The accolade is spoken by Dick the Butcher, a follower of anarchist Jack Cade, whom Shakespeare depicts as "the head of an army of rabble and a demagogue pandering to the ignorant," who sought to overthrow the government. Shakespeare's acknowledgment that the first thing any potential tyrant must do to eliminate freedom is to "kill all the lawyers" is, indeed, a classic and well-deserved compliment to our distinguished profession.

Today's Jack Cades can readily be found throughout the insurance industry and in manufacturing, pharmaceutical, and chemical companies. They want to dismantle the tort system. They want to disrupt the judiciary and abrogate the common law, to the detriment of the rights of individual citizens, consumers, and injured persons who deserve competent representation and adequate redress for harm done to them.

In the fiercely competitive charity world, the Slade Farm Donkey Sanctuary that inspires awe and envy in equal degrees. The 500 four-legged inhabitants of the Devon farm receive more than £14m a year in donations from the public - more than Age Concern, Mencap or the Samaritans. In an age when charities are having to cut jobs and struggle with multimillion-pound deficits, the Donkey Sanctuary is deluged with cash and bequests every day.

While even experienced ironers take about eight minutes to press a shirt, with the Dressman robot, built by the electronics giant Siemens, it takes seconds - as long as it takes to button up the shirt and smooth out any wrinkles.

The story goes that a warrior leader named Brutus, of royal Trojan lineage, set sail for Albion, as Britain was then called, with his men - known as Britons - after being shunned back home.

They reportedly founded a city on the Thames and called it Troia Newydd, or New Troy. The word London came much later, perhaps from Lud's Town.

Be sure it's clear to the person to whom you are talking that the conversation is finished. Then replace the receiver gently. A receiver banged down may seem like slamming the door in someone's face.