The Sun.
London, England, 1856-01-22 00:00:00

PEERAGE'S FOR LIFE.

Most of our readers have, no doubt, observed in the
Gazette the announcement that the Queen has been
pleased to raise the Right Hon. Sir James Parke to the
dignity of a baron of the United Kingdom, for the term
of his natural life, by the style of Baron Wensleydale.
The unusual wording of this patent, though it has as
yet attracted but little attention, betokens an important
novelty in the exercise of the Queen's prerogative. It
is, in fact, the creatiou of a peerage for life, without, as
hitherto, a remainder to the heirs male of the body.
The dignity will therefore become extinct on the death
of Lord Wensleydale, in the event of his leaving male
issue.

There can be no doubt that in thus limiting the
dignity her Majesty has only exercised her prero-
gative according to precedent, though we have to
look back many centuries for such a precedent. Lord
Coke says that the King may create a man or woman
►noble for life, but not for years, because it might go
to executors or administrators ; and he gives as an
instance that Richard 11. created Robert de Vere Mar-
quis of Dublin for life. Again, Henry IV. created
Thomas Beaufort, Earl of Dorset, Duke of Exeter with-
out any limitation, from which Degdale concludes that
he was only tenant for life of that dignity. Henry VI.
created Sir John Cornwall, who was married to one of
the Plantagenets, Baron Fannon fur life ; and in later
times James I. created Lady Margaret Compton, who
was mother of Buckingham, Countess of Buckingham
for her life. In more recent times there are several in-
stances of dignities granted to a person for life with a
remainder over ; the latest, we believe, is that of the
Marquis of Londonderry, who was created Earl Vane
for life, with remainder to the issue of his second wife.
Of the law on the subject, therefore, there can be no
doubt.
To a mar. of Lord Wensleydale's age, and without a
son to inherit the title, it can signify little whether the
peerage be granted to him i❑ the usual manner or not,
for the probabilities would be strongly in favour of its
being extinct in any case ; but, viewed as a precedent,
this creation may assume a far more important aspect,
and we therefore presume that it is not without mature
deliberation that her Majesty's Ministers have recom-
mended to her this exercise of her prerogative. In the
event of the precedent being followed up it is worth
while to consider what will be its effect on the august
body which it relates to.

The hereditary transmission of dignities has hitherto
been considered one of the dearest privileges of the
House of Peers, and will, doubtless, not be discontinued
in future creations without a remonstrance from that
body. It is at once coeval with and the excuse for pri-
mogeniture and all those family arrangements by which
the wealth of the family is centred in the eldest son.
Indeed property is an essential qualification to an here-
ditary Upper House, and so much so that no one can
doubt that the House of Lords would cease to exist if its
rn r
t
members were to lose their reputation for wealth, and
the influence which they derive from it. In feudal times
personalance even d
st
thianne
tni
oonw,
andth is wasdignities
matter
w e
wore
ofe
nmootr e
merelyimportance
but annexed to lands, so that in parting with
the lands the feudal baron' parted with the dignities
that appertained to them. Thus we read of a
certain Brian Baron Fitzeount, in the year 1141,
whose two son,, being lepers, and he and his wife
betaking themselves to a religious course of life, the
king seized ou his barony, and thereby extinguished the
dignity ; and, again, an unfortunate Duke of Bedford
was deprived of his title in Henry Vll.'s time on ac-
count of his poverty. But, as these modes of extin;
guishing peerages have fallen into abeyance, there arises
this difficulty—that, in creating a peer, the country
must either give an apanage suitable to the title, as it
has in many cases done, or else its choice must be limited
either to men of fortune large enough to endow a peerage
for their successor, or to men who are not likely, from
the circumstances of their age, to leave an heir to the
title. Henceforward there need be no such difficulty,
' and the only danger we can foresee to the House of
Peers is that the peers for life—of whom, necessarily,
a large number may be appointed—will be considered
the more honourable and influential part of the house
by all who do not think that qualities of naiad are
hereditary as well as rank and wealth. It may per-
haps result that it will be necessary for the house to
invent some mode of weeding itself of some of its
more useless members—its imbecilles and mauvais aujets
—by treating them, it may be, in the same way that the
Irish and Scotch peers were treated at the union of
those kingdoms.
There is no measure which is more likely to raise the
influence of the upper house in the question, of the day,
or to restore the equilibrium which a further el-tension
of the suffrage in the election, for the lower house is likely
to disturb.

QUEER DECISION.—At Castle Eden, the other day,
in an assault, case, the Rev. Mr. Park, in announcing
the decision of the bench, addressed the defendant in
the following manner :—As the assault is not proved we
will dismiss the case on your paying the costs, but if
you refuse to do so, then we shall fine yen for the as.
sault and &oaten Vim