circumstances, had successfully acted upon the nervous temperament, or the
statesman-like prudence, of a certain section of the peers, who
consequently hesitated in their course; were known as being no longer
inclined to pursue their policy of the preceding session; had thus
obtained a title at that moment in everybody's mouth, the title of 'THE
WAVERERS.'

Notwithstanding, therefore, the opposition of the Duke of Wellington and
of Lord Lyndhurst, the Waverers carried the second reading of the Reform
Bill; and then, scared at the consequences of their own headstrong
timidity, they went in a fright to the Duke and his able adviser to
extricate them from the inevitable result of their own conduct. The
ultimate device of these distracted counsels, where daring and
poltroonery, principle and expediency, public spirit and private intrigue,
each threw an ingredient into the turbulent spell, was the celebrated and
successful amendment to which we have referred.

But the Whig ministers, who, whatever may have been their faults, were at
least men of intellect and courage, were not to be beaten by 'the
Waverers.' They might have made terms with an audacious foe; they trampled
on a hesitating opponent. Lord Grey hastened to the palace.

Before the result of this appeal to the Sovereign was known, for its
effects were not immediate, on the second morning after the vote in the
House of Lords, Mr. Rigby had made that visit to Eton which had summoned
very unexpectedly the youthful Coningsby to London. He was the orphan
child of the youngest of the two sons of the Marquess of Monmouth. It was
a family famous for its hatreds. The eldest son hated his father; and, it
was said, in spite had married a lady to whom that father was attached,
and with whom Lord Monmouth then meditated a second alliance. This eldest