THE WOOLSACK

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 36, 13 February 1939, Page 3

THE WOOLSACK

When the Peers and Bishops have assembled for the opening of the English Parliament and Big Ben begins to strike the hour of noon, the procession of high officers enters, the lights are gradually raised until, as the King and Queen arrive, they go on in full brilliance. The gilding, the red benches, the scheme of decorations, the scarlet and ermine robes, the jewels of the Peeresses, all go to make a wonderful picture, the charm and dignity of w’hich it is impossible to reproduce. The Lord Chamberlain, in his black and gold robes, hands the King his speech on bended knee, and this is read by the King seated on the Throne. The judges of the High Court sit on 'the Woolsack, also in their robes. This is literally a red sack of sheep’s wool. On it the Lord Chancellor sits when he presides over the ordinary business of the House. It was first placed there in the fifteenth century as a gentle reminder to the King’s principal Minister, as the Lord Chancellor then was, of the material interest of the majority of the Peers. In those dsys they were all great land - owners, comparatively wealthy and exercising their full feudal powers. Their main income was derived from the sale of wool to the textile mills in Flanders. Anything which interfered with the wool trade hit the pockets of the Lords. So the great Barons made the Lord Chancellor himself sit on a sack of wool, and there the woolsack has remained ever since.— Lord Strabolgi, in Windsor, London.