."--"Yes,
and of you too, if you don't mind it!" answers one.

And so, like Apollo taken for a Neat-herd, and perhaps for none of the
best on the Admetus establishment, this new Norse Thor had to put
up with what was going; to gauge ale, and be thankful; pouring his
celestial sunlight through Scottish Song-writing,--the narrowest chink
ever offered to a Thunder-god before! And the meagre Pitt, and his
Dundasses and red-tape Phantasms (growing very ghastly now to think of),
did not in the least know or understand, the impious, god-forgetting
mortals, that Heroic Intellects, if Heaven were pleased to send such,
were the one salvation for the world and for them and all of us. No;
they "had done very well without" such; did not see the use of such;
went along "very well" without such; well presided over by a singular
Heroic Intellect called George the Third: and the Thunder-god, as was
rather fit of him, departed early, still in the noon of life, somewhat
weary of gauging ale!--O Peter, what a scandalous torpid element of
yellow London fog, favorable to owls only and their mousing operations,
has blotted out the stars of Heaven for us these several generations
back,--which, I rejoice to see, is now visibly about to take itself away
again, or perhaps to be _dispelled_ in a very tremendous manner!

For the sake of my Democratic friends, one other observation. Is
not this Proposal the very essence of whatever truth there is in
"Democracy;" this, that the able man be chosen, in whatever rank be
is found? That he be searched for as hidden treasure is; be trained,
supervised, set to the work which he alone is fit for. All Democracy
lies in this; this, I think, is worth all the ballot-boxes and
suffrage-movements now going. Not that the noble soul, born poor, should
be set to spout in Parliament, but that he should be set to assist in
governing men: this is our grand Democratic interest. With this we
can be saved; without this, were there a Parliament spouting in
every parish, and Hansard Debates to stem the Thames, we perish,--die
constitutionally drowned, in mere oceans of palaver.

All reformers, constitutional persons, and men capable of reflection,
are invited to reflect on these things. Let us brush the cobwebs from
our eyes; let us bid the inane traditions be silent for a moment; and
ask ourselves, like men dreadfully intent on having it _done_, "By what
method or methods can the able men from every rank of life be gath