86 court of appeals of maryland

information of their manners and customs. It
was, of course, a court of a very different time. As
all five of the judges of 1778 lived on the water's
edge they probably all traveled by sail boat to and
from their sessions; the flapping of canvas was one
of their familiar sounds, and the world stood still
a good deal for their contemplation. Judge Jones
has left, in a letter,³⁷ a description of a night-time
wreck of his boat apparently somewhere about
Sandy Point, below the mouth of the Magothy
River, as he was going to court at Annapolis from
his home north of the Patapsco River. He seems
to have written while still unnerved by his ex-
perience. It would be interesting to know how,
if at all, these judges specially arrayed themselves
for the court sessions, but this is not known. It
was a time when distinctive dress of office was still
regarded as necessary, and it is reported by one
authority³⁸ that for many years, after the Revolu-
tion all the judges of the state sat in gowns, but
without wigs; but this must be inexact in part, at
least, for Taney noted in the autobiographical por-
tion of his memoirs that the judges of the General
Court sat in scarlet coats,³⁹ and there is a tradition
of an official coat of the Chancellor. The justices
of the Supreme Court of the United States at the
same time appear to have adopted gowns of black
and red.⁴⁰ But what official attire the judges of
the Court of Appeals of Maryland wore has prob-
ably passed forever into the great limbo of unre-

37. Md. Hist. Mag. II, 257.

38. Scharf, History of Baltimore City and County, 708, and History
Western Maryland, I, 382.

39. Tyler, Memoir of Roger B. Taney, 64.

40. Warren, The Supreme Court in United States History, I, 48.