On Monday last I was riding early in the Park and met Lord Howick. We rode together for some time. He said that 'he supposed they should be out after this session, and they ought to be out, as they could carry none of their measures, and the Lords rejected Bill after Bill sent up from the other House; that since the Tories chose to go on in this way, they must make the experiment and carry on the Government if they could, but they must look for every opposition from his friends and his party. It was quite impossible things could go on upon their present footing; the country would not stand it, and the Lords must look to those changes which their own conduct rendered indispensable.' I said to Howick that the appropriation clause made the great difficulty of the Whigs; that I believed they were, on the whole, a very Conservative Government, but why struggle for this absurdity, and why not bring forward a measure at once of real relief and pay the Catholic clergy? He said they could not do it; their own friends would not support them; that the Tories might have done it, but that the Whigs could not. 'So,' I replied, 'both parties are in such a position that no Conservative measures can be carried but by the Whigs, and no Liberal ones but by the Tories.' Since this there has been a free conference, and the Lords have been bowling down Bills like ninepins. This certainly cannot go on; either the Tories must come into power again, or the Whigs must do something to control the House of Lords, or the Lords must lower their tone and adopt more moderate counsels. The latter would be the best, as it is the least probable, of the three alternatives. His Majesty was pleased to be very facetious at the Council the other day, though not very refined. A new seal for the Cape of Good Hope was approved, and the impression represented a Caffre, with some ornaments on his head which resembled _horns_. The King asked Lord Glenelg what these _horns_ meant, but Glenelg referred his Majesty to Poulett Thomson, to whom he said, 'Well, Mr. Thomson, what do you say to this? I know you are a man of gallantry, but if you choose to be represented with a pair of horns I am sure I have no objection;' at which sally their lordships laughed, as in duty bound. August 21st, 1836 {p.361} [Page Head: PARLIAMENT PROROGUED.] Yesterday the King prorogued Parliament with a very moderate, inoffensive Speech. The Tories had spread a report that the Ministers wanted to thrust into the Speech some allusions to the conduct of the House of Lords, but no such thing was ever contemplated.