However, they cheered and applauded, and
I took advantage of the applause to sit down, and Mrs. ------ informed me
that I had succeeded admirably. It was no success at all, to be sure;
neither was it a failure, for I had aimed at nothing, and I had exactly
hit it. But after sitting down, I was conscious of an enjoyment in
speaking to a public assembly, and felt as if I should like to rise
again. It is something like being under fire,--a sort of excitement, not
exactly pleasure, but more piquant than most pleasures. I have felt this
before, in the same circumstances; but, while on my legs, my impulse is
to get through with my remarks and sit down again as quickly as possible.
The next speech, I think, was by Rev. Dr. ------, the celebrated Arctic
gentleman, in reply to a toast complimentary to the clergy. He turned
aside from the matter in hand, to express his kind feelings towards
America, where he said he had been most hospitably received, especially
at Cambridge University. He also made allusions to me, and I suppose it
would have been no more than civil in me to have answered with a speech
in acknowledgment, but I did not choose to make another venture, so
merely thanked him across the corner of the table, for he sat near me.
He is a venerable-looking, white-haired gentleman, tall and slender, with
a pale, intelligent, kindly face.
Other speeches were made; but from beginning to end there was not one
breath of eloquence, nor even one neat sentence; and I rather think that
Englishmen would purposely avoid eloquence or neatness in after-dinner
speeches.
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