call them Conservatives and Whigs; the wiser simply term them the men who are in office and the men who are not.  The Government for the time being sits on the right hand of the Lord Chancellor, who acts as Speaker, and who has a far easier berth of it than Mr. Denison.  The Lords are not long-winded, nor noisy; not passionate, and, like true Britons, always adjourn to dinner.  Hence no post-prandial scenes are visible.  In the small hours no patriots, smelling strongly of whisky-and-water and cigars, expatiate to a

wearied assembly on that ever fertile theme, the wrongs and woes of the Green Isle.  The Lords, like Mr. Wordsworth’s gods—

“Approve the depth but not the tumult of the soul.”

We can never fancy the House of Lords to be what you may sometimes take the House of Commons to be—a bear garden or a menagerie.  You miss the vulgarity of the one, and you also miss its excitement and earnestness—its cries of “question” and “divide” when some well-known bore is on his legs, and its long resounding cheers when some favourite partisan sits down.  All is staid, and correct, and proper, with the exception of a tirade from the Rupert of debate, or some father in God on the Episcopal Bench.  We would fain say a few words about these reverend gentlemen.  One could hardly expect to find the ministers of the self-denying and lowly Jesus of Nazareth sitting in a gorgeous house with the proudest and wealthiest of the English peers.  You would expect to find them rather by the bed-side of the sick, in the houses of the poor, combating with the vice and infidelity of the day; or else you would look for them in their studies, surrounded with stately

folios; or in the midst of their clergy, reviving the fainthearted, urging on the timid, counselling the young, and girding up the energies and hearts of all.  You would expect to find them in the House of the Lord rather than in the House of Lords.  In short, anywhere but in the turmoil of party conflict.  This, however, is not the case.  The bishops are almost the first object that attracts your eye.  They sit on benches by themselves, on the Government side, but beyond the ministerial bench.  In the “dim religious light” of the Upper House, you can scarcely make out what they are.  You see venerable wigs, and black robes, and lawn sleeves; and if you look sharp, you may, at times, catch the outline of a reverend face—most probably of Dr. Tait, the energetic bishop of London, or of the pug nose and plebeian profile of Samuel of Oxford.  They are very regular in their attendance, and frequently take part in the debate.  Indeed, the latter bishop is a great man in the Lords; and so was Henry of Exeter, but his voice is seldom heard, and his name never mentioned now, though he is generally present, and sits at the end of the benches nearest to the spectator, while the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is also pretty

regular in his attendance, occupies the other end of the bench.  The other bishops do not muster quite so strongly.  Half of them is a good attendance.  It is to be hoped they are more profitably employed.

Coming lower down, our eyes rest on the men who did carry on government, and generally occupy the unenviable situation of Ministers of the Crown.  At present they are out of office, and are seated on the Lord Chancellor’s left.  Generally, at the top of the bench, is seated a slight, undersized, juvenile, red-haired Scot—that is the Duke of Argyle, who, in virtue of being a Duke, and the husband of the daughter of the Duchess of Sutherland, was Lord Privy Seal.  His lordship is as pert and ready as any forward youth in a debating-club, and has much of the appearance and manner of such a one.  He gives you no great idea of hereditary statesmanship, the only quality conspicuous in him being a tolerable amount of modest assurance, perfectly natural to a peer who is an author and has lectured at mechanics’ institutions, and read papers before the British Association.  By him is seated Lord Panmure, very red in the face, which redness seems to arise from a military stock which

he persists in wearing.  There sits the Marquis of Clanricarde, who has suffered much from public opinion, and who deserves to suffer, if only his conduct in certain electioneering matters be taken into account.  The Earl of Granville is the leader of this small band; he is a pleasant looking man, and speaks not badly for a lord.  The Whig Nestor, the aged Marquis of Lansdowne, worthy of remembrance for his friendship for Tom Moore, is easily detected by his blue coat and brass buttons, that remnant of the palmy days of party.  None of these men are remarkable for oratorical power.  A strong contrast is presented by the illustrious personage sitting on the next row, higher up, just opposite the bishops—a severe, well-made, heavy, grey-haired man, who sits almost silent and sullen, as if he had no feelings, as if the debate was a sham, and he should be glad if it were over.  We refer to

“The travelled thane, Athenian Aberdeen,”

the best-abused man, at one time, in her gracious Majesty’s dominions, but without whom, nevertheless, it is questionable whether the Queen’s Government could be carried on.  Unfortunately, Lord Aberdeen is not the man for the public. 

The public likes to be gammoned, and his lordship cannot gammon.  He is spare in words, cold and unimpassioned in delivery, and somewhat too indifferent to party attacks.  On neighbouring benches are seated discontented Whigs, overlooked in the scramble for place, and who therefore view the proceedings of all governments with an impartial, but yet a jealous eye.  Prominent amongst such is the sandy-looking unamiable Earl Grey, who seems angry with himself and all the world, because he is lame, and has not the command of the colonies.  Below the table are half-a-dozen benches, on which congregate a few peers till dinner time.  Here sits Earl Fitzwilliam—here also sits one of the most frightful bores in the House, Lord Monteagle, who always speaks, and, for a lord, cruelly long.  That is the consequence of his having been in the Lower House.  Never stop to hear him.  As soon as you see his bald head, be off.  The Dukes sit here.  On the front bench on your right is the Duke of Cambridge.  On his left is seated the Duke of Newcastle, a promising orator when a member of the Lower House, and a follower of Sir Robert Peel.  Crossing to the government benches, the Earl of Derby fills the first place.  We need not

paint his portrait; the sharp aristocratic face—but feebly reflected in that promising young man, but unfortunate speaker, his son—is familiar to us all; there he is out of place.  He has no fitting opponents.  It was among the Commons that he won his laurels.  Yet, at times, the old afflatus fills him, and his clear voice and fluent declamation are as bitter and terrible as when night after night he wrestled, as if for very life, with the brawny champion of Catholic Emancipation, and the somewhat too selfish, unscrupulous exponent of Irish wrongs.  By his side is his trusty page, the inelegant and insipid Malmesbury, of whom, in a passing freak, the author of “Vivian Grey” not merely made a statesman, but actually Minister for Foreign Affairs.  On the bench behind the Premier sits that wonderful old man eloquent, whose shrill tones may occasionally be heard, and whose intellect seems as great