Neither the weather, which was very hot, nor the tedium of the session, which had been very great, nor the anxiety of Ministers, which was very pressing, had any effect in impairing the energy of Mr Turnbull. He was as instant, as oratorical, as hostile, as indignant about redistribution as he had been about the franchise. He had been sure then, and he was sure now, that Ministers desired to burke the question, to deceive the people, to produce a bill that should be no bill. He brought out his clause, – and made Loughton his instance. ‘Would the honourable gentleman who sat lowest on the Treasury bench, – who at this moment was in sweet confidential intercourse with the right honourable gentleman now President of the Board of Trade, who had once been a friend of the people, – would the young Lord of the Treasury get up in his place and tell them that no peer of Parliament had at present a voice in sending a member to their House of Commons, – that no peer would have a voice if this bill, as proposed by the Government, were passed in its present useless, ineffectual, conservative, and most dishonest form?’
Phineas, who replied to this, and who told Mr Turnbull that he himself could not answer for any peers, – but that he thought it probable that most peers would, by their opinions, somewhat influence the opinions of some electors, – was thought to have got out of his difficulty very well. But there was the clause of Mr Turnbull to be dealt with, – a clause directly disfranchising seven single-winged boroughs, of which Loughton was of course one, – a clause to which the Government must either submit or object. Submission would be certain defeat in one way, and objection would be as certain defeat in another, – if the gentlemen on the other side were not disposed to assist the ministers. It was said that the Cabinet was divided. Mr Gresham and Mr Monk were for letting the seven boroughs go. Mr Mildmay could not bring himself to obey Mr Turnbull, and Mr Palliser supported him. When Mr Mildmay was told that Mr Daubeny would certainly go into the same lobby with Mr Turnbull respecting the seven boroughs, he was reported to have said that in that case Mr Daubeny must be prepared with a Government. Mr Daubeny made a beautiful speech about the seven boroughs; – the seven sins, and seven stars, and seven churches, and seven lamps. He would make no party question of this. Gentlemen who usually acted with him would vote as their own sense of right or wrong directed them; – from which expression of a special sanction it was considered that these gentlemen were not accustomed to exercise the privilege now accorded to them. But in regarding the question as one of right and wrong, and in looking at what he believed to be both the wish of the country and its interests, he, Mr Daubeny, – he, himself, being simply a humble member of that House, – must support the clause of the honourable gentleman. Almost all those to whom had been surrendered the privilege of using their own judgment for that occasion only, used it discreetly, – as their chief had used it himself, – and Mr Turnbull carried his clause by a majority of fifteen. It was then 3 A.M., and Mr Gresham rising after the division, said that his right honourable friend the First Lord of the Treasury was too tired to return to the House, and had requested him to state that the Government would declare their purpose at 6 P.M. on the following evening.
Phineas, though he had made his little speech in answer to Mr Turnbull with good-humoured flippancy, had recorded his vote in favour of the seven boroughs with a sore heart. Much as he disliked Mr Turnbull, he knew that Mr Turnbull was right in this. He had spoken to Mr Monk on the subject, as it were asking Mr Monk's permission to throw up his office, and vote against Mr Mildmay. But Mr Monk was angry with him, telling him that his conscience was of that restless, uneasy sort which is neither useful nor manly. ‘We all know,’ said Mr Monk, ‘and none better than Mr Mildmay, that we cannot justify such a borough as Loughton by the theory of our parliamentary representation, – any more than we can justify the fact that Huntingdonshire should return as many members as the East Riding.68 There must be compromises, and you should trust to others who have studied the matter more thoroughly than you, to say how far the compromise should go at the present moment.’
‘It is the influence of the peer, not the paucity of the electors,’ said Phineas.
‘And has no peer any influence in a county? Would you disfranchise Westmorland?69 Believe me, Finn, if you want to be useful, you must submit yourself in such matters to those with whom you act.’
Phineas had no answer to make, but he was not happy in his mind. And he was the less happy, perhaps, because he was very sure that Mr Mildmay would be beaten. Mr Low in these days harassed him sorely. Mr Low was very keen against such boroughs as Loughton, declaring that Mr Daubeny was quite right to join his standard to that of Mr Turnbull on such an issue. Mr Low was the reformer now, and Phineas found himself obliged to fight a losing battle on behalf of an acknowledged abuse. He never went near Bunce; but, unfortunately for him, Bunce caught him once in the street and showed him no mercy. ‘Slide was a little 'eavy on you in the Banner the other day, – eh, Mr Finn? – too 'eavy, as I told him.’
‘Mr Slide can be just as heavy as he pleases, Bunce.’
‘That's in course. The press is free, thank God, – as yet. But it wasn't any good rattling away at the Earl's little borough when it's sure to go. Of course it'll go, Mr Finn.’
‘I think it will.’
‘The whole seven on 'em. The 'ouse couldn't but do it. They tell me it's all Mr Mildmay's own work, sticking out for keeping on ‘em. He's very old, and so we'll forgive him. But he must go, Mr Finn.’
‘We shall know all about that soon, Bunce.’
‘If you don't get another seat, Mr Finn, I suppose we shall see you back at the Inn. I hope we may. It's better than being member for Loughton, Mr Finn; – you may be sure of that.’ And then Mr Bunce passed on.
Mr Turnbull carried his clause, and Loughton was doomed. Loughton and the other six deadly sins were anathematized, exorcised, and finally got rid of out of the world by the voices of gentlemen who had been proclaiming the beauty of such pleasant vices all their lives, and who in their hearts hated all changes that tended towards popular representation. But not the less was Mr Mildmay beaten; and, in accordance with the promise made by his first lieutenant immediately after the vote was taken, the Prime Minister came forward on the next evening and made his statement. He had already put his resignation into the hands of Her Majesty, and Her Majesty had graciously accepted it. He was very old, and felt that the time had come in which it behoved him to retire into that leisure which he thought he had, perhaps, earned. He had hoped to carry this bill as the last act of his political life; but he was too old, too stiff, as he said, in his prejudices, to bend further than he had bent already, and he must leave the completion of the matter in other hands. Her Majesty had sent for Mr Gresham, and Mr Gresham had already seen Her Majesty. Mr Gresham and his other colleagues, though they dissented from the clause which had been carried by the united efforts of gentlemen opposite to him, and of gentlemen below him on his own side of the House, were younger men than he, and would, for the country's sake, and for the sake of Her Majesty, – endeavour to carry the bill through. There would then, of course, be a dissolution, and the future Government would, no doubt, depend on the choice of the country. From all which it was understood that Mr Gresham was to go on with the bill to a conclusion, whatever might be the divisions carried against him, and that a new Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs must be chosen. Phineas understood, also, that he had lost his seat at Loughton. For the borough of Loughton there would never again be an election. ‘If I had been Mr Mildmay, I would have thrown the bill up altogether,’ Lord Brentford said afterwards; ‘but of course it was not for me to interfere.’
The session was protracted for two months after that, – beyond the time at which grouse should have been shot, – and by the 23rd of August became the law of the land. ‘I shall never get over it,’ said Mr Ratler to Mr Finn, seated one terribly hot evening on a bench behind the Cabinet Ministers, – ‘never. I don't suppose such a session for work was ever known before. Think what it is to have to
keep men together in August, with the thermometer at 81 °, and the river stinking like, – like the very mischief.’70 Mr Ratler, however, did not die.
On the last day of the session Laurence Fitzgibbon resigned. Rumours reached the ears of Phineas as to the cause of this, but no certain cause was told him. It was said that Lord Cantrip had insisted upon it, Laurence having by mischance been called upon for some official statement during an unfortunate period of absence. There was, however, a mystery about it; – but the mystery was not half so wonderful as the triumph to Phineas, when Mr Gresham offered him the place.
‘But I shall have no seat,’ said Phineas.
‘We shall none of us have seats to-morrow,’ said Mr Gresham.
‘But I shall be at a loss to find a place to stand for.’
‘The election will not come on till November, and you must look about you. Both Mr Monk and Lord Brentford seem to think you will be in the House.’
And so the bill was carried, and the session was ended.
CHAPTER 48
‘The Duke’
By the middle of September there was assembled a large party at Matching Priory, a country mansion belonging to Mr Plantagenet Palliser. The men had certainly been chosen in reference to their political feelings and position, – for there was not a guest in the house who had voted for Mr Turnbull's clause, or the wife or daughter, or sister of any one who had so voted. Indeed, in these days politics ran so high that among politicians all social gatherings were brought together with some reference to the state of parties. Phineas was invited, and when he arrived at Matching he found that half the Cabinet was there. Mr Kennedy was not there, nor was Lady Laura. Mr Monk was there, and the Duke – with the Duchess, and Mr Gresham, and Lord Thrift; Mrs Max Goesler was there also, and Mrs Bonteen, – Mr Bonteen being detained some-where out of the way; and Violet Effingham was expected in two days, and Lord Chiltern at the end of the week. Lady Glencora took an opportunity of imparting this latter information to Phineas very soon after his arrival; and Phineas, as he watched her eye and her mouth while she spoke, was quite sure that Lady Glencora knew the story of the duel. ‘I shall be delighted to see him again,’ said Phineas. ‘That is all right,’ said Lady Glencora. There were also there Mr and Mrs Grey, who were great friends of the Pallisers, – and on the very day on which Phineas reached Matching, at half an hour before the time for dressing, the Duke of Omnium arrived. Now, Mr Palliser was the Duke's nephew and heir, – and the Duke of Omnium was a very great person indeed. I hardly know why it should have been so, but the Duke of Omnium was certainly a greater man in public estimation that the other duke then present, – the Duke of St Bungay. The Duke of St Bungay was a useful man, and had been so all his life, sitting in Cabinets and serving his country, constant as any peer in the House of Lords, always ready to take on his own shoulders any troublesome work required of him, than whom Mr Mildmay, and Mr Mildmay's predecessor at the head of the liberal, party, had had no more devoted adherent. But the Duke of Omnium had never yet done a day's work on behalf of his country. They both wore the Garter, the Duke of St Bungay having earned it by service, the Duke of Omnium having been decorated with the blue ribbon, – because he was Duke of Omnium. The one was a moral, good man, a good husband, a good father, and a good friend. The other, – did not bear quite so high a reputation. But men and women thought but little of the Duke of St Bungay, while the other duke was regarded with an almost reverential awe. I think the secret lay in the simple fact that the Duke of Omnium had not been common in the eyes of the people. He had contrived to envelope himself in something of the ancient mystery of wealth and rank. Within three minutes of the Duke's arrival Mrs Bonteen, with an air of great importance, whispered a word to Phineas. ‘He has come. He arrived exactly at seven!’
‘Who has come?’ Phineas asked.
‘The Duke of Omnium!’ she said, almost reprimanding him by her tone of voice for his indifference. ‘There has been a great doubt whether or no he would show himself at last. Lady Glencora told me that he never will pledge himself. I am so glad he has come.’
‘I don't think I ever saw him,’ said Phineas.
‘Oh, I have seen him, – a magnificent-looking man! I think it is so very nice of Lady Glencora getting him to meet us. It is very rarely that he will join a great party, but they say Lady Glencora can do anything with him since the heir was born. I suppose you have heard all about that.’
‘No,’ said Phineas; ‘I have heard nothing of the heir, but I know that there are three or four babies.’
‘There was no heir, you know, for a year and a half, and they were all au désespoir; and the Duke was very nearly quarrelling with his nephew;71 and Mr Palliser–; you know it had very nearly come to a separation.’
‘I don't know anything at all about it,’ said Phineas, who was not very fond of the lady who was giving him the information.
‘It is so, I can assure you; but since the boy was born Lady Glencora can do anything with the Duke. She made him go to Ascot last spring, and he presented her with the favourite for one of the races on the very morning the horse ran. They say he gave three thousand pounds for him.’
‘And did Lady Glencora win?’
‘No; – the horse lost; and Mr Palliser has never known what to do with him since. But it was very pretty of the Duke; – was it not?’
Phineas, though he had intended to show to Mrs Bonteen how little he thought about the Duke of Omnium, – how small was his respect for a great peer who took no part in politics, – could not protect himself from a certain feeling of anxiety as to the aspect and gait and words of the man of whom people thought so much, of whom he had heard so often, and of whom he had seen so little. He told himself that the Duke of Omnium should be no more to him than any other man, but yet the Duke of Omnium was more to him than other men. When he came down into the drawing-room he was angry with himself, and stood apart; – and was then angry with himself again because he stood apart. Why should he make a difference in his own bearing because there was such a man in the company? And yet he could not avoid it. When he entered the room the Duke was standing in a large bow-window, and two or three ladies and two or three men were standing round him. Phineas would not go near the group, telling himself that he would not approach a man so grand as was the Duke of Omnium. He saw Madame Max Goesler among the party, and after a while he saw her retreat. As she retreated, Phineas knew that some word from Madame Max Goesler had not been received with the graciousness which she had expected. There was the prettiest smile in the world on the lady's face, and she took a corner on a sofa with an air of perfect satisfaction. But yet Phineas knew that she had received a wound.
‘I called twice on you in London,’ said Phineas, coming up close to her, ‘but was not fortunate enough to find you!’
‘Yes; – but you came so late in the season as to make it impossible that there should be any arrangements for our meeting. What can any woman do when a gentleman calls on her in August?’
‘I came in July.’
‘Yes, you did; on the 31st. I keep the most accurate record of all such things, Mr Finn. But let us hope that we may have better luck next year. In the meantime, we can only enjoy the good things that are going.’
‘Socially, or politically, Madame Goesler?’
‘Oh, socially. How can I mean anything else when the Duke of Omnium is here? I feel so much taller at being in the same house with him. Do not you? But you are a spoilt child of fortune, and perhaps you have met him before.’
‘I think I once saw the back of a hat in the park, and somebody told me that the Duke's head was inside it.’
‘And you have never seen him but that once?’
‘Never but that once, – till now.’
‘And do not you feel elated?’
‘Of course I do. For what do you take me, Madame Goesler?’
‘I do, – immensely. I believe him to be a fool, and I never heard of his doing a kind act to anybody in my life.’
‘Not when he gave the racehorse to Lady Glencora?’
‘I wonder whether that was true. Did you ever hear of such an absurdity? As I was saying, I don't think he ever did anything for anybody; – but then, you know, to be Duke of Omnium! It isn't necessary, – is it, – that a Duke of Omnium should do anything except be Duke of Omnium?’
At this moment Lady Glencora came up to Phineas, and took him across to the Duke. The Duke had expressed a desire to be introduced to him. Phineas, half-pleased and half-disgusted, had no alternative, and followed Lady Glencora. The Duke shook hands with him, and made a little bow, and said something about the garrotters, which Phineas, in his confusion, did not quite understand. He tried to reply as he would have replied to anybody else; but the weight of the Duke's majesty was too much for him, and he bungled. The Duke made another little bow, and in a moment was speaking a word of condescension to some other favoured individual. Phineas retreated altogether disgusted, – hating the Duke, but hating himself worse; but he would not retreat in the direction of Madame Max Goesler. It might suit that lady to take an instant little revenge for her discomfiture, but it did not suit him to do so. The question with him would be, whether in some future part of his career it might not be his duty to assist in putting down Dukes of Omnium.
Phineas Finn, the Irish Member Page 50
