By the time that Lord John Russell’s measure was being debated in the House of Commons, there was a new political animation in Middlemarch, and a new definition of parties which might show a decided change of balance if a new election came.  And there were some who already predicted this event, declaring that a Reform Bill would never be carried by the actual Parliament.  This was what Will Ladislaw dwelt on to Mr. Brooke as a reason for congratulation that he had not yet tried his strength at the hustings.

“Things will grow and ripen as if it were a comet year,” said Will.  “The public temper will soon get to a cometary heat, now the question of Reform has set in.  There is likely to be another election before long, and by that time Middlemarch will have got more ideas into its head.  What we have to work at now is the `Pioneer’ and political meetings.”

“Quite right, Ladislaw; we shall make a new thing of opinion here,” said Mr. Brooke.  “Only I want to keep myself independent about Reform, you know; I don’t want to go too far.  I want to take up.  Wilberforce’s and Romilly’s line, you know, and work at Negro Emancipation, Criminal Law—­that kind of thing.  But of course I should support Grey.”

“If you go in for the principle of Reform, you must be prepared to take what the situation offers,” said Will.  “If everybody pulled for his own bit against everybody else, the whole question would go to tatters.”

“Yes, yes, I agree with you—­I quite take that point of view.  I should put it in that light.  I should support Grey, you know.  But I don’t want to change the balance of the constitution, and I don’t think Grey would.”

“But that is what the country wants,"-said Will.  “Else there would be no meaning in political unions or any other movement that knows what it’s about.  It wants to have a House of Commons which is not weighted with nominees of the landed class, but with representatives of the other interests.  And as to contending for a reform short of that, it is like asking for a bit of an avalanche which has already begun to thunder.”

“That is fine, Ladislaw:  that is the way to put it.  Write that down, now.  We must begin to get documents about the feeling of the country, as well as the machine-breaking and general distress.”

“As to documents,” said Will, “a two-inch card will hold plenty.  A few rows of figures are enough to deduce misery from, and a few more will show the rate at which the political determination of the people is growing.”

“Good:  draw that out a little more at length, Ladislaw.  That is an idea, now:  write it out in the `Pioneer.’  Put the figures and deduce the misery, you know; and put the other figures and deduce—­ and so on.  You have a way of putting things.  Burke, now:—­when I think of Burke, I can’t help wishing somebody had a pocket-borough to give you, Ladislaw.  You’d never get elected, you know.  And we shall always want talent in the House:  reform as we will, we shall always want talent.  That avalanche and the thunder, now, was really a little like Burke.  I want that sort of thing—­not ideas, you know, but a way of putting them.”