grees, or you won't understand.

"His speech--do you know to what it can be compared? A fugue of Bach's.
There was something fulminating but abundant, uninterruptedly abundant,
and often so gentle; but there was this great difference, that he often
groped for a word, changed it, altered it again, and yet it was
incessant, and reverberant in spite of it all--that was the wonderful
part of it. An irresistible reckless eagerness and haste. One wondered
if there could be more, and there was always more, and nearly always
something extraordinary.

"I had often heard people described as being possessed by some force
of nature, but I had never seen it. Least of all at the Court, where
marked personality is rare. I was at last face to face with one. The
man who stood there was _obliged_ to speak--in the same way, probably,
as at a generous table he was _obliged_ to drink. I knew that he
managed his two farms, and worked on them himself when he had time, and
I imagined that I could see the giant finding relaxation in the work;
but I saw clearly that his mind would work on as actively all the same,
and that head and hands would vie with each other which should weary
first.

"It was of work that he spoke. He led off by a reference to the Queen.

"'Who is she?' he asked; then he answered with some kindly feeling
words about her. Then he asked again: 'Who is she?' He replied with
another inquiry: 'Does she earn her own bread?'

"This he held was the first obligation of all grown-up human beings who
had the power to do it. That was the first standard we should apply to
one another.

"'Does she earn her own bread? Do those who are in her suite earn
theirs?'

"'No,' he answered, 'they don't earn it. They live on that which others
have earned, and are earning.

"'What do they do? Brain work? No, they live by the brain work of
others. How do they spend their days then?

"'In enjoyment, mental and bodily enjoyment of that which others have
done and are doing. In luxury, in idleness, in social formalities, in
king-worship, in travelling, in repose do they live.' At this point he
kept on substituting one word for another, but made no pause.

"Their greatest exertion, he said, was to try to enjoy an additional
party or an extra levee, their greatest danger was a cold or an
overtaxed digestion.

"And in order that the fruit of other people's labour should not be
taken from them, what did they do?

"They opposed everything whic