d not been originally a part of his case. Even in the last three
years of his parliamentary life, when his sight had so failed that he
read nothing, printed or written, except what it was absolutely
necessary to read, and when his deafness had so increased that he did
not hear half of what was said in debate, it was sufficient for a
colleague to say into the better ear a few words explaining how the
matter at issue stood, and he would rise to his feet and extemporise a
long and ingenious argument, or retreat with dexterous grace from a
position which the course of the discussion or the private warning of
the Whips had shown to be untenable. Never was he seen at a loss
either to meet a new point raised by an adversary or to make the best
of an unexpected incident. Sometimes he would amuse himself by drawing
a cheer or a contradiction from his opponents, and would then suddenly
turn round and use this hasty expression of their opinion as the basis
for a fresh argument of his own. Loving conflict, he loved debate,
and, so far from being confused or worried by the strain conflict put
upon him, his physical health was strengthened and his faculties were
roused to higher efficiency by having to prepare and deliver a great
speech. He had the rare faculty of thinking ahead while he was
speaking, and could, while pouring forth a stream of glittering
sentences, be at the same time (as one saw by watching his eye)
composing an argument to be delivered five or ten minutes later. Once,
at a very critical moment, when he was defending a great measure
against the amendment--moved by a nominal supporter of his own--which
proved fatal to it, a friend suddenly reminded him of an incident in
the career of the mover which might be effectively used against him.
When Mr. Gladstone sat down after delivering an impassioned speech, in
the course of which he had several times approached and then sheered
off from the incident, he turned round to the friend and said, "I was
thinking all the time I was speaking whether I could properly use
against ---- what you told me, but concluded, on the whole, that it
would be too hard on him."

The weakness of his eloquence sprang from its supersubtlety and
superabundance. He was prone to fine distinctions. He multiplied
arguments when it would have been better to rely upon two or three of
the strongest. And he was sometimes so intent on refuting the
particular adversaries opposed to him, and persuading the p