t of a chair before his house, opposite the Green Park,
and he stopped swearing at the chairmen to wave at us.

"Hello, March!" Mr. Fox said affably, "you're drunk."

His Lordship smiled, bowed graciously if unsteadily to me, and did not
appear to resent the pleasantry. Then he sighed.

"What a pair of cubs it is," said he; "I wish to God I was young again.
I hear you astonished the world again last night, Charles."

We left him being assisted into his residence by a sleepy footman, paid
our toll at Hyde Park Corner, and rolled onward toward Kensington,
Fox laughing as we passed the empty park at the thought of what had so
lately occurred there. After the close night of St. Stephen's, nature
seemed doubly beautiful. The sun slanted over the water in the gardens
in bars of green and gold. The bright new leaves were on the trees, and
the morning dew had brought with it the smell of the living earth. We
passed the stream of market wagons lumbering along, pulled by sturdy,
patient farm-horses, driven by smocked countrymen, who touched their
caps to the fine gentlemen of the court end of town; who shook their
heads and exchanged deep tones over the whims of quality, unaccountable
as the weather. But one big-chested fellow arrested his salute, a scowl
came over his face, and he shouted back to the wagoner whose horses were
munching his hay:

"Hi, Jeems, keep down yere hands. Mr. Fox is noo friend of we."

This brought a hard smile on Mr. Fox's face.

"I believe, Richard," he said, "I have become more detested than any man
in Parliament."

"And justly," I replied; "for you have fought all that is good in you."

"I was mobbed once, in Parliament Street. I thought they would kill me.
Have you ever been mobbed, Richard?" he asked indifferently.

"Never, I thank Heaven," I answered fervently.

"I think I would rather be mobbed than indulge in any amusement I know
of," he continued. "Than confound Wedderburn, or drive a measure against
Burke,--which is no bad sport, my word on't. I would rather be mobbed
than have my horse win at Newmarket. There is a keen pleasure you wot
not of, my lad, in listening to Billingsgate and Spitalfields howl
maledictions upon you. And no sensation I know of is equal to that of
the moment when the mud and sticks and oranges are coming through the
windows of your coach, when the dirty weavers are clutching at your
ruffles and shaking their filthy fists under your nose."

"It is, at any rate