eloquence, genius rose to a premium above its market price in times of
tranquillity and tape. Without effort of his own, by the mere force of
the undercurrent, Guy Darrell was thrown up from oblivion into note. He
could not form a Cabinet, certainly not; but he might help to bring a
Cabinet together, reconcile jarring elements, adjust disputed questions,
take in such government some high place, influence its councils, and
delight a public weary of the oratory of the day with the eloquence of
a former race. For the public is ever a /laudator temporis acti/, and
whatever the authors or the orators immediately before it, were those
authors and orators Homers and Ciceros, would still shake a disparaging
head, and talk of these degenerate days as Homer himself talked ages
before Leonidas stood in the pass of Thermopylae, or Miltiades routed
Asian armaments at Marathon. Guy Darrell belonged to a former race. The
fathers of those young members rising now into fame had quoted to their
sons his pithy sentences, his vivid images; and added, as Fox added when
quoting Burke, "But you should have heard and seen the man!"

Heard and seen the man! But there he was again! come up as from a
grave,--come up to the public just when such a man was wanted. Wanted
how? wanted where? Oh, somehow and somewhere! There he is! make the
most of him. The house in Carlton Gardens is prepared, the establishment
mounted. Thither flock all the Viponts, nor they alone; all the chiefs
of all parties, nor they alone; all the notabilities of our grand
metropolis. Guy Darrell might be startled at his own position; but he
comprehended its nature, and it did not discompose his nerves. He knew
public life well enough to be aware how much the popular favour is the
creature of an accident. By chance he had nicked the time; had he thus
come to town the season before, he might have continued obscure, a man
like Guy Darrell not being wanted then. Whether with or without design,
his bearing confirmed and extended the effect produced by his