CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.
CONTENTS
WHAT IS A PEER?
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
A ROMANCE OF ALMANACS.
TWO DAYS IN A LIFETIME.
A KING OF ACRES.
MRS SHAW: THE LATE PRINCE IMPERIAL’S NURSE.
A YEAR’S WOOING.
No. 2.—Vol. I.
Price 1½d.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 12, 1884.
WHAT IS A PEER?
Judging from casual remarks often heard inordinary conversation, it would seem that nota few persons believe every man who is styled‘Lord So-and-so’ to be a peer. The notion indicated,though prevalent, is wholly erroneous; andas the peerage of this realm, unlike that of othercountries, is a matter of substantial importance,not only in a social but in a constitutional sense,an answer to the question, ‘What is a peer?’ maynot prove uninteresting.
The word ‘peer’ itself, etymologically, in noway denotes superiority of position; on the contrary,strange to say, it denotes equality, beingsimply a form of the Latin par, equal, and comesto us through the French word pair, bearing thesame meaning. How comes it, then, that anennobled person should be designated by a termwhich signifies ‘an equal?’; and of whom is suchperson an equal? One statement will answerthese questions—namely, that every peer of therealm is the equal of every other peer of therealm—that is, of the United Kingdom; just asthe members of all other classes of the communityare the peers of each other in regard to citizenrights. We say ‘peer of the realm,’ because allpeers are not entitled to be so styled. Thus, amember of only the Irish peerage is not the equalof an English peer or a peer of the realm, for thereason that he is not, by the mere reason of beinga peer of Ireland, entitled to a seat in the Houseof Lords. In other words, he is not a peer orlord of parliament unless he is elected to be such;a remark which requires explanation.
At the time of the union of Ireland with GreatBritain, confirmed by the statute 39 and 40 Geo.III. (1801), it was provided in the Act of Parliamentthat the peers of Ireland should have thepower to elect twenty-eight representatives fromamongst their own body to sit in the Upper Houseof the united legislatures for life. Such representativepeers are chosen when necessary, and whenelected, are lords of parliament, and have all theprivileges of peers of the United Kingdom. OtherIrish peers who are not representative peers arein a very different position. They are not lordsof parliament, a