THE EXPENSE OF MAKING A BARON.
Those who accept dignities are usually expected to pay for them; but, perhaps, if a man has "greatness thrust upon him" in the form of a title, it would be rather hard to make him pay £420 for an "honour" of which he was not solicitous. Before a man can be "dubbed" a knight he must "dub up" some £200; but it seems to cost between £400 and £500 to make a baron. Last year Lord Fitzroy Somerset was changed into Lord Raglan—a conversion which, though it might have been managed as easily and as cheaply as the pantomime trick of So-and-So afterwards Harlequin, or Pantaloon, or Clown, has, it seems, added upwards of £400 to the annual item of civil contingencies. It is very "civil," no doubt, to make a commoner into a peer, but when the "contingency" arrives, we think the recipient of the honour ought to be civilly expected to pay for it. Perhaps, however, the better course would be to do it cheap, and we should hardly think the dignity of the peerage can be sustained by such charges as we find making up the sum total of the cost of a Barony.
The Clerk of the Hanaper, or Hamper, gets £24 13s. 4d.; but why the title of Baron should be hampered with such an expense it is difficult to guess, unless it is that the newly-made peer is expected to "wet" his dignity with a few dozen of something drinkable. Deputy Hamper—by virtue, possibly, of some bottled beer—gets a guinea; and the "porter to the Great Seal" has another guinea; but, whether the word "porter" applies to some officers, or to some beer for the Lord Chancellor's department, we have no means of knowing. The sealing of the patent is a costly affair, including "Sealer, £1 2s. 3d.; Deputy ditto, 10s. 6d.; Chaff Wax, £1 2s. 6d.; deputy ditto, 10s. 6d."; from which we can only infer that, while two officers are employed in the act of sealing, two other officers are standing by and "chaffing" the operation.
The "Royal Household" receives £104 6s. 10d. for a jollification, no doubt; though we suspect that this act of High Life Below Stairs in the Palace is entirely without the sanction of Royalty. Our old friend "Garter" comes in for £20, which is moderate, considering how invariably the recipients of dignities are tied by the leg by Garter's stringent requirements. The bill winds up with one guinea for the engrossing clerk, who engrosses very little of the profit but a great deal of the trouble, for he was obliged to engross the warrant and find the parchment.
It costs in all £420 to make a Peer; and if every Member of the Peerage is worth what he costs, it is easy to estimate the value of the Upper House of Parliament. Our own opinion is, that the Lords would be quite as precious without the preliminary outlay incurred in their manufacture; but if something is to be paid on the occasion, we think the money might be better employed than by inciting it in chaff, or any other kind of wax, and liquidating it in "porter," or Hampers of any description whatever.
A Tap on a Tub.
The Morning Advertiser, speaking of Louis Napoleon's new tariff reforms, says that he has effected them, "deaf to the howlings of the iron-masters and the scowlings of the coal-owners". One would not deprive the Emperor of one iota of his merit, but we have a "random recollection" that a "scowl" is a thing to see, rather than to hear. We do think that our friends the Licensed Victuallers are entitled to demand better grammar for their money. Our Jeames would not have so written.