SIR ROBERT.—And, then, I can’t keep my place a day.
THE QUEEN.—Then the majority of my subjects are to be rendered miserable for the advantage of the few?
SIR ROBERT.—That’s the principle of all good governments. Besides, cheap bread would be no benefit to the masses, for wages would be lower.
THE QUEEN.—Do you really believe such would be the case?
SIR ROBERT.—Am I regularly called in?
THE QUEEN.—You evade a direct answer, I see. Granting such to be your belief, your friends and landowners would suffer no injury, for their incomes would procure them as many luxuries.
SIR ROBERT.—Not if they were to live abroad, or patronise foreign manufactures: and should wages be higher, what would they say to me after all the money they have expended in bri—I mean at the Carlton Club, if I allow the value of their “dirty acres” to be reduced.
THE QUEEN.—Pray, what do you call such views?
SIR ROBERT.—Patriotism.
THE QUEEN.—Charity would be a better term, as that is said to begin at home. How long were you in your last place?