then into clamours. A
rumour rose and spread that the funds of the two wealthiest corporations
in the kingdom, the City of London and the East India Company, had been
largely employed for the purpose of corrupting great men; and the names
of Trevor, Seymour and Leeds were mentioned.

The mention of these names produced a stir in the Whig ranks. Trevor,
Seymour and Leeds were all three Tories, and had, in different ways,
greater influence than perhaps any other three Tories in the kingdom.
If they could all be driven at once from public life with blasted
characters, the Whigs would be completely predominant both in the
Parliament and in the Cabinet.

Wharton was not the man to let such an opportunity escape him. At
White's, no doubt, among those lads of quality who were his pupils in
politics and in debauchery, he would have laughed heartily at the fury
with which the nation had on a sudden begun to persecute men for doing
what every body had always done and was always trying to do. But if
people would be fools, it was the business of a politician to make use
of their folly. The cant of political purity was not so familiar to the
lips of Wharton as blasphemy and ribaldry; but his abilities were so
versatile, and his impudence so consummate, that he ventured to appear
before the world as an austere patriot mourning over the venality and
perfidy of a degenerate age. While he, animated by that fierce party
spirit which in honest men would be thought a vice, but which in him
was almost a virtue, was eagerly stirring up his friends to demand an
inquiry into the truth of the evil reports which were in circulation,
the subject was suddenly and strangely forced forward. It chanced that,
while a bill of little interest was under discussion in the Commons,
the postman arrived with numerous letters directed to members; and the
distribution took place at the bar with a buzz of conversation which
drowned the voices of the orators. Seymour, whose imperious temper
always prompted him to dictate and to chide, lectured the talkers on the
scandalous irregularity of their conduct, and called on the Speaker to
reprimand them. An angry discussion followed; and one of the offenders
was provoked into making an allusion to the stories which were current
about both Seymour and the Speaker. "It is undoubtedly improper to talk
while a bill is under discussion; but it is much worse to take money
for getting a bill passed. If we are extreme to mark