"Lawyers, I suppose, were children once," Charles Lamb mused. But as a child, Pat O'Connor's choice of becoming a solicitor came second to his desire to be an airline pilot, a career for which he still has "a hankering".

With a family practice stretching back to the beginning of the century, the profession was bound to be on his mind. "Because of my family background I kind of drifted into law because it was the thing to do. Without being over encouraging, my father did not do anything to discourage me."

He followed in the footsteps of his father and grandfather in taking over the practice in Swinford, Co Mayo.

Mr O'Connor blames the media for the reputation of the lawyer. "The perception has been that we are, somehow or other, avaricious and well-heeled and really play on the misery of others. But when anyone is in trouble, where do they go to? They go to a lawyer."

He is also following his father by being elected president of the Law Society and is now an official spokesman for solicitors, of whom there are more than ever. By the end of the year, there will be a record 7,000 solicitors on the roll, he says, compared to 1,400 in 1974. The irony is that there is still a shortage.

"Business is booming and in every business transaction, there are lawyers involved.

"At the same time businesses themselves are taking on, in-house, a larger number of legal advisers and particularly solicitors, who are well trained for in-house advice."

This is a turnaround on the position a few years ago when the Law Society had a careers guidance officer advising law students not to go into the profession.

It is a result of the economic boom and the explosion in business transactions. The society is wearing the cap well. It has a sumptuous 17th century headquarters at Blackhall Place in Dublin, formerly the Kings Hospital School and bought for £110,000 (€139,670) in 1968. "That wouldn't buy the front gate now," Mr O'Connor says. The building, however, brings its own problems and about £250,000 is being spent countering dry rot. Otherwise, the wall spaces and high ceilings provide the right ambience for the Irish art collection the society is building up.

Mr O'Connor has made his own particular contribution, introducing house plants to improve the office environment and hoping he has introduced a feeling of team spirit. His office looks out over Smithfield, itself an area marked for development, while on an adjacent site, a £5.2 million education centre is being built to cater for future students of the profession. The modern design has attracted criticism but he argues that it is a fresh contribution to the city's architectural heritage.

"With about 600 apprentices now, Blackhall Place is not big enough. That education centre will hopefully be ready for occupation for August of next year."

During his term as president, he tries to spend two working days a week in Mayo and the remainder of the time in Dublin. He says he can do a week's work in three days by this method. "I enjoy it. I really do not find it hard going. I would say I am a fairly organised individual and I enjoy my business and lifestyle." Although the roads have improved, it takes him three hours to travel to the capital now. "Five years ago it was two-and-a-half hours," he says.

Mr O'Connor boarded at Glenstal Abbey in Co Limerick and went on to UCD to study law before taking the Law Society exams and entering his father's practice in 1977. He affirms his preference for living in the west but fears that the social changes in Co Mayo, with rural post offices closing, and the hinterland's population in decline will be irreversible. "There is a huge wealth of community in rural Ireland that is being lost because of the draw of urban centres.

"One of the problems that exists in the country is the lack of Government planning towards encouraging people to live there and perhaps commuting to Dublin or other centres of work," he says.

He welcomes the change in IDA policy which focused in the past on job creation in urban centres, saying that it now has a critical mass of industrialisation which will allow for indigenous growth. Swinford has grown to a population of about 2,000 while the surrounding countryside has become depleted. "At the time of the Famine, in the 1840s, there were over half a million people in the county. There are now about 115,000, a five-fold decrease."

He is defensive of Knock Airport, which is seven miles from Swinford. He describes it as one of the most successful regional airports, saying he can do a half day's work and be in London by 4.30 p.m. What of the widespread belief that it is an economic white elephant? "I think it is a nonsense. That is a little bit of begrudgery and a lack of understanding of the confidence that infrastructure like that can bring to an area."

He is interested in local history and has published books on the O'Connors, one on the clan, The Royal O'Connors of Connaught and the other on his immediate family. His grandfather paid five guineas to become an apprentice solicitor 100 years ago and his father qualified in 1937, establishing the first two-man practice in Mayo. Now, excluding Mr O'Connor, it has six solicitors, and 14 other staff.

The first of his three books was a handbook on coroners. He, like his father and grandfather, is the coroner for east Mayo, conducting inquests into violent or accidental deaths, a task which is made cumbersome he believes by the need to call juries. He believes the rising number of suicides, especially among men in their 20s, is due to increased stress. "The big question is how can you reduce the stress and reduce that pressure?" he says.

Technological change has had a significant effect on the legal profession. Mr O'Connor is the first president of the society with a personal computer and e-mail access to his business and the society recently launched its website.

"The plan is that in two years time, the majority of solicitors will be linked in to the Law Society's technology. Hopefully it will cut down on time and paper."

He is conscious that computer strength is doubling every year or two years, affecting the whole body of law and, in particular, intellectual property rights, confidentiality issues, patents and copyright. "That is a legal challenge. The laws have been slow because of the nature of making law," he says.