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CHAP, I.]

EXTENSION OF FAMILY NAMES.

107

Howard. It is quite certain to any one who considers the facts that an hereditary title "tends to maintain the distinction of an ancient lineage," not far less, but far more, perfectly, than any other system which as yet has been discovered. The conditions of the modern world differ beyond all comparison from those either of ancient Rome or of an Italian republic in the Middle Ages. What became of the Colonna and Doria whom Professor Bryce mentions? To-day they are dukes and princes and grandees of Spain. The "Almanach de Gotha" of 1892 gives us

(1) "Giovanni-Andrea, prince Colonna, prince et duc de Palianoet Tursi, duc de Marino, prince d'Avello et Sonnino, etc., prince assistant au rône du St. Siége, grand d'Espagne de 1ère classe ;

(2) "Gioacchino Colonna, 6ème prince de Stigliano, prince d'Aliano, Marquis de Castelnuovo, grand d'Espagne de 1ère classe ;

(3) "Maffeo Barberini Colonna di Sciarra, prince de Carbagnano, Roviano, et Nerola, duc de Bassanello, Montelibretti, et Auticoli-Corrado, marquis de Correse, etc., comte de Pallazuolo, etc., baron et seigneur de San Stefano, etc., etc. ;

(4) "Giovanni-Antonio-Francesco-Giorgio-Landolfo Colonna, duc de Cesaro, duc de Reitano, marquis de Fiumedinisi, comte de S. Alesio, baron de Joppolo, Giancascio, etc.;

(5) "Alfonso-Maria Doria-Pamphily-Landi, prince de Melfi et de Valmontone, duc d'Avigliano,"

We saw in an earlier chapter that the existence of the Peerage does not preclude the concurrent existence of a nobility independent of royal grant. But it cannot be maintained that this latter nobility is in the same secure position as the nobility founded on the Peerage. It rests on social opinion, and the opinion of society, using that word in its largest sense, is in a constant state of change. Popular opinion tends largely to identify the Peerage families with the nobility, and although this is but a vulgar error, there is considerable danger of its finding general acceptance. A Peerage is something definite and tangible, obvious to all men as a public recognition on the part of the State, but social opinion is an impalpable entity. An ancient family of the untitled aristocracy which retains possession of some portion at least of its estates will continue to enjoy some portion at least of its former social consideration; but when

the estates and the family part company it is highly probable that the social consideration will desert the family also. An hereditary peerage preserves a family and holds it together better than anything else. "Any upstart," says Professor Bryce, "may be created a duke." It would be interesting to obtain a statistical return of the upstarts who have been created Dukes in our history from first to last. But without harshly insisting upon fact in opposition to theory, "any upstart" may purchase an estate and may assume, if he does not already bear, the name of some historic family which possessed it. The law affords no protection to the bearers of historic names. But the impostor who should assume a peerage would be at once detected and exposed.

The complaint of Professor Bryce is in effect that the Peerage is an order, not a caste, a Baronage, not a noblesse. And this is true enough. Titles and primogeniture and the royal power of creating peers have made the Peerage an order, not a caste. But a complaint of this sort is out of keeping with the charge that the House of Lords oppresses the people. A complaint of this sort goes far to show that, in spite of all disclaimers, new Radical is but old Whig writ large. Professor Bryce attacks the House of Lords in the spirit of the Peerage Bill of 1719. A man could only be born a Colonna or a Doria. That the King, that is to say the nation, can make any one a Duke is far more democratic. What to the eyes of Professor Bryce are the demerits of the British Peerage, in the disinterested judgment of foreign political philosophers constitute a unique claim to public consideration, both popular and scientific, and the true secret of its enduring strength. The Peerage gives representation to aristocracy in a reasonable and practicable form. By the very limitations which it has imposed on the aristocratic principle it has preserved the aristocracy from running into vicious excess, and from meeting the fate which such vicious excess has entailed upon it in other countries. It has made aristocracy compatible with Monarchy and compatible with democracy, and in doing so it has preserved the balance of the Constitution.

CHAP. I.]

THE PEERAGE IS REPRESENTATIVE.

109

The peerage has not ceased to be aristocratic, to be "either respectable or useful." If it had no other use than to preserve us from such an unchecked rule of irresponsible wealth as exists in the United States this alone would completely justify its existence. But it does much more than this. It gives a reasonable scope to ambition, and minimizes discontent. It is a great object of ambition with most prosperous men to found or continue a family, and a peerage preserves a family better than anything else. At a future date peerages even of the present time may have come to possess a venerable antiquity. There is nothing, but the natural decay of families, to prevent a peerage founded four hundred years ago from lasting for four hundred more. It gives a reasonable scope to ambition. The personal element cannot be altogether eliminated from public affairs. There is good ground for supposing that had Oliver Cromwell been made Earl of Essex there would have been no Commonwealth. A man who accepts a peerage binds himself to the established order of things. But a great general uncompromised by such a pledge may at any moment of popular dissatisfaction take advantage of it to become a military tyrant. The Peerage is of use because it saves us from a plutocracy and from a caste, from the unqualified rule of birth and from the unqualified rule of wealth. Where there is no State-regulated aristocracy the latter of these principles commonly prevails. Some one must go out of the room first. It may be very annoying to a learned historian to give place to some young whippersnapper fresh from school or college, but if he did not he might have to yield precedence to the local "dry goods" person or some one even less acceptable.

That the peerage is "respectable" is shown by the fact that the men most respected by the nation never hesitate to accept titles, hereditary or personal, or if they refuse them do so on personal, and not on public grounds. One can understand and sympathize with the great Irish chiefs who flung aside Elizabeth's titles, but these princely leaders of Celtic and Celto-Norman clans were of other stuff than your nineteenth-century placeman and modern millionaire.

"Honours are inestimable to the honourable." Did Sir Walter Scott refuse a title, or Byron for all his Liberalism think little of his peerage-Byron whose constant allusions to his family and order won for him at school the nickname of "the old English Baron"? It is well known that Burke would have anticipated Disraeli in the title of Lord Beaconsfield but for the death of the only son in whom his hopes were centred. "Had it pleased God to continue to me the hopes of a succession," he wrote, in his "Letter to a Noble Lord," "I should have been according to my mediocrity, and the mediocrity of the age I live in, a sort of a founder of a family."

If we turn for an opinion from Professor Bryce to Lord Nelson, who lived in the very age when Pitt was "prostituting hereditary titles," what do we hear from his biographer? After the battle of the Nile, Nelson was made a Baron.

"When the grant (of £2000 a year) was moved in the House of Commons, General Walpole expressed an opinion that a higher degree of rank ought to be conferred. Mr. Pitt made answer that he thought it needless to enter into that question. 'Admiral Nelson's fame,' he said, 'would be coequal with the British name: and it would be remembered that he had gained the greatest naval victory on record, when no man would think of asking whether he had been created a baron, a viscount, or an earl.' It was strange that, in the very act of conferring a title, the minister should have excused himself for not having conferred a higher one, by representing all titles on such an occasion as nugatory and superfluous. True, indeed, whatever title had been bestowed, whether viscount, earl, marquis, duke, or prince, if our laws had so permitted, he who received it would have been Nelson still. That name he had ennobled beyond all addition of nobility: it was the name by which England loved him, France feared him, Italy, Egypt, and Turkey celebrated him; and by which he will continue to be known while the present kingdoms and languages of the world endure, and as long as their history after them shall be held in remembrance. It depended upon the degree of rank what should be the fashion of his coronet, in what page of the red book his name was to be inserted, and what precedency should be allowed his lady in the drawing-room and at the ball. That Nelson's honours were affected thus far, and no farther, might be conceded to Mr. Pitt and his colleagues in administration: but the degree of rank which they thought proper to allot was the measure of their gratitude, though not of his services. This Nelson felt, and this he expressed, with indignation, among his friends."

* 66
"Life," by Southey, ch. v.

CHAP. I.]

REAL VALUE OF HONOURS.

III

"Ribbons,

"Honours are inestimable to the honourable." and regalia, and rubbish," as Sir Wilfred Lawson, decorated himself with a self-bestowed Blue Ribbon, once styled the honours granted to its servants by the Crown, were to the greatest naval hero whom England has produced precious almost beyond their real value. Let us turn to another chapter (nine) of his Life.

"He wore that day [the day of Trafalgar], as usual, his admiral's frock coat, bearing on the left breast four stars, of the different orders with which he was invested. Ornaments which rendered him so conspicuous a mark for the enemy were beheld with ominous apprehensions by his officers. It was known that there were riflemen on board the French ships; and it could not be doubted but that his life would be particularly aimed at. They communicated their fears to each other, and the surgeon, Mr. Beatty, spoke to the chaplain, Dr. Scott, and to Mr. Scott, the public secretary, desiring that some person would entreat him to change his dress or cover the stars; but they knew that such a request would highly displease him. 'In honour I gained them,' he had said, when such a thing had been hinted to him formerly, and in honour I will die with them.""

It would be impossible to give an instance of a great naval or military commander who refused a Peerage, though some generals and admirals have freely expressed their dissatisfaction that no such honour had been offered them. And what was accepted by Clive and Wellington, by Howe and Hawke and Rodney and Duncan and St. Vincent in their own day, has not been refused in ours by Lord Wolseley and Lord Roberts, Lord Clyde and Lord Strathnairn, Lord Alcester, and Lord Napier of Magdala. Peerages form a cheap reward for naval and military services. The practice of awarding them to distinguished officers forms such a 'custom" as Bacon advocated in his Essay, "Of the True Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates," for "adding amplitude and greatness to a Kingdom." "The wars of later ages," he regrets, "seem to be made in the dark, in respect of the glory and honour which reflected upon men from the wars in ancient time." He dwells on the paucity of distinctions offered to generals in modern times, and urges the fullest employment of such as were in existence. "But in ancient

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