Page:Eminent English liberals in and out of Parliament.djvu/34

 conscience, the intellect, Mr. Bright can touch with equal ease. His speech is the natural expression of a mind at once beautiful and strong. The whole man speaks, and not, as is the case with most other speakers, only a part of him. His words glide like a pleasant brook, without haste and without rest. His rising in the House is always an event. I remember by chance being in the Speaker's Gallery on a Wednesday afternoon when he made his now celebrated speech on the Burials Bill. He had seldom spoken since his severe illness, and was not expected to address the House. The debate had been of the poorest select vestry stamp, without ability and without human interest of any kind, when suddenly a movement of expectation was visible on both sides of the House:—

The effect was magical. Languid and recumbent legislators sat erect, and were all attention in a moment. It was curious to observe how the occupants of the Conservative benches, the majority of whom in the late Parliament looked for all the world like a band of horse-jockeys and prize-fighters, were affected. Mr. Bright talked to them with all the simplicity and confidence of a good paterfamilias addressing his family circle with his back to his own mantel-piece. And such talk! No wonder that they listened with silent respect. The whole House was transformed by it, and began to feel something like a proper sense of its own duty and dignity. Before he had spoken five minutes,