The Treasury Bench on which he sat and
the big box on the table before him were to him fortifications of
which he knew how to use every stone. The cheers and jeers of the
House had been so measured by him that he knew the value and force
of every sound. Politics had never been to him a study; but to
parliamentary strategy he had devoted all his faculties. No one
knew so well as Sir Timothy how to make arrangements for business,
so that every detail should be troublesome to his opponents. He
could foresee a month beforehand that on a certain day a Royal
concert would make the House empty, and would generously give that
day to a less observant adversary. He knew how to blind the eyes
of members to the truth. Those on the opposite side of the House
would find themselves checkmated by his astuteness,--when with all
their pieces on the board, there should be none which they could
move. And this to him was Government! It was to these purposes
that he conceived that a great Statesman should devote himself!
Parliamentary management! That in his mind, was under the
Constitution of ours the one act essential for Government.
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