iend, Mr. Hughes, although of Gladstone's party,
joined at the top of his lungs. I think the Bedlam lasted
five minutes. But Plunket stood his ground and made his correction.

Although Bernal Osborne was a man of great wit and sense,
and Sir Stafford Northcote and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach were
then, as the latter is now, very eminent characters, yet the
only speakers who belonged to the rank of the great orators
were Gladstone and Disraeli. I will not undertake to add
another description of Gladstone to the many with which every
reader of mine is thoroughly familiar. The late Dr. Bellows
resembled him very nearly, both in his way of reasoning and
his manner of speech. Persons who have heard Dr. Bellows
at his best will not deem this comparison unworthy.

Gladstone was terribly in earnest. He began his speech by
a compliment to Northcote, his opponent, for whom he had shown
his esteem by sending him to the United States as one of the
Joint High Commission to make the Alabama Treaty. But when
Mr. Gladstone was well under way, Sir Stafford interposed
a dissent from something he said by calling out "No, no"--
a very frequent practice in the House. Gladstone turned
upon him savagely, with a tone of anger which I might almost
call furious: "Can the gentleman tolerate no opinion but
his own, that he interjects his audible contradiction into
the middle of my sentence?" The House evidently did not like
it. Hughes, who agreed with Gladstone, said to me: "What
a pity it is that he cannot control his temper; that is his
great fault."

There are no passages in this speech of Gladstone that can
be cited as among the best examples of the great style of
the orator. But there are several that give a good idea of
his manner, and show something of the argument in two or
three sentences: "I am not at all ashamed of having said,
and I will say it again, that this is a choice of evils. I do not
say that the proposal for a secret ballot is open to no objections
whatever. I admit that open voting has its evils as well
as its merits. One of these merits is that it enables a
man to discharge a noble duty in the noblest possible manner.
But what are its demerits? That by marking his vote you expose
the voter to be tempted through his cupidity and through his
fears. We propose, by secret voting, to greatly diminish
the first of these, and we hope to take away the second. We
do not believe that the disposition to bribe can