"Well, then, we shall have all the bother of another election; and Earl Grey will form a new Ministry, and Lord Brougham will bully the new Ministry, as he has done the old one, about this Reform Bill. He intended to have begun that business this very night; but there wasn't any Ministers, nor any Administration to arraign, and so he said, in his domineering way, that he would put the question of Reform off until the twenty-fifth of this month, and not a day longer, no matter what circumstances prevailed, nor who were His Majesty's Ministers. I can tell you the city was in a pretty commotion as we came home. We shall have a Reform Government now, with Earl Grey at the head, and the real fight will then begin." "Earl Grey!" said Mrs. Atheling; "that is Edgar's friend." "Well, I wouldn't brag about it, Mother, if I was thee. I shall have to go back to Yorkshire, and so will Exham; and there will be no end of bother, and a Reform Ministry at the end of it. It is too bad! What they will do with Mr. Brougham, I am sure I don't know. No Ministry can live without him; and it will be hard work for any Ministry to live with him; for if he drew up a bill himself, he would find faults in it, and never rest until he had torn it to pieces." Piers was sitting in the embrasure of a window, holding Kate's hands, and talking to her in those low, sweet tones that women love; and at this remark he rose, and, coming towards the Squire, said with a grave smile, "For such dilemmas, Squire, there are remedies made and provided. If it is a clever clergyman who arraigns the church, or his superiors, he is made a bishop; and thereafter, he sees no faults. If it is a clever Commoner who arraigns the Government, the Government makes him a peer; and in the House of Lords, he finds the grace of silence. Earl Grey will have Mr. Brougham made Lord High Chancellor, and then _Lord_ Brougham will only have the power to put the question." Exham's prophecy proved to be correct. Brougham had declared that under any circumstances he would bring up Reform on the twenty-fifth of November; but, on the twenty-second of November, he took his seat as Chancellor in the House of Lords. It was said the Great Seal had been forced upon him; but the Squire wondered what pressure, never before known, had been discovered to make Henry Brougham do anything, or take anything, he did not want to do or take. However the feat was an accomplished one; and with Earl Gray, Lord Durham, Sir James Graham, Viscounts Melbourne and Palmerston, and other great leaders, Brougham kissed the King's hand on his appointment just three days before his threatened demonstration for Reform. Soon after Parliament adjourned for the re-election of Members in the Lower House; and the Duke, with Lord Exham and Squire Atheling, went down into Yorkshire.