ement of what passed for a liberal patent was not
turning out well. Convulsions in the cabinet, murmurs in the lobbies,
resistance from the opposite benches, all showed that a ministry
existing on sufferance would not at that stage be allowed to settle the
question. In this contest Mr. Gladstone did not actively join. Speaking
from the ministerial side of the House, he made a fervid defence of
nomination boroughs as the nurseries of statesmen, but he voted with
ministers against a whig amendment. His desire, he said, was to settle
the question as soon as possible, always, however, on the foundation of
trust in the people, that 'sound and satisfactory basis on which for
several years past legislation had been proceeding.' The hostile
amendment was carried against ministers by statesmen irreconcilably at
variance with one another, alike in principle and object. The majority
of thirty-nine was very large for those days, and it was decisive.
Though the parliament was little more than a couple of years old, yet in
face of the desperate confusion among leaders, parties, and groups, and
upon the plea that reform had not been formally submitted as an issue to
the country, Lord Derby felt justified in dissolving. Mr. Gladstone held
the Oxford seat without opposition. The constituencies displayed an
extension of the same essentially conservative feeling that had given
Lord Palmerston the victory two years before. Once more the real
question lay not so much between measures as men; not so much between
democratic change and conservative moderation, as between Palmerston and
Russell on the one hand, and Derby and Disraeli on the other. The
government at the election improved their position by some thirty votes.
This was not enough to outnumber the phalanx of their various opponents
combined, but was it possible that the phalanx should combine? Mr.
Gladstone, who spoke of the dissolution as being a most improper as well
as a most important measure, alike in domestic and in foreign bearings,
told Acland that he would not be surprised if the government were to
attempt some reconstruction on a broad basis before the new parliament
met. This course was not adopted.

CRITICAL MOMENTS

The chances of turning out the government were matters of infinite
computation among the leaders. The liberal whip after the election gave
his own party a majority of fifteen, but the treasury whip, on the other
hand, was equally c