Add to these the flowing black ringlets, and do not wonder that
his hostess told the young man that he was making a fool of
himself. Froude says he dressed in this fantastic guise to give
the impression of folly so that his sudden displays of brilliancy
might have the more striking effect coming from such an unlikely
source.
Self-esteem was abounding in the young Hebrew, and he did not
hesitate to compare himself with others to his own advantage. At
twenty-nine he wrote his sister after an evening in the gallery
of the House of Commons, "Heard Macaulay's best speech.....but
between ourselves I could floor them all!" Egotism it doubtless
was, but it sprang from no empty confidence in himself. The time
was not distant when he was the acknowledged master of the House
which looked so tempting from the galleries. He had offered
himself as a Tory with Radical ideas--a combination as unusual as
his style of apparel--to the electors of High Wycombe in June,
1832, but was beaten, as he was again in the autumn. It was said
that in one of his early candidacies he replied to an elector,
who had asked him on what he intended to stand, in the
sententious phrase "on my head!" In 1834 he stood for Taunton,
only to be defeated a third time. O'Connell, who had helped him
in his first campaign, was mortally offended by Disraeli's
allusion to his "bloody hand" in the Taunton canvass.
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