The Man Who Laughs | Page 7

Lady. Other English girls are
plain Mistress.
"All judges rank below peers. The serjeant wears a lambskin tippet; the
judge one of patchwork, de minuto vario, made up of a variety of little
white furs, always excepting ermine. Ermine is reserved for peers and
the king.
"A lord never takes an oath, either to the crown or the law. His word
suffices; he says, Upon my honour.
"By a law of Edward the Sixth, peers have the privilege of committing
manslaughter. A peer who kills a man without premeditation is not
prosecuted.
"The persons of peers are inviolable.
"A peer cannot be held in durance, save in the Tower of London.
"A writ of supplicavit cannot be granted against a peer.
"A peer sent for by the king has the right to kill one or two deer in the
royal park.
"A peer holds in his castle a baron's court of justice.
"It is unworthy of a peer to walk the street in a cloak, followed by two
footmen. He should only show himself attended by a great train of
gentlemen of his household.
"A peer can be amerced only by his peers, and never to any greater
amount than five pounds, excepting in the case of a duke, who can be

amerced ten.
"A peer may retain six aliens born, any other Englishman but four.
"A peer can have wine custom-free; an earl eight tuns.
"A peer is alone exempt from presenting himself before the sheriff of
the circuit.
"A peer cannot be assessed towards the militia.
"When it pleases a peer he raises a regiment and gives it to the king;
thus have done their graces the Dukes of Athol, Hamilton, and
Northumberland.
"A peer can hold only of a peer.
"In a civil cause he can demand the adjournment of the case, if there be
not at least one knight on the jury.
"A peer nominates his own chaplains. A baron appoints three chaplains;
a viscount four; an earl and a marquis five; a duke six.
"A peer cannot be put to the rack, even for high treason. A peer cannot
be branded on the hand. A peer is a clerk, though he knows not how to
read. In law he knows.
"A duke has a right to a canopy, or cloth of state, in all places where the
king is not present; a viscount may have one in his house; a baron has a
cover of assay, which may be held under his cup while he drinks. A
baroness has the right to have her train borne by a man in the presence
of a viscountess.
"Eighty-six tables, with five hundred dishes, are served every day in the
royal palace at each meal.
"If a plebeian strike a lord, his hand is cut off.
"A lord is very nearly a king.

"The king is very nearly a god.
"The earth is a lordship.
"The English address God as my lord!"
Opposite this writing was written a second one, in the same fashion,
which ran thus:--
"SATISFACTION WHICH MUST SUFFICE THOSE WHO HAVE
NOTHING.
"Henry Auverquerque, Earl of Grantham, who sits in the House of
Lords between the Earl of Jersey and the Earl of Greenwich, has a
hundred thousand a year. To his lordship belongs the palace of
Grantham Terrace, built all of marble and famous for what is called the
labyrinth of passages--a curiosity which contains the scarlet corridor in
marble of Sarancolin, the brown corridor in lumachel of Astracan, the
white corridor in marble of Lani, the black corridor in marble of
Alabanda, the gray corridor in marble of Staremma, the yellow corridor
in marble of Hesse, the green corridor in marble of the Tyrol, the red
corridor, half cherry-spotted marble of Bohemia, half lumachel of
Cordova, the blue corridor in turquin of Genoa, the violet in granite of
Catalonia, the mourning-hued corridor veined black and white in slate
of Murviedro, the pink corridor in cipolin of the Alps, the pearl corridor
in lumachel of Nonetta, and the corridor of all colours, called the
courtiers' corridor, in motley.
"Richard Lowther, Viscount Lonsdale, owns Lowther in Westmorland,
which has a magnificent approach, and a flight of entrance steps which
seem to invite the ingress of kings.
"Richard, Earl of Scarborough, Viscount and Baron Lumley of Lumley
Castle, Viscount Lumley of Waterford in Ireland, and Lord Lieutenant
and Vice-Admiral of the county of Northumberland and of Durham,
both city and county, owns the double castleward of old and new
Sandbeck, where you admire a superb railing, in the form of a
semicircle, surrounding the basin of a matchless fountain. He has,

besides, his castle of Lumley.
"Robert Darcy, Earl of Holderness, has his domain of Holderness, with
baronial towers, and large gardens laid out in French fashion, where he