avouring
the mass of their dangerous doctrines, and how the sentiments of such a
man served to exalt the tone of their opinions. While the conversation
went on around the table, the speakers, warming with the themes, growing
each moment more bold and more animated, Brissot turned his attentions
entirely to Fitzgerald. He not only sketched off to him the men around
the board, but, in a few light touches, characterised their opinions and
views.

At the conclusion of a description in which he had spoken with the most
unguarded frankness, Gerald could not help asking him how it was that
he could venture to declare so openly his opinions to a perfect stranger
like himself.

Brissot only smiled, but did not answer.

'For, after all,' continued Gerald, 'I am here in the camp of the enemy!
I _was_ a Royalist; I am so still.'

'But there are none left, _mon cher_; the King himself is not one.'

'Ready to die for the throne------'

'There is no throne; there is an old arm-chair, with the gilding rubbed
away!'

'At all events there was a right to defend------'

'The right to live has an earlier date than the right to rule,' said
Brissot gravely; and seeing that he had caught the other's attention, he
launched forth into the favourite theme of his party, the wrongs of the
people. Unlike the generality of his friends, Brissot did not dwell on
the vices and corruptions of the nobles. It was the evils of poverty
he pictured; the hopeless condition of those whose misery made them
friendless.

'If you but knew the suffering patience of the poor,' said he, 'the
stubbornness of their devotion to those above them in station; the tacit
submission with which they accept hardship as their birthright, you
would despair of humanity--infinitely more from men's humility than
from their cruelty! We cannot stir them; we cannot move them,' cried he.
'"They are no worse off than their fathers were," that is their reply.
If the hour come, however, that they rise up of themselves----'

Once more did Gerald revert to the hardihood of such confessions to a
stranger, when the other broke in----

'Does the shipwrecked sailor on the raft hesitate to stretch out his
hand to the sinking swimmer beside him. Come home with me from this,
and let me speak to you. You will learn nothing from these men. There
is Marat again! he has but one note in his voice, and it is to utter the
cry of Blood!'

While the stormy speaker revelled wildly in the chaos