'Look how they were treated!' said Mr Roby.'Was it likely that they should be very staunch when Mr Monk became Leader of the House?'
There was a Cabinet Council that day which lasted but a few minutes, and it may be easily presumed that the Ministers decided that they would all resign at once if Sir Orlando should carry his amendment.It is not unlikely that they were agreed to do the same if he should carry it,--leaving probably the Prime Minister to judge what narrow majority would constitute nearness.On this occasion the gentlemen assembled were jocose in their manner, and apparently well satisfied,--as though they saw before them an end to all their troubles.The Spartan boy did not even make a grimace when the wolf bit him beneath his frock, and these were all Spartan boys.Even the Prime Minister, who had fortified himself for the occasion, and who never wept in any company but that of his wife and his old friend, was pleasant in his manner and almost affable.'We shan't make the step towards the millennium just at present,' he said to Phineas Finn as they left the room together,--referring to words which Phineas had spoken on a former occasion, and which then had not been very well taken.
'But we shall have made a step towards the step,' said Phineas, 'and getting to a millennium even that is something.'
'I suppose we are all too anxious,' said the Duke, 'to see some green effects come from our own little doings.Good day.We shall know all about it tolerably early.Monk seems to think that it will be an attack on the Ministry and not on the bill, and that it will be best to get a vote with as little delay as possible.'
'I'll bet an even five-pound note,' said Mr Lupton at the Carlton, 'that the present Ministry is out to-morrow, and another that no one names five members of the next Cabinet.'
'You can help to win your first bet,' said Mr Beauchamp, a very old member, who, like many other Conservatives, had supported the Coalition.
'I shall not do that,' said Lupton, 'though I think I ought.Iwon't vote against the man in his misfortunes, though, upon my soul, I don't love him very dearly.I shall vote neither way, but I hope that Sir Orlando may succeed.'
'If he do, who is to come in?' said the other.'I suppose you don't want to serve under Sir Orlando?'
'Nor certainly under the Duke of Omnium.We shall not want a Prime Minister as long as there are as good fish in the sea as have been caught out of it.'
There had lately been formed a new Liberal club, established on a broader basis than the Progress, and perhaps with a greater amount of aristocratic support.This had come up since the Duke had been Prime Minister.Certain busy men had never been quite contented with the existing state of things, and had thought that the Liberal party, with such assistance as the club could give it, would be strong enough to rule alone.That the great Liberal party should be impeded in its work and its triumph by such men as Sir Orlando Drought and Sir Timothy Beeswax was odious to the club.All the Pallisers had, from time immemorial, run straight as Liberals, and therefore the club had been unwilling to oppose the Duke personally, though he was the head of the Coalition.
And certain members of the Government, Phineas Finn, for instance, Barrington Erle, and Mr Rattler were on the committee of the club.But the club, as a club, was not averse to a discontinuance of the present state of things.Mr Gresham might again become Prime Minister, if he would condescend so far, on Mr Monk.It might be possible that the great Liberal triumph contemplated by the club might not be achieved by the present House;--but the present House must go shortly, and then, with that assistance from a well-organized club, would had lately been so terribly wanting,--the lack of which had made the Coalition necessary,--no doubt the British constituencies would do their duty, and a Liberal Prime Minister, pure and simple, might reign, --almost for ever.With this great future before it, the club was very lukewarm in its support of the present bill.'I shall go down and vote for them of course,' said Mr O'Mahony, 'just for the look of the thing.' In saying this Mr O'Mahony expressed the feeling of the club, and the feeling of the Liberal party generally.There was something due to the Duke, but not enough to make it incumbent on his friends to maintain his position as Prime Minister.
It was a great day for Sir Orlando.At half-past four the House was full,--not from any desire to hear Sir Orlando's arguments against the bill, but because it was felt that a good deal of personal interest would be attached to the debate.If one were asked in these days what gift should a Prime Minister ask first from the fairies, one would name the power of attracting personal friends.Eloquence, if it be too easy, may become almost a curse.Patriotism is suspected, and sometimes sinks to pedantry.
A Jove-born intellect is hardly wanted, and clashes with the inferiorities.Industry is exacting.Honesty is unpractical.
Truth is easily offended.Dignity will not bend.But the man who can be all things to all men, who has ever a kind word to speak, a pleasant joke to crack, who can forgive all sins, who is ever prepared for friend or foe, but never very bitter to the latter, who forgets not man's names, and is always ready with little words,--he is the man who will be supported at a crisis such as this that was now in the course of passing.It is for him that men will struggle, and talk, and, if needs be, fight, as though the very existence of the country depended on his political security.The present man would receive no such defence, but still the violent deposition of a Prime Minister is always a memorable occasion.