The Old Man courteously gave way; but it was only to jump up again and pour on his young opponent a tide of ridicule and answer which overwhelmed him.
Higher and higher he soared with every succeeding moment, and stranger and more impressive became the aspect of the House.

There is nothing which becomes that assembly so much as those moments of exaltation during which it is under the absolute spell of some great master of its emotions.

Then a death-like stillness falls upon it--you can almost hear the same heavy-drawn sighs as those that in a Paris opera-house tell of all the passion, the flood of memory and regret, and the dreams which are evoked by the voice of a Marguerite before her final expiation--of a Juliet before her final immolation.

Laughter and cheers there were in abundance during this portion of Mr.Gladstone's speech; but the general demeanour was one of deadly stillness and rapt emotion--the stillness one can imagine on that Easter morning when De Quincey went forth and washed the fever from his forehead with the dew of early day.
[Sidenote: An episode.] And in the midst of it all there came one of the most pathetic little episodes I have seen in the House of Commons of recent years.

Mr.
Gladstone has somewhat changed his habits in one respect.