at one
moment silver lamps, at another poising hawks, and again sprawling
pumpkins; anything except useful citizens. How could they be? They had
the attraction of the lamp, the appetite of the hawk, the occupation of
the pumpkin: nothing was given them to do but to shine, destroy, and
fatten. Their hands were kept empty: a trifle in their heads would topple
them over; they were monuments of the English system of compromise. Happy
for mankind if they were monuments only! Happy for them! But they had the
passions of men. The adulation of the multitude was raised to inflate
them, whose self-respect had not one prop to rest an, unless it were
contempt for the flatterers and prophetic foresight of their perfidy.
They were the monuments of a compromise between the past and terror of
the future; puppets as princes, mannikins as men, the snares of frail
women, stop-gaps of the State, feathered nonentities!

So far (but not in epigram) he marshalled the things he had heard to his
sound of drum and trumpet, like one repeating a lesson off-hand. Steering
on a sudden completely round, he gave his audience an outline of the
changes he would have effected had he but triumphed in his cause; and now
came the lashing of arms, a flood of eloquence. Princes with brains,
princes leaders, princes flowers of the land, he had offered them!
princes that should sway assemblies, and not stultify the precepts of a
decent people 'by making you pay in the outrage of your morals for what
you seem to gain in policy.' These or similar words. The whole scene was
too grotesque and afflicting. But his command of his hearers was
extraordinary, partly a consolation I thought, until, having touched the
arm of one of the gentlemen of the banquet and said, 'I am his son; I
wish to remove him,' the reply enlightened me: 'I 'm afraid there's
danger in interrupting him; I really am.'

They were listening obediently to one whom they dared not interrupt for
fear of provoking an outburst of madness.

I had to risk it. His dilated eyes looked ready to seize on me for an
illustration. I spoke peremptorily, and he bowed his head low, saying,
'My son, gentlemen,' and submitted himself to my hands. The feasters
showed immediately that they felt released by rising and chatting in
groups. Alderman Saddlebank expressed much gratitude to me for the
service I had performed. 'That first half of your father's speech was the
most pathetic thing I ever heard!' I had not shared