No divorce can be pronounced but by act of Parliament. The Peers decide on all process for separation. As in these cases the only question is about facts which no legal knowledge is required to comprehend, they are decided indifferently by the Law-Peers, or any others present at the commencement of the political session. So the House of Lords is at the same time a court and a legislative chamber; a barbarous amalgam. If the strict rules of ceremony were preserved, the Peers should sit according to their ranks; that is to say, Dukes on the first benches, Marquisses on the second, and the Barons on the third. This order is, however, not observed. They range themselves like the Commons, according to the political party to which they belong, Barons, Earls, Dukes or Marquisses indiscriminately. During the session just closed, the ministry of the whigs and their friends, occupied the seats to the right of the woolsack; the opposition of the tories, those on the left. We use the terms “whigs” and “tories,” for these words are most suitable to the House of Lords. The whole aristocracy being centered in that House, the Peers only represent themselves; they do not express the will of such or such a party, but their own will. Lord Durham and Lord Brougham, both radicals, are anomalies and differ entirely from their fellows. The political classification of the House of Lords, is more simple and easy than that of the Commons. There is at present, as during the last century, in the Upper House, two different shades of aristocracy, which fiercely contend for power and the emoluments of office; the _tories_, consistent at least with their anti-liberal principles, the triumph of which, if such triumph could be accomplished peacefully and without a revolution, would be the only safety for the Peerage; the _whigs_, very much embarrassed by their pretended popular opinions, of the sincerity of which proofs by acts and not by words, are begun to be required. Numerically these two divisions are far from being {549} equal. Counting consciences, you would have ten tories for one whig. However, in 1832 the whig minority forced the tories to capitulate; and, since that time assisted by the pressure from without, it has more than once dictated the law to its adversaries. But the period is rapidly approaching when the true majority will attempt to break the yoke, perceiving that concessions can no longer avail to secure its safety. It would be at least as becoming to seize the sword, and fall in defending its ramparts, as to wait seated on its curule chairs, the political death which threatens it. The rules and customs of the two chambers in some respects resemble, and in others differ from each other.