Harry Graham - The Mother of Parliaments

Could Pitt return to the scene of his former triumphs, he would indeed marvel at the splendours of the modern parliamentary restaurant – Pitt, whose thoughts even upon his deathbed are said to have reverted lovingly to the delights of the old House of Commons kitchen. "I think I could eat one of Bellamy's pork pies" were the great statesman's last words as he expired at Putney in January, 1806, and it was no doubt at Bellamy's humble board that he drank many a bottle of that wine for which he entertained so strong a predilection.

Pearson, the famous doorkeeper of the House of Commons, has described Bellamy's as "a damn'd good house, upstairs, where I have drank many a pipe of red port. Here the members, who cannot say more than 'Yes' or 'No' below, can speechify for hours to Mother Bellamy about beef-steaks and pork-chops. Sir Watkin Lewes always dresses them there himself; and I'll be curst if he ben't a choice hand at a beef-steak and a bottle, as well as a pot and a pipe." 119 119 Pearson's "Political Dictionary," p. 19.

Dickens, in his "Sketches by Boz," has left a picture of that old-fashioned eating-room, with the large open fire, the roasting-jack, the gridiron, the deal tables and wax candles, the damask linen cloths, and the bare floor, where peers and members of Parliament assembled with their friends 120 120 "25 April, 1822. Eat cold meat at Bellamy's (introduced by Lambton); and did not leave the House till near two." – Thomas Moore's "Memoirs," vol. iii. p. 346. to sit over their modest meals until it was time for a division, or, as Sheil says, "the whipper-in aroused them to the only purpose for which their existence was recognized."

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King's "Essay on the English Constitution," p. 17.

"The Spirit of Laws." "Works," vol. i. p. 212.

"Lex Parliamentaria" (1690), p. 1.

"A Brief Register of Parliamentary Writs" (1664).

Elsynge, Clerk of the Parliaments in the seventeenth century, took notes of the Lords' speeches, which have been published by the Camden Society (1870-1879).

"Works and Correspondence," vol. iii. p. 525. (The power to dissolve Parliament is still theoretically in the hands of the Sovereign; practically it is in those of the Cabinet. Parliament has only been dissolved once by the Sovereign since the beginning of the eighteenth century.)

Oldfield's "History of Great Britain and Ireland," vol. i. p. 280.

May's "A Breviary of the History of Parliament" (1680), p. 21.

Burnet's "History of His Own Times," vol. iii. p. 92 n.

E.g. , "Sir Edward Turner, who for a secret service had lately a bribe of £4000, as in the Exchequer may be seen, and about £2000 before; and made Lord Chief Baron.

"Sir Stephen Fox – once a link boy; then a singing boy at Salisbury; then a serving man; and permitting his wife to be common beyond sea, at the Restoration was made Paymaster of the Guards, where he has cheated £100,000, and is one of the Green Cloth." "Flagellum Parliamentarium," pp. 10 and 24.

Forster's "Life of Sir John Eliot," vol. i. p. 529.

See "Journal of the Protectorate House of Lords, from the original MS. in the possession of Lady Tangye, January 20, 1657, to April 22, 1659." House of Lords MSS. vol. iv. new series, p. 503.

Burnet's "History of His Own Time," vol. i. p. 184.

"Public affairs vex no man," said Dr. Johnson, when asked whether he were not annoyed by this vote. "I have never slept an hour less, nor eat an ounce less meat. I would have knocked the factious dogs on the head, to be sure; but I was not vexed ."

Boswell's "Life of Johnson," p. 731. (Cromwell had already stigmatized Scotland as corrupt. He had been told, he said, that it was a poor country inhabited by honest people, but found that the country was not poor and the people anything but honest.)

Dr. King's "Anecdotes of His Own Time," p. 44.

"History of His Own Time," vol. ii. p. 76.

"History," vol. iii. p. 545.

"Correspondence of George III. and Lord North," vol. ii. p. 425.

Bell's "Life of Canning," p. 347.

Mark Boyd's "Social Gleanings," p. 246.

Russell's "Recollections," p. 35.

Oldfield's "Representative History," vol. vi., App.

"The Black Book," vol. i. p. 430.

"By the same violence that one Parliament, chosen but for Three Years , could prolong their own sitting for Seven , any other may presume to render themselves perpetual." Ralph's "Uses and Abuses of Parliament," vol. ii. p. 716.

"Essays and Sketches of Life and Character," p. 148.

For example, one of £7000 for a retired Auditor of the Imprest, and another of £7300 granted to Lord Bute as some slight compensation for his loss of office. See Rose's "Influence of the Crown."

"Gleanings of Past Years," vol. i. pp. 134-5.

O'Connell showed Pryme an Irish Act of Parliament for the suppression of "Rapparees, Tories, and other Robbers." Pryme's "Recollections," p. 231.

A German writer, Herr Bucher, wrote as follows, in 1855: – "It would be difficult to give any other definition of the two parties than that a Whig is a man who is descended from Lord John Russell's grandmother, a Tory, one who sits behind Disraeli." "Der Parliamentarismus wie er ist," p. 152.

"I have a maxim," wrote Horace Walpole to his friend Montague in 1760, "that the extinction of party is the origin of faction." "Letters," vol. iii. 370.

See Parr's "Discourse on Education," p. 51.

"Anecdotes and other miscellaneous pieces" left by the Rt. Hon. Arthur Onslow. (From the MS. at Clandon.)

This saying has often been wrongly attributed to Lord Randolph Churchill. That statesman's most famous maxim on the subject of Opposition is given in his son's "Life" (p. 188-9): "Whenever by an unfortunate occurrence of circumstances an Opposition is compelled to support the Government," said Lord Randolph, "the support should be given with a kick and not with a caress, and should be withdrawn on the first available moment."