rise. Yet, public
life has its difficulties in proportion to its height. As Walpole said,
that no man knows the human heart but a minister; so no man knows the real
difficulties of office, but the man of office. Lures to his passions,
temptations to his integrity, and alarms to his fears, are perpetually
acting on his sense of honour. To make a false step is the most natural
thing in the world under all those impulses; and one false step ruins him.
The rumour reached me that there were dissensions in the cabinet; and,
though all was smooth to the eye, I had soon sufficient proof that the
intelligence was true. A prominent member of the administration was the
object of the intrigue. He was an intelligent, high-spirited, and
straightforward man, open in language, if the language was not of the most
classic order; and bold in his conceptions, if those conceptions were not
formed on the most accomplished knowledge. He had attained his high
position, partly by public services, but still more by connexion. It was
impossible to refuse respect to his general powers, but it was equally
impossible to deny the intellectual superiority of his competitor. The
contrast which they presented in the House was decisive of their talents
for debate. While the one spoke his mind with the uncultured expressions
of the moment; the other never addressed the House but with the polished
and pointed diction of the orator. He was the most accomplished of
debaters.--Always prepared, always pungent, often powerful. Distinguished
in early life by scholarship, he had brought all the finer spirit of his
studies into the business of public life. He was the delight of the House;
and the boundless applause which followed his eloquence, and paid an
involuntary tribute to his mastery of public affairs, not unnaturally
stimulated his ambition to possess that leading official rank to which he
seemed called by the right of nature. The rivalry at length became open
and declared; it had been felt too deeply to die away among the casual
impressions of public life; it had been suppressed too long to be forgiven
on either side; and the crisis was evidently approaching in which it was
necessary to take a part with either of those gifted men.

I seldom spent more anxious hours in the course of an anxious life, than
during the period of this deliberation. I felt all the fascinations of the
man of genius. On the other hand, I respected all the solid and manly
qualities