He had grown pale with excitement as he went on, and his voice gained in force until the last words were clear and ringing to the farthest corners of the room. A universal stir succeeded the silence with which he had been heard. Half a dozen men were on their feet at once amid a babble of comment, protestation, and approval. The Secretary managed to get the floor. "Mr. President," he said, his round face flushed with anger, and his fat hands so shaking with excitement that the papers on the table before him rustled audibly, "since it must be evident that the gentleman's remarks are instigated by anger at the committee's treatment of himself, it is only justice to the committee to state what many of the members may not know, that a letter of ample apology has been sent by them to Mr. Fenton." The men who had been eager to speak paused at this, and everybody looked at the artist. "Mr. President," he said, with a delightful sense of having himself perfectly in hand, and of being in an unassailable position, "I have been insulted by the committee under cover of a charge which they now acknowledge to be false; and, contrary to the usage of the club, a printed notice of this has been sent to every member. I have received a note of apology from the Secretary." He paused just long enough to let those who were taking sides against him emphasize their satisfaction at this acknowledgment by half-suppressed exclamations; then, in a voice of cutting smoothness, he continued,-- "At the head of that note was the word 'confidential,' which forbade me, as a gentleman, to show it. This was evidently the committee's idea of reparation for the outrage of that printed circular." He paused again, and the impression that he was making was evident from the fact that nobody attempted to deprive him of the floor; then he went on again,-- "I have already said that my motion was not a personal matter; if my case serves as an illustration, so much the better, as long as the principle is enforced." "The motion," interposed the President, gathering his wits together, "has not been seconded, and is therefore not debatable." "I second it," roared Tom Bently in his big voice, adding _sotto voce_: "We won't let the fun be spoiled for a little thing like that." The half laugh that followed this sally seemed to recall men from the state of astonishment into which they had been thrown by the audacity of Fenton's attack. There were plenty of men to speak now;--men who thought Fenton's position absurd;--men who believed in upholding the dignity of the Executive Committee;--men, more revolutionary, who were always pleased to see the existing order of things attacked;--men who wanted explanations, and men who offered them;--men who rose to points of order, and men who proposed amendments; with the inevitable men who are always in a state of oratorical effervescence and who speak upon every occasion, quite without reference to having anything to say.