t didn't. We all talked and
talked at once, just as people do who have recently preserved an enforced
silence.

"How ill-fitting was that gray suit!"

"Yes, the sleeves too long."

"Did you notice the absence of the forefinger of his left hand--shot off
in Eighteen Hundred Forty-five while hunting, they say."

"But how strong his voice is!"

"He looks like a farmer."

"Eighty-five years of age! Think of it, and how vigorous!"

Then the preacher spoke and his voice was sorrowful:

"Oh, but I made a botch of it--was it sarcasm or was it not?"

"Was what sarcasm?"

"When Mr. Gladstone said that Fate was unkind in not having him born in
the United States!"

And we were all silent. Then Boots came in, and we put the question to
Boots, who decided it was not sarcasm.

The next day, when we went away, we rewarded Boots bountifully.

* * * * *

William Gladstone is England's glory. Yet there is no
English blood in his veins; his parents were Scotch. Aside from Lord
Brougham, he is the only Scotchman who has ever taken a prominent part in
British statecraft. The name as we first find it is Gled-stane, "gled"
being a hawk--literally, a hawk that lives among the stones. Surely the
hawk is fully as respectable a bird as the eagle, and a goodly amount of
granite in the clay that is used to make a man is no disadvantage. The
name fits.

There are deep-rooted theories in the minds of many men (and still more
women) that bad boys make good men, and that a dash of the pirate, even
in a prelate, does not disqualify. But I wish to come to the defense of
the Sunday-school story-books and show that their very prominent moral is
right after all: it pays to be "good."

William Ewart Gladstone was sent to Eton when twelve years of age. From
the first, his conduct was a model of propriety. He attended every chapel
service, and said his prayers in the morning and before going to bed at
night; he could repeat the catechism backwards or forwards, and recite
more verses of Scripture than any other boy in school.

He always spoke the truth. He never played "hookey"; nor, as he grew
older, would he tell stories of doubtful flavor, or allow others to
relate such in his presence. His influence was for good, and Cardinal
Manning has said that there was less wine drunk at Oxford during the
Forties than would have been the case if Gladstone had not been there in
the Thirties.

He graduated from Christ