192 court of appeals of maryland

and briefs, together with the opinions, furnish the
reporter with sufficient material, and he no longer
hears the oral arguments.

Perhaps a more pronounced change in the
period considered is that which has resulted from
the absorption of the interest and energies of the
bar in work outside of litigation. It is not clear
to us yet just how much change this has produced.
A large portion of the attorneys are now officers
of the courts only in legal theory or fiction. Liti-
gation is foreign to the work of many, and
for many others who do appear in court, it is an
interruption of regular labors. This is especially
true of lawyers from Baltimore City, from which
jurisdiction, as has been said, the larger part of
the business of the court comes. And it has had
its effect on the work of the judges. There are
still lawyers who present cases carefully prepared
and stated, with expert skill, not only older mem-
bers of the bar, but young ones as well, especially
a few recently graduated from high-grade law-
schools. It is hardly believable that there could
ever have been better and more helpful work at
the bar than these lawyers do. But a considerable
number who bring cases before the court seem
unable to spare time sufficient for full study and
preparation, and some, even able and otherwise ex-
perienced lawyers, display a lack of skill in the
work. The inevitable consequence has been a
shifting of some of the function of counsel to the
judges; instead of having all the material for de-
cision laid before them, the judges have now more
and more original exploration of facts and au-