the Government has not fallen into the disgracefully incapable hands of his right honourable friend opposite; and after that the Address is carried amidst universal serenity.  But such was not the order of the day on the present occasion.  Mr. Mildmay, the veteran leader of the liberal side of the House, had moved an amendment to the Address, and had urged upon the House, in very strong language, the expediency of showing, at the very commencement of the session, that the country had returned to Parliament a strong majority determined not to put up with Conservative inactivity.  “I conceive it to be my duty,” Mr. Mildmay had said, “at once to assume that the country is unwilling that the right honourable gentlemen opposite should keep their seats on the bench upon which they sit, and in the performance of that duty I am called upon to divide the House upon the Address to her Majesty.”  And if Mr. Mildmay used strong language, the reader may be sure that Mr. Mildmay’s followers used language much stronger.  And Mr. Daubeny, who was the present leader of the House, and representative there of the Ministry,—­Lord de Terrier, the Premier, sitting in the House of Lords,—­was not the man to allow these amenities to pass by without adequate replies.  He and his friends were very strong in sarcasm, if they failed in argument, and lacked nothing for words, though it might perhaps be proved that they were short in numbers.  It was considered that the speech in which Mr. Daubeny reviewed the long political life of Mr. Mildmay, and showed that Mr. Mildmay had been at one time a bugbear, and then a nightmare, and latterly simply a fungus, was one of the severest attacks, if not the most severe, that had been heard in that House since the Reform Bill.  Mr. Mildmay, the while, was sitting with his hat low down over his eyes, and many men said that he did not like it.  But this speech was not made till after that dinner at Lord Brentford’s, of which a short account must be given.

Had it not been for the overwhelming interest of the doings in Parliament at the commencement of the session, Phineas might have perhaps abstained from attending, in spite of the charm of novelty.  For, in truth, Mr. Low’s words had moved him much.  But if it was to be his fate to be a member of Parliament only for ten days, surely it would be well that he should take advantage of the time to hear such a debate as this.  It would be a thing to talk of to his children in twenty years’ time, or to his grandchildren in fifty;—­and it would be essentially necessary that he should be able to talk of it to Lady Laura Standish.  He did, therefore, sit in the House till one on the Monday night, and till two on the Tuesday night, and heard the debate adjourned till the Thursday.  On the Thursday Mr. Daubeny was to make his great speech, and then the division would come.