As
Phineas had formerly sat in the House for five years, and had been
in office, and had never made himself objectionable either to his
friends or adversaries, he had been widely known. He now found half
a dozen men who were always members of Parliament,--men who seem,
though commoners, to have been born legislators,--who all spoke to
him as though his being member for Tankerville and hunting with the
Brake hounds were equally matters of course. They knew him, but they
knew nothing of the break in his life. Or if they remembered that he
had not been seen about the House for the last two or three years
they remembered also that accidents do happen to some men. It will
occur now and again that a regular denizen of Westminster will get
a fall in the political hunting-field, and have to remain about the
world for a year or two without a seat. That Phineas had lately
triumphed over Browborough at Tankerville was known, the event
having been so recent; and men congratulated him, talking of poor
Browborough,--whose heavy figure had been familiar to them for many
a year,--but by no means recognising that the event of which they
spoke had been, as it were, life and death to their friend.
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