he shabby velvet breeches, Mr. Charles
was a very handsome and striking-looking man. No wonder the poor
hay-makers had collected from all parts to hear him harangue.

What was he haranguing upon? Could it be, that like his friend, "John
Philip," whoever that personage might be, his vocation was that of a
field preacher? It seemed like it, especially judging from the
sanctified demeanour of the elder and inferior person who accompanied
him; and who sat in the front of the cart, and folded his hands and
groaned, after the most approved fashion of a methodistical "revival."

We listened, expecting every minute to be disgusted and shocked: but
no! I must say this for Mr. Charles, that in no way did he trespass the
bounds of reverence and decorum. His harangue, though given as a
sermon, was strictly and simply a moral essay, such as might have
emanated from any professor's chair. In fact, as I afterwards learnt,
he had given for his text one which the simple rustics received in all
respect, as coming from a higher and holier volume than Shakspeare--

"Mercy is twice blessed:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest."

And on that text did he dilate; gradually warming with his subject,
till his gestures--which at first had seemed burthened with a queer
constraint, that now and then resulted in an irrepressible twitch of
the corners of his flexible mouth--became those of a man beguiled into
real earnestness. We of Norton Bury had never heard such eloquence.

"Who CAN he be, John? Isn't it wonderful?"

But John never heard me. His whole attention was riveted on the
speaker. Such oratory--a compound of graceful action, polished
language, and brilliant imagination, came to him as a positive
revelation, a revelation from the world of intellect, the world which
he longed after with all the ardour of youth.

What that harangue would have seemed like, could we have heard it with
maturer ears, I know not; but at eighteen and twenty it literally
dazzled us. No wonder it affected the rest of the audience. Feeble
men, leaning on forks and rakes, shook their old heads sagely, as if
they understood it all. And when the speaker alluded to the horrors of
war--a subject which then came so bitterly home to every heart in
Britain--many women melted into sobs and tears. At last, when the
orator himself, moved by the pictures he had conjured up, paused
suddenly, qui