On 9 January 1827 a special sub-commission of the Royal Commission for Visiting the Universities and Colleges in Scotland questioned the current Regius Professor of Civil Law at Glasgow University, Robert Davidson. Davidson described his professorship as being in Civil or Roman law, adding that he lectured on Scots law in a course lasting one year. He revealed, however, that the course on Roman law was not always taught, because often fewer than five students appeared to take it, and he was no longer willing to lecture to such a small number. He had not taught it now for four or five years. When the commissioners asked him if, before that, it had been regularly taught, Davidson replied: “Mr. Millar, my predecessor, was a man of great eminence; he was quite a speculative man; I consider myself rather a practical man. This was a very famous school of Roman Law in Mr. Millar's time.”

Davidson explained that the bulk of his pupils were writers’ clerks and apprentices in Glasgow, who afterwards regularly went to writers’ offices in Edinburgh and often took a course of lectures from the Edinburgh Professor of Scots Law before returning to practice in Glasgow. Very few joined the Faculty of Advocates. Statistics provided to the commissioners also showed that enrolments in law were relatively low. Davidson only attracted students to his lectures in Scots law, which the Faculty of Procurators in Glasgow, the local society of lawyers, required future members to attend (Evidence (n 1) vol ii, 145–146). Almost all of his students were from Glasgow and its immediate neighbourhood (University Register of Law Students 1818– 1843, GUA 26,798).

The location of the University of Glasgow is one possible reason for Davidson's failure to attract students. “Glasgow lies under many obvious disadvantages, as a school of law”, wrote John Craig in 1806. Proximity to the courts was recognised as a major asset in attracting students and eminent professors to the University of Edinburgh. Nor was Davidson alone among Glasgow professors of law in having difficulty attracting significant numbers of students. John Craig reported that law students “seldom exceeded four or five, and sometimes fell short even of that number” before the appointment of John Millar in 1761, although this has proved impossible to verify (Craig (n 2) xi).