The British Parliament, 1815–1911.The next greatest thing, probably every one will admit, is the Parliament of the United Kingdom. During these ninety-six years that Parliament has undergone considerable changes. The House of Lords has been very much increased in numbers, but has not been altogether strengthened by this increase. The House of Lords.It still represents, as it has always represented, the wealthy people of the Kingdom. When the only wealth was in land, the House of Lords consisted almost wholly of great landowners. Now that the traders have more wealth than the landowners, rich manufacturers and other great employers of labour have been made peers, though they also have nearly always bought land to support their dignity.
The House of Commons.The House of Commons has undergone a still greater change. I told you in the last chapter what serious need there was in the eighteenth century for a ‘Reform’ of that House, and how, during the twenty-two years of the Great War, that and all other reforms had to be put off. A very small knot of Whigs had never ceased to urge that reform even during the war. The foremost of these was Charles, Earl Grey.
Mistakes of the Tories, 1815–32.I have had to scold the Whigs a good deal during the reign of George III, and I am afraid I shall now have to scold the Tories for their attitude during the first fifteen of these ninety-six years. They held power right up to 1830, and it was obviously their duty to take up this and many other questions in a serious and ‘modern’ spirit. They consisted of two sections, the enlightened Tories, like Mr. Canning and Sir Robert Peel, who had sat at the feet of William Pitt; and the stick-in-the-mud Tories, like Lord Sidmouth and Lord Eldon, who were opposed to any change in any depart-