Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 128, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 November 1904 — LONDON’S LORD MAYOR. [ARTICLE]

LONDON’S LORD MAYOR.

Hl* Power aa Well aa the Area H* Ralea la Limited. The lord mayor of London is not the all powerful official he is thought to be on the continent He is not the mayor of all London, but only of the city of London, and the City ia but a fraction of the whole. Greater London has, roughly, a population of 6,000,000, but in the 650 acres that comprise the City there is a resident population at night of only 88,000 and by day of little over 800,000. And even within this area tha powers of the lord mayor and of the twentWlx aldermen and the two hundred old common councilors are by no means autocratic. Mach of what used to lie within his and their province has been taken over by the London county council. In fact, the average Londoner never thinks of lord mayor as an edict making, official. He stands altogether apafv 111 th ® popular mind from questions of and assessments, schools and police, Yt>7 few people could say what legislative fbiwtl° n 8» if an T» be fulfills. They may have beard that be la the chief magistrate of tii? courts, but beyond that their knowledge of hi« precise duties does not stray. It la the social and decorative side of his position'that Impresses the public. The lord mayor is never without his badge and rarely without his robes and chains of office, He tides abroad In a magnificently glided eoacb, with powdered coachmen and footmen In cocked bats and silk knee breeches, sending a gleam of gold through the dirty drab of London. , The lord mayor’s show on Nov. 9 Is one of England's few annual pageants and, uncouth as It is, has a warm place In the hearts of the populace, and, besides all this, be has some rights and provileges of 400 years’ standing. No troops may pass the City boundaries without his leave. The sovereign himself has to ask permission to enter the city walls, Just as he has to ask for permission to enter the bouse of commons.—Harper's Weekly.