write slashing articles.  Mr. Slide was an energetic but not a thoughtful man; but in his thoughts on politics, as far as they went with him, he regarded the wrongs of the people as being of infinitely greater value than their rights.  It was not that he was insincere in all that he was daily saying;—­but simply that he never thought about it.  Very early in life he had fallen among “people’s friends,” and an opening on the liberal press had come in his way.  To be a “people’s friend” suited the turn of his ambition, and he was a “people’s friend.”  It was his business to abuse Government, and to express on all occasions an opinion that as a matter of course the ruling powers were the “people’s enemies.”  Had the ruling powers ceased to be the “people’s enemies,” Mr. Slide’s ground would have been taken from under his feet.  But such a catastrophe was out of the question.  That excellent old arrangement that had gone on since demagogues were first invented was in full vigour.  There were the ruling powers and there were the people,—­devils on one side and angels on the other,—­and as long as a people’s friend had a pen in his hand all was right.

Phineas, when he left the indignant Bunce to go among his friends, walked to the House thinking a good deal of what Mr. Slide had said to him.  The potted peas Committee was again on, and he had intended to be in the Committee Room by twelve punctually:  but he had been unable to leave Mr. Bunce in the lurch, and it was now past one.  Indeed, he had, from one unfortunate circumstance after another, failed hitherto in giving to the potted peas that resolute attention which the subject demanded.  On the present occasion his mind was full of Mr. Quintus Slide and the People’s Banner.  After all, was there not something in Mr. Slide’s proposition?  He, Phineas, had come into Parliament as it were under the wing of a Government pack, and his friendships, which had been very successful, had been made with Ministers, and with the friends of Ministers.  He had made up his mind to be Whig Ministerial, and to look for his profession in that line.  He had been specially fortified in this resolution by his dislike to the ballot,—­which dislike had been the result of Mr. Monk’s teaching.  Had Mr. Turnbull become his friend instead, it may well be that he would have liked the ballot.  On such subjects men must think long, and be sure that they have thought in earnest, before they are justified in saying that their opinions are the results of their own thoughts.  But now he began to reflect how far this ministerial profession would suit him.  Would it be much to be a Lord of the Treasury, subject to the dominion of Mr. Ratler?  Such lordship and such subjection would be the result of success.  He told himself that he was at heart a true Liberal.  Would it not be better for him to abandon the idea of office trammels, and go among them on the People’s Banner?  A glow of enthusiasm came over him as he thought of it.  But what would Violet Effingham say to the People’s Banner and Mr. Quintus Slide?  And he would have liked the Banner better had not Mr. Slide talked about the ’Ouse.