message came to him at the Reform Club, and he was in his seat in
the House by four o'clock. During the debate a note was brought to
him, which ran as follows:--

I have got your letter this moment. Of course we must
meet. I hunt on Tuesday, and go down by the early train;
but I will come to town on Wednesday. We shall require to
be private, and I will therefore be at your rooms at one
o'clock on that day.--C.

Phineas at once perceived that the note was a hostile note, written
in an angry spirit,--written to one whom the writer did not at the
moment acknowledge to be his friend. This was certainly the case,
whatever Lord Chiltern may have said to his sister as to his
friendship for Phineas. Phineas crushed the note into his pocket, and
of course determined that he would be in his rooms at the hour named.

The debate was opened by a speech from Mr. Mildmay, in which that
gentleman at great length and with much perspicuity explained his
notion of that measure of Parliamentary Reform which he thought to
be necessary. He was listened to with the greatest attention to the
close,--and perhaps, at the end of his speech, with more attention
than usual, as there had gone abroad a rumour that the Prime Minister
intended to declare that this would be the last effort of his life
in that course. But, if he ever intended to utter such a pledge, his
heart misgave him when the time came for uttering it. He merely said
that as the management of the bill in committee would be an affair
of much labour, and probably spread over many nights, he would be
assisted in his work by his colleagues, and especially by his right
honourable friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. It was
then understood that Mr. Gresham would take the lead should the bill
go into committee;--but it was understood also that no resignation of
leadership had been made by Mr. Mildmay.

The measure now proposed to the House was very much the same as that
which had been brought forward in the last session. The existing
theory of British representation was not to be changed, but the
actual practice was to be brought nearer to the ideal theory. The
ideas of manhood suffrage, and of electoral districts, were to be as
for ever removed from the bulwarks of the British Constitution. There
were to be counties with agricultural constituencies, purposely
arranged to be purely agricultural, whenever the nature of the
counties would admit of its bei