e tried to judge the effect of the meeting by the verdict of
those about him.

But the words he overheard seemed to clash with what he wished them to
be, and the eager look on his face changed to one of doubt and of grave
disappointment. When he had reached the sidewalk he stopped and stood
looking back alternately into the lighted hall and at the hurrying
crowds which were dispersing rapidly. He made a movement as though he
would recall them, as though he felt they were still unconvinced, as
though there was much still left unsaid.

A fat stranger halted at his elbow to light his cigar, and glancing up
nodded his head approvingly.

"Fine speaker, Senator Stanton, ain't he?" he said.

The young man answered eagerly. "Yes," he assented, "he is a great
orator, but how could he help but speak well with such a subject?"

"Oh, you ought to have heard him last November at Tammany Hall," the fat
stranger answered. "He wasn't quite up to himself to-night. He wasn't so
interested. Those Cubans are foreigners, you see, but you ought to
heard him last St. Patrick's day on Home Rule for Ireland. Then he was
talking! That speech made him a United States senator, I guess. I don't
just see how he expects to win out on this Cuba game. The Cubans haven't
got no votes."

The young man opened his eyes in some bewilderment.

"He speaks for the good of Cuba, for the sake of humanity," he ventured.

"What?" inquired the fat stranger. "Oh, yes, of course. Well, I must be
getting on. Good-night, sir."

The stranger moved on his way, but the young man still lingered
uncertainly in the snow-swept corridor shivering violently with the cold
and stamping his feet for greater comfort. His face was burned to a deep
red, which seemed to have come from some long exposure to a tropical
sun, but which held no sign of health. His cheeks were hollow and his
eyes were lighted with the fire of fever and from time to time he was
shaken by violent bursts of coughing which caused him to reach toward
one of the pillars for support.

As the last of the lights went out in the Garden, the speaker of the
evening and three of his friends came laughing and talking down the long
corridor. Senator Stanton was a conspicuous figure at any time, and even
in those places where his portraits had not penetrated he was at once
recognized as a personage. Something in his erect carriage and an
unusual grace of movement, and the power and success in his face, made
men