Lords Sitting of 11 May 1910

Preamble
Several Lords Several Lords—Took the Oath.
The Viscount MORLEY OF BLACKBURN The Viscount MORLEY OF BLACKBURN affirmed.

HIS LATE MAJESTY KING EDWARD VII.
The LORD CHANCELLOR The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House that he had received the following letter from the Earl Marshal—
"My dear Lord Chancellor,
"I have received the King's Commands "to intimate to you that the remains of "His late Majesty will be conveyed from "Buckingham Palace to Westminster "Hall on Tuesday the 17th instant.
His Majesty believes that it would be "in accord with the feelings of the "Members of the House of Lords to be "present on the occasion, in order to "receive the remains of the late King."The hour of arrival will be intimated to "you as soon as possible.
"Believe me to be
"Your very faithful Servant,
"NORFOLK,
"Earl Marshal,"

MESSAGE FROM KING GEORGE V.
Delivered by the LORD PRIVY SEAL (E. Crewe), and read by the LORD CHANCELLOR as follows—
"GEORGE REX.
"The King knows that the House of "Lords shares in the profound and sudden sorrow which has fallen upon His "Majesty by the death of His Majesty's "father, the late King, and that the "House entertains a true sense of the "loss which His Majesty and the Nation "have sustained from this mournful "event.
"King Edward's care for the welfare "of his country and his people, his "skilled and prudent guidance of affairs, "his unwearying devotion to public duty"during his illustrious Reign, his simple"courage in pain and danger, will long "be held in honour by his subjects at "home and beyond the seas."

ADDRESSES OF CONDOLENCE.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF CREWE): My Lords, I have the honour to move, "That a humble Address be presented to His Majesty to assure His Majesty of the heartfelt sympathy of this House in his grievous affliction and loss by the death of the late King, His Majesty's Father, of blessed and glorious memory. That we shall ever remember with grateful affection the zeal and success with which our late Sovereign laboured to consolidate the peace and concord of the world, to aid every merciful endeavour for the alleviation of human suffering, and to unite in justice and freedom all races and classes of his subjects with His Imperial Throne."
My Lords, the House re-assembles to-day in the shadow of a great calamity, all the more overwhelming from the suddenness of its approach; for although the conditions of human life forbade the expectation that our late Sovereign could reign for so long a term as did several of his illustrious line, yet his robust constitution, his active way of life, and his abundant vitality all entitled us to hope that the span of his life might equal that of any of his predecessors on the Throne.
We look back at these last nine years with feelings of thankfulness and of pride. I think we all recognised at the time of the late King's Accession that the task before His Majesty was one of exceptional difficulty. He succeeded at a comparatively advanced age to the great Queen who had become in her lifetime almost a legendary figure, and whose person seemed to be, as it were, part of the British Constitution itself. Whatever King Edward's reign might be, it could not be the same as that of Queen Victoria; and now as we cast our thoughts backwards we are able sincerely to declare that, though different, the late reign does not suffer by comparison. The prosperity and orderly progress of the nation, the strengthening of Imperial tics, and, above all, the maintenance of peace—if these be the signs and tests of a great and glorious reign, they are fulfilled in that of which we are now lamenting the close.
My Lords, we all know the capacity, the diligence, the sense of duty with which the late King performed his part as Constitu-

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tional Sovereign of those realms. Not less aware are we of his conspicuous position in international politics. That position, indeed, has sometimes been misunderstood and misinterpreted both here and abroad. British Sovereigns do not engage in the direct negotiations and transactions of diplomacy; but His Majesty's influence was none the less real and potent. His close knowledge of the continent of Europe, his freedom from insular prejudice, his absolute straightforwardness—these, added to his position as an elder and beloved relative in so many Sovereign and Princely Houses, all gave him frequent opportunities which he used, needless to say, always for the benefit of this country, but never to the detriment of any other country, and with a perpetual and engrossing desire for the preservation of peace.
I think that we are all profoundly touched by the evident sincerity which has inspired the manifestations of sorrow throughout Europe. On His Majesty's subjects all over the world the loss falls with a different weight. From the Dominions over seas, from the Colonies and from India, there is but one voice of mourning. In the whole of the United Kingdom, over which His Majesty ruled with an equal affection, it is the same. Other Sovereigns may have been popular, but I do not think that any Sovereign has ever been the personal friend of his people in the sense in which King Edward was. Certainly no British Sovereign has ever known and conversed with in the course of his life so many different classes of his subjects and so many individuals in those classes. This was both the origin and the outcome of the keen interest in social questions which so distinguished His Majesty. The result was that he always understood, if he did not always adopt, the point of view of any particular section of his people; that he was sensible to public opinion without being in any degree afraid of it; while those who have been privileged to serve him have been often indebted to his shrewd judgment and the fruit of his large experience.
As we all know, the King came in contact with the nation at many other points. His devotion both to his Navy and his Army is well known. His encouragement of science and art, his interest in agriculture, his enjoyment of our national open-air sports and amusements—these are familiar to us all.
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When, too, we consider that there never was seen such unaffected dignity of bearing united to a cordiality so spontaneous and so irresistible, can we be surprised that the country feels that it has lost not only its Sovereign, but its best friend? My Lords, when a great figure such as that of the King passes off this earthly stage we are, indeed, apt first to think of the splendour which surrounds his name, and of the high affairs quorum pars magna fuit. But many will turn to the touches of personal character, the little nameless unremembered acts of kindness, unremembered, indeed, by their doer, but not forgotten by those for whom they were done. Those who in different degrees were honoured by personal intimacy with the King can recall a hundred instances of these kindnesses, and they never, too, will forget his dislike of affectation in every form, his qualities of courage, of generosity in thought and deed, and of toleration which only recoiled from anything that was hard or anything that was insincere.
My Lords, I have further to move, "That an Address of Condolence be sent to Her Majesty the Queen-Mother to assure Her Majesty of the deep and warm sympathy which this House feels for Her Majesty in this melancholy time of sorrow and of irreparable loss, and that this House and the Nation will ever preserve towards Her Majesty sentiments of unalterable reverence and affection." Ever since Queen Alexandra came to these shores, forty-seven years ago, she has held a secure place in the hearts of the people of Great Britain. This is not the time to enumerate the qualities which have won for Her Majesty these feelings of affection in an ever-increasing degree. I will only say that if anything could have endeared her more closely to us, it would be the very moving and beautiful Message which we have all read to-day, and none, I am sure, without profound emotion.

ADDRESS TO THE KING.
My Lords (continued the noble Earl), I have next to move: "To offer His Majesty our loyal congratulations upon his auspicious Accession, to assure His Majesty of our devotion to His Royal person, and of our sure conviction that his Reign will, under the favour of Divine Providence, be distinguished by unswerving efforts to promote the virtue, prosperity, and contentment of the Realm, and to guard the rights and liberties of His Majesty's faithful

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people." With one heart, we all wish His Majesty well. He is well known to many of us. We know that he was brought up plainly and simply in an ideal English home. He has enjoyed what by common consent, I think, we all regard as the best early education and training that a man can have in the British Navy. His Majesty has also enjoyed the advantage of knowing more of his wide Dominions, not merely than any Sovereign who has gone before him, but, perhaps, more even than any one of his own subjects. He has enjoyed, too, the benefit, the incalculable benefit, of continued and close association with his illustrious father, and I do not think that the paternal and filial relation has ever been more happily exemplified than in the case of his late Majesty and the present King. By his side he has in his Gracious Consort one who we know will help him to bear the glorious burden of the British Monarchy. It is our earnest prayer that His Majesty's reign may be long and prosperous and that it may in no way fall short of the two illustrious reigns that have gone before it.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I beg to second the Motion which has been made by the noble Earl opposite. To-night we are all ready to follow him, and, indeed, I think the House owes him a debt for the manner in which he has expressed the many feelings which rush to our minds on this melancholy occasion. It was no easy task for the noble Earl to clothe, as he has done, in appropriate and fitting words, the feelings of profound dismay which this great calamity has occasioned to us; our feelings of sympathy with those who are mourning not only a great public misfortune, but a poignant domestic calamity; and, again, those feelings of hopefulness and of confidence with which we look forward to the reign which has just begun.
My Lords, a great misfortune has indeed befallen the British nation, the whole British Empire, and the whole civilised community of the world. The nation mourns a Sovereign to whom it was bound by ties, not only hereditary, but personal—ties which the noble Earl has described better than I can attempt to describe them—and if we can at such a moment as this find any grain of comfort, it is indeed satisfactory to think that the nation is absolutely unanimous at the present time. We know at this moment no distinction of party, of race, of religious
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persuasion. We all stand shoulder to shoulder in our desire to express, however imperfectly, our grief and consternation at the common misfortune which has come upon us. The Empire has lost an illustrious chief—that vast Empire throughout the length and breadth of which the late King was regarded by all his subjects with an affection not less than that which he commanded within these islands. To those subjects His Majesty stood as the outward symbol of Imperial unity, and I doubt whether any but those who have had the honour of serving the Crown in different parts of the Empire really know to what extent throughout that Empire the feeling of reverence for the Sovereign and the Royal House prevails.
But, my Lords, it is not only within the Empire that the King's death has occasioned an irreparable loss. I am sure your Lordships must have listened with approbation to the sketch which the noble Earl gave us of the part played by His late Majesty in connection with the foreign affairs of this country. His Majesty had established with the chiefs of other States and with the public men of other States relations which enabled him to bear, unostentatiously and strictly within the limits of the Constitution, a distinguished and useful part in international affairs, and, to my mind, amongst the many remarkable attributes of the late King none was more remarkable than his power of creating what I can only describe as an atmosphere of international goodwill and good feeling—an atmosphere the presence of which diminished asperities, if asperities were there, made difficulties easier of solution, if there were difficulties, and contributed immensely, if I may use the words of the Address, to the consolidation of peace and concord throughout the world. At this moment I am convinced that there is not a Chancellerie in Europe which does not recognise that with the death of King Edward VII a great international force has been removed. It was a force winch always operated for avowable reasons for the public good, and I think we are justified in believing that it will not cease entirely to operate now that he has left us.
My Lords, this is no time for elaborate appreciations of the characteristic qualities which enabled His late Majesty to earn for himself the great position which he occupied both in and out of this country. Some of us who are present here to-night had the

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privilege of hearing the speech which he addressed to the Privy Council at the opening of his reign. Your Lordships may recollect that that speech contained a threefold pledge—the pledge that His Majesty would walk in the footsteps of his late mother, the pledge that he desired to be a constitutional Sovereign in the strictest acceptation of the word, and, lastly, the pledge that so long as breath remained in his body, so long would he work for the good of his people. How completely and how nobly has that threefold pledge been redeemed! And, my Lords, does not the pathos of that third pledge come home to us at this moment as we read the accounts of his Majesty's last hours, when the vital spark was already beginning to burn feebly but when the resolve to work for the good of his people burned on undiminished till the end came.
His Majesty's position at home and abroad was certainly not due to any studied endeavour to force himself into a position of prominence either upon the national or upon the international stage. It was not due to any deliberate pursuit of popularity for the sake of popularity, but to his spontaneous, instinctive, I would almost say irrepressible kindliness, and to the tact and good temper which were a second nature with him and which never forsook him throughout his life. It was the possession of these qualities which enabled him to feel as his people felt, to share our emotions, our joys, and our sorrows, to take part in our aspirations and hopes, to rejoice with us in our achievements, if anything was achieved and well done; it was the possession of these qualities which led the people of this country to regard His late Majesty, not only as a ruler, but as a friend, and to reverence in him, not only the Sovereign, but the man.
The late King never spared himself. Few probably know how heavy was the burden which he had to bear. Nor should we forget that that burden was borne, not only during the nine years, all too short, in which he occupied the Throne, but before his accession and during the latter years of the reign of his illustrious mother, when it was her pleasure to delegate to the then Prince of Wales many of the duties and obligations which naturally pertain to the Sovereign. In this House many of us will no doubt call to mind the fact that in those days His Majesty sat not infrequently on those benches [the Cross Benches] and took an
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interest and sometimes a part in the business of the House.
My Lords, in out public grief we cannot allow ourselves to forget the great private sorrow of those members of the Royal House who are at this moment mourning for the late King, and most of all, surely, our thoughts go out to that illustrious lady who, from the day when we first welcomed her to these shores, nearly half a century ago, has ever stood in the eyes of the people of this country as the embodiment of all that is most graceful and tender, gentle and sympathetic in a woman. We can scarcely bear to think of the Queen-Mother in her desolation. I, at any rate, am quite unequal to the attempt of expressing to the House the feelings which every member of it must entertain towards her at this moment. This, perhaps, we may be permitted to say—that the Royal mourners will receive no truer and more heartfelt expressions of sympathy than those which this House is ready to tender to them.
And now it remains for me merely to add one word to what has fallen from the noble Earl in regard to our feelings towards the Sovereign who has assumed his father's place. We offer him the full measure of our allegiance and devotion. King George the Fifth is not a stranger to us. He has already shown his aptitude for the great task which lies before him. Already we recognise in the son the presence of many of the qualities which served to endear the father. In the midst of our sorrow, we can look forward with confidence to the future. The reign which has closed has been honourable and happy for the nation and for the Throne. The reign which is now opening will, we believe, under Providence furnish a chapter not less creditable to the history of this country and not less honourable to the annals of the Royal House. I beg to second.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD LOREBURN): My Lords, the Question is, That a humble Address be presented to His Majesty:
To assure His Majesty of the heartfelt sympathy of this House in his grievous affliction and loss by the death of the late King, His Majesty's Father, of blessed and glorious memory.
That we shall ever remember with grateful affection the zeal and success with which

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our late Sovereign laboured to consolidate the peace and concord of the World, to aid every merciful endeavour for the alleviation of human suffering, and to unite in justice and freedom all races and classes of his subjects with His Imperial Throne.
To offer His Majesty our loyal congratulations upon his auspicious Accession, to assure His Majesty of our devotion to His Royal person, and of our sure conviction that his Reign will, under the favour of Divine Providence, be distinguished by unswerving efforts to promote the virtue, prosperity, and contentment of the Realm, and to guard the rights and liberties of His Majesty's faithful people.
On Question, Motion agreed to, nemine dissentiente, and ordered accordingly: The said Address to be presented to His Majesty by the Lords with White Staves.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The Question is, That an Address of Condolence be sent to Her Majesty the Queen-Mother to assure Her Majesty of the deep and warm sympathy which this House feels for Her Majesty in this melancholy time of sorrow and of irreparable loss, and that this House and the Nation will ever preserve towards Her Majesty sentiments of unalterable reverence and affection.
On Question, Motion agreed to, nemine dissentiente, and ordered accordingly: The said Address to be presented to Her Majesty by the Duke of Northumberland, the Marquess of Bath, the Lord Bishop of Winchester, the Lord Bishop of Ripon, the Lord Brassey, and the Lord Welby.

HIS LATE MAJESTY KING EDWARD VII.
The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House that he had received a message of sympathy on the death of the late King from the Senate of the Argentine Republic of which the following is a translation:
"The Argentine Senate has just "adjourned its sitting in homage to the "memory of King Edward VII and in "their name I have the honour to present "to your High Chamber their heartfelt "grief in the great and irreparable loss "which the British Nation are lamenting.
"(Signed) DOMINGO J. PEREZ, President.
"(Signed) ADOLFO J. LABOUGLE, Secretary."

LLANELLY HARBOUR.
(Petition for Bill).

LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL.
(Tramways and Improvements)—(Petition for additional Provision).
The meeting of the Standing Orders Committee (which stands appointed for Tuesday the 31st instant), put off to Thursday the 9 th of June next.

NORTH EAST LONDON RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
Second Reading (which stands appointed for the 27th instant), put off to Thursday the 9th of June next.
JUDICIAL BUSINESS.
Ordered that for the purposes of the Judicial Business of the House, Wednesday the eighth day of June next may be deemed the "first sitting day of the next ensuing meeting of the House."
POLICE (WEEKLY REST-DAY) BILL.
Second Reading (which stands appointed for the 26th instant) put off to Thursday the 9th of June next.
REFORM OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS.
Order for the House to be again in Committee to consider the best means of reforming its existing organisation so as to constitute a strong and efficient Second Chamber, discharged.

THE LYING IN STATE.
THE EARL OF CREWE: My Lords, I beg to move "That this House will attend the funeral ceremonies of His late Majesty King Edward VII in Westminster Hall on Tuesday, the 17th of this instant May."
On Question, Motion agreed to.

ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE.
THE EARL OF CREWE: I now move "That this House do adjourn till Wednesday, the 8th of June."
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House adjourned at twenty-five minutes before Five o'clock, to Wednesday, the 8th of June next, a quarter past Four o'clock, except for Judicial Business.