:
perhaps he did not quite know himself. Looking back, we of to-day
might be inclined to think that he received more blame for it than he
deserved, but contemporary observers generally set it down to a want
of principle. In one thing, however, he was consistent then, and
remained consistent ever after--his hearty hatred of the Whigs. There
was something in the dryness and coldness of the great Whig families,
their stiff constitutionalism, their belief in political economy,
perhaps also their occasional toyings with the Nonconformists (always
an object of dislike to Disraeli), which roused all the antagonisms of
his nature, personal and Oriental.

When he entered the House of Commons he was already well known to
fashionable London, partly by his striking face and his powers of
conversation, partly by the eccentricities of his dress--he loved
bright-coloured waistcoats, and decked himself with rings,--partly by
his novels, whose satirical pungency had made a noise in society. He
had also become, owing to his apparent change of front, the object of
angry criticism. A quarrel with Daniel O'Connell, in the course of
which he challenged the great Irishman to fight a duel, each party
having described the other with a freedom of language bordering on
scurrility, made him, for a time, the talk of the political world.
Thus there was more curiosity evoked by his first speech than usually
awaits a new member. It was unsuccessful, not from want of ability,
but because its tone did not suit the temper of the House of Commons,
and because a hostile section of the audience sought to disconcert him
by their laughter. Undeterred by this ridicule, he continued to speak,
though in a less ambitious and less artificial vein, till after a few
years he had become one of the most conspicuous unofficial members. At
first no one had eulogised Peel more warmly, but after a time he edged
away from the minister, whether repelled by his coldness, which showed
that in that quarter no promotion was to be expected, or shrewdly
perceiving that Peel was taking a line which would ultimately separate
him from the bulk of the Conservative party. This happened in 1846,
when Peel, convinced that the import duties on corn were economically
unsound, proposed their abolition. Disraeli, who, since 1843, had
taken repeated opportunities of firing stray shots at the powerful
Prime Minister, now bore a foremost part not only in attacking him,
but in organising the P