“Is there one law he ever caused to pass for the benefit of the working classes? No, Lord Paul, his Whiggism is for peers, and his Toryism for peasants. With the same zeal he advocates the Catholic Question and the Manchester Massacre.” “Yet, surely,” cried Lord Paul, “you make a difference between the just liberality that provides for property and intelligence, and the dangerous liberality that would slacken the reins of an ignorant multitude.” “But,” said Mr. Benson, a very powerful member of the Lower House, “true politicians must conform to circumstances. Canning may not be all we wish, but still he ought to be supported. I confess that I shall be generous: I care not for office, I care not for power; but Canning is surrounded with enemies, who are enemies also to the people: for that reason I shall support him.” “Bravo, Benson!” cried Lord Paul. “Bravo, Benson!” echoed two or three notables, who had waited an opportunity to declare themselves; “that’s what I call handsome.” “Manly!” “Fair!” “Disinterested, by Jove!” Here the Duke of Aspindale suddenly entered the room. “Ah, Lady Erpingham, you should have been in the Lords to-night; such a speech! Canning is crushed for ever!” “Speech! from whom?” “Lord Grey--terrific: it was the vengeance of a life concentrated into one hour; it has shaken the Ministry fearfully.” “Humph!” said Benson, rising; “I shall go to Brooks’s and hear more.” “And I too,” said Lord Paul. A day or two after, Benson in presenting a petition, alluded in terms of high eulogy to the masterly speech made “in another place:” and Lord Paul Plympton said, “it was indeed unequalled.” That’s what I call handsome. Manly! Fair! Disinterested, by Jove! And Canning died; his gallant soul left the field of politics broken into a thousand petty parties. From the time of his death the two great hosts into which the struggles for power were divided have never recovered their former strength. The demarcation that his policy had tended to efface was afterwards more weakened by his successor, the Duke of Wellington; and had it not been for the question of Reform that again drew the stragglers on either side around one determined banner, it is likely that Whig and Tory would, among the many minute sections and shades of difference, have lost for ever the two broad distinguishing colours of their separate factions. Mr. Canning died; and now, with redoubled energy, went on the wheels of political intrigue. The rapid succession of short-lived administrations, the leisure of a prolonged peace, the pressure of debt, the writings of philosophers, all, insensibly, yet quickly, excited that popular temperament which found its crisis in the Reform Bill. CHAPTER LV. THE DEATH OF GEORGE IV.--THE POLITICAL SITUATION OF PARTIES, AND OF LADY ERPINGHAM.