From these contentions Lord Randolph was suddenly withdrawn by a solemn and unexpected event. On June 28 the Duke of Marlborough persuaded the House of Lords to reject by a narrow majority (145--140) the Deceased Wife’s Sister Bill upon its third reading. His speech was perhaps the best he had ever made. It was also his last. On the night of July 4, when he went to bed, he seemed in the best of health and spirits. Early the next morning he was found dead by his servants, struck down by that same swift, unheralded affection of the heart which was a few years later to end the life of his heir. Lord Randolph was profoundly shocked and grieved by his father’s death. He passed many hours reading over his father’s letters, all carefully preserved from his boyhood days. That strong religious strain in his nature to which reference has already been made, afforded him consolation in this season of trouble and, though always a devout man, he became much more regular in devotional exercises than at any other period of his life. He had in his hands the threads of half a dozen political enterprises, for the success of which his constant presence in the House of Commons was necessary. He cast them all away from him and retired at once to Blenheim. Many appeals were made to him to return to the arena, where his absence was instantly felt and regretted even by those in his own party who were antagonistic to him. But nothing would induce him to go near Parliament for the rest of the year. ‘You are very kind,’ he wrote to Wolff, ‘wanting me to come back to the House; but it is quite impossible. I am not up to it physically or mentally, and am longing to get away abroad.... It is very melancholy here--sad recollections at every moment. Nothing can be nicer than Blandford to everyone.’ The two brothers were very closely drawn together by their common mourning, and all bitterness faded at once out of the political world. Sir Stafford Northcote wrote, in the gentle courtesy of his nature, a generous and affectionate letter of sympathy and regret and a private correspondence followed between them which stands in pleasant contrast to the general course of their relations and shows that in modern times personal kindness and good feeling lie never very far below the sullen surface of English politics.