' Hiram went on, 'the opposition soon began to grumble----'

'Some people are always grumbling,' said Soame Rivers. 'What should we
do without them? Where should we get our independent opposition?'

'Where, indeed,' said Sir Rupert, with a sigh of humorous pathos.

'Well,' said Helena, 'what did the opposition do?'

'Made themselves nasty,' answered Hiram. 'Stirred up discontent against
the foreigner, as they called him. He found his congress hard to handle.
There were votes of censure and talks of impeachment, and I don't know
what else. He went right ahead, his own way, without paying them the
least attention. Then they took to refusing to vote his necessary
supplies for the army and navy. He managed to get the money in spite of
them; but whether he lost his temper, or not, I can't say, but he took
it into his head to declare that the constitution was endangered by the
machinations of unscrupulous enemies, and to declare himself Dictator.'

'That was brave,' said Helena, enthusiastically.

'Rather rash, wasn't it?' sneered Soame Rivers.

'It may have been rash, and it may not,' Hiram answered meditatively. 'I
believe he was within the strict letter of the constitution, which does
empower a President to take such a step under certain conditions. But
the opposition meant fighting. So they rebelled against the Dictator,
and that's how the bother began. How it ended you all know.'

'Where were the people all this time?' Helena asked eagerly.

'I guess the people didn't understand much about it then,' Hiram
answered.

'My great deed was too great,' Helena murmured once again.

'The usual thing,' said Soame Rivers. 'Victory to begin with, and the
confidence born of victory; then defeat and disaster.'

'The story of those three days' fighting in Valdorado is one of the most
rattling things in recent times,' said the Duke.

'Was it not?' said Helena. 'I read every word of it every day, and I did
want him to win so much.'

'Nobody could be more sorry that you were disappointed than he, I should
imagine,' said Mrs. Selwyn.

'What puzzles me,' said Mr. Selwyn, 'is why when they had got him in
their power they didn't shoot him.'

'Ah, you see he was an Englishman by family,' Sir Rupert explained; 'and
though, of course, he had changed his nationality, I think the
Congressionalists were a little afraid of arousing any kind of feeling
in England.'

'As a matter of fact, of course,' said Soame Rivers, 'we shouldn'