uproar, protestations and accusations from all sides, some of the
extreme Left getting up, gesticulating wildly, and shaking their fists
at the speaker--the Right, generally calm and sarcastic, requesting the
speaker to repeat his monstrous statements--the huissiers dressed in
black with silver chains, walking up and down in front of the tribune,
calling out at intervals: "Silence, messieurs, s'il vous plait,"--the
President ringing his bell violently to call the house to order, and
nobody paying the slightest attention,--the orator sometimes standing
quite still with folded arms waiting until the storm should abate,
sometimes dominating the hall and hurling abuse at his adversaries. W.
was always perfectly quiet; his voice was low, not very strong, and he
could not speak if there were an uproar. When he was interrupted in a
speech he used to stand perfectly still with folded arms, waiting for a
few minutes' silence. The deputies would call out: "Allez! allez!"
interspersed with a few lively criticisms on what he was saying to them;
he was perfectly unmoved, merely replied: "I will go on with pleasure as
soon as you will be quiet enough for me to be heard." Frenchmen
generally have such a wonderful facility of speech, and such a pitiless
logic in discussing a question, that the debates were often very
interesting. The public was interesting too. A great many women of all
classes followed the sittings--several Egerias (not generally in their
first youth) of well-known political men sitting prominently in the
President's box, or in the front row of the journalists' box, following
the discussions with great interest and sending down little slips of
paper to their friends below--members' wives and friends who enjoyed
spending an hour or two listening to the speeches--newspaper
correspondents, literary ladies, diplomatists. It was very difficult to
get places, particularly when some well-known orators were announced to
speak upon an important question. We didn't always know beforehand, and
I remember some dull afternoons with one or two members making long