They were aware that they had been assembled at a somewhat unusual
and inconvenient period of the year, because the service of the
country had demanded that certain money bills should be passed. He,
however, rejoiced greatly that this earliest opportunity had been
afforded to him of explaining the intentions of the Government with
which he had the honour of being connected. In answer to this there
arose a perfect torrent of almost vituperative antagonism from the
opposite side of the House. Did the Right Honourable gentleman dare
to say that the question had been ventilated in the country, when it
had never been broached by him or any of his followers till after
the general election had been completed? Was it not notorious to
the country that the first hint of it had been given when the Right
Honourable gentleman was elected for East Barsetshire, and was it not
equally notorious that that election had been so arranged that the
marvellous proposition of the Right Honourable gentleman should not
be known even to his own party till there remained no possibility of
the expression of any condemnation from the hustings? It might be
that the Right Honourable could so rule his own followers in that
House as to carry them with him even in a matter so absolutely
opposite to their own most cherished convictions.
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