arce
knew when or how to stop. Commons, both sides, rather liked to hear
him struggle with his verbiage. Later he developed the rapier thrust,
some snatches of humor, a trifle of contempt. He learned the value of
playing with a rhetorical period that he might later leap upon a
climax. Frank B. Carvell was periodically egged on to bait the member
of Portage. He did it well. I recall once when the member for
Carleton was spluttering vitriolic abuse at the member for Portage that
Meighen muttered, "Oh, you wait. I'll get you." Which he
did--immediately. Young Cicero had his Catiline.

One of Meighen's best speeches now will rank with the best in any
country where dignity has not quite deserted the art of parliamentary
oration. But he is rather too fond of picturesque language to make a
really great speech. He has a strong intellectual grasp of what he
wants to say and a high moral measure of its significance to the
nation; but for a Premier he is too prone to lapse into the lingo of
partisan debate which in Canada--since the battering days of the giants
that followed Confederation--has not been on a very high level.
Meighen's best speeches are temperamentally big, but he has yet made no
great speech which will live, either in whole or in part, as a
glorification of his country. It takes a Lincoln or a Roosevelt to be
in high office and say things that palpitate in the heart of a crowd.
Wilson did; but he was dangerous. You judge a man in high office by
words and deeds. Lincoln was great in both. Lloyd George is great in
either, but not always in both at once. Macdonald could thrill a crowd
with a homely epigram and turn his hand to a vastly national piece of
work. We have yet to be sure that Meighen can be as big in action as
he has sometimes been in speech.

Unless one is too easily mistaken, the Imperial Conference imparted a
steady sense of responsibility to Arthur Meighen that he rather lacked
when he took office. He found himself in a very uncomfortable
spotlight. He had not been used to measuring his words to suit such
momentous occasions; nor accustomed to realizing how small the greatest
men and the most impressive human arrangements are when you get to the
centre and no longer have the perspective. He represented the oldest
self-governing Dominion. A word misplaced might make a vast
difference. He realized the significance of the event--especially
before an election. He was never able to k