They found him in better looks and better spirits than they had
anticipated. Few persons, when he liked it, could be more agreeable than
William Brandon; but at times there mixed with his conversation a bitter
sarcasm, probably a habit acquired in his profession, or an occasional
tinge of morose and haughty sadness, possibly the consequence of his ill-
health. Yet his disorder, which was somewhat approaching to that painful
affliction the _tic douloureux_, though of fits more rare in occurrence
than those of that complaint ordinarily are, never seemed even for an
instant to operate upon his mood, whatever that might be. That disease
worked unseen; not a muscle of his face appeared to quiver; the smile
never vanished from his mouth, the blandness of his voice never grew
faint as with pain, and, in the midst of intense torture, his resolute
and stern mind conquered every external indication; nor could the most
observant stranger have noted the moment when the fit attacked or
released him. There was something inscrutable about the man. You felt
that you took his character upon trust, and not on your own knowledge.
The acquaintance of years would have left you equally dark as to his
vices or his virtues. He varied often, yet in each variation he was
equally undiscoverable. Was he performing a series of parts, or was it
the ordinary changes of a man's true temperament that you beheld in him?
Commonly smooth, quiet, attentive, flattering in social intercourse, he
was known in the senate and courts of law for a cold asperity, and a
caustic venom,--scarcely rivalled even in those arenas of contention. It
seemed as if the bitterer feelings he checked in private life, he
delighted to indulge in public. Yet even there he gave not way to
momentary petulance or gushing passion; all seemed with him systematic
sarcasm or habitual sternness. He outraged no form of ceremonial or of
society. He stung, without appearing conscious of the sting; and his
antagonist writhed not more beneath the torture of his satire than the
crushing contempt of his self-command. Cool, ready, armed and defended