more modest and less assured are content to place themselves
"above" it, at a point farthest removed from the leaders.

On the day he was sworn in there was much curiosity to see where
Churchill would elect to sit. In his own mind there was apparently
no doubt. After he had taken the oath, signed his name, and shaken
the hand of the Speaker, without hesitation he seated himself on
the bench next to the Ministry. Ten minutes later, so a newspaper
of the day describes it, he had cocked his hat over his eyes, shoved
his hands into his trousers pockets, and was lolling back eying the
veterans of the House with critical disapproval.

His maiden speech was delivered in May, 1901, in reply to David
Lloyd George, who had attacked the conduct of British soldiers in
South Africa. Churchill defended them, and in a manner that from
all sides gained him honest admiration. In the course of the debate
he produced and read a strangely apropos letter which, fifteen
years before, had been written by his father to Lord Salisbury. His
adroit use of this filled H. W. Massingham, the editor of the _Daily
News_, with enthusiasm. Nothing in parliamentary tactics, he
declared, since Mr. Gladstone died, had been so clever. He
proclaimed that Churchill would be Premier. John Dillon, the
Nationalist leader, said he never before had seen a young man, by
means of his maiden effort, spring into the front rank of
parliamentary speakers. He promised that the Irish members would
ungrudgingly testify to his ability and honesty of purpose. Among
others to at once recognize the rising star was T. P. O'Connor,
himself for many years of the parliamentary firmament one of the
brightest stars. In _M. A. P._ he wrote: "I am inclined to think that
the dash of American blood which he has from his mother has