“Ce faict,” says the old Norman charter, “le pair prend son espee, et monte aux hauts sieges, et assiste a l’audience.”

Gwynplaine heard a voice behind him which said,—­

“I array your lordship in a peer’s robe.”

At the same time, the officer who spoke to him, who was holding the robe, placed it on him, and tied the black strings of the ermine cape round his neck.

Gwynplaine, the scarlet robe on his shoulders, and the golden sword by his side, was attired like the peers on his right and left.

The librarian presented to him the red book, and put it in the pocket of his waistcoat.

The King-at-Arms murmured in his ear,—­

“My lord, on entering, will bow to the royal chair.”

The royal chair is the throne.

Meanwhile the two clerks were writing, each at his table—­one on the register of the Crown, the other on the register of the House.

Then both—­the Clerk of the Crown preceding the other—­brought their books to the Lord Chancellor, who signed them.  Having signed the two registers, the Lord Chancellor rose.

“Fermain Lord Clancharlie, Baron Clancharlie, Baron Hunkerville, Marquis of Corleone in Sicily, be you welcome among your peers, the lords spiritual and temporal of Great Britain.”

Gwynplaine’s sponsors touched his shoulder.

He turned round.

The folds of the great gilded door at the end of the gallery opened.

It was the door of the House of Lords.

Thirty-six hours only had elapsed since Gwynplaine, surrounded by a different procession, had entered the iron door of Southwark Jail.

What shadowy chimeras had passed, with terrible rapidity through his brain—­chimeras which were hard facts; rapidity, which was a capture by assault!

CHAPTER II.

IMPARTIALITY.

The creation of an equality with the king, called Peerage, was, in barbarous epochs, a useful fiction.  This rudimentary political expedient produced in France and England different results.  In France, the peer was a mock king; in England, a real prince—­less grand than in France, but more genuine:  we might say less, but worse.

Peerage was born in France; the date is uncertain—­under Charlemagne, says the legend; under Robert le Sage, says history, and history is not more to be relied on than legend.  Favin writes:  “The King of France wished to attach to himself the great of his kingdom, by the magnificent title of peers, as if they were his equals.”

Peerage soon thrust forth branches, and from France passed over to England.