said, at two other certain places, that they
meant to do half of that thing (but differed
about which half), and to do a variety of
nameless wonders instead of the other half;
and one of the remaining two declared that
the thing itself was dead and buried, while
the other as strenuously protested that it was
alive and kicking. It was admitted that the
parliamentary genius of our honorable friend
would be quite able to reconcile such small
discrepancies as these; but, there remained
the additional difficulty that each of the
twelve made entirely different statements at
different places, and that all the twelve called
everything visible and invisible, sacred and
profane, to witness, that they were a perfectly
impregnable phalanx of unanimity. This,
it was apprehended, would be a stumbling-
block to our honorable friend.

The difficulty came before our honorable
friend, in this way. He went down to
Verbosity  to meet his free and independent
constituents, and to render an account (as he
informed them in the local papers) of the
trust they had confided to his hands -- that
trust which it was one of the proudest privileges
of an Englishman to possess -- that trust
which it was the proudest privilege of an
Englishman to hold. It may be mentioned
as a proof of the great general interest
attaching to the contest, that a Lunatic whom
nobody employed or knew, went down to
Verbosity with several thousand pounds in
gold, determined to give the whole away --
which he actually did; and that all the
publicans opened their houses for nothing.
Likewise, several fighting men, and a patriotic
group of burglars sportively armed with life-
preservers, proceeded (in barouches and very
drunk) to the scene of action at their own
expense; these children of nature having
conceived a warm attachment to our honorable
friend, and intending, in their artless
manner, to testify it by knocking the voters
in the opposite interest on the head.

Our honorable friend being come into the
presence of his constituents, and having
professed with great suavity that he was delighted
to see his good friend Tipkisson there, in his
working dress -- his good friend Tipkisson
being an inveterate saddler, who always
opposes him, and for whom he has a mortal
hatred -- made them a brisk, ginger-beery sort
of speech, in which he showed them how the
dozen noblemen and gentlemen had (in
exactly ten days from their coming in) exercised
a surprisingly beneficial effect on the
whole financial condition of Europe, had
altered the state of the exports and imports
for the current half-year, had prevented the
drain of gold, had made all that matter right
about the glut of the raw material, and had
restored all sorts of balances with which
the superseded noblemen and gentlemen had
played the deuce -- and all this, with wheat
at so much a quarter, gold at so much an
ounce, and the Bank of England discounting
good bills at so much per cent ! He
might be asked, he observed in a peroration
of great power, what were his principles?
His principles were what they always
had been. His principles were written in
the countenances of the lion and unicorn;
were stamped indelibly upon the royal shield
which those grand animals supported, and
upon the free words of fire which that shield
bore. His principles were, Britannia and her
sea-king trident! His principles were, commercial
prosperity co-existently with perfect
and profound agricultural contentment; but
short of this he would never stop. His
principles were, these, -- with the addition
of his colors nailed to the mast, every man's
heart in the right place, every man's eye
open, every man's hand ready, every man's
mind on the alert. His principles were, these,
concurrently with a general revision of
something-- speaking generally -- and a possible
re-adjustment of something else, not to be
mentioned more particularly. His principles,
to sum up all in a word, were, Hearths
and Altars, Labor and Capital, Crown and
Sceptre, Elephant and Castle. And now, if his
good friend Tipkisson required any further
explanation from him he (our honorable
friend) was there, willing and ready to
give it.

Tipkisson, who all this time had stood
conspicuous in the crowd, with his arms folded and
his eyes intently fastened on our honorable
friend; Tipkisson, who throughout our honorable
friend's address had not relaxed a muscle
of his visage, but had stood there, wholly
unaffected by the torrent of eloquence: an object
of contempt and scorn to mankind (by which
we mean, of course, to the supporters of our
honorable friend); Tipkisson now said that
he was a plain man (Cries of " You are
indeed! "), and that what he wanted to
know was, what our honorable friend and
the dozen noblemen and gentlemen were
driving at?

Our honorable friend immediately replied,
"At the illimitable perspective."

It was considered by the whole assembly
that this happy statement of our honorable
friend's political views ought, immediately, to
have settled Tipkisson's business and covered
him with confusion; but, that implacable
person, regardless of the execrations that
were heaped upon him from all sides (by
which we mean, of course, from our honorable
friend's side), persisted in retaining an
unmoved countenance, and obstinately
retorted that if our honorable friend meant
that, he wished to know what that meant?

It was in repelling this most objectionable
and indecent opposition, that our honorable
friend displayed his highest qualifications for
the representation of Verbosity. His warmest
supporters present, and those who were best
acquainted with his generalship, supposed
that the moment was come when he would
fall back upon the sacred bulwarks of our