"Where is this Hugh Littlepage at this very moment? In Paris, squandering _your_ hard earnings in riotous living, according to the best standards of aristocracy. He lives in the midst of abundance, dresses richly and fares richly, while _you_ and _yours_ are eating the sweat of your brows. He is no man for a pewter spoon and two-pronged fork! No, my countrymen! He must have a _gold_ spoon for some of his dishes, and you will find it hard to believe--plain, unpretending, republican farmers as you are, but it is not the less true--he must have forks of _silver_! Fellow-citizens, Hugh Littlepage would not put his knife into his mouth, as you and I do, in eating--as all plain, unpretending republicans do--for the world. It would choke him; no, he keeps _silver_ forks to touch his anointed lips!" Here there was an attempt to get up something like applause, but it totally failed. The men of Ravensnest had been accustomed all their lives to see the Littlepages in the social station they occupied; and, after all, it did not seem so very extraordinary that we should have silver forks, any more than that others should have silver spoons. The lecturer had the tact to see that he had failed on this point, and he turned to another. The next onset was made against our title. Whence did it come? demanded the lecturer. From the king of England; and the people had conquered the country from that sovereign, and put themselves in his place. Now, is it not a good principle in politics, that to the victors belong the spoils? He believed it was; and that in conquering America, he was of opinion that the people of America had conquered the land, and that they had a right to take the land, and to keep it. Titles from kings he did not respect much; and he believed the American people, generally, did not think much of them. If Hugh Littlepage wished an "estate," as he called it, let him come to the people and "sarve _them_," and see what sort of an estate _they_ would give him.