What do _you_ think? and so it is from morning
till night, in the streets, in the clubs, and in private houses.
Yesterday morning met Hobhouse; told him how well I heard he had
spoken, and asked him what he thought of Peel's speech; he said
it was brilliant, imposing, but not much in it. Everybody cries
up (more than usual) the speeches on their own side, and despises
those on the other, which is peculiarly absurd, because the
speaking has been very good, and there is so much to be said on
both sides that the speech of an adversary may be applauded
without any admission of his being in the right. Hobhouse told me
he had at first been afraid that his constituents would
disapprove this measure, as so many of them would be
disfranchised, but that they had behaved nobly and were quite
content and ready to make any sacrifices for such an object. I
asked him if he thought it would be carried; he said he did not
like to think it would not, for he was desirous of keeping what
he had, and he was persuaded he should lose it if the Bill were
rejected. I said it was an unlucky dilemma when one-half of the
world thought like him and the other half were equally convinced
that if it be carried they shall lose everything.

Dined at Boodle's with the Master of the Rolls and Charles Grant,
who talked about Peel and the reconstruction of the Tory party;
that Peel and Wetherell do not _yet_ speak, but that the parties
have joined, and at the meeting at Wetherell's Herries went to
represent Peel with sixteen or eighteen of his friends. Ross,
another of Peel's _ames damnees_, told me the same thing and that
they would soon come together again. Grant said he knew that the
Duke of Wellington had expressed his readiness to take any part
in which it was thought he could render service, either a
prominent or a subordinate one or none at all. If so he will be a
greater man than he has ever been yet.

Grant talked long and pathetically about the West Indies, and
told me a curious anecdote on the authority of Scarlett, who was
present. When Wilberforce went out of Parliament he went to
Canning and offered him the lead and direction of his party (the
Saints), urging him to accept it, and assuring him that their
support would give him a strength which to an ambitious man like
him was invaluable. Canning took three days to consider it, but
finally declined, and then the party elected Brougham as their
chief; hence the representation of Yorkshire an