fidence. It happens, however, that the world is often not displeased
at these small signs of confusion--these little defects in oratorical
readiness--in men of acknowledged ability, and even prefer them to the
rapid flow and voluble ease of more practised orators. There is, so to
say, a mock air of sincerity in the professions of a man whose feelings
seem fuller than his words,--something that implies the heart to be
in the right place, though the tongue be but a poor exponent of
its sentiments; and lastly, the world is always ready to accept the
embarrassment of the speaker as an evidence of the grateful emotions
that are swaying him. Hence the success of country gentlemen in the
House; hence the hearty cheers that follow the rambling discursiveness
of bucolic eloquence!

If Mr. Dunn was not an orator, he was a keen and shrewd observer, and
one fact he had noticed, which was that the shouts and cries of
popular assemblages are to an indifferent speaker pretty much what
an accompaniment is to a bad singer,--the aids by which he surmounts
difficult passages and conceals his false notes. Mr. Hankes, too, well
understood how to lead this orchestra, and had already taken his place
on the steps of the door beneath.

Dunn stood in front of the balcony, Lord Glengariff at his side and a
little behind him. With one hand pressed upon his heart, he bowed deeply
to the multitude. "My kind friends," said he, in a low voice, but
which was audible to a great distance, "it has been my fortune to have
received at different times of my life gratifying assurances of sympathy
and respect, but never in the whole course of a very varied career do I
remember an occasion so deeply gratifying to my feelings as the present.
(Cheers, that lasted ten minutes and more.) It is not," resumed he, with
more energy,--"it is not at a moment like this, surrounded by brave
and warm hearts, when the sentiments of affection that sway _you_ are
mingled with the emotions of my own breast, that I would take a dark or
gloomy view of human nature, but truth compels me to say that the attack
made this day upon my credit--for _I_ am the Ossory Bank--(loud and wild
cheering)--yes, I repeat it, for the stability of this institution
_I_ am responsible by all I possess in this world. Every share, every
guinea, every acre I own are here! Far from me to impute ungenerous or
unworthy motives to any quarter; but, my worthy friends, there has been
foul play--(groans)--the