His dreamy,

he saw his way to founding a house which might have been a power in Europe. But the more splendid his position the more bitter would have been his wife's feelings. He retired therefore early from the field, contented with the wealth which he had acquired. Perhaps his resolution was precipitated by the character of the son who was the only issue of his marriage. Isaac Disraeli was intended for the heir of business, and Isaac showed from the first a determined disinclination for business of any sort or kind. 'Nature had disqualified the child from his cradle for the busy pursuits of men.' 'He grew up beneath a roof of worldly energy and enjoyment, indicating that he was of a different order from those with whom he lived.' Neither his father nor his mother understood him. To one he was 'an enigma,' to the other 'a provocation.' wandering eyes were hopelessly unpractical. His mother was irritated because she could not rouse him into energy. He grew on 'to the mournful period of boyhood, when eccentricities excite attention and command no sympathy.' Mrs. Disraeli was exasperated when she ought to have been gentle. Her Isaac was the last drop in her cup of bitterness, and only served to swell the aggregate of many humiliating particulars.' She grew so embittered over her grievances that Lord Beaconsfield says 'she lived till eighty without indulging a tender expression;' and must have been an unpleasant figure in her grandson's childish recollections. The father did his best to keep the peace, but had nothing to offer but good-natured commonplaces. Isaac at last ran away from home, and was brought back after being found lying on a tombstone in Hackney Churchyard. His father 'embraced him, gave him a pony,' and sent him to a day school, where he had temporary peace. But the reproaches

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and upbraidings recommenced when he returned in the evenings To crown all, Isaac was delivered of a poem, and for the first time the head of the family was seriously alarmed. Hitherto he had supposed that boys would be boys, and their follies ought not to be too seriously noticed; but a poem was a more dangerous symptom; 'the loss of his argosies could not have filled him with a more blank dismay.'

The too imaginative youth was despatched to a countinghouse in Holland. His father went occasionally to see him, but left him for several years to drudge over ledgers without once coming home, in the hope that in this way, if in no other, the evil spirit might be exorcised. Had it been necessary for Isaac Disraeli to earn his own bread the experiment might have succeeded. His nature was gentle and amiable, and though he could not be driven he might have been led. But he knew that he was the only child of a wealthy parent. Why should he do violence to his disposition and make himself unnecessarily miserable? Instead of book-keeping he read Bayle and Voltaire. He was swept into Rousseauism and imagined himself another Emile. When recalled home at last the boy had become a young man. He had pictured to himself a passionate scene in which he was to fly into his mother's arms, and their hearts were to rush together in tears of a recovered affection. When he entered, his strange appearance, his gaunt figure, his excited manner, his long hair, and his unfashionable costume only filled her with a sentiment of tender aversion. She broke into derisive laughter, and noticing his intolerable garments reluctantly lent him her cheek.' The result, of course, was a renewal of household misery. His father assured him that his parents desired

only to make him happy, and proposed to establish him in business at Bordeaux. He replied that he had written another poem against commerce, 'which was the corruption of man,' and that he meant to publish it. What was to be done with such a lad? With a home that ought to have been happy,' says Lord Beaconsfield, 'surrounded with more than comfort, with the most good-natured father in the world and an agreeable man, and with a mother whose strong intellect under ordinary circumstances might have been of great importance to him, my father, though himself of a very sweet disposition, was most unhappy.' To keep him at home was worse than useless. He was sent abroad again, but on his own terms. He went to Paris, made literary acquaintance, studied in libraries, and remained till the eve of the Revolution amidst the intellectual and social excitement which preceded the general convulsion. But his better sense rebelled against the Rousseau enthusiasm. Paris ceasing to be a safe residence, he came home once more, recovered from the dangerous form of his disorder, 'with some knowledge of the world and much of books.'

His aversion to the counting-house was, however, as pronounced as ever. Benjamin Disraeli resigned himself to the inevitable-wound up his affairs and retired, as has been said, upon the fortune which he had realised. Isaac, assured of independence, if not of great wealth, went his own way; published a satire, which the old man overlived without a catastrophe, and entered the literary world of London. Before he was thirty he brought out his 'Curiosities of Literature,' which stepped at once into popularity and gave him a name. He wrote verses which were pretty and graceful, verses which were read and

The poetical

remembered by Sir Walter Scott, and were at least better than his son's. But he was too modest to overrate their value. He knew that poetry, unless it be the best of its kind, is better unproduced, and withdrew within the limits. where he was conscious that he could excel. temperament was not thrown away upon him. Because he was a poet he was a popular writer, and made belles-lettres charming to the multitude. . . . His destiny was to give his country a series of works illustrative of its literary and political history, full of new information and new views which time has ratified as just.'

CHAPTER II

Family of Isaac Disraeli-Life in London-Birth of his Children— Abandons Judaism and joins the Church of England-Education of Benjamin Disraeli-School Days-Picture of them in 'Vivian Grey' and 'Contarini Fleming'-Self-education at Home-Early Ambition.

ISAAC DISRAELI, having the advantage of a good fortune, escaped the embarrassments which attend a struggling literary career. His circumstances were easy. He became intimate with distinguished men ; and his experiences in Paris had widened and liberalised his mind. His creed sate light upon him, but as long as his father lived he remained nominally in the communion in which he was born. He married happily a Jewish lady, Maria, daughter of Mr. George Basevi, of Brighton, a gentle, sweet-tempered, affectionate woman To her he relinquished the management of his worldly affairs, and divided his time between his own splendid library, the shops of book collectors or the British Museum, and the brilliant society of politicians and men of letters. His domestic life was unruffled by the storms which had disturbed his boyhood; a household more affectionately united was scarcely to be found within the four seas. children were born to him-the eldest a daughter, Sarah, whose gifts and accomplishments would have raised her, had she been a man, into fame; Benjamin, the Prime Minister

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