THE HOUSE OF LORDS

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 130, 4 June 1934, Page 6

THE HOUSE OF LORDS

An American correspondent recently I described the House of Lords fur Uic benefit lof readers of a leading New York, journal, [in the Lords, lie writes, no gust of emotion, no sudden capriec of feeling, ruflles the calm of the stately Chamber. Peers who feel moved to address the House do so from a crimsontopped table in the centre of the floor, end if two are inspired at the same moment the peer who reaches the table first gets the floor. If tlicv arrive together the House indicates which it wants to hear, and thus, the writer adds, the House conducts its own affairs, "studiously ignoring the black-and-grcy image 011 the woolsack." Speeches, he says, sound like bumble bees droning in the warmth of summer sunshine. "The key varies as the peers vary, some of them being gigantic silverhaired ol<l boys who totter to the table 011 antiquated legs to drone with a thin and faraway quaver." Even with so much in the House of Lords unusual to an American, the. writer concludes with the statement that "the whole picture moves in stately rounded periods which accord with the superb scene that frames it."