m, and they had been glad to see him, and Mrs.
Low had been less severe than hitherto against the great sin of her
husband's late pupil. She had condescended to congratulate him on
becoming member for an English borough instead of an Irish one, and
had asked him questions about Saulsby Castle. But, nevertheless, Mr.
Monk's letter was not received with that respectful admiration which
Phineas thought that it deserved. Phineas, foolishly, had read it
out loud, so that the attack came upon him simultaneously from the
husband and from the wife.

"It is just the usual claptrap," said Mr. Low, "only put into
language somewhat more grandiloquent than usual."

"Claptrap!" said Phineas.

"It's what I call downright Radical nonsense," said Mrs. Low, nodding
her head energetically. "Portrait indeed! Why should we want to have
a portrait of ignorance and ugliness? What we all want is to have
things quiet and orderly."

"Then you'd better have a paternal government at once," said Phineas.

"Just so," said Mr. Low,--"only that what you call a paternal
government is not always quiet and orderly. National order I take to
be submission to the law. I should not think it quiet and orderly if
I were sent to Cayenne without being brought before a jury."

"But such a man as you would not be sent to Cayenne," said Phineas,

"My next-door neighbour might be,--which would be almost as bad. Let
him be sent to Cayenne if he deserves it, but let a jury say that
he has deserved it. My idea of government is this,--that we want
to be governed by law and not by caprice, and that we must have a
legislature to make our laws. If I thought that Parliament as at
present established made the laws badly, I would desire a change;
but I doubt whether we shall have them better from any change in
Parliament which Reform will give us."

"Of course not," said Mrs. Low. "But we shall have a lot of beggars
put on horseback, and we all know where they ride to."

Then Phineas became aware that it is not easy to convince any man or
any woman on a point of politics,--not even though he who argues may
have an eloquent letter from a philosophical Cabinet Minister in his
pocket to assist him.

CHAPTER XXXVI

Phineas Finn Makes Progress

February was far advanced and the new Reform Bill had already been
brought forward, before Lady Laura Kennedy came up to town. Phineas
had of course seen Mr. Kennedy and had heard from him tidings of
his wife. She wa