Roehampton was called up to the House of Lords for one of his baronies,
and Endymion was informed that when parliament met, he would have to
represent the Foreign Office in the House of Commons.

Waldershare heartily congratulated him. "You have got what I most
wished to have in the world; but I will not envy you, for envy is a vile
passion. You have the good fortune to serve a genial chief. I had to
deal with a Harley,--cold, suspicious, ambiguous, pretending to be
profound, and always in a state of perplexity."

It was not a very agreeable session. The potato famine did something
more than repeal the corn laws. It proved that there was no floating
capital left in the country; and when the Barings and Rothschilds
combined, almost as much from public spirit as from private speculation,
to raise a loan of a few millions for the minister, they absolutely
found the public purse was exhausted, and had to supply the greater
portion of the amount from their own resources. In one of the many
financial debates that consequently occurred, Trenchard established
himself by a clear and comprehensive view of the position of affairs,
and by modestly reminding the House, that a year ago he had predicted
the present condition of things, and indicated its inevitable cause.

This was the great speech on a great night, and Mr. Bertie Tremaine
walked home with Trenchard. It was observed that Mr. Bertie Tremaine
always walked home with the member who had made the speech of the
evening.

"Your friends did not behave well to you," he said in a hollow voice to
Trenchard. "They ought to have made you Secretary of the Treasury. Think
of this. It is an important post, and may lead to anything; and, so far
as I am concerned, it would give me real pleasure to see it."

But besides the disquietude of domestic affairs, famine and failures
competing in horrible catastrophe and the Bank Act suspended, as
the year advanced matters on the Continent became not less dark and
troubled. Italy was mysteriously agitated; the pope announced himself
a reformer; there were disturbances in Milan, Ancona, and Ferrara; the
Austrians threatened the occupation of several States, and Sardinia
offered to defend His Holiness from the Austrians. In addition to all
this, there were reform banquets in France, a civil war in Switzerland,
and the King of Prussia thought it prudent to present his subjects with
a Constitution.

The Count of Ferroll about this time made