The houses of Parliament

THE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT serve as the meeting place of two legislative bodies, the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The buildings are officially called the New Palace of Westminster. They were constructed to replace old palace buildings, which had burned down in 1834. Famous events in the history of the House of Parliament include the Gunpowder Plot and Charles I in the House of Commons. At midnight on November 4^th, 1605, Guy Fawkes was dis­covered in a cellar beneath the House of Lords, about to set light to a pile of gunpowder barrels. Every au­tumn his capture is still celebrated. There are organized bonfires and firework displays around London.

In 1642 Charles the First went to the House of Commons to arrest five Members of Parliament /MPs/, who criticized his rule. They foiled him by escaping. Since then, the sovereign has never been al­lowed into the Commons.

Parliament is reopened in November after a summer break with a ceremony called the State Open­ing, when the monarch makes a speech from a throne in the Lords Chamber. An official called " Black Rod " is sent to the Commons to summon MPs to hear the speech.

Westminster Hall completed in 1099 was the chief survivor of the 1834 fire. It stands near the cen­ter of the House of Parliament. It has an impressive hammer-beam roof decorated with massive carved an­gels. It has been used for royal Christmas feasts, coronation banquets, and State trials. A terrorist bomb slightly damaged the hall in 1974.

In Victoria Tower millions of parliamentary documents are kept. A Union flag flies on the flower when Parliament is sitting during daylight hours.

Big Ben is the huge bell in the clock of Saint Stephen's Tower. It may have been named after Sir Benjamin Hall, who supervised the rebuilding of Parliament, or after a famous Victorian prizefighter. Big Ben has boomed out the hours since 1859. When Parliament is sitting at night a light shines above the clock.

The Houses of Parliament has over 1000 rooms, and over 3 km of corridors. Laid out they stretch from Parliament to Saint Paul's Cathedral.

The Central Lobby is the main reception area, decorated with brightly coloured mosaics. On his way to debates Speaker walks in procession through here with the Mace, the symbol of royal authority.In the Robing Room the monarch puts on the Robes of State and the Imperial State Crown before Opening Parliament. The room has its own throne, and decorations based on ancient tales. The walls are painted with scenes from the story of King Arthur, leader in the war against the Saxons.The Royal Gallery leads from the Robing Room to the Lords Chamber. On each side of the long hall there are huge wall paintings by the Victorian artist Daniel Maclisse. They show the battles of Trafal­gar and Waterloo. In the Battle of Trafalgar the British fleet under Nelson broke the line of the French and Spanish fleets, capturing 20 vessels. In the Battle of Waterloo on June 18, 1815, Napoleon was defeated by the British and Prussian armies under Wellington /1769-1852/ and Blucher /1742-1819/.The Lord Chancellor is in charge of the House of Lords. He sits on the Woolsack. It is a cushion stuffed with wool to symbolize what was once England's chief source of wealth.

The House of Commons is decorated in a simple style with tiers of green seats. The government sits on one side of the room with the Opposition on the other. There are stripes on the floor in front of each side. The distance between the stripes is the distance between two drawn swords. During the W.W.II the House of Commons was destroyed by German bombs; it was rebuilt after the war. The MPs' Tea Terrace stretches along the riverside, and you can see it from the Westminster Bridge. The Speaker's Rooms are the living quarters of the House of Commons Speaker, who keeps order during debates.