unicated succinctly the nature of the business to which
attention is to be directed. Following the retirement of the
sovereign, the Commons again withdraw, the Throne Speech is reread and
an address in reply voted in each house, and the Government begins the
introduction of fiscal and legislative proposals. In the event that a
session is not the first one of a parliament, the election of a
Speaker and the administration of oaths are omitted.[167]

[Footnote 167: On the ceremonies involved in the
opening, adjournment, prorogation, and dissolution
of a parliament see Anson, Law and Custom of the
Constitution, I., 61-77; J. Redlich, The Procedure
of the House of Commons; a Study of its History and
Present Form, trans. by A. E. Steinthal, 3 vols.
(London, 1908), II., 51-67; T. E. May, Treatise on
the Law, Privileges, Proceedings, and Usage of
Parliament (11th ed., London, 1906), Chap. 7; A.
Wright and P. Smith, Parliament, Past and Present,
2 vols. (London, 1902), II., Chap. 25; MacDonaugh,
The Book of Parliament, 96-114, 132-147, 184-203;
and H. Graham, The Mother of Parliaments (Boston,
1911), 135-157.]

*121. The Palace of Westminster.*--From the beginning of parliamentary
history the meeting-place of the houses has been regularly
Westminster, on the left bank of the Thames. The last parliament which
sat at any other spot was the third Oxford Parliament of Charles II.,
in 1681. The Palace of Westminster, in mediaeval times outside, though
near, the principal city of the kingdom, was long the most important
of the royal residences, and it was natural that its great halls and
chambers, together with the adjoining abbey, should be utilized
habitually for parliamentary sittings. Of the enormous structure known
as Westminster to-day (still, technically, a royal palace, though not
a royal residence), practically all portions save old Westminster Hall
were constructed after the fire of 1834. The Lords first occupied
their present quarters in 1847 and the Commons theirs in 1850.[168]

[Footnote 168: MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament,
79-95; Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 60-80;
Wright and Smith, Parliamen