Page:Roy Norton--The unknown Mr Kent.djvu/179

 beyond their deserts, shall with full bellies rest between silken sheets."

He paused dramatically, and lifted his hands above his head, crossed in a peculiar manner, and instantly a wild cheer broke out that began in a singularly scattered way, but was so insistent that the people themselves took it up at last and roared loudly, "God Save the King! Long live the King!"

Kent, discerning the same sort of frenzy that prevails alike in negro camp-meetings and Madison Square political meetings, where individuals yell and shriek principally because the men on either side are setting the example, played another fine old oratorical trick by furiously bawling for silence and gesturing appeals, polite requests, and commands.

"No man dares speak against the king's wish," he roared, as if intent on being heard by some one across the Atlantic ocean, "because his intelligent and wise fellows will understand, at once, that such an objector is a disgrace to the name of manhood, an obstructor to progress, a rebel at heart, and, worst of all, one who would trample under foot the grand and noble flag of labour, that sacred standard that has been followed, defended and died for since time began, that symbolises the glory of honest toil!"

Again he made that peculiar gesture, and this [175]