‘I said, when you are at Ashley Place come over to Atheling, and I gave Edgar my hand and looked at him; and he looked at me and clasped it tight, and said, “We will come.’”
“That was right.”
“I am glad I have done right for once, Maude. Do you know that Ashley is one of the worst Radicals in the lot of them?”
“Never mind, John. I have noticed that, as a general thing, the worse Radical, the better man; but a Tory cannot be trusted to give a Radical a character. The Tories are very like the poor cat who said, ‘If she only had wings, she would gladly extirpate the whole race of those troublesome sparrows.’”
“There are to be no more Tories now, we have got a new name. Lord John Russell called us ‘Conservatives,’ and we took to the word, and it is as like as not to stick to us. It will be Conservatives and Reformers in the future.”
“But you said the Reform Bill was lost.”
“I said it had not passed. What of that? The rascals have only been downed for this round; they will be up to time, when time is called June the twenty-first; and they will fight harder than ever.”
“How was the Bill lost? By obstructions?”
“Yes; when it was ready to go into Committee, General Gascoigne moved that, ‘The number of members returned to Parliament ought not to be diminished;’ and when the House divided on this motion, Gascoigne’s resolution had a majority of eight.”
“Then Grey’s Ministry have retired?” said Mrs. Atheling, in alarm.