OLD WAYS AT WESTMINSTER.
RECALLED BY SIR HENRY LUCY.
To the July number of Cornhill I last year contributed an article gleaned from the Recollections of an anonymous observer of the House of Commons from the year 1830 to the close of the session of 1835. It contained a series of thumb-nail personal sketches of eminent members long since gone to ‘another place,’ leaving names that will live in English history. A portion of the musty volume was devoted to descriptions of Parliamentary surroundings and procedure interesting by comparison with those established at the present day.
‘Q,’ as for brevity I name the unknown recorder, describes the old House of Commons destroyed by fire in 1834 as dark, gloomy and badly ventilated, so small that not more than 400 out of the 658 members could be accommodated with any measure of comfort. In those days an important debate was not unfrequently preceded by ‘a call of the House,’ which brought together a full muster. On such occasions members were, ‘Q’ says, ‘literally crammed together,’ the heat of the House recalling accounts of the then recent tragedy of the Black Hole of Calcutta. Immediately over the entrance provided for members was the Strangers’ Gallery; underneath it were several rows of seats for friends of members. This arrangement exists in the new House. Admission to the Strangers’ Gallery was obtained on presentation of a note or order from a member. Failing that, the payment of half a crown to the doorkeeper at once procured admittance.
When the General Election of 1880 brought the Liberals into power, parties in the House of Commons, in obedience to immemorial custom, crossed over, changing sides. The Irish members, habitually associated with British Liberals, having when in Opposition shared with them the benches to the left of the Speaker, on this occasion declined to change their quarters, a decision ever since observed. They were, they said, free from allegiance to either political party and would remain uninfluenced by their movements. This was noted at the time as a new departure. Actually they were following a precedent established half a century earlier.
In the closing sessions of the unreformed Parliament, a group of extreme Radicals, including Hume, Cobbett and Roebuck, remained seated on the Opposition Benches whichever party was in power. Prominent amongst them was Hume, above all others most constant in attendance. He did not quit his post even during the dinner hour. He filled his pockets with fruit—pears by preference—and at approach of eight o’clock publicly ate them.
In the old House of Commons a bench at the back of the Strangers’ Gallery was by special favour appropriated to the reporters. The papers represented paid the doorkeepers a fee of three guineas a session. As they numbered something over threescore this was a source of snug revenue in supplement to the strangers’ tributary half-crown. Ladies were not admitted to the Strangers’ Gallery. The only place whence they could partly see, and imperfectly hear, what was going on was by looking down through a large hole in the ceiling immediately above the principal candle-stocked chandelier. This aperture was the principal means of ventilating the House, and the ladies circled round it regardless of the egress of vitiated air. Mr. Gladstone, who sat in the old House as member for Newark, once told me that during progress with an important debate he saw a fan fluttering down from the ceiling. It had dropped from the hand of one of the ladies, who suddenly found herself in a semi-asphyxiated condition. Something more than half a century later Mr. Gladstone was unconsciously the object of attention from another group of ladies indomitable in desire to hear an historic speech. On the night of the introduction of the first Home Rule Bill there was overflowing demand for seats in the Ladies’ Gallery. When accommodation was exhausted, the wife of the First Commissioner of Works happily remembered that the floor of the House is constructed of open iron network, over which a twine matting is laid. These cover the elaborate machinery by which fresh air is constantly let into the Chamber, escaping by apertures near the ceiling. Standing or walking along the Iron Gallery that spans the vault, it is quite easy to hear what is going on in the House. Here, on the invitation of the First Commissioner’s wife, were seated a company of ladies who, unseen, their presence unsuspected, heard every word of the Premier’s epoch-making speech.
‘Q’ incidentally records details of procedure in marked contrast with that of to-day. In these times, on the assembling of a newly elected Parliament, the Oath is administered by the Clerk to members standing in batches at small tables on the floor of the House. In the old Parliament, members were sworn in by the Lord Steward of His Majesty’s Household. At the same period a new Speaker being duly elected or re-elected was led by the Mover and Seconder from his seat to the Bar, whence he was escorted to the Chair. To-day he is conducted direct to the Chair. When divisions were taken in Committee of the whole House, members did not, as at present, go forth into separate lobbies. The ‘ayes’ ranged themselves to the right of the Speaker’s Chair, the ‘noes’ to the left, and were counted accordingly. The practice varied when the House was fully constituted, the Speaker in the Chair and the Mace on the Table. In such circumstances one only of the contending parties, the ‘ayes’ or the ‘noes’ according to the nature of the business in question, quitted the Chamber. The tellers first counted those remaining in the House, and then, standing in the passage between the Bar and the door, counted the others as they re-entered. The result of the division was announced in the formula: ‘The ayes that went out are’ so many. ‘The noes who remained are’ so many, or otherwise according to the disposition of the opposing forces. A quorum then as now was forty, but when the House was in Committee the presence of eight members sufficed. ‘Q’ makes no reference to the use of a bell announcing divisions. But he mentions occasions on which the Mace was sent to Westminster Hall, the Court of Request, or to the several Committee Rooms to summon members to attend.
At the period of Parliamentary history of which ‘Q’ is the lively chronicler, the ceremony of choosing a Speaker and obtaining Royal Assent to the choice was identical with that first used on the occasion of Sir Job Charlton’s election to the Chair in the time of Charles II. The title of Speaker was bestowed because he alone had the right to speak to or address the King in the name and on behalf of the House of Commons. Of this privilege he customarily availed himself at considerable length. On being summoned to the presence of the Sovereign in the House of Lords he, in servile terms, begged to be excused from undertaking the duties of Speaker, ‘which,’ he protested, ‘require greater abilities than I can pretend to own.’ The Lord Chancellor, by direction of the Sovereign, assured the modest man that ‘having very attentively heard your discreet and handsome discourse,’ the King would not consent to refusal of the Chair. Thereupon the Speaker-designate launched forth into a fresh, even more ornate, address, claiming ‘renewal of the ancient privileges of Your most loyal and dutiful House of Commons.’ Whereto His Majesty, speaking again by the mouth of the Lord Chancellor, remarked, not without a sense of humour, that ‘he hath heard and well weighed your short and eloquent oration and in the first place much approves that you have introduced a shorter way of speaking on these occasions.’