For seven hours the one or two editors were
obliged to sit and calmly compliment the great speech which that night
flashed over the wires of a continent with the old electric thrill. And,
worse than all, they were obliged to record with it the closing of the
---- Congress, with more than the usual amount of Unfinished Business.
A little group of friends surrounded the great Senator with hymns of
praise and congratulations. Old adversaries saluted him courteously as
they passed by with the respect of strong men. A little woman with a
shawl drawn over her shoulders, and held with one small brown hand,
approached him timidly:
"I speak not the English well," she said gently, "but I have read much.
I have read in the plays of your Shakspeare. I would like to say to
you the words of Rosalind to Orlando when he did fight: 'Sir you have
wrestled well, and have overthrown more than your enemies.'" And with
these words she was gone.
Yet not so quickly but that pretty Mrs. Hopkinson, coming,--as Victrix
always comes to Victor, to thank the great Senator, albeit the faces of
her escorts were shrouded in gloom,--saw the shawled figure disappear.
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