“Less than eighty men, Melords, in an assembly of fifteen hundred! Hardly five per cent.--hardly, if I may use a bold metaphor, thirteen pence in the pound! It is by this proportion alone, even did these detestable falsehoods contain--which they do not--a grain of truth, that our whole body is forsooth to be judged! But, Melords, who are these eighty men, if I do not insult them by permitting my argument to approach their names? “I will not cite my own case; my public career is open for any man to examine, and I think I know the temper of my own people too well to delay upon that score. But there are around me others perhaps (I know not) more sensitive, or less experienced in the petty villainies of the world, than am I, who may have thought themselves especially marked out. “I ask, against which of them could such an accusation be levelled by name, without the certitude of such a result in any Court of Justice as would silence the mouth of the libeller for many years? Is it, Melords, the man to whom we owe the great reservoir at Sing Yan? Is it that world-famous Englishman who by his organising ability, his untiring industry and his knowledge of men, has built up the United Sausage Company’s emporiums throughout the length and breadth of the land? “I might extend the list indefinitely: Melords, to no one of these, to no one member of this House I venture to say, can words of this kind be addressed without their falsity being apparent almost without need for proof. “I repeat in the words of Burke, ‘No, no, no, a thousand times no.’ I am not ashamed to recall the glorious phrase with which these walls echoed to the voice of Ephraim ten years ago: ‘Give me such principles as these and I will trample them into the dust beneath my feet!’” Having said so much, Lord Repton sat down, and it is a tribute to the fire and the conviction of the man that a young heiress of African Origin but recently married, who had been listening intently from the Peeresses’ Gallery throughout the latter part of the speech, gave a low moan and fainted clean away. Her young form was borne down to the buttery by a strong posse of attendants where the air from the Terrace soon revived her. I mention the incident only as a signal proof of the oratorical powers that had illumined Repton’s great career. After such an effort Lord Methlinghamhurst necessarily somewhat palled, especially as an imperfection in his diction, failing eyesight and a certain loss of memory compelled him to make long and uncomfortable pauses over the large printed slip which he held in his hand, but it was over at last, and the Duke of Battersea rose amid the evident interest of such as remained to hear him, no less than five of whom were concerned with himself in the Anapootra Ruby Mines.