itself perhaps a little dangerous. Gentlemen bound to support the
Government, when they perceived that there was comparatively but
little to do, and that that little might be easily done, became
careless, and, perhaps, a little contemptuous. So that the great
popular orator, Mr. Turnbull, found himself compelled to rise in his
seat, and ask whether the noble Duke at the head of the Government
thought himself strong enough to rule without attention to
Parliamentary details. The question was asked with an air of
inexorable severity, and was intended to have deep signification. Mr.
Turnbull had disliked the Coalition from the beginning; but then Mr.
Turnbull always disliked everything. He had so accustomed himself to
wield the constitutional cat-of-nine-tails, that heaven will hardly
be happy to him unless he be allowed to flog the cherubim. Though the
party with which he was presumed to act had generally been in power
since he had been in the House, he had never allowed himself to agree
with a Minister on any point. And as he had never been satisfied
with a Liberal Government, it was not probable that he should endure
a Coalition in silence. At the end of a rather lengthy speech, he
repeated his question, and then sat down, taking his place with all
that constitutional indignation which becomes the parliamentary
flagellator of the day. The little jokes with which Sir Orlando
answered him were very well in their way. Mr. Turnbull did not care
much whether he were answered or not. Perhaps the jauntiness of Sir
Orlando, which implied that the Coalition was too strong to regard
attack, somewhat irritated outsiders. But there certainly grew up
from that moment a feeling among such men as Erle and Rattler that
care was necessary, that the House, taken as a whole, was not in a
condition to be manipulated with easy freedom, and that Sir Orlando
must be made to understand that he was not strong enough to depend
upon jauntiness. The jaunty statesman must be very sure of his
personal following. There was a general opinion that Sir Orlando had
not brought the Coalition well out of the first real attack which had
been made upon it.

"Well, Phineas; how do you like the Phoenix?" Phineas Finn had
flown back to London at the instigation probably of Mr. Rattler, and
was now standing at the window of Brooks's club with Barrington Erle.
It was near nine one Thursday evening, and they were both about to
return to the House.

"I don't li