The Colonel walked on to the East-end, his eyes about him, and heart rising.
The country was facing the situation with dignity and composure.
The streets were thronged. Everywhere men and women gathered in knots and talked. There was no drunken-ness, no rioting, no Jingo manifestations—and that though it was August Bank Holiday. The gravity of the situation had sobered all men.
The Colonel passed on into Seagate to find the hero of Sunday afternoon's battle.
Joe Burt stood in his shirt-sleeves in the door of his lodgings with folded arms and cocked chin. His pipe was in his mouth and he was sucking at it fiercely with turned-in lips and inflated nostrils.
The engineer was clearly on the defensive; the Colonel saw it at once and knew why. On the main issue Joe had proved fatally, irretrievably wrong. But he had been "on the platform" now for twenty years. In other words he was a politician, and in the Colonel's view no politician ever admitted that he was wrong. To cover his retreat he would almost certainly resort to the correct tactical principle of a counter-offensive.
"That was a great speech of yours, Burt," the Colonel began.
The engineer sucked and puffed unmoved.
"We must fight," he said. "There's no two ways about it. The Emperors have asked for it; and they shall have it. No more crowned heads! We've had enoof o yon truck!"
In his elemental mood accent had coarsened, phrase become colloquial. He took his pipe from his mouth.