h he will be able to see whether
you leave the building. In that case, he will blow us all into
atoms."

Then Sir Ferdinando rose to his legs, and began his speech. I had
never before heard a specimen of that special oratory to which the
epithet flowery may be most appropriately applied. It has all the
finished polish of England, joined to the fervid imagination of
Ireland. It streams on without a pause, and without any necessary end
but that which the convenience of time may dictate. It comes without
the slightest effort, and it goes without producing any great effect.
It is sweet at the moment. It pleases many, and can offend none. But
it is hardly afterwards much remembered, and is efficacious only in
smoothing somewhat the rough ways of this harsh world. But I have
observed that in what I have read of British debates, those who have
been eloquent after this fashion are generally firm to some purpose
of self-interest. Sir Ferdinando had on this occasion dressed himself
with minute care; and though he had for the hour before been very
sedulous in manipulating certain notes, he now was careful to show
not a scrap of paper; and I must do him the justice to declare that
he spun out the words from the reel of his memory as though they all
came spontaneous and pat to his tongue.

"Mr Neverbend," he said, "ladies and gentlemen,--I have to-day for
the first time the great pleasure of addressing an intelligent
concourse of citizens in Britannula. I trust that before my
acquaintance with this prosperous community may be brought to an end,
I may have many another opportunity afforded me of addressing you. It
has been my lot in life to serve my Sovereign in various parts of the
world, and humbly to represent the throne of England in every quarter
of the globe. But by the admitted testimony of all people,--my
fellow-countrymen at home in England, and those who are equally my
fellow-countrymen in the colonies to which I have been sent,--it is
acknowledged that in prosperity, intelligence, and civilisation, you
are excelled by no English-speaking section of the world. And if by
none who speak English, who shall then aspire to excel you? Such,
as I have learned, has been the common verdict given; and as I look
round this vast room, on a spot which fifty years ago the marsupial
races had under their own dominion, and see the feminine beauty and
manly grace which greet me on every side, I can well believe that
some peculiarly kind