en words seemed to preface a challenge
to mortal combat, and men held their breath until his purpose cleared.
The striking delivery of several keen thrusts fixed them in the
memory. Given in his deep, sonorous tones, one of these ran much as
follows: "When Doc-tor-r-r Ja-a-awnson said that patr-r-riotism-m was
the l-a-w-s-t r-r-refuge of a scoundr-r-rel he ignor-r-red the
enor-r-rmous possibilities of the word r-refa-awr-rm."[1581] Other
sentences, now historic, pleased opponents not less than friends. That
parties are not upheld by "deportment, ladies' magazines, or gush"
instantly caught the audience, as did "the journal made famous by the
pencil of Nast," and the comparison suggested by Edmund Burke of the
noise of "grasshoppers in the corner of a fence even without a
newspaper to be heard in."[1582]

[Footnote 1580: After the death of Thomas B. Reed of Maine, this speech
was found in his scrap-book among the masterpieces of sarcasm and
invective.]

[Footnote 1581: White, _Autobiography_, Vol. 1, p. 171.]

[Footnote 1582: "Because half-a-dozen grasshoppers under a fern make
the field ring with their importunate chink, while thousands of great
cattle beneath the shadow of the British oak chew the cud and are
silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only
inhabitants of the field, that of course they are many in number, or
that, after all, they are other than the little, shrivelled, meagre,
hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."--Edmund
Burke. George H. Jennings, _Anecdotal History of the British
Parliament_, p. 159.]

Nevertheless, these moments of accord between speaker and hearers
deepened by contrast the depth of bitterness existing between him and
the friends of the President. His denunciation of Curtis had included
Evarts if not other members of the Administration, and during the
recital of the rhythmical sentences of arraignment dissent mingled
with applause. "He was hissed," said a reporter of long experience,
"as I have never heard any speaker hissed at a convention
before."[1583] A friend to whom Conkling read the speech on the
preceding Sunday pronounced it "too severe," and the nephew excluded
the epithet "man-milliner" from the address as published in his
uncle's biography.[1584] The contemporary press, reflecting the injury
which Conkling's exuberance of denunciation did his cause, told how
its effect withered as soon as oratory and acting had ceased. With