She managed all the details of their daily life; the meals were punctually served, the carriage at the door to the moment. Mr. Gladstone was never, through her instrumentality, kept waiting for anything. She contrived with what almost amounted to genius to have a hot dinner consisting of suitable food ready at any time between eight and twelve o’clock that Mr. Gladstone might come home from the House. It was always she who made the arrangements for journeys; she looked after all the details of, and carefully guarded him from, the tiresome inconveniences and annoyances inseparable from travel. She used laughingly to tell him that while he, no doubt, could govern the country admirably, arrangements for a railway journey were better left to her. She accompanied him to the House of Commons whenever he had an important speech to make, and from the Speaker’s little gallery listened to every word and watched every gesture. She herself mixed the egg-flip with which Mr. Gladstone provided himself when his voice was to undergo a prolonged strain. In 1847, when she canvassed for her husband at Oxford, she was described as a “potent canvasser.” At Newcastle in 1862 she told a friend that it had been the happiest day of her life, while her husband averred: “Catherine is a great part of the whole business everywhere,” and twenty years later she said, “I shall never forget that day! It was the first time that he was received as he deserved to be.” Sometimes she would herself receive his callers on business and usher them into the library. Indeed, she shielded him from all the cares and worries that it was possible for her to take on herself. She looked after his health, and in her powers as physician Gladstone had an intense confidence. He often consulted his wife when there were difficulties between Ministers, and averred that her mother-wit often hit on a solution. Even in comparatively small matters she sought to save him physical fatigue. Every one who has held any kind of public office knows the pain incurred in shaking hands with hundreds of people. Mr. Gladstone used to stiffen his hand and to place his thumb against the palm so that people could not grasp it, but even so when his wife thought he had gone through enough fatigue of the kind, standing close behind him she would thrust her hand forward in place of his, and no one noticed the exchange. She accompanied Gladstone on all his political campaigns, on all his recreative travels. When in 1891 he went into residence at All Souls’, Oxford, for a week, she invited herself to stay with Sir Henry Acland, and her husband was in and out of the house as often as he wished.