A week passed by at Loughlinter, at the end of which Phineas found himself on terms of friendly intercourse with all the political magnates assembled in the house, but especially with Mr. Monk.  He had determined that he would not follow Lady Laura’s advice as to his selection of companions, if in doing so he should be driven even to a seeming of intrusion.  He made no attempt to sit at the feet of anybody, and would stand aloof when bigger men than himself were talking, and was content to be less,—­as indeed he was less,—­than Mr. Bonteen or Mr. Ratler.  But at the end of a week he found that, without any effort on his part,—­almost in opposition to efforts on his part,—­he had fallen into an easy pleasant way with these men which was very delightful to him.  He had killed a stag in company with Mr. Palliser, and had stopped beneath a crag to discuss with him a question as to the duty on Irish malt.  He had played chess with Mr. Gresham, and had been told that gentleman’s opinion on the trial of Mr. Jefferson Davis.  Lord Brentford had—­at last—­called him Finn, and had proved to him that nothing was known in Ireland about sheep.  But with Mr. Monk he had had long discussions on abstract questions in politics,—­and before the week was over was almost disposed to call himself a disciple, or, at least, a follower of Mr. Monk.  Why not of Mr. Monk as well as of any one else?  Mr. Monk was in the Cabinet, and of all the members of the Cabinet was the most advanced Liberal.  “Lady Glencora was not so far wrong the other night,” Mr. Monk said to him.  “Equality is an ugly word and shouldn’t be used.  It misleads, and frightens, and is a bugbear.  And she, in using it, had not perhaps a clearly defined meaning for it in her own mind.  But the wish of every honest man should be to assist in lifting up those below him, till they be something nearer his own level than he finds them.”  To this Phineas assented,—­and by degrees he found himself assenting to a great many things that Mr. Monk said to him.

Mr. Monk was a thin, tall, gaunt man, who had devoted his whole life to politics, hitherto without any personal reward beyond that which came to him from the reputation of his name, and from the honour of a seat in Parliament.  He was one of four or five brothers,—­and all besides him were in trade.  They had prospered in trade, whereas he had prospered solely in politics; and men said that he was dependent altogether on what his relatives supplied for his support.  He had now been in Parliament for more than twenty years, and had been known not only as a Radical but as a Democrat.  Ten years since, when he had risen to fame, but not to repute, among the men who then governed England, nobody dreamed that Joshua Monk would ever be a paid servant of the Crown.  He had inveighed against one minister after another as though they all deserved impeachment.  He had advocated political doctrines which at that time seemed to be altogether at variance with any possibility of governing according to English rules of government.  He had been regarded as a pestilent thorn in the sides of all ministers.  But now he was a member of the Cabinet, and those whom he had terrified in the old days began to find that he was not so much unlike other men.  There are but few horses which you cannot put into harness, and those of the highest spirit will generally do your work the best.