Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/259

 to present a humble memorial to his lordship on the subject, and thereby, I fear, did incur his lordship's displeasure. For great men. Sir, do not easily brook any opposition to their will."

"So much the worse for the great men themselves in the long run," said the Englishman. "It is one of the greatest advantages of a free country, with a free Parliament, and a free press, to protect great men, as you call them, against themselves. Some of the greatest men that ever lived. Napoleon Bonaparte, for instance, have gone to destruction because they were without such protection. As for these small tyrants, such as your landlord here, you see what monkey tricks they play when left to themselves. And, indeed, I believe they lose the little intelligence they may have bad from nature, and descend in the scale of being so as to form the connecting link between man and the baboon."

The Englishman would not have gone so far in the expression of his opinions, for he was always careful not to say unnecessarily what might hurt the feelings of any person unless such person, by having been the aggressor, rendered an attack on him a mere act of self-defence; but he saw that the worthy minister, though he might