The late Mr. Evelyn Philip Shirley, of Ettington, the most enthusiastic and cultured of English antiquaries, was once describing the procedure observed on the rare occasion of a "Free Conference" between the Houses of Parliament. "The Lords," he said, "sit with their hats on their heads. The Commons stand, uncovered, at the Bar; and the carpet is spread not on the floor but on the table, illustrating the phrase 'on the _tapis_.' Those are the things which make life really worth living." I cannot profess to equal Mr. Shirley in culture, but I yield to no man in enthusiasm for antiquarian rites. Like Burke, I "piously believe in the mysterious virtue of wax and parchment." With Mr. Gladstone, I say that "the principle which gives us ritual in Religion gives us the ceremonial of Courts, the costume of judges, the uniform of regiments, all the language of heraldry and symbol, all the hierarchy of rank and title." My antiquarian enthusiasm for the Garter must not be allowed to brush aside the more obvious topic of the Sheriffs. That just now[10] is a topic which, as the French say, palpitates with actuality. November is the Sheriffs' month; in it they bloom like chrysanthemums--doomed, alas! to as brief a splendour. The Sheriffs of London and Middlesex--those glorious satellites who revolve round the Lord Mayor of London as the Cardinals round the Pope--are already installed. Their state carriages of dazzling hue, and their liveries stiff with gold bullion, have flung their radiance (as the late Mr. J. R. Green would have said) over the fog and filth of our autumnal climate. "Who asketh why the Beautiful was made? A wan cloud drifting o'er the waste of blue, The thistledown that floats along the glade, The lilac blooms of April--fair to view, And naught but fair are these; and such I ween are you. Yes, ye are beautiful. The young street boys Joy in your beauty----" But I am becoming rhapsodical, and with less excuse than "C. S. C.," whose poetic fire was kindled by the sight of the Beadles in the Burlington Arcade. [10] November 1896. On Monday the 12th of November, being the morrow of St. Martin, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in clothing of wrought gold and figured silk, attending the ghost of what was once the Court of Exchequer, nominates three gentlemen of good estate to serve the office of High Sheriff for each of the counties of England. Be it remarked in passing that the robe of black and gold which the Chancellor wears on this occasion is that which Mr. Gladstone's statue in the Strand represents, and which, as a matter of fact, he wore at the opening of the Law Courts in December 1882, when, to the astonishment of the unlearned, he walked in procession among the Judges.