e it worth
his while the mysterious acts by which the puppets on the stage were
moved, and who moved them; who, for instance, wrote the declamation which
his Excellency Asa Gray recited as his own. Mr. Tooting, as we have seen,
had a remarkable business head, and combined with it--as Austen Vane
remarked--the rare instinct of the Norway rat which goes down to the sea
in ships--when they are safe. Burrowing continually amongst the bowels of
the vessel, Mr. Tooting knew the weak timbers better than the Honourable
Hilary Vanes who thought the ship as sound as the day Augustus Flint had
launched her. But we have got a long way from Horatius in our imagery.

Little birds flutter around the capital, picking up what crumbs they may.
One of them, occasionally fed by that humanitarian, the Honourable Jacob
Botcher, whispered a secret that made the humanitarian knit his brows. He
was the scout that came flying (if by a burst of imagination we can
conceive the Honourable Jacob in this aerial act)--came flying to the
Consul in room Number Seven with the news that Mr. Hamilton Tooting had
been detected on two evenings slipping into the Duncan house. But the
Consul--strong man that he was--merely laughed. The Honourable Elisha
Jane did some scouting on his own account. Some people are so small as to
be repelled by greatness, to be jealous of high gifts and power, and it
was perhaps inevitable that a few of the humbler members whom Mr. Crewe
had entertained should betray his hospitality, and misinterpret his pure
motives.

It was a mere coincidence, perhaps, that after Mr. Jane's investigation
the intellectual concentration which one of the committees had bestowed
on two of Mr. Crewe's bills came to an end. These bills, it is true,
carried no appropriation, and, were, respectively, the acts to
incorporate the State Economic League and the Children's Charities
Association. These suddenly appeared in the House one morning, with
favourable recommendations, and, mirabile dicta, the end of the day saw
them through the Senate and signed by the governor. At last Mr. Crewe by
his Excellency had stamped the mark of his genius on the statute books,
and the Honourable Jacob Botcher, holding out an olive branch, took the
liberty of congratulating him.

A vainer man, a lighter character than Humphrey Crewe, would have been
content to have got something; and let it rest at that. Little Mr.
Butcher or Mr. Speaker Doby, with his sorrowful smile, gu