Genre:

Novel, Serial

Subjects:

Statistics, Gender, Spiritualism, Periodicals

    Plantagenet Palliser has learned the 'art of startling the House of Commons and frightening the British public by the voluminous accuracy of his statistics', but he does not know 'what to say to a pretty woman' and ends up talking to the 'very handsome' Lady Dumbello about 'the sugar duties' (518–19). However, when he was told that 'Lady Dumbello smiled upon him', Palliser 'certainly thought more about her smiles than had been good for his statistics'. Also comments that 'We are not content in looking to our newspapers for all the information that earth and human intellect can afford; but we demand from them what we might demand if a daily sheet could come to us from the world of the spirits. The result, of course, is this,—that the papers do pretend that they have come daily from the world of spirits'. (520)

Reprinted:

Trollope 1864