ny rate
appearances would be kept up; and that whatever corner of the field he
got kicked to, the blame for it would be laid, ostensibly, on others;
though, as a result, the monarchy to which it was his bounden duty to
"add luster" would be either strengthened or weakened: and what course
to take he really did not know.

His mind, in consequence, was greatly troubled. Being of conservative
instincts he believed that, in the main, the Bishops were right and the
Prime Minister wrong. The Prime Minister had been harassing the country
with general elections; and the country had had about as many as it
could stand: yet without a fresh election no other ministry was
possible. And now, at a moment when the country was bent on profiting by
the revival in trade which the approaching celebrations had stimulated,
nothing would be so unpopular as a fresh ministerial crisis; and he
could have no doubt that, whatever the papers might pretend to say, the
odium of that crisis, if due to his own action, would fall eventually
upon himself.

And the Prime Minister knew it! Yes, just at that juncture, resignation,
or the threat of it, had become an absolutely compelling card; and he
was playing it for all it was worth. Free Church Bishops were to be
promised for the ensuing year, or the Ministry would be bound to feel,
here and now, that his Majesty's confidence in it had been withdrawn.

Resignation, aimed not against any opposing majority in Parliament, but
against the demur and opposition of the Crown itself--that fact in all
its political significance, with all its possible developments of danger
for the State and of humiliation for the monarchy, was daily pressing
its relentless weight against the King's scruples. The more unanswerable
it seemed the more angry he became, the more keenly did he feel that he
was being unfairly used. And then, one day, as he sat thinking at his
desk, all at once a new thought occurred to him, throwing a queer
radiance into his face, of joy mixed with cunning. And then, gradually,
it faded out and left a blank; the old expression of anxiety and
distrustfulness returned. He shook his head at himself, scared that such
a thought should ever have come into it. "No, no, it wouldn't do!" he
muttered. "Impossible."

All the same he got up from his desk, and in deep cogitation began
walking about the room. The carpet with its rich variegated pattern,
like Max's conversation, helped him to think; until certain