"Oh, yes."
"And then, in spite of Messrs. Rattler and Roby,—who have been wrong before and may be wrong now,—we may lose the second reading."
"And the third chance against us?"
"You would not probably try to carry on the Bill with a very small majority."
"Not with three or four."
"Nor, I think, with six or seven. It would be useless. My own belief is that we shall never carry the Bill into Committee."
"I have always known you to be right, Duke."
"I think that general opinion has set in that direction, and general opinion is generally right. Having come to that conclusion I thought it best to tell you, in order that we might have our house in order." The Duke of Omnium, who with all his haughtiness and all his reserve, was the simplest man in the world and the least apt to pretend to be that which he was not, sighed deeply when he heard this. "For my own part," continued his elder, "I feel no regret that it should be so."
"It is the first large measure that we have tried to carry."
"We did not come in to carry large measures, my friend. Look back and see how many large measures Pitt carried,—but he took the country safely through its most dangerous crisis."