The Parliamentary Novels Author:Anthony Trollope Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE SECOND READING IS CARRIED. The debate on the bill was prolonged during the whole of that week. Lord Brentford, who loved his seat in the C... more »abinet and the glory of being a Minister, better even than he loved his borough, had taken a gloomy estimate when he spoke of twenty-seven defaulters, and of the bill as certainly lost. Men who were better able than he to make estimates,—the Bon- teens and Fitzgibbons on each side of the House, and above all the Rattlers and Robys, produced lists from day to day which varied now by three names in one direction, then by two in another, and which fluctuated at last by units only. They all concurred in declaring that it would be a very near division. A great effort was made to close the debate on the Friday, but it failed, and the full tide of speech was carried on till the following Monday. On that morning Phineas heard Mr. Rattler declare at the club that, as far as his judgment went, the division at that moment was a fair subject for a bet. " There are two men doubtful in the House," said Rattler, " and if one votes on one side and one on the other, or if neither votes at all, it will be a tie." Mr. Roby, however, the whip on the other side, was quite sure that one at least of these gentlemen would go into his lobby, and that the other would not go into Mr. Rattler's lobby. I am inclined to think that the town was generally inclined to put more confidence in the accuracy of Mr. Roby than in that of Mr. Rattler; and among betting men there certainly was a point given by those who backed the conservatives. The odds, however, were lost, for on the division the numbers in the two lobbies were equal, and the Speaker gave his casting vote in favour of the Government. The bill was read a second time, and was lost, as a matter of ...« less