Disraeli, for whom my father had an
immense admiration, although he had not yet occupied the post of
Prime Minister. Mr. Disraeli's curiously impassive face, with its
entire absence of colouring, rather frightened me. It looked like
a mask. He had, too, a most singular voice, with a very impressive
style of utterance. After 1868, by which time my three elder
brothers were all in the House of Commons, and Disraeli himself
was Prime Minister, he was a more frequent visitor at our house.
In 1865 my uncle, Lord John Russell, my mother's brother, was
Prime Minister. My uncle, who had been born as far back as 1792,
was a very tiny man, who always wore one of the old-fashioned,
high black-satin stocks right up to his chin. I liked him, for he
was always full of fun and small jokes, but in that rigorously
Tory household he was looked on with scant favour. It was his
second term of office as Prime Minister, for he had been First
Lord of the Treasury from 1846 to 1852; he had also sat in the
House of Commons for forty-seven years. My father was rather
inclined to ridicule his brother-in-law's small stature, and
absolutely detested his political opinions, declaring that he
united all the ineradicable faults of the Whigs in his diminutive
person.
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