Lady Magistrate

Lady Berkley was made by Queen Mary a justice of the peace for Gloucestershire and appointed to the quorum of Suffolk. Lady Berkley sat on the bench at assizes and sessions, girt with a sword. Tony Lumpkin says of Mr. Hardcastle—

“Heʹll persuade you that his mother was an alderman and his aunt a justice of the peace.”—Goldsmith: She Stoops to Conquer.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.