gh, and, when the man was beaten, pay his
expenses! Was this to be done,--to be done and found out and then
nothing come of it in these days of purity, when a private member of
Parliament, some mere nobody, loses his seat because he has given
away a few bushels of coals or a score or two of rabbits! Mr. Slide's
energetic love of public virtue was scandalised as he thought of the
probability of such a catastrophe. To his thinking, public virtue
consisted in carping at men high placed, in abusing ministers and
judges and bishops--and especially in finding out something for
which they might be abused. His own public virtue was in this matter
very great, for it was he who had ferreted out the secret. For his
intelligence and energy in that matter the country owed him much. But
the country would pay him nothing, would give him none of the credit
he desired, would rob him of this special opportunity of declaring
a dozen times that the "People's Banner" was the surest guardian of
the people's liberty,--unless he could succeed in forcing the matter
further into public notice. "How terrible is the apathy of the people
at large," said Mr. Slide to himself, "when they cannot be wakened by
such a revelation as this!"

Mr. Slide knew very well what ought to be the next step. Proper
notice should be given and a question should be asked in Parliament.
Some gentleman should declare that he had noticed such and such
statements in the public press, and that he thought it right to ask
whether such and such payments had been made by the Prime Minister.
In his meditations Mr. Slide went so far as to arrange the very words
which the indignant gentleman should utter, among which words was a
graceful allusion to a certain public-spirited newspaper. He did even
go so far as to arrange a compliment to the editor,--but in doing
so he knew that he was thinking only of that which ought to be, and
not of that which would be. The time had not come as yet in which
the editor of a newspaper in this country received a tithe of the
honour due to him. But the question in any form, with or without a
compliment to the "People's Banner," would be the thing that was now
desirable.

Who was to ask the question? If public spirit were really strong in
the country there would be no difficulty on that point. The crime
committed had been so horrible that all the great politicians of the
country ought to compete for the honour of asking it. What greater
service c