_Handbook_; cons his lesson and declaims brief formula in deep rich
voice that lends touch of eloquence to its unadorned, remorseless
demand. All this, too, following on a day like yesterday, when two
other deputations stormed Downing Street; drew from him weighty reply;
followed, after hasty dinner, by a speech in the House on the eternal
Irish question, which GRANDOLPH rightly termed, "entrancing."

"A Grand Old Man, indeed!" said PRINCE ARTHUR, talking over these
things to-night, when he should have been listening to TOMMY BOWLES,
who having at the morning sitting had his speech on Vote on Account
closured, delivered another at evening sitting on the question of the
Depreciation of Silver as it affects domestic architecture in China
and Peru.

_Business done._--Vote on Account through Committee.

_Thursday._--CAINE going about House this afternoon, his slim figure
bulging out at the pockets in mysterious fashion, "Brought your supper
with you?" I asked, lightly touching one of the excrescences that felt
like an imperial pint of ginger-beer (WHITE 1880). "You seem bursting
with broiled bones. All no use. No more all-night sittings _this_ side
of Easter."

[Illustration: Portrait of a Member of Parliament examining the
Signatures to a Petition against the Local-Veto Bill, to see if they
are genuine or not. (_Vide_ Report of the Proceedings in the Commons,
March 28, which suggests that they are obtained in Public Houses.)]

"No, my boy, you're wrong," said CAINE. "Fact is, I'm going off to
the country, and these protuberances you observe about my person are
phonograms. All labelled, you see," he said, taking out cylinders from
several pockets. "Here are a few remarks on Registration; that's my
Local-Veto Speech; and here is an entirely new view of the Home-Rule
question. If you like to come over to my house at Clapham--close by,
you know, busses every ten minutes--you shall have a night's thorough
enjoyment. Leave you in the room by yourself with the phonograph. Pop
in one of these cylinders; set the phonograph whizzing; and you'll
hear me on Local Veto. Take out cylinder, put in another, and you'll
know more about Home Rule in five minutes than you ever dreamt.
Can only let you have them for to-night. To-morrow they go down to
Yorkshire, and thro' Easter Recess I shall be delivering, at various
places, six speeches every night, I myself comfortably making holiday
in Wales." "Thank you," I said; "but, if you'll ex