although a foreigner.  Winchester, termed first and sole marquis of England, as Astorga was termed sole Marquis of Spain, was absent, being a Jacobite; so that there were only five marquises, of whom the premier was Lindsay, and the junior Lothian; seventy-nine earls, of whom Derby was premier and Islay junior; nine viscounts, of whom Hereford was premier and Lonsdale junior; and sixty-two barons, of whom Abergavenny was premier and Hervey junior.  Lord Hervey, the junior baron, was what was called the “Puisne of the House.”  Derby, of whom Oxford, Shrewsbury, and Kent took precedence, and who was therefore but the fourth under James II., became (under Anne) premier earl.  Two chancellors’ names had disappeared from the list of barons—­Verulam, under which designation history finds us Bacon; and Wem, under which it finds us Jeffreys.  Bacon and Jeffreys! both names overshadowed, though by different crimes.  In 1705, the twenty-six bishops were reduced to twenty-five, the see of Chester being vacant.  Amongst the bishops some were peers of high rank, such as William Talbot, Bishop of Oxford, who was head of the Protestant branch of that family.  Others were eminent Doctors, like John Sharp, Archbishop of York, formerly Dean of Norwich; the poet, Thomas Spratt, Bishop of Rochester, an apoplectic old man; and that Bishop of Lincoln, who was to die Archbishop of Canterbury, Wake, the adversary of Bossuet.  On important occasions, and when a message from the Crown to the House was expected, the whole of this august assembly—­in robes, in wigs, in mitres, or plumes—­formed out, and displayed their rows of heads, in tiers, along the walls of the House, where the storm was vaguely to be seen exterminating the Armada—­almost as much as to say, “The storm is at the orders of England.”

CHAPTER IV.

THE OLD CHAMBER.

The whole ceremony of the investiture of Gwynplaine, from his entry under the King’s Gate to his taking the test under the nave window, was enacted in a sort of twilight.

Lord William Cowper had not permitted that he, as Lord Chancellor of England, should receive too many details of circumstances connected with the disfigurement of the young Lord Fermain Clancharlie, considering it below his dignity to know that a peer was not handsome; and feeling that his dignity would suffer if an inferior should venture to intrude on him information of such a nature.  We know that a common fellow will take pleasure in saying, “That prince is humpbacked;” therefore, it is abusive to say that a lord is deformed.  To the few words dropped on the subject by the queen the Lord Chancellor had contented himself with replying, “The face of a peer is in his peerage!”

Ultimately, however, the affidavits he had read and certified enlightened him.  Hence the precautions which he took.  The face of the new lord, on his entrance into the House, might cause some sensation.  This it was necessary to prevent; and the Lord Chancellor took his measures for the purpose.  It is a fixed idea, and a rule of conduct in grave personages, to allow as little disturbance as possible.  Dislike of incident is a part of their gravity.  He felt the necessity of so ordering matters that the admission of Gwynplaine should take place without any hitch, and like that of any other successor to the peerage.