f the obstructive gang, had to submit to have
the vote taken. In the meantime there stood the business of the country
to be done. All its needs, its pressing grievances, its vast chorus of
sighs and wails from wasted lives--rose up and called for justice; but
tricksters, and self-seekers, and horse-jockeys stopped the way.

[Sidenote: Carlton Club echoes.]

There were signs of the meeting at the Carlton when the House met on
Thursday evening, March 9th. The Tory benches were crowded; the young
bloods were fuller than ever of that self-consciousness to which I have
adverted, and there were signs of movement, excitement, and the spirit
of mischief and evil in all their faces and in their general demeanour.
There were nearly one hundred questions on the paper--and questions had
become a most effective weapon of Obstruction. But there was a certain
peculiarity about the questioning on this Thursday evening. A stranger
to the House would have remarked that all the questions addressed to Mr.
Gladstone were asked last. This was not an accidental arrangement. It
was done in the case of every leader of the House, so as to leave him
more time before coming down to the House of Commons. It was done in the
case of Mr. Balfour when he was leader of the House, with the result
that that very limp and leisurely gentleman never came down to his place
until the House had been one or two hours at work. There was, of course,
much stronger reason for that little bit of consideration in the case
of Mr. Gladstone, than in that of a young man like Mr. Balfour.

[Sidenote: The epoch of brutality.]

But the Tories, in the new and brutal mood to which they have worked
themselves up, have taken means for depriving Mr. Gladstone of what
small benefit he got from this postponement of the questions to him till
the end of question time. The puniest whipster of the Tory or the
Unionist party now is satisfied with nothing less, if you please, than
to have his questions addressed to and answered by Mr. Gladstone
himself. One of this impudent tribe is a Scotch Unionist named Cochrane.
The Scotch Unionist is one of the most bitter of the venomous tribe to
which he belongs. Mr. Gladstone is a man of peace and unfailing
courtesy, but the old lion has potentialities of Olympian wrath, and
when he is stirred up a little too much his patience gives way, and he
has a manner of shaking his mane and sweeping round with his tail which
is dangerous to his enemies