In the Court of the High Steward, he alone is judge in all points of law and practice; the peers triers are merely judges of fact, and are summoned by virtue of a precept from the High Steward to appear before him on the day appointed by him for the trial, ut rei veritas melius sciri poterit.  The High Steward’s commission, after reciting that an indictment hath been found against the peer by the grand jury of the proper county, impowereth him to send for the indictment, to convene the prisoner before him at such day and place as he shall appoint, then and there to hear and determine the matter of such indictment; to cause the peers triers, tot et tales, per quos rei veritas melius sciri poterit, at the same day and place to appear before him; veritateque inde comperta, to proceed to judgment according to the law and custom of England, and thereupon to award execution.[82] By this it is plain that the sole right of judicature is in cases of this kind vested in the High Steward; that it resideth solely in his person; and consequently, without this commission, which is but in nature of a commission of Oyer and Terminer, no one step can be taken in order to a trial; and that when his commission is dissolved, which he declareth by breaking his staff, the court no longer existeth.

But in a trial of a peer in full Parliament, or, to speak with legal precision, before the King in Parliament, for a capital offence, whether upon impeachment or indictment, the case is quite otherwise.  Every peer present at the trial (and every temporal peer hath a right to be present in every part of the proceeding) voteth upon every question of law and fact, and the question is carried by the major vote:  the High Steward himself voting merely as a peer and member of that court, in common with the rest of the peers, and in no other right.

It hath, indeed, been usual, and very expedient it is, in point of order and regularity, and for the solemnity of the proceeding, to appoint an officer for presiding during the time of the trial, and until judgment, and to give him the style and title of Steward of England:  but this maketh no sort of alteration in the constitution of the court; it is the same court, founded in immemorial usage, in the law and custom of Parliament, whether such appointment be made or not.  It acteth in its judicial capacity in every order made touching the time and place of the trial, the postponing the trial from time to time upon petition, according to the nature and circumstances of the case, the allowance or non-allowance of council to the prisoner, and other matters relative to the trial;[83] and all this before an High Steward hath been appointed.  And so little was it apprehended, in some cases which I shall mention presently, that the existence of the court depended on the appointment of an High Steward, that the court itself directed in what manner and by what form of words he should be appointed.  It