tically, but he had won a certain kind of victory. Emmet was
already beaten when he failed to grasp the opportunity the President's
visit presented and allowed the committee to thrust him aside. No
amount of subsequent championing could restore him to a position of
dignity. His enemies had decided that he must not be allowed to
introduce the President, for they knew he would do it well. They had
brought the fury of the people down upon their heads, but they had
exhibited their chosen representative before them in a mute and
inglorious role. They had even succeeded in making him an object of
pity. The damage he had received in the imagination of his supporters
was incalculable, and while they burned with indignation, they
instinctively paid a treacherous tribute to Cobbens's amazing
cleverness and audacity.

Though no such tribute was paid the lawyer by Leigh, it was still true
that the turn of affairs forced Emmet from his consideration until,
instead of a star of the first magnitude, he became a mere point of
light, and finally disappeared. During the President's speech, he felt
that he had been holding secret communion with Felicity, and the
accumulated excitement of the evening worked in his thoughts an
unexpected license and daring. It was possible to allow Emmet's claims
when he was receiving the homage of the people alone, and she had not
yet appeared; but her presence had revived the old passionate torment
in his heart. Love returned triumphant, making light of all other
claims and considerations.

Upon some natures oratory, the successful swaying of the crowd, has the
same effect, irrespective of the tone and content of the speech, that
is produced by the harmony of a great orchestra, an effect of
exaltation and lawlessness. In the young mathematician this
responsiveness was a marked trait, at variance with another more coldly
intellectual quality. He began to feel that he ranged at will, freed
from artificial and unreal restraints. He, too, would do some great
thing. On that full wave of excitement he was carried beyond the dikes
which in cooler moments he had erected against himself.

When the audience arose to depart, he looked longingly in the direction
of the box in which Felicity sat. He would fain have leaped upon the
stage and have gone to her before she could escape him; he was burning
to speak to her, to hear her voice and touch her hand. But her
departure with her friends was little