active work, and when the measure was passing through the House of Commons evil changes, it was argued, were made in it, and for these Mr. Bright could not be blamed. Unfortunately it was written in the inexorable chronicles of _Hansard_ that the only changes made in the Bill were all in favour of the Dissenters. Mr. Bright was accordingly too clearly responsible for the original measure, which was infinitely more odious to the Nonconformists than the one that was finally passed, and which he now disowned and denounced on account of its injustice. Curiously enough, it was Mr. Lowe who was most successful in winning popularity for the Ministry during the recess. The police found in him a zealous defender. The working-classes heard with pleased surprise a rumour to the effect that he had drafted a Bill conceding the demand of Trade Unionists for a reform of the Labour Laws. His manner of receiving deputations had suddenly become bland and suave. When, for example, the representatives of the Licensed Victuallers went to complain to him of the Licensing Laws, he was so sympathetic that the leader of the deputation sent a graphic account of the interview to the Press. He explained how he and his colleagues had waited on the new Home Secretary in fear and trembling, but how delighted they were to find that “the great scholar and debater cheered the meeting with many sunny glimpses of his own Anti-puritanic nature.” Still, in spite of Mr. Bright and Mr. Lowe, the Liberal cause was waning among the electors. Every day Mr. Chamberlain was driving deeper and deeper into the heart of the Liberal Party the wedge of Dissenting dissension, that ultimately split its electoral organisation in twain. On the whole, the bye-elections favoured the Conservatives. But Mr. Henry James, the new Attorney-General, carried Taunton, and Captain Hayter, owing to an imprudent letter which Mr. Disraeli wrote in support of the Tory candidate, was successful at Bath.[62] A Colonial scandal and a Colonial war also attracted much attention during the recess, and though the scandal did not affect the Ministry, the war somewhat chilled the sympathies of many of their strongest supporters.