Mr. Chamberlain spoke, as I have said, in the debate. It was a very characteristic speech. I know people think I am prejudiced about this gentleman. Not in the least. I recognize that he has many splendid qualities for political life. They are not qualities which I think highest either in the oratorical or the intellectual sense. He also has staying power, and has gone through seven terrible years. There is the trace of all the bitterness of that struggle in his face--which has lost in these years the almost boyish freshness of expression and outline, which bears in every deep line a mark of the ferocity of the passions by which his breast has been torn. He is one of the many men in the House of Commons that give one the impression of being hunted by the worst and most pitiless of all furies--violent personal passion--especially for power, for triumph, for revenge. But still, there he is--ready as ever to take part in the struggle--still holding the position he held seven years ago--with no sign of weakening or repentance, though there be plenty of the hunger of baulked revenge. [Sidenote: The tragedy of politics.] What a pity it is we can't see some of those great political figures in the nudity of their souls. They must have many a bitter moment--many an hour of dark and hopeless depression--probably far more than other men; for them emphatically life is a conflict and a struggle. And the conflict and the struggle often kill them long before their time. Was there ever anything much more tragic than the cry of M. Ferry for "le grand Repos," as he lay stifling from the weakening heart which the bullet of a political enemy and the slings and arrows of years of calumny and persecution had at last broken? To any man with ordinary sensitiveness of nerves, a political career is a crucifixion--many times repeated. But Mr. Chamberlain, probably, has not the ordinary sensitiveness of nerves. Combative, masterful, with narrow and concentrated purpose, he pursues the game of politics--not without affliction, but with persistent tenacity and a courage that have rarely shown any signs of faltering or failing. All these things must be granted to Mr. Chamberlain; but when I come to speak of him intellectually, I cannot see anything in him but a very perky, smart, glib-tongued "drummer," who is able to pick up the crumbs of knowledge with extraordinary rapidity, and give them forth again with considerable dexterity. He speech on Uganda, so far as its thought and its phraseology were concerned, was on the level of the profound utterances with which Sir Ashmead Bartlett tickles and infuriates the groundlings of provincial audiences. But it took the House--at least, it took the Tories; and, after all, what party orators who have not the responsibilities of office have to do, is to get cheers and embarrass the Government. [Sidenote: Another hymn to the G.O.M.]