There was a gasp, a moment of supreme quiet, and then a mighty burst of applause. To men of all parties and factions there came a single thought. Johnson was the leading county of its Congressional district. There was an election that fall, and Harrison was in the race. Those eight words meant to a surety he would not go to Washington, for the Senator from Maxwell had chosen the right word when he referred to the prejudice of Johnson County on the Williams case as “undying.” The world throbs with such things at the moment of their doing--even though condemning them later, and the part of the world then packed within the Senate-Chamber shared the universal disposition. The noise astonished Senator Harrison, and he looked around with something like resentment. When the tumult at last subsided, and he saw that he was expected to make a speech, he grew very red, and grasped his chair desperately. The reporters were back in their places, leaning nervously forward. This was Senator Harrison's chance to say something worth putting into a panel by itself with black lines around it--and they were sure he would do it. But he did not. He stood there like a schoolboy who had forgotten his piece--growing more and more red. “I--I think,” he finally jerked out, “that some of us have been mistaken. I'm in favour now of--of giving him his chance.” They waited for him to proceed, but after a helpless look around the Chamber he sat down. The president of the Senate waited several minutes for him to rise again, but he at last turned his chair around and looked out at the green things on the State-house grounds, and there was nothing to do but go ahead with the second calling of the roll. This time it stood 50 to 12 in favour of the boy. A motion to adjourn immediately followed--no one wanted to do anything more that afternoon. They all wanted to say things to the Senator from Johnson; but his face had grown cold, and as they were usually afraid of him, anyhow, they kept away. All but Senator Dorman--it meant too much with him. “Do you mind my telling you,” he said, tensely, “that it was as fine a thing as I have ever known a man to do?” The Senator from Johnson moved impatiently. “You think it 'fine,'” he asked, almost resentfully, “to be a coward?” “Coward?” cried the other man. “Well, that's scarcely the word. It was--heroic!” “Oh no,” said Senator Harrison, and he spoke wearily, “it was a clear case of cowardice. You see,” he laughed, “I was afraid it might haunt me when I am seventy.” Senator Dorman started eagerly to speak, but the other man stopped him and passed on. He was seeing it as his constituency would see it, and it humiliated him. They would say he had not the courage of his convictions, that he was afraid of the unpopularity, that his judgment had fallen victim to the eloquence of the Senator from Maxwell.