t he
hung his umbrella upon the Speaker's mace, but it was certainly counted
as an act of intentional discourtesy against him. He was sent to
Coventry from the first, and he was so sore and angry that he was almost
fore-doomed to bring himself into trouble.

Kenealy succeeded in placing on the paper a motion in favour of
triennial Parliaments very shortly after his first unfavourable
introduction into the House. It was long after midnight when he rose to
speak. He began at the beginning and favoured us with an analysis of
the characteristics of the first gathering of a representative assembly
under Alfred the Great. Sir Wilfred Lawson almost immediately rose
to inquire whether the hour were not somewhat too advanced for a
disquisition on parliamentary history, the facts of which were
available to everybody, and Kenealy passionately retorted that he was in
possession of the ear of the House, that he would stand upon his rights,
would adopt his own methods and would speak at what length he chose.
In answer to this defiance, the House rose _en masse_ and its members
solemnly filed away, leaving Kenealy to address the Speaker, the clerks
at the table and a handful of reporters in the gallery. He struggled on
for awhile, but by and by a member returned and drew the attention of
the Speaker to the very obvious fact that there were not forty members
present. The Speaker rose under his canopy and waved his cocked hat
solemnly towards Kenealy and then towards the other occupant of the
House.

"There are not forty members present," he said solemnly, "the House is
now adjourned." That was the result of Dr Kenealy's first essay and in
his second he came to final and irremediable grief. In a crowded House,
he arose to impeach his enemies and traducers. He was ploughing along
and I was fighting after him in my own gouty, inefficient shorthand,
when one of the strangest premonitions of my life occurred to me. He
said "If any of these unjust aspersions are cast anew upon me"--and I
seemed to know as absolutely what he was going to say as if the whole
thing were a play which I had seen rehearsed a score of times. I
thought, "I hope to heaven he won't say that," and he went on in the
very words my mind forebode. "If these unjust aspersions are cast upon
me, I shall shake them from me as the lion shakes the dew-drops from his
mane." There was a second's silence as he paused, and then there was a
crash of laughter with peal on peal to fo