He had a tongue that would flatter the nose off your face, if you did but listen to him! A voice of silver, and a hand of iron--those are the gifts which have made the fortunes of my Lord of Marlborough." "Ay, an iron hand for keeping money when once the fingers have closed upon it!" laughed one.
"And a wife who rules the Queen, and is bent upon making her husband the greatest man in the kingdom--though she will always keep the upper hand of her lord, you will see.

Marlborough, whom no combination of military prowess can daunt, trembles and turns pale before the frown of his wife!" "Yet it is not fear but love which makes him tremble," said another.

"Although their children are grown to adolescence, he loves her yet as dotingly as ever youthful swain loves the Phyllis of his boyhood's amours!" "That is nothing to sneer at," remarked Lord Claud, speaking for the first time.

"Rather should we thank Heaven, in these days of profligacy and vice, that we have a Queen upon the throne who loves her husband faithfully and well, and a general, victorious in arms, who would gladly lay down his victor's laurels for the joy of living in peaceful obscurity at the side of his wife!" Nobody laughed at Lord Claud's speech, though it would have provoked mirth if another had given utterance to the sentiment.

The talk went on, however, in the same vein, and Tom listened in silence, trying to digest as much as he could of the news of the day.
Lord Claud did not remain long; and when they were in the street together, Tom asked him of the great Duke, and what had been said of him.