It chanced he was the president of the night.

He sat in the same room where the Society still meets--only the portraits were not there: the men who afterwards sat for them were then but beginning their career.

The same lustre of many tapers shed its light over the meeting; the same chair, perhaps, supported him that so many of us have sat in since.

At times he seemed to forget the business of the evening, but even in these periods he sat with a great air of energy and determination.

At times he meddled bitterly, and launched with defiance those fines which are the precious and rarely used artillery of the president.