The fault may not be the wit's, but what of that?
The result is the same.
"Wits are like theatres: they may have a glorious youth and prime, but their old age is dismal.

To the outsider, like myself, signs are not wanting--to continue the figure of speech--that you have put on your last successful piece.
"Can you say candidly that your last Christmas number was more than a reflection of its predecessors, or that your remarks this year on the Derby day took as they did the year before?
"Surely the most incisive of our satirists will not let himself degenerate into an illustration of Mr.Herbert Spencer's theory that man repeats himself, like history.
"Mr.Labouchere, sir, to those of us who have grown up in your inspiration it would indeed be pitiful if this were so." Andrew's host turned nervously in his chair.
Probably he wished that he had gone to church now.
"You need not be alarmed," he said, with a forced smile.
"You will die," cried Andrew, "before they send you to the House of Lords ?" "In which case the gain would be all to those left behind." "No," said Andrew, who now felt that he had as good as gained the day; "there could not be a greater mistake.
"Suppose it happened to-night, or even put it off to the end of the week; see what would follow.
"The ground you have lost so far is infinitesimal.

It would be forgotten in the general regret.
"Think of the newspaper placards next morning, some of them perhaps edged with black; the leaders in every London paper and in all the prominent provincial ones; the six columns obituary in the 'Times'; the paragraphs in the 'World'; the motion by Mr.Gladstone or Mr.Healy for the adjournment of the House; the magazine articles; the promised memoirs; the publication of posthumous papers; the resolution in the Northampton Town Council; the statue in Hyde Park! With such a recompense where would be the sacrifice ?" Mr.Labouchere rose and paced the room in great mental agitation.
"Now look at the other side of the picture," said Andrew, rising and following him: "'Truth' reduced to threepence, and then to a penny; yourself confused with Tracy Turnerelli or Martin Tupper; your friends running when you looked like jesting; the House emptying, the reporters shutting their note-books as you rose to speak; the great name of Labouchere become a synonym for bore!" They presented a strange picture in that room, its owner's face now a greyish white, his supplicant shaking with a passion that came out in perspiration.
With trembling hand Mr.Labouchere flung open the window.

The room was stifling.
There was a smell of new-mown hay in the air, a gentle breeze tipped the well-trimmed hedge with life, and the walks crackled in the heat.
But a stone's throw distant the sun was bathing in the dimpled Thames.
There was a cawing of rooks among the tall trees, and a church-bell tinkled in the ivy far away across the river.
Mr.Labouchere was far away too.
He was a round-cheeked boy again, smothering his kitten in his pinafore, prattling of Red Riding Hood by his school-mistress's knee, and guddling in the brook for minnows.
And now--and now! It was a beautiful world, and, ah, life is sweet! He pressed his fingers to his forehead.
"Leave me," he said hoarsely.
Andrew put his hand upon the shoulder of the man he loved so well.
"Be brave," he said; "do it in whatever way you prefer.

A moment's suffering, and all will be over." He spoke gently.