This mental query, utterly unthought of and uncalled for, very much annoyed him. Who or What was it that suggested "The Other One"? Not himself; he was sure of that. He went to his father, and they talked of the King, and the Ministers, and the great Mr. Brougham, whom both King and Ministers feared--but all the time, and far below the tide of this restless conversation, Piers heard this very different one,-- "_I_ and _Thou_!" "And _the Other One_." "There is no 'Other One.'" "Annabel." "No." "If Annabel were Destiny?" "Will is stronger than Destiny." "If Annabel should be Will." "Love is stronger than Will." "It is Kate and Piers." "And the Other One." He grew impatient at this persistence of an idea that he had not evoked, that he had, in fact, denied. But he could not exorcise it. His very dreams were made and mingled of the two girls,--Kate, whom he loved, Annabel, who came like a splendid destiny to trouble love. In the pageant of sleep, he lost that will-power which controlled his life; he was tossed to-and-fro between blending shadows: Kate was Annabel; Annabel was Kate; and the fretful, unreasonable drama went on through restless hours, always to the same tantalising refrain,-- "_I, Thou, and the Other One!_" CHAPTER SIXTH THE BEGINNING OF THE GREAT STRUGGLE There is no eternity for nations. Individuals may be punished hereafter; nations are punished here. In the first years of the Nineteenth Century, Englishmen were mad on war; and though wise men warned them of the ruin that stalks after war, no one believed their report. The treasure that would have now fed the starving population of England, had been spent in killing Frenchmen. Bad harvests followed the war years, taxation was increased, wages were lowered and lowered, credit was gone, trade languished, hunger or scrimping carefulness was in every household. For the iniquitous Corn Laws of 1815, forbidding the importation of foreign grain, had raised English wheat to eighty shillings a quarter. And how were working men to buy bread at such a price? No wonder, they clamoured for a House of Commons that should represent their case, and repeal Acts that could only benefit one class, and inflict ruin and misery on all others.