Parliament until the occurrence of another vacancy. It was naturally provided by the Irish Church Act of 1869 that, upon the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, her bishops should cease to have seats in the House of Lords.

Life Peerages.-Before the meeting of Parliament in 1855, the Crown, on the advice of the ministry, issued letters patent to Sir James Parke, who had been a baron of the Court of Exchequer, giving him a peerage for life with the title of Baron Wensleydale. When Parliament met, the House of Lords referred this patent to a committee of privileges, which, while they did not question the power of the Crown to confer such a peerage on its subjects and thereby give them rank and precedence, reported that the life-peerage could neither of itself, nor with the addition of the writ of summons founded upon it, entitle the grantee to sit and vote in Parliament. House agreed to the report, and the Crown, in deference to its decision, issued a new patent conferring on Lord Wensleydale an hereditary peerage. Shortly afterwards a bill was brought in to authorise the Crown to grant life-peerages to two judges of at least five years' standing, who should sit with the Lord Chancellor as judges of appeal and deputy speakers; but, after passing the House of Lords, it was lost in the Commons.

The

Proxies.-The practice of giving proxies having been found to diminish the personal attendance of peers in Parliament, was discontinued by a resolution of the House in 1868.

Number of Peers.-The total number of peers, lay and spiritual, having seats in the House at the close of 1872, was 481. The number of Scotch peers which, at the time of the Union, was 154, has now by extinction and absorption into the peerage of the United Kingdom,

dwindled down to one-half of that number; and as no new members of the order can be created, the whole body may possibly at some future period altogether disappear, being incorporated into the national nobility.

III. THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.

3. Early Composition.-The regular and unvarying attendance in Parliament of representatives from both counties and boroughs dates from 1295. In that year the number of knights who sat was 74, and the number of burgesses 200. The knights seem to have been originally chosen only by the military tenants in capite, but as their election took place in the county court, in which all freeholders had a voice, it probably soon fell into the hands of the whole body of freeholders. The deputies for a borough were probably elected originally by all the burgesses or resident householders, but when a poorer class of householders sprang up, unable to discharge the duties attaching to full citizenship, the franchise became limited in some towns to the inhabitants who paid taxes under the name of scot and lot, and in others to those who held houses or land in the town by burgage tenure.

From the fact that the rates of taxation for the counties and boroughs were in Edw. I's reign often different, it may be inferred that the knights and burgesses in many cases voted separately. But in Edw. 2's reign they were permanently united together in one House, although an instance occurs so late as 6 Edw. 3 of the knights taxing themselves at a less rate than the burgesses.

In the reign of Edw. 3 and the three following reigns, about 180 burgesses and 74 knights sat in the Lower House. In 46 Edw. 3 complaints were made of the number of lawyers returned as knights for counties, and an ordinance

was passed rendering them ineligible as such. This ordinance, after having been long disregarded, was formally repealed in 1871.

Imperfect Representation.-The representation in the Lower House was in early times exceedingly imperfect. Not only was the attendance of the elected members very defective, but in the holding of the elections themselves great irregularity prevailed. The Crown exercised the right of from time to time summoning deputies from new boroughs, and omitting other boroughs which had been previously represented. Moreover, the obligation to pay a salary to their representatives, which amounted to 4s. per diem for a knight and 2s. for a burgess, caused considerable gaps in the representation; for the sheriffs were prevailed upon by some boroughs to pass them over on account of their poverty, while others on the same ground obtained express dispensation from sending deputies. Others again, when the writ for the election was issued to them, refused to comply with it. Sometimes, too, the sheriffs fraudulently omitted to return deputies for boroughs within their bailiwick. And in both counties and boroughs they frequently, at the instance of the Crown, or for their own private interests, exercised undue influence over the elections. In general, the king and his privy council had at this time exclusive jurisdiction over disputed elections. But in the reigns of Hen. 4 and Hen. 6 statutes were passed punishing sheriffs for making false returns. And st. 7 Hen. 4, c. 15, alluding to the malpractice, enacts that the elections of knights shall be made in the full County Court by all there present freely and indifferently, notwithstanding any request or commandment to the contrary. This Act probably did not create any new privilege, but merely declared the existing right of all the freeholders to take part in the election.

In 1429, however, it was found necessary to curtail this right, owing to the riots that took place at the elections; and the possession of a freehold of at least 40s. clear annual value was thenceforth fixed as a qualification for a county vote. St. 8 Hen. 6, c. 7, by which this was effected, also repeated, as to knights of the shire, the qualification of residence which had been required by an Act of 1 Hen. 5, for the eligibility of representatives of both counties and towns. The election of deputies for cities and boroughs gradually fell into the hands of the corporations. At first they obtained the concurrence of the whole community in the choice, but ultimately they acquired exclusive control over it.

4. Members.-The first instance of an heir to the peerage sitting in the Lower House was in 1549, when, upon the Earl of Bedford succeeding to the peerage, it was ordered that his son, who was then a member, should continue in the House. The second occurred in 1575, in favour of the son of the individual in whose case the point had been first decided. Since that time it has become a usual practice.

The payment of members by their constituencies, and the necessity of their being resident in the counties or towns which they represented, fell into disuse about the time of Elizabeth; and it was in her reign that the first instance occurred of punishment for bribery. About the same time the House successfully asserted its right to determine all cases of contested elections. It is true that in the following reign the royal proclamation for the meeting of Parliament in 1604 arrogated a control over the elections; but the case of Fortescue and Goodwin's election in that year was the last attempt to dispute the exclusive jurisdiction of the House in the matter. The

ENG. INST.

L

right of the House to expel one of its members, which was asserted in the case of Arthur Hall in 1581 (see p. 146), was frequently exercised by the Long Parlia

ment.

New Boroughs.-The control exercised by the Crown over the constitution of the Lower House by the arbitrary creation of new parliamentary boroughs was continued by the successors of Henry VIII. Under Edward VI. the privilege of returning members was granted to fourteen additional towns, and restored to ten who had lost it by disuse. Mary added twenty-one, Elizabeth sixty-two, and James I. twenty-seven new members to the Lower House. Many of the so-called decayed boroughs, the scandal of which was one of the causes of the Reform Act of 1832, were thus created, when their condition was no better than it was three centuries later. Some of them received the franchise at the same time as their charters of incorporation, in the hope, which proved illusory, that prosperity would follow. To others it was granted merely on account of their being part of the ancient demesne of the Crown, or subject to its influence. The practice was especially carried out in Cornwall, where the Stannary Court was a ready engine of royal coercion. Thus, between the accession of Edward VI. and the death of Elizabeth the number of Cornish boroughs returning members was increased from five to twenty-one. In 1563 eight new boroughs at once were created by charter, a measure which was acquiesced in by the House of Commons, though not without question. In the reign of Ja. 1 the Commons resolved that every town which had at any time returned members to Parliament was entitled to a writ as a matter of course. And in accordance with this resolution, the privilege was, upon their petition, restored to fifteen boroughs during that and the following reign.