His was assuredly not the vulgar self-seeking of the gilded _bourgeois_ who covets an after-dinner sleep on Parliamentary benches.

His ignorance of the machinery of government was profound; though he spoke scornfully of Parliament and its members, he had no conception of those powers of dulness and respectability which seize upon the best men if folly lures them within the precincts of St.
Stephen's.

He thought, poor fellow! that he could rise in his place and thunder forth his indignant eloquence as he did in Commonwealth Hall and elsewhere; he imagined a conscience-stricken House, he dreamed of passionate debates on a Bill which really had the good of the people for its sole object.

Such Bill would of course bear _his_ name; shall we condemn him for that?
Adela was at Exmouth, drinking the mild air, wondering whether there was in truth a life to come, and, if so, whether it was a life wherein Love and Duty were at one.

A year ago such thoughts could not have entered her mind.