Even as the sun has set on the British Empire one legacy that has waxed stronger in the former colonies is the English language. Aided and abetted by the growth of popular music and Premiership football, it continues to pull the people of the former empire, their children and their children’s children, towards the British Isles in pursuit of the model life that empire had sown in their minds. The ultimate life model is that of the men and women in the white wigs and black robes doing battle in the courtrooms to distinguish the lawful from the lawless.

This is an autobiographical account of a journey that began immediately post-Empire, from the rainforests of West Africa to the English Bar; a voyage of discovery from one world to a complete other in the mode of the adventures of Livingstone, but only in reverse.