In accordance with the old custom at learned universities, Lord Monboddo was determined to address the Oxonians in Latin, which he spoke with much readiness.

But they could not stand the numerous slips in prosody.

Lord Monboddo shocked the ears of the men of Eton and of Winchester by dreadful false quantities--verse-making being, in Scotland, then quite neglected, and a matter little thought of by the learned judge.
Lord Monboddo was considered an able lawyer, and on many occasions exhibited a very clear and correct judicial discernment of intricate cases.

It was one of his peculiarities that he never sat on the bench with his brother judges, but always at the clerk's table.

Different reasons for this practice have been given, but the simple fact seems to have been, that he was deaf, and heard better at the lower seat.