancient knights and barons always sat in court wearing their swords.  Amongst the archives of the mayoralty of London, we find in the “account of the entry of Henry V., King of England, into Paris” (on the 1st of December, 1420), that “the first president was in royal dress (estoit en habit roial), the first usher preceding him, and wearing a fur cap; the church dignitaries wore blue robes and hoods, and all the others in the procession scarlet robes and hoods.”  This imposing dress, in perfect harmony with the dignity of the office of those who wore them, degenerated towards the fifteenth century.  So much was this the case, that an order of Francis I. forbad the judges from wearing pink “slashed hose” or other “rakish garments.”