He spoke for about an hour, and while he was speaking he knew nothing about himself, whether he was doing it well or ill.  Something of himself he did say soon after he had commenced,—­not quite beginning with it, as though his mind had been laden with the matter.  He had, he said, found himself compelled to renounce his happy allegiance to the First Lord of the Treasury, and to quit the pleasant company in which, humble as had been his place, he had been allowed to sit and act, by his unfortunate conviction in this great subject.  He had been told, he said, that it was a misfortune in itself for one so young as he to have convictions.  But his Irish birth and Irish connection had brought this misfortune of his country so closely home to him that he had found the task of extricating himself from it to be impossible.  Of what further he said, speaking on that terribly unintelligible subject, a tenant-right proposed for Irish farmers, no English reader will desire to know much.  Irish subjects in the House of Commons are interesting or are dull, are debated before a crowded audience composed of all who are leaders in the great world of London, or before empty benches, in accordance with the importance of the moment and the character of the debate.  For us now it is enough to know that to our hero was accorded that attention which orators love,—­which will almost make an orator if it can be assured.  A full House with a promise of big type on the next morning would wake to eloquence the propounder of a Canadian grievance, or the mover of an Indian budget.

Phineas did not stir out of the House till the division was over, having agreed with Mr. Monk that they two would remain through it all and hear everything that was to be said.  Mr. Gresham had already spoken, and to Mr. Palliser was confided the task of winding up the argument for the Government.  Mr. Robson spoke also, greatly enlivening the tedium of the evening, and to Mr. Monk was permitted the privilege of a final reply.  At two o’clock the division came, and the Ministry were beaten by a majority of twenty-three.  “And now,” said Mr. Monk, as he again walked home with Phineas, “the pity is that we are not a bit nearer tenant-right than we were before.”

“But we are nearer to it.”

“In one sense, yes.  Such a debate and such a majority will make men think.  But no;—­think is too high a word; as a rule men don’t think.  But it will make them believe that there is something in it.  Many who before regarded legislation on the subject as chimerical, will now fancy that it is only dangerous, or perhaps not more than difficult.  And so in time it will come to be looked on as among the things possible, then among the things probable;—­and so at last it will be ranged in the list of those few measures which the country requires as being absolutely needed.  That is the way in which public opinion is made.”

“It is no loss of time,” said Phineas, “to have taken the first great step in making it.”