SERJEANT, or SERGEANT. The word " serjeant " comes to us from " ser gent," into which the French had modi fied the Latin " serviens." The word serjeanty, in French " sergenterie," was formed from " sergent," but was always used with reference to a particular species of service.
In the creation of serjeants, some an tient practices are still retained in those cases where the writ of the serjeant elect issues in term-time; but by statute 6 Geo. IV. C. 95, barristers who receive writs issued in vacation commanding them to appear in the Court of Chancery, and to take upon themselves the estate and dignity of a serjeant-at-law, are, upon appearing before the lord chancellor and taking the oaths usually administered to persons called to that degree and office, declared to be serjeants-at-law sworn, without any further ceremony.
Serjeants at law, until 1846, were the only advocates recognized in the Common Pleas, in which court they retained the right of exclusive audience. This pri vilege extended to trials at bar, not to trials at nisi prius, either at the assizes or at the sittings in London.
The serjeants formerly occupied three inns, or collegiate buildings, for practice, and for occasional residence, situate in Chancery Lane, Fleet Street and Holborn.
They have now no other building than Serjeants' Inn, Chancery Lane, which has been lately rebuilt. Here all the common-law judges have chambers, in which they dispose in a summary way, and with closed doors,, of such matters as the legislature has expressly entrusted to a single judge, and of all business which is not thought of sufficient magnitude to be brought before more than one judge, or which is supposed to be of a nature too urgent to admit of postponement.
The inn contains, besides accommo dations for the judges, chambers for four teen serjeants, the junior serjeants, while waiting for a vacancy, being dispersed in the different inns of courts.
In Serjeants* Inn Hall the judges and serjeants, as members of the Society of Serjeants' Inn, dine together during term time. Out of term the hall is or was fre quently used as a place for holding the revenue sittings of the court of Exchequer.
A full account of the various kinds of serjeants and of the origin of their func tions is given in Manning's Serviens ad Legem.' [BARRISTER. ] See also SER. JEANT, in ' Penny Cyclopirdia: