it was practised.
There was a proper mahogany ballot-box. The subjects for discussion
always began, "That this house, etc.," and the secretary entered in a
book exhaustive minutes of every meeting, which the chairman signed
with a quill pen. These details are given in order that the reader may
understand the character of the society in question, and be therefore
in a better position to pass judgment on the outrageous behaviour of
certain gentlemen whose conduct will shortly be described.
On the following Saturday evening, in answer to the formal invitation
which they had received, Tinkleby and his friends filed into the room,
looking very good and demure, and occupied the desk against the end
wall, which they entered as though it had been a pew in church. The
usual preliminaries were gone through, and the chairman called on "our
worthy friend the secretary" to open the debate by moving, "That this
house is of opinion that the moral and physical condition of mankind is
in a state of retrogression."
For a time all went well. The visitors sat as mute as mummies, and the
opener sought to justify his proposition by launching out into an
impassioned discourse, which seemed rather inclined to resolve itself
into a brief history of the world, and which the critical Tinkleby
afterwards described as containing "more wind than argument." Touching
briefly on the statements of the Hebrew chroniclers, Heningson
proceeded with a wordy exposition of the manners and customs of ancient
Greece, and from this stumbled rather abruptly into the rise of the
Roman empire. Drawing a fancy and perhaps rather flattering portrait
of one of the world-conquering legionaries, the speaker thought fit to
compare it with that of a latter-day Italian organ-grinder who often
visited the school, and who had recently been had up for being drunk
and disorderly in the streets of Melchester.
"Gentlemen," exclaimed the orator earnestly, pointing accidentally at
the chairman, but meaning to indicate the unfortunate musician, "is
_this_ the culmination of a race of gods? this inebriate, undersized--"
At this point the discourse was suddenly interrupted by a loud and
prolonged snore. Heningson hesitated, and glanced up from his notes
with a look of annoyance. He was about to proceed when a chorus of
snores in every imaginable pitch and key effectively checked his
utterance. With an indignant "Sh--s-h!" the audience turned in their
seats to witness
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