He suffered disappointment, but did not seriously resent the world's indifference.

Honestly speaking, was the book worth much?
The writing had at first amused him; in the end it had grown a task.
Literature was not his field.
Back, then, to politics! There he knew his force.

He was looking to the first taste of Parliament with decided eagerness.
In Madeira he chanced to make acquaintance with an oldish man who had been in Parliament for a good many years; a Radical, an idealist, sore beset with physical ailments.

This gentleman found pleasure in Denzil's society, talked politics to him with contagious fervour, and greatly aided the natural process whereby Quarrier was recovering his interest in the career before him.
"My misfortune is," Denzil one day confided to this friend, "that I detest the town and the people that have elected me." "Indeed ?" returned the other, with a laugh.

"Then lay yourself out to become my successor at----when a general election comes round again.