202 



REPOHTING AND REPOKTrSS. 



best 'possible condition for judging 

 of the probability of Mr.Wilber- 

 force delivering such a speech, they 

 repaired to their respective offices, 

 and actually gave a copy of it into 

 the hands of the printer. Next 

 morning it appeared in all the pa- 

 pers, except the one with which 

 Morgan O'Sullivan was connected. 

 The sensation and surprise it 

 created in town exceeded every- 

 thing. Had it only appeared in 

 one or two of the papei's, persons 

 of ordinary intelligence must at 

 once have concluded that there 

 was some mistake about the mat- 

 ter. But its appearing in all the 

 journals except one forced, as it 

 were, people to the conclusion that 

 it must have been actually spoken. 

 The inference was plain. Every- 

 body, while regretting that the ne- 

 cessity should exist, saw that no 

 other course was left but to put 

 Mr. Wilberforce at once into a 

 strait jacket, and provide him with 

 a keeper. In the evening, the house 

 met as usual, and Mr. Wilberforce, 

 on the speaker taking the chair, 

 rose and begged the indulgence of 

 the house for one moment to a 

 matter which concerned it, as well 

 as himself, personally. "Every 

 honourable member," he observed, 

 "has doubtless read the speech 

 which I am represented as having 

 made on the previous night. "With 

 the permission of the house, I will 

 read it. (Here the honourable 

 member read the speech amidst 

 deafening roars of laughter.) I 

 can assure honourable members 

 that no one could have read this 

 speech with more surprise than I 

 myself did this morning, when I 

 found the paper on my breakfast 

 table. For myself, personally, I 

 care but little about it, though, if 

 I were capable of utteriug such 

 nonsense as is here put into my 

 mouth, it is high time that, instead 

 of being a member of this house, I 

 were an inmate of some lunatic 



[asylum. It is for the dignity of 

 this house that I feel concerned ; 

 for if honourable members were 

 capable of listening to such non- 

 sense, supposing me capable of 

 giving expression to it, it were 

 much more appropriate to call this 

 a theatre for the performance of 

 farces, than a place for the legisla- 

 tive deliberations of the represen- 

 tatives of the nation." 



It was proposed by some mem- 

 bers to call the printers of the 

 different papers in which the 

 speech appeared to the bar of the 

 house, for a breach of privilege; 

 but the matter was eventually al- 

 lowed to drop. 



THE HUMOROUS REPORTER MARK 

 SUPPLE. 



Mark took his wine frequently 

 at Bellamy's, and then went up 

 into the gallery, and reported like 

 a gentleman and a man of genius. 

 The members hardly knew their 

 own speeches again ; but they ad- 

 mired his free and bold manner of 

 dressing them up. None of them 

 ever went to the printing-office of 

 the Horning Chronicle, to complain 

 that the tall Irishman had given a 

 lame sneaking version of their sen- 

 timents. They pocketed the affront 

 of their metamorphosis, sjid father- 

 ed speeches they had never made. 

 His way was the hyperbole ; a 

 strong spice of Orientalism, with a 

 dash of the bogtrotter. His manner 

 seemed to please, and he presumed 

 upon it. One evening, as he sat 

 at his post in the gallery, waiting 

 the issue of things, and a hint to 

 hang his own tropes and figures 

 upon, a dead silence happened to 

 prevail in the house. It was when 

 Mr. Addington was speaker. The 

 bold leader of the press-gang was 

 never bent upon serious business 

 much, and at this time he was par- 

 ticularly full of meat and wine. 



Delighted, therefore^ with the 

 pause, but thinking that some- 



