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individual eminence commands. When Lord Brougham announced his levees,
it could not be known whether he should receive the homage of the
aristocracy, to whom it was not supposed that his lordship's politics
were very amicable. It was moreover thought that the republican, or,
to speak more guardedly, the whig Lord Chancellor would care little
for a custom in which there was no manifest utility. He had declared
that the gewgaws of office delighted him not; and I dare say he would
fain bring his mind to believe that all ceremonial was idle, perhaps
contemptible. But it is the greatest mistake to suppose that Lord
Brougham is inattentive to the ceremonies with which his high place
is surrounded. A careful observer will see clearly that imposing
forms are perfectly agreeable to his mind; nobody could ridicule form
better, so long as he held no situation which required the observance
of customary rules; but elevated to his present distinction, it is
plain that he enjoys all the little peculiarities of his office.
Somebody said that he presided in the House of Lords in a bar whig,
and instanced the fact as a proof of his reforming temper; but it
was not true. Accident may have obliged him to take his seat in this
ungainly form, but he had no purpose of deviating from the ancient
full-bottom, and he is now to be seen in all the amplitude of the
olden fleece. In like manner he observes the strict _regime_, so
fantastical to a stranger, of causing counsel to be shouted for
from without, although they are actually present; and he adds to the
oddness of this custom by receiving them with a most imposing mien,
and putting on his chapeau as they advance. This is a form, for
which the model is not to be found in the practice of his immediate
predecessors. It is possible, however, that his extensive and minute
reading may have made him aware that Wolsey, peradventure, or
some great chancellor of old, had the fancy to be covered when the
suppliants approached. Let any one observe with what studied dignity
he performs the duty of announcing the royal assent to Acts of
Parliament: he assumes a solemnity of tone for which his voice is not
ill-fitted, but which is unusual with him. These small circumstances,
and many such which might be mentioned, show that State is not
uncongenial to his mind. Why should it? His weakness consists in the
unreal contempt for what is not really contemptible. With his high
notions of office, I should have be