sit there," said Mr. Turnbull, in a tone of
voice which was almost angry.

"And what reason have you for supposing that I have omitted that
duty?" said Mr. Monk.

"Simply this,--that I cannot reconcile your known opinions with the
practices of your colleagues."

"I will not tell you what my convictions may be worth in Mr.
Mildmay's Cabinet. I will not take upon myself to say that they are
worth the chair on which I sit when I am there. But I will tell you
what my aspirations were when I consented to fill that chair, and you
shall judge of their worth. I thought that they might possibly leaven
the batch of bread which we have to bake,--giving to the whole batch
more of the flavour of reform than it would have possessed had I
absented myself. I thought that when I was asked to join Mr. Mildmay
and Mr. Gresham, the very fact of that request indicated liberal
progress, and that if I refused the request I should be declining to
assist in good work."

"You could have supported them, if anything were proposed worthy of
support," said Mr. Turnbull.

"Yes; but I could not have been so effective in taking care that
some measure be proposed worthy of support as I may possibly be now.
I thought a good deal about it, and I believe that my decision was
right."

"I am sure you were right," said Mr. Kennedy.

"There can be no juster object of ambition than a seat in the
Cabinet," said Phineas.

"Sir, I must dispute that," said Mr. Turnbull, turning round upon our
hero. "I regard the position of our high Ministers as most
respectable."

"Thank you for so much," said Mr. Monk. But the orator went on again,
regardless of the interruption:--

"The position of gentlemen in inferior offices,--of gentlemen who
attend rather to the nods and winks of their superiors in Downing
Street than to the interest of their constituents,--I do not regard
as being highly respectable."

"A man cannot begin at the top," said Phineas.

"Our friend Mr. Monk has begun at what you are pleased to call the
top," said Mr. Turnbull. "But I will not profess to think that even
he has raised himself by going into office. To be an independent
representative of a really popular commercial constituency is, in my
estimation, the highest object of an Englishman's ambition."

"But why commercial, Mr. Turnbull?" said Mr. Kennedy.

"Because the commercial constituencies really do elect their own
members in accordance with their own judgments, whereas the c