“Now for a twenty-four hours' sleep,” said Linton, “and then once more to roll the stone of life, which, by the way, gives the lie to the old adage, for unquestionably it does 'gather moss' as we grow older.”
CHAPTER XVII. SCANNING THE POLITICAL HORIZON.
Confound their politics!
—National Anthem.
Linton was very far from indulging that dreamy inactivity of which he spoke. Plans and schemes of various kinds occupied his thoughts too intently to admit of slumber. Indeed, his theory was, that, if a man could not dream of some happy mode of advancing his fortune, sleep was a fearful inroad upon his worldly career.
He at once hastened home to read his letters and newspapers, and so important did their intelligence seem, that he only delayed to change his dress and eat a hurried breakfast, when he repaired to the Castle, where a few minutes previously the secretary, Mr. Downie Meek, had arrived from his lodge in the Park.
“Safe once more, Meek,” said he, entering the official chamber, where, immersed in printed returns, petitions, and remonstrances, sat the busy secretary.
“Ah, Linton! you are the bien venu. We are to have another heat for the race, though I own it scarcely looks promising.”
“Particularly as you are going to carry weight,” said Linton, laughing. “It's true, I suppose, that the Irish party have joined you?”
“There was no help for it,” said the secretary, with a despondent gesture of the eyebrows; “we had no alternative save accepting the greasy voices, or go out. Some deemed the former the better course, but others remembered the story of the Brahmin, who engaged to teach the ass to speak in ten years, or else forfeit his own head.”