430 POLITICAL CAREER. 



sugar and coffee interests ; and secondly, on that 

 which was seeking to ascertain the causes of the 

 prevailing commercial distress. We learn from 

 the same source that the energy, application, and 

 zeal which he brought to his new avocations were 

 never exceeded by any man in Parliament. " This 

 was the period of his life," says Mr Disraeli, 

 " when he was frequently in the habit of working 

 eighteen hours in the day, and when he made 

 great progress towards acquiring the habit of liv- 

 ing without food, for he breakfasted on dry toast, 

 and took no sustenance all day or all night, until 

 Parliament was up, when he dined at White's 

 Club at half-past two o'clock in the morning." 



I have read all the books within my reach which 

 deal with my dear and honoured master's political 

 career ; but neither Mr Disraeli's ' Political Bio- 

 graphy ' nor Mr Greville's ' Diaries,' nor any of 

 the many Lives of the Fourteenth Earl of 

 Derby, give such insight into Lord George Ben- 

 tinck's character as the last volume of ' The Croker 

 Papers,' published in 1884. The letters from Lord 

 George to Mr Croker are seventeen in number, the 

 first being dated on June 30, 1847, and the last on 

 March 2, 1848, so that they cover a sjDace of little 

 more than eight months. Within them, however, 

 may be found the germs of what Lord George was, 

 and I venture to think that they explain the ex- 

 traordinary ascendancy gained in less than two 

 years by a statesman — for as such I shall always 



