‘But if the right honourable member for Westminster were to propose to the Committee that he himself should have a vote at Parliamentary elections and that I should have none, I feel sure the House of Commons would repudiate the proposal with indignation and disgust.’ The ‘mud-cabin’ argument seems after this to have disappeared altogether from Parliamentary warfare and Mr. Brodrick’s amendment was rejected by the enormous majority of 332 to 137. After this the resistance of the Opposition in the House of Commons was at an end. The third reading of the Bill was allowed to pass _nemine contradicente_ and entered accordingly on the journals of the House. The Bill then went to the House of Lords at the end of June; and there, by amendments supported by majorities of 59 and 50, it was incontinently destroyed. The collision between the two Houses was direct, and a dangerous excitement arose in the country. Although unwilling to impede the progress of the Reform Bill and decidedly predisposed to take action contrary to the views of his own pastors above the gangway in order to put a spoke in their wheel, Lord Randolph was the most unrelenting and vigilant opponent of the Liberal Government. Whenever and wherever a favourable chance of fighting occurred he was the foremost man, and many furious wrangles between him and Mr. Gladstone, or Mr. Chamberlain or Sir Charles Dilke marked the course of the session. In the quarrel between the two Houses after the rejection of the Bill in the House of Lords, he exerted himself to his utmost on behalf of the House of Lords and laid on the Prime Minister the whole responsibility for the dangerous constitutional situation which had arisen and was becoming increasingly grave. Hansard and the newspapers record these battles in ample detail. Sometimes he found powerful support. On one occasion, when a dispute arose with Sir Charles Dilke as to the accuracy of a quotation from Lord Randolph’s speeches, Sir Michael Hicks-Beach said abruptly that ‘he preferred to believe the word of his noble friend to that of the right honourable baronet’--an observation which he was required by the Speaker to withdraw. On another occasion Lord Randolph charged the Prime Minister with having ‘traduced’ his opponents by representing that Lord Salisbury had said in the course of a confidential conversation that he would not discuss Redistribution ‘with a rope round his neck,’ and he moved the adjournment of the House. Mr. Gladstone, violently incensed, described this word ‘traduce’--which he declared implied a wilful and disgraceful act, not arising from error--as ‘foul language.’ Lord Randolph immediately rose to order, and asked the Speaker whether the Prime Minister was to be allowed to use words which would not be tolerated in any other member. The Speaker hoped that Mr. Gladstone would not insist on employing the expression. The Prime Minister’s reply was accepted as a withdrawal, though his