TO MISQUOTE P.G. Wodehouse, it is never difficult to distinguish between a right-wing British politician with a grievance and a ray of sunshine. Yet even by its own grumpy standards, the right of the Conservative Party sounded disgruntled this week after the first big reshuffle of David Cameron's government.

Examined dispassionately, Conservative gloom feels exaggerated. True, the reshuffle was triggered by the resignation as defence secretary of Liam Fox, a fierce partisan and patriot who was something of a darling among Thatcherite MPs. But Philip Hammond, Dr Fox's replacement, is hardly a Kumbaya-humming Europhile. A dry-as-dust businessman, he is perhaps “95% as right-wing as Liam Fox”, admits one Thatcherite. As for Justine Greening, a Treasury minister promoted into the cabinet to replace Mr Hammond as transport secretary, she backed Dr Fox in his unsuccessful party-leadership bid against Mr Cameron in 2005.

More broadly, in several areas the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition is being forced by events to tack to the right. A year ago the talk was of exceeding Labour-era commitments on health spending and making this the “greenest government ever”. Tory Eurosceptics glumly predicted that Lib Dem affection for Europe would hobble attempts to stand up to Brussels.

Now, with austerity stalking the land and the euro zone ablaze, much of last year's “fluffy, tree-hugging” agenda is dead, concedes a Cameroon MP. Allies of the Conservative chancellor of the exchequer, George Osborne, have signalled that green measures to curb climate change should not put British business at a competitive disadvantage. The coalition is openly discussing the need for big efficiency savings in the health service and Mr Cameron has pledged to seek powers back from Brussels if the euro-zone crisis reorders the EU's architecture. The Lib Dems, meanwhile, have gone quiet about their support for the euro. Should a deal to repatriate powers become possible, Nick Clegg's party would be mad to stand in its way (and Mr Clegg knows it).

Yet standard-bearers of the right are still unhappy. In part, the cause is dashed ambition. At a mere 42, Ms Greening is ancient next to her replacement in the Treasury: Chloe Smith, a 29-year-old who entered Parliament at a by-election way back in 2009. At a stroke, whole generations of middle-aged Tory men can feel dreams of high office evaporating like the fumes from a consoling tumbler (or two) of late-night Scotch. Portcullis House, a parliamentary complex whose bland, airport-like atrium has become the 21st-century agora of British politics, pullulates with MPs from the 2010 Tory intake (who make up nearly half the parliamentary party). Thrusting newbies are busy writing books and forming policy groups dedicated to a “modernised right” that is pro-free enterprise, Eurosceptic but scornful of their elders' social conservativism (fussing about gay marriage? Oh, come on).

To be fair, not all grandee gloom involves personal disappointment. Some big beasts of the right raise sincere concerns about the gulf between Mr Cameron's ministerial team—which they see as dominated by managerialism and pragmatism—and a parliamentary party that is more ideological, especially over Europe, the great uniting issue of the right (and a cause that binds crusty oldies to the 2010 intake). Dr Fox may have been a bit of a chancer, MPs murmur, but when it came to British sovereignty or defending the armed forces from spending cuts, he was the sort to “plant a stake in the ground” and go no farther. Though able, Mr Hammond and Ms Greening are seen as symbolising the victory of managerialism over passion, or of government over party. Such pragmatism makes right-wing grandees worry that, if events have pulled Mr Cameron's coalition towards Conservative policies, a turn of fortune could yet lead it the other way.

The 2010 intake are likelier to trust Mr Cameron, or at least to believe they owe their election to his project to “detoxify” the Conservative brand. But they, too, are jumpy about Europe. Many if not most Tory MPs believe that Britain should try for what amounts to a free-rider membership of the single market (ie, staying inside while spurning EU rules on employment, the environment, fisheries and the like). A substantial minority believe that if its EU neighbours refuse, Britain should leave and seek access to continental markets under world trade rules. A test will come on October 24th, when MPs are set to debate a backbencher's motion calling for a three-way referendum on leaving the EU, staying or negotiating a looser trading relationship. Though the motion would not bind the government, Conservative leaders want MPs to vote against a referendum. Scores have threatened to rebel.

Not as populist as they think they are

The moment is perilous for Mr Cameron, but not, in truth, because he faces a coup within his party. Many on the right are convinced they are more in tune with the public than Mr Cameron's cautious, languidly metropolitan inner circle. They are only half-correct. In some areas—crime, immigration, fuel prices, a broad hostility to Europe—the right's arguments have populist appeal. But, often to its credit, the British right is not as populist as it thinks. It is a complex animal, but defining causes include free trade, deregulation, cutting taxes and welfare, and shielding City banks from EU rules. This is not reliably rabble-rousing stuff.

The real danger from the right lies elsewhere. Because a showdown over Europe would split his party, Mr Cameron is left nagging EU leaders to do what it takes to save the euro, so long as they do not expect Britain to pay, sit at the table or help shape deeper integration. Still, the Tory right is disgruntled. Judging by the referendum motion before MPs, many want to tie the government's hands still more tightly, with a utopian mandate to demand a free-trade relationship. They ought to realise that in a fast-moving crisis, their country needs more room for manoeuvre, not less.

Economist.com/blogs/bagehot