'Hartington is very angry with me for not voting, and wants me turned out for it. He has to vote every day for things which he strongly disapproves, and this makes the position difficult. He says that my position was wholly different from that of Fawcett and Courtney, because I was a party to the decision of the Cabinet, and that custom binds the minority in the collective decision of Her Majesty's servants. This is undoubtedly the accepted theory. Poor Hibbert was made to vote. [Footnote: Sir John Tomlinson Hibbert (d. 1908), at this time Financial Secretary to the Treasury, was an able administrator, and held office in Mr. Gladstone's four administrations. He assisted materially in the passing of the Execution within Gaols Act, Married Women's Property Act, and Clergy Disabilities Act, and was keenly interested in the reform of the Poor Law.] I fear the Cabinet put the yoke, not of political necessity, but of their personal prejudice against woman suffrage, on the necks of their followers.' The matter came up at a Cabinet on June 14th, and was made worse because a letter from Lord Hartington, 'offensive in tone,' had been circulated by accident. However, Mr. Gladstone issued a minute about my walking out on woman's suffrage, which concluded by a proposal, if his colleagues concurred, to request me to remain in the Government. Thus ended a personal crisis which, to use the French phrase, had been 'open' since my letter to Mr. Gladstone dated 'Antibes, Easter Eve.' 'Chamberlain wrote to me: "It is settled"; and I wrote back: "It is settled. I would not have asked you to stand by me, as I have no constitutional case, and your conduct in so doing could not be defended. I always count on your friendship, but this would have been too much." He replied: "We are both right. You could not ask me, but if you had been requested to resign I should have gone too." Chamberlain had previously informed the Cabinet that, though he differed from me about woman's suffrage, and regretted the course that I had felt myself obliged to take, he intended to stand by me "to the fullest extent."' [Footnote: The further negotiations with regard to Franchise and Redistribution in 1884, and the 'compact' which ended them, are dealt with in Chapter XXXVI., infra, pp. 63-79.] II. While the great measure of the Session went steadily through its stages, various other questions were also occupying the Cabinet. The search for a new Speaker in succession to Sir Henry Brand, who had declared at the beginning of 1883 his unwillingness to retain office beyond that Session, was one, and not the least important, of these questions. Sir Henry James was first mentioned, and he refused.