One would have been inclined to say that politics were altogether unnecessary to her, and that as Duchess of Omnium, lately known as Lady Glencora Palliser, she had a wider and a pleasanter influence than could belong to any woman as wife of a Prime Minister.

And she was essentially one of those women who are not contented to be known simply as the wives of their husbands.
She had a celebrity of her own, quite independent of his position, and which could not be enhanced by any glory or any power added to him.

Nevertheless, when he left her to go down to the Queen with the prospect of being called upon to act as chief of the incoming ministry, her heart throbbed with excitement.

It had come at last, and he would be, to her thinking, the leading man in the greatest kingdom in the world.
But she felt in regard to him somewhat as did Lady Macbeth towards her lord.
"What thou would'st highly, That would'st thou holily." She knew him to be full of scruples, unable to bend when aught was to be got by bending, unwilling to domineer when men might be brought to subjection only by domination.

The first duty never could be taught to him.