About this time Mr. Disraeli was making himself prominent as an orator, and as a foe to the administration. He was clever in nicknames and witty expressions,--as when he dubbed the Blue Book of the Import Duties Committee "the greatest work of imagination that the nineteenth century had produced." Mr. Gladstone was no match for this great parliamentary fencer in irony, in wit, in sarcasm, and in bold attacks; but even in a House so fond of jokes as that of the Commons he commanded equal if not greater attention by his luminous statements of fact and the earnest solemnity of his manner. Benjamin Disraeli entered Parliament in 1837, as a sort of democratic Tory, when the death of King William IV. necessitated a general election. His maiden speech as member for Maidstone was a failure; not because he could not speak well, but because a certain set determined to crush him, and made such a noise that he was obliged to sit down, declaring in a loud voice that the time would come when they should hear him. He was already famous for his novels, and for a remarkable command of language; the pet of aristocratic women, and admired generally for his wit and brilliant conversation, although he provoked criticism for the vulgar finery of his dress and the affectation of his manners. Already he was intimate with Lord Lyndhurst, a lion in the highest aristocratic circles, and universally conceded to be a man of genius. Why should not such a man, at the age of thirty-three, aspire to a seat in Parliament? His future rival, Gladstone, though five years his junior, had already been in Parliament three years, and was distinguished as an orator before Disraeli had a chance to enter the House of Commons as a supporter of Sir Robert Peel; but his extraordinary power was not felt until he attacked his master on the repeal of the corn laws, nor was he the rival of Mr. Gladstone until the Tory party was disintegrated and broken into sections. In 1847, however, he became the acknowledged leader of the most conservative section,--the party of protection,--while Gladstone headed the followers of Peel. On the disruption of the Whig administration in 1851 under Lord John Russell, who was not strong enough for such unsettled times, Lord Derby became premier, and Disraeli took office under him as chancellor of the exchequer,--a post which he held for only a short time, the "coalition cabinet" under Lord Aberdeen having succeeded that of Lord Derby, keeping office during the Crimean war, and leaving the Tories out in the cold until 1858.