A PARLIAMENTARY JOKE.
The prevailing fashion of certain orators interlarding their speeches with frequent classical quotations, reminds us of a piece of mischievous waggery perpetrated by one of the greatest men of his time. Sheridan once electrified the country gentlemen in the House of Commons, by concluding an animated appeal to their patriotism, with a quotation from Herodotus, which they cheered most vociferously; when, in fact, he merely strung together a jumble of words, a jargon uttered on the instant, which sounded very much like Greek. Pitt, it is said, was in a convulsion of laughter all the time.