waving condemnatory flippers.

[Illustration: One of the Most Reverend of the Senate Walruses]

Senator Hanway had thought of this, and the cloakroom move did not
disconcert him. He seized on one of the most reverend of the Senate
walruses, one festooned with the very seaweed of Senate tradition, and,
casting him, as it were, on the coals of his hot rhetoric, proceeded to
roast him exhaustively. The cloakroom walruses smelled the odor of
burning blubber and returned eagerly to their cakes of ice, for there is
nothing so pleasing to your true walrus as the spectacle of a brother
walrus being grilled. It was in time understood that if the walruses
placed an affront upon Senator Hanway he would assail them singly or in
the drove. Then the walruses made their peace with him and admitted him
to fellowship before his time; for your walrus cannot carry on a war and
is only terrible in appearance.

Now, when the seal of silence was taken from Senator Hanway and he found
himself consented to as a full-grown walrus possessed of every right of
the Senate beaches, he became deferential to his fellow Senators. He
curried their favor by pretending to consult with them, personally and
privately, on every Senate question that arose. He could be a great
courtier when he pleased and had a genius for flattery, and now that his
right to go without a gag was no longer disputed he devoted himself to
healing what wounds he had dealt the vanity of the oldsters. By this he
grew both popular and powerful; as a finale no man oftener had his
Senate way.

Senator Hanway, modestly and unobtrusively, did sundry Senate things
that stamped him a leader of men. He bore the labor of a staggering