But for him,--he had to arrange who should attend the Queen, what ribbons should be given away, and what middle-aged young man should move the address.

He sighed as he thought of those happy days in which he used to fear that his mind and body would both give way under the pressure of decimal coinage.
But Phineas Finn had read the Duke's character rightly in saying that he was neither gregarious nor communicative, and therefore but little fitted to rule Englishmen.

He had thought that it was so himself, and now from day to day he was becoming more assured of his own deficiency.

He could not throw himself into cordial relations with the Sir Orlando Droughts, or even with the Mr.Monks.But, though he had never wished to be put into his present high office, now that he was there he dreaded the sense of failure which would follow his descent from it.

It is this feeling rather than genuine ambition, rather than the love of power or patronage or pay, which induces men to cling to place.