I’ll be shot if I hear you, that’s all. Fill your glass. That’s old port that John Beresford tasted in the Custom-House Docks seventy-odd years ago, and you are the only Whig living that ever drank a drop of it!’ ‘I am proud to be the first exception, and I go so far as to believe--I shall not be the last!’ ‘I’ll send a few bottles over to that boy in the infirmary. It cannot but be good for him,’ said Flood. ‘Take care, for Heaven’s sake, if he be threatened with inflammation. Do nothing without the doctor’s leave.’ ‘I wonder why the people who are so afraid of inflammation, are so fond of rebellion,’ said he sarcastically. ‘Perhaps I could tell you that, too--’ ‘No, do not--do not, I beseech you; reading the Whig Ministers’ speeches has given me such a disgust to all explanations, I’d rather concede anything than hear how it could be defended! Apparently Mr. Disraeli is of my mind also, for he won’t support Paul Hartigan’s motion.’ ‘What was Hartigan’s motion?’ ‘For the papers, or the correspondence, or whatever they called it, that passed between Danesbury and Dan Donogan.’ ‘But there was none.’ ‘Is that all you know of it? They were as thick as two thieves. It was “Dear Dane” and “Dear Dan” between them. “Stop the shooting. We want a light calendar at the summer assizes,” says one. “You shall have forty thousand pounds yearly for a Catholic college, if the House will let us.” “Thank you for nothing for the Catholic college,” says Dan. “We want our own Parliament and our own militia; free pardon for political offences.” What would you say to a bill to make landlord-shooting manslaughter, Mr. Kearney?’ ‘Justifiable homicide, Mr. Bright called it years ago, but the judges didn’t see it.’ ‘This Danesbury “muddle,” for that is the name they give it, will be hushed up, for he has got some Tory connections, and the lords are never hard on one of their “order,” so I hear. Hartigan is to be let have his talk out in the House, and as he is said to be violent and indiscreet, the Prime Minister will only reply to the violence and the indiscretion, and he will conclude by saying that the noble Viceroy has begged Her Majesty to release him of the charge of the Irish Government; and though the Cabinet have urgently entreated him to remain and carry out the wise policy of conciliation so happily begun in Ireland, he is rooted in his resolve, and he will not stay; and there will be cheers; and when he adds that Mr. Cecil Walpole, having shown his great talents for intrigue, will be sent back to the fitting sphere--his old profession of diplomacy--there will be laughter; for as the Minister seldom jokes, the House will imagine this to be a slip, and then, with every one in good humour--but Paul Hartigan, who will have to withdraw his motion--the right honourable gentleman will sit down, well pleased at his afternoon’s work.’