There he sat before the fire with his pouch open before him, and Phineas had no power of moving him.  Could Phineas have paid him the money which was manifestly due to him on the bill, the man would of course have gone; but failing in that, Phineas could not turn him out.  There was a black cloud on the young member’s brow, and great anger at his heart,—­against Fitzgibbon rather than against the man who was sitting there before him.  “Sir,” he said, “it is really imperative that I should go.  I am pledged to an appointment at the House at twelve, and it wants now only a quarter.  I regret that your interview with me should be so unsatisfactory, but I can only promise you that I will see Mr. Fitzgibbon.”

“And when shall I call again, Mr. Finn?”

“Perhaps I had better write to you,” said Phineas.

“Oh dear, no,” said Mr. Clarkson.  “I should much prefer to look in.  Looking in is always best.  We can get to understand one another in that way.  Let me see.  I daresay you’re not particular.  Suppose I say Sunday morning.”

“Really, I could not see you on Sunday morning, Mr. Clarkson.”

“Parliament gents ain’t generally particular,—­’speciaily not among the Catholics,” pleaded Mr. Clarkson.

“I am always engaged on Sundays,” said Phineas.

“Suppose we say Monday,—­or Tuesday.  Tuesday morning at eleven.  And do be punctual, Mr. Finn.  At Tuesday morning I’ll come, and then no doubt I shall find you ready.”  Whereupon Mr. Clarkson slowly put up his bills within his portfolio, and then, before Phineas knew where he was, had warmly shaken that poor dismayed member of Parliament by the hand.  “Only do be punctual, Mr. Finn,” he said, as he made his way down the stairs.

It was now twelve, and Phineas rushed off to a cab.  He was in such a fervour of rage and misery that he could hardly think of his position, or what he had better do, till he got into the Committee Room; and when there he could think of nothing else.  He intended to go deeply into the question of potted peas, holding an equal balance between the assailed Government offices on the one hand, and the advocates of the potted peas on the other.  The potters of the peas, who wanted to sell their article to the Crown, declared that an extensive,—­perhaps we may say, an unlimited,—­use of the article would save the whole army and navy from the scourges of scurvy, dyspepsia, and rheumatism, would be the best safeguard against typhus and other fevers, and would be an invaluable aid in all other maladies to which soldiers and sailors are peculiarly subject.  The peas in question were grown on a large scale in Holstein, and their growth had been fostered with the special object of doing good to the British army and navy.  The peas were so cheap that there would be a great saving in money,—­and it really had seemed to many that the officials of the Horse Guards and the Admiralty had been actuated by some fiendish desire to deprive their men of salutary fresh