it more."

"Nay, I think he will, my lord--to the death."

"That may be--and yet--" his lordship smiled. "Mr. Halifax, I have
just had news by a carrier pigeon--my birds fly well--most important
news for us and our party. Yesterday, in the lobby of the House of
Commons, Mr. Perceval was shot."

We all started. An hour ago we had been reading his speech. Mr.
Perceval shot!

"Oh, John," cried the mother, her eyes full of tears; "his poor
wife--his fatherless children!"

And for many minutes they stood, hearing the lamentable history, and
looking at their little ones at play in the garden; thinking, as many
an English father and mother did that day, of the stately house in
London, where the widow and orphans bewailed their dead. He might or
might not be a great statesman, but he was undoubtedly a good man; many
still remember the shock of his untimely death, and how, whether or not
they liked him living, all the honest hearts of England mourned for Mr.
Perceval.

Possibly that number did not include the Earl of Luxmore.

"Requiescat in pace! I shall propose the canonization of poor
Bellingham. For now Perceval is dead there will be an immediate
election; and on that election depends Catholic Emancipation. Mr.
Halifax," turning quickly round to him, "you would be of great use to
us in parliament."

"Should I?"

"Will you--I like plain speaking--will you enter it?"

Enter parliament! John Halifax in parliament! His wife and I were
both astounded by the suddenness of the possibility; which, however,
John himself seemed to receive as no novel idea.

Lord Luxmore continued. "I assure you nothing is more easy; I can
bring you in at once, for a borough near here--my family borough."

"Which you wish to be held by some convenient person till Lord Ravenel
comes of age? So Mr. Brown informed me yesterday."

Lord Luxmore slightly frowned. Such transactions, as common then in
the service of the country as they still are in the service of the
Church, were yet generally glossed over, as if a certain discredit
attached to them. The young lord seemed to feel it; at sound of his
name he turned round to listen, and turned back again, blushing
scarlet. Not so the earl, his father.

"Brown is--(may I offer you a pinch, Mr. Halifax?--what, not the Prince
Regent's own mixture?)--is indeed a worthy fellow, but too hasty in his
conclusions. As it happens, my son is yet undecided between the
Church--that is, the