ks about the revenue
falling off! As if the revenue could ever really fall off! And then our
bad harvests. Why, that is the very reason we shall have an excellent
harvest this year. You cannot go on always having bad harvests. Besides,
good harvests never make a ministry popular. Nobody thanks a ministry
for a good harvest. What makes a ministry popular is some great _coup_
in foreign affairs."

Amid all these exciting disquietudes, Endymion pursued a life of
enjoyment, but also of observation and much labour. He lived more
and more with the Montforts, but the friendship of Berengaria was not
frivolous. Though she liked him to be seen where he ought to figure, and
required a great deal of attention herself, she ever impressed on him
that his present life was only a training for a future career, and that
his mind should ever be fixed on the attainment of a high position.
Particularly she impressed on him the importance of being a linguist.
"There will be a reaction some day from all this political economy,"
she would say, "and then there will be no one ready to take the helm."
Endymion was not unworthy of the inspiring interest which Lady Montfort
took in him. The terrible vicissitudes of his early years had gravely
impressed his character. Though ambitious, he was prudent; and, though
born to please and be pleased, he was sedulous and self-restrained.
Though naturally deeply interested in the fortunes of his political
friends, and especially of Lord Roehampton and Mr. Wilton, a careful
scrutiny of existing circumstances had prepared him for an inevitable
change; and, remembering what was their position but a few years back,
he felt that his sister and himself should be reconciled to their
altered lot, and be content. She would still be a peeress, and the happy
wife of an illustrious man; and he himself, though he would have to
relapse into the drudgery of a public office, would meet duties the
discharge of which was once the object of his ambition, coupled now with
an adequate income and with many friends.

And among those friends, there were none with whom he maintained his
relations more intimately than with the Neuchatels. He was often their
guest both in town and at Hainault, and he met them frequently in
society, always at the receptions of Lady Montfort and his sister.
Zenobia used sometimes to send him a card; but these condescending
recognitions of late had ceased, particularly as the great dame heard
he was "