And Pharaoh took the hint, and perorated a few minutes about the beauty of brotherly love, of righteousness, Liberty, patriotism and the Flag; and having made exactly one dozen obeisances to the glorious Flag of the Free, and spent five minutes in silent and rapturous adoration of it, he slid away to the rear, and sank out of sight, and was no more seen or heard.
CHAPTER XXX.
Wilhelm Bunkum Mak Tinley Deals out to the Dogs Some Tremendous Doses of Bunkum, but the Dogs’ Swallow is Much More Tremendous and They Gulp it Easily.—He Treats Them to a Masterly Exhibition of His Art of Statistic and Average Juggling.—The Starving Dogs Delighted at Finding Themselves Proved so Wealthy.
THEN arose Wilhelm Bunkum Mak Tinley Flea and stepped forward, while all the assembled fleas cheered and applauded to the echo, which made all the dogs think that he must be some extraordinary prophet, either just arisen or just come down. He was a portly flea, of most benevolent aspect, and seemed to be the very embodiment of sincerity. He had a mild and beautiful God-Bless-You-My-Children eye, and a beautifully sympathetic O-How-I-Love-You mouth, which at once inspired respect. And when he opened his mouth to speak, his softly cadent voice floated o’er the vast assembly of dogs like angelic music, so that they—utter strangers to such delightful sounds—stood entranced, and the Bamboozling Committee beamed glances of perfect satisfaction on one another.
“Incline your ears unto me, O beautiful, dutiful dogs,” said he, “dogs of a goodly lineage, free born, noble and independent. Give ear unto my voice. I esteem it the proudest honor of my life to be permitted the precious privilege of standing before and addressing such a vast audience of free and intellectual dogs, as the one now before me. [Great straightening up of the dogs, and brightening of their eyes.] This is an audience whose intelligent eyes and noble brows show at once that nothing but TRUTH will go down with them, [Greater straightening up of the dogs.] that to fool them is an impossible task. And why? Because ye are Canisvillians, and that [pointing] is your Flag, the Flag of the Free. [Great cheering from the fleas and dogs too.]
“And not only is that the Flag of Freedom, but it is the Flag of Prosperity, too. [Fleas cheer, while dogs wonder.] Yes, fellow citizens, I repeat it, the Flag of Prosperity. Never was there a country so free or so prosperous; and I may say never was there a country so able to defend its freedom and prosperity. [Cheering.]
“I regret to say that there are certain unpatriotic dogs amongst us, who are so far lost to the sense of their duty to stick up for their country, right or wrong, as to wickedly assert that dogs in this country are hungry and poor; but we fling the calumny in their teeth; we brand it as a lie; we rejoin that it is the lie of our country’s old time enemy, Kyhidom, and for you dogs to believe it, were a libel upon your intelligence. [Great wonderment on the countenances of the dogs.]