 whether or no he would show himself at last. Lady Glencora told me that he never will pledge himself. I am so glad he has come."

"I don't think I ever saw him," said Phineas.

"Oh, I have seen him,—a magnificent-looking man! I think it is so very nice of Lady Glencora getting him to meet us. It is very rarely that he will join in a great party, but they say Lady Glencora can do anything with him since the heir was born. I suppose you have heard all about that."

"No," said Phineas; "I have heard nothing of the heir, but I know that there are three or four babies."

"There was no heir, you know, for a year and a half, and they were all au désespoir; and the Duke was very nearly quarrelling with his nephew; and Mr. Palliser—; you know it had very nearly come to a separation."

"I don't know anything at all about it," said Phineas, who was not very fond of the lady who was giving him the information.

"It is so, I can assure you; but since the boy was born Lady Glencora can do anything with the Duke. She made him go to Ascot last spring, and he presented her with the favourite for one of the races on the very morning the horse ran. They say he gave three thousand pounds for him."

"And did Lady Glencora win?"

"No;—the horse lost; and Mr. Palliser has never known what to do with him since. But it was very pretty of the Duke;—was it not?"

Phineas, though he had intended to show to Mrs. Bonteen how little he thought about the Duke of Omnium,—how small was his respect for a great peer who took no part in politics,—could not protect himself from a certain feeling of anxiety as to the aspect and gait and words of the man of whom people thought so much, of whom he had heard so often, and of whom he had seen so little. He told himself that the Duke of Omnium should be no more to him than any other man, but yet the Duke of Omnium was more to him than other men. When he came down into the drawing-room he was angry with himself, and stood apart;—and was then angry with himself again because he stood apart. Why should he make a difference in his own bearing because there was such a man in the company? And
