m occasion for resort to this variation from the
established practice. The device of "pairing" is not unknown, and when
the question is one of political moment the fact is made obvious by
the activity of the party "whips" in behalf of the interests which
they represent.[208]

[Footnote 208: On the conduct of business in the
Commons see Lowell, Government of England, I,
Chaps. 15-16; Moran, English Government, Chap. 15;
Walpole, Electorate and Legislature, Chap. 8;
Ilbert, Parliament, Chap. 5; Redlich, Procedure of
the House of Commons, II., 215-264, III., 1-41;
May, Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings,
and Usage of Parliament, Chaps, 8-12; Medley,
Manual of English Constitutional History, 231-284;
Graham, The Mother of Parliaments, 225-258; and
MacDonaugh, The Book of Parliament, 217-247.]

*149. Procedure in the Lords.*--The rules of procedure of the House of
Lords are in theory simple, and in practice yet more so. Nominally,
all measures of importance, after being read twice, are considered in
Committee of the Whole, referred to a standing committee for textual
revision, reported, and accorded final adoption or rejection. In
practice the process is likely to be abbreviated. Few bills, for
example, are actually referred to the revision committee. For the
examination of such measures as seem to require it committees are
constituted for the session, and others are created from time to time
as need of them appears, but the comparative leisure of the chamber
permits debate within the Committee of the Whole upon any measure
which the members really care to discuss. Willful obstruction is all
but unknown, so that there has never been occasion for the adoption of
any form of closure. Important questions are decided, as a rule, by a
division. When the question is put those members who desire to
register an affirmative vote repair to the lobby at the right of (p. 142)
the woolsack, those who are opposed to the proposal take their places
in the corresponding lobby at the left, and both groups are counted by
tellers appointed by the presiding officer. A member may abstain from
voting by taking his station on "the steps of the throne," technically
accounted outside the chamber. Prior to 1868 absent members were
a