ting in their judicial capacity, they were exposed to a species of direct influence not less dangerous than that of the Crown. In the debate of October 20, 1675, Lord Shaftesbury said :

'Pray, my Lords, forgive me if on this occasion I put you in mind of committee dinners, and the scandal of it-those ladies that attended all causes. It was come to that pass that men even hired or borrowed of their friends handsome sisters or daughters to deliver their petitions. But for all this, I must say that your judgments have been sacred, unless in one or two causes, and those we owe most to that bench (the episcopal) from whom we now apprehend the most danger.'

We learn from the Parliamentary Debates' that on Friday, January 12, 1711, 'the House of Lords having adjourned, to give time for the presentation of an address, resumed as soon as the Queen (who designed to hear the debate incognito) was come to the House.' Meagre as is the report of the ensuing debate, it was obviously a spirited and highly interesting one, in which Lord Somers, Lord Cowper, Lord Halifax, Lord Nottingham, the Duke of Argyll, the Duke of Leeds, Lord Godolphin, the Duke of Marlborough, and Lord Peterborough took part. Much of it turned on the distinction between Ministry' and Cabinet Council,' terms then confessedly ambiguous. The Duke of Argyll said: He thought all Ministers were of the Cabinet Council, but that all the Cabinet Council were not Ministers.' Lord Peterborough argued that the word "Cabinet Council" was indeed too copious, for they disposed of all: they fingered the money: they meddled with the war: they meddled with things they did not understand: so that sometimes there was no "Minister" in the Cabinet Council.'

'Few things in our history,' says Macaulay, are more curious than the origin and growth of the power now possessed by the Cabinet. During many years

old-fashioned politicians continued to regard the Cabinet as an unconstitutional and dangerous Board. Nevertheless, it constantly became more and more important. It at length drew to itself the chief executive power, and has now been regarded during several generations as an essential part of our polity. Yet, strange to say, it still continues to be altogether unknown to the law!' 1 Stranger still, neither Macaulay nor any one else has been able to specify the period when the Cabinet was first nominated by the Prime Minister or constituted as now. William III. was his own prime minister. The sudden and critical appearance of the Dukes of Argyll and Somerset in Queen Anne's last Council, when they were thanked by the Lord Treasurer (Shrewsbury) for coming uninvited, is well known. They came as Privy Councillors. No Prime Minister was formally nominated at the accession of George I. A new Privy Council (consisting only of 33 members) was formed, of which Lord Nottingham was declared president; and the chief conduct of affairs was left to a cabinet council or junto, composed of the Duke of Marlborough, the Earls of Nottingham and Sunderland, the Lords Halifax, Townshend, and Somers, and General Stanhope. Walpole, who was to lead the House of Commons, and who gradually became the most influential member of the administration, was not even a member of this junto.

Smollett, in his opening chapter on the reign of George II., distinctly states that the supreme direction of affairs was not yet engrossed by a single Minister.' Lord Townshend had the principal control (subject to royal interference) of foreign affairs, whilst Walpole was paramount at home. It was by personal influence rather than by official right as Premier, that Walpole obtained the monopoly of power, which he consolidated by a well-organised system of corruption. Henry

1 'History,' c. ii.

Fox, the first Lord Holland (already a Privy Councillor) was made a member of the Cabinet in 1754, by the King, as a mark of private favour, on condition that he was not to interfere with, or derogate from, the priority of the Secretary of State in the House of Commons.'1

Although the first Pitt was the guiding spirit of the administration during one of the most glorious periods of our annals, the Duke of Newcastle was First Lord of the Treasury, with the uncontrolled distribution of the patronage. In 1765, however, Pitt, on being invited to form a Ministry, refused to undertake the duty without carte blanche, which was conceded to him in 1766; and this appears to be the first instance in which such a concession was enforced. But he proceeded to form a Government much as the Duke of Cumberland (who had just before formed the Rockingham Government) may have done. He named the constituent parts including the First Lord of the Treasury, and (having become Lord Chatham) reserved merely the Presidency of the Council for himself. Nor did he make any sustained attempt to guide the counsels of the Cabinet thus constructed, the heterogeneous composition of which has been rendered memorable by Burke.2 It is remarkable that the great commoner, in the height of his well-earned popularity, besides putting up with more than one personal slight, allowed a congenial colleague (Legge) to be ousted, and a most uncongenial one (Lord Bute)

1 The entire Correspondence is printed in 'Holland House;' by Princess Marie Lichtenstein, vol. i. pp. 47-49.

2 He made an administration so chequered and speckled he put together a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically dovetailed: a cabinet so variously inlaid: such a piece of diversified mosaic: such a tesselated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone and there a bit of white; patriots and courtiers: king's friends and republicans: whigs and tories: treacherous friends and open enemies: that it was indeed a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch, and unsure to stand upon.'-(Burke).

to be forced upon him; yet when he resigned (Oct. 1761) rather than be responsible for a policy which he was no longer allowed to guide, he is censured as guilty of an undue and extraordinary assumption of superiority.1

Till some years after the accession of George III. a member of the Government was frequently found voting against his chief. It was a surprise to Charles Fox when he was suddenly dismissed for an act of ministerial insubordination by Lord North; and Thurlow made no secret of his disappointment when he found that he, the Lord Chancellor, could not beard Pitt, the Premier, with impunity. Stick to Pitt,' was his advice to Scott (Lord Eldon). He has tripped up my heels; and I would have tripped up his if I could. I confess I did not think the King would have parted with me so easily.' This was in 1792. Ministerial discipline has been tolerably well observed since.

The conflicts between the two Houses, with their comparative weight and influence at different epochs, are replete with dramatic situations and details. Take, for example, the conflict in 1700, when the Commons brought in a Bill for annulling the royal grants of forfeited property, and sought to force it intact through the Lords by coupling it with a money Bill. The Lords passed amendments: the Commons rejected them: the Lords passed them a second time, and a second time received the Bill back again with a threatening intimation that it must pass. The House

1 'He (Pitt) and Lord Temple have declared against the whole Cabinet Council. Why, that they have done so before now, and yet have acted with them again, it is very true; but a little word has reached Mr. Pitt, which never entered into his former declaration; nay, nor into Cromwell's, nor Hugh Capet's, nor Julius Cæsar's; nor any reformer's of modern or ancient times. He has happened to say he will guide. Now, though this Cabinet Council are mighty willing to be guided when they cannot help it, yet they wish to have appearances saved: they cannot be fond of being told that they are to be guided, still less that other people should be told so.'-(Horace Walpole.)

of Commons (says Macaulay) broke up with gloomy looks and in great agitation. All London looked forward to the next day with painful forebodings. The general feeling was in favour of the Bill. It was rumoured that the majority which had determined to stand by the amendments, had been swollen by several prelates, by several of the illegitimate sons of Charles II., and by several needy and greedy courtiers. The cry in all the public places of resort was that the nation would be ruined by the three B.'s-Bishops, Bastards, and Beggars.'

In every conflict of this kind the final appeal must be to the people, and the boldest champions of the peerage felt that they had no alternative but to give way. It is worthy of remark that the hero of Blenheim then acted the part so frequently acted in our time by the hero of Waterloo. The Duke of Marlborough counselled concession as the least of two evils. Better pass a bad Bill than provoke another revolution or civil war. This is substantially the same argument by which the Duke of Wellington persuaded the Lords to pass the Reform Bill, the same by which he satisfied himself that he was bound to carry Catholic Emancipation and support the Bill for the abolition of the Corn Laws. According to Lord Russell, he told a Protectionist Peer, who expressed a bad opinion of it: 'Bad opinion of the Bill, my Lord! You can't have a worse opinion of it than I have, but it was recommended from the throne; it was passed by the Commons by a large majority, and we must all vote for it. The Queen's Government must be supported.'

Has not this (the great Duke's favourite) doctrine been carried much too far? The Queen's Government -meaning government as involving law and order— must be supported; but not any particular government or ministry, nor any particular policy in which their official existence may be wrapped up. Sound, well