AUDIENCE (from

See also:

• LAT

Lat. audire, to hear)  , the act or state of hearing, the term being therefore transferred to those who hear or listen, as in a theatre, at a concert or meeting . In a more technical sense, the term is applied to the right of access to the sovereign enjoyed by the peers of the realm individually and by the House of Commons collectively . More particularly it means the ceremony of the admission of ambassadors, envoys or others to an interview with a sovereign or an important official for the purpose of presenting their credentials . In France, audience is the term applied to the sitting of a law court for hearing actions . In Spain, audiencia is the name given to certain tribunals which try appeals from minor courts . The Spanish judges were originally known as oidores, hearers, from the Spanish oir, to hear; but they are now called ministros, or magistrados togados, robed judges, as the gown of the Spanish judge is called a toga . The audiencia pretorial, i. e. of the praetor, was a court in Spanish America from which there was no appeal to the viceroy, but only to the council of the Indies in Spain . It is not the custom in Spain to speak of audiencias reales, royal courts, but of the audiencias del Reino, courts of the kingdom . In England the Audience-court was an ecclesiastical court, held by the archbishops of Canterbury and York, in which they once exercised a considerable part of their jurisdiction, dealing with such matters as they thought fit to reserve for their own hearing . It has been long disused and is now merged in the court of arches . AUDIFFRET-PASQUIER, EDM$ ARMAND GASTON, Duc D' (1823-1905), French statesman, was the grand-nephew and adopted son of Baron Etienne Denis Pasquier . He was created duke in 1844, and became auditor at the council of state in 1846 .

After the revolution of 1848 he retired to private

life . Under the empire he was twice an unsuccessful candidate for the legislature, but was elected in February 1871 to the National Assembly, and became president of the right centre in 1873 . After the fall of Thiers, he directed the negotiations between the different royalist parties to establish a king in France, but as he refused to give up the tricolour for the flag of the old regime, the project failed . Yet he retained the confidence of the chamber, and was its president in 1875 when the constitutional laws were being drawn up . Nominated senator under the new constitution, he likewise was president of the senate from March 1876 to 1879 when his party lost the majority . Henceforth he was less prominent in politics . He was distinguished by his moderation and uprightness; and he did his best to dissuade MacMahon from taking violent advisers . In 1878 he was elected to the French Academy, but never published anything .