It was not long before the chairman of the committee on the judiciary (one of the effects of the resolution was entirely to change the coloring of all testimony throughout the vast Republic of Leaplow) made his report on the subject-matter of the resolution. This person was a Tangent, who had a besetting wish to become a Riddle, although the leaning of our house was decidedly Horizontal; and, as a matter of course, he took the Riddle side of this question. The report, itself, required seven hours in the reading, commencing with the subject at the epocha of the celebrated caucus that was adjourned sine die, by the disruption of the earth’s crust, and previously to the distribution of the great monikin family into separate communities, and ending with the subject of the resolution in his hand. The reporter had set his political palette with the utmost care, having completely covered the subject with neutral tints, before he got through with it, and glazing the whole down with ultramarine, in such a way as to cause the eye to regard the matter through a fictitious atmosphere. Finally, he repeated the resolution, verbatim, and as it came from the other house.
Mr. Speaker now called upon gentlemen to deliver their sentiments. To my utter amazement, Captain Poke arose, put his tobacco back into its box, and opened the debate without apology.
The honorable captain said he understood this question to be one implicating the liberties of everybody. He understood the matter literally, as it was propounded in the Allegory, and set forth in the resolution; and, as such, he intended to look at it with unprejudiced eyes. “The natur’ of this proposal lay altogether in color. What is color, after all? Make the most of it, and in the most favorable position, which, perhaps, is the cheek of a comely young woman, and it is but skin-deep. He remembered the time when a certain female in another part of the univarse, who is commonly called Miss Poke, might have out-rosed the best rose in a placed called Stunnin’tun; and what did it all amount to? He shouldn’t ask Miss Poke herself, for obvious reasons—but he would ask any of the neighbors how she looked now? Quitting female natur’, he would come to human natur’ generally. He had often remarked that sea water was blue, and he had frequently caused pails to be lowered, and the water brought on deck, to see if he could come at any of this blueing matter—for indigo was both scarce and dear in his part of the world, but he never could make out anything by the experiment; from which he concluded that, on the whull, there was pretty much no such thing as color, at all.
“As for the resolution before the house, it depended entirely on the meaning of words. Now, after all, what is a word? Why, some people’s words are good, and other people’s words are good for nothing. For his part, he liked sealed instruments—which might be because he was a sealer—but as for mere words, he set but little store by them. He once tuck a man’s word for his wages; and the long and short of it was, that he lost his money. He had known a thousand instances in which words had proved to be of no value, and he did not see why some gentlemen wished to make them of so much importance here. For his part, he was for puffing up nothing, no, not even a word or a color, above its desarts. The people seemed to call for a change in the color of things, and he called upon gentlemen to remember that this was a free country, and one in which the laws ruled; and therefore he trusted they would be disposed to adapt the laws to the wants of the people. What had the people asked of the house in this matter? So far as his knowledge went, they had really asked nothing in words, but he understood there was great discontent on the subject of the old colors; and he construed their silence into an expression of contempt for words in general. He was a Parpendic’lar, and he should always maintain Parpendic’lar sentiments. Gentlemen might not agree with him, but, for one, he was not disposed to jipordyze the liberties of his constituents, and therefore he gave the rizolution just as it came from the Riddles, without altering a letter—although he did think there was one word misspelt—he meant ‘really,’ which he had been taught to spell ‘ra’aily’—but he was ready to sacrifice even his opinions on this point to the good of the country; and therefore he went with the Riddles, even to their misprints. He hoped the rizolution would pass, with the entire unanimity so important a subject demanded.”
This speech produced a very strong sensation. Up to this time, the principal orators of the house had been much in the practice of splitting hairs about some nice technicality in the Great Allegory; but Noah, with the simplicity of a truly great mind, had made a home thrust at the root of the whole matter; laying about him with the single-first, I made a few apposite remarks on the necessity of respecting the vital ordinances of the body politic, and asked the attention of my hearers while I read to them a particular clause, which it had struck me had some allusion to the very point now in consideration. Having thus cleared the way, I had not the folly to defeat the objects of so much preparation, by an indiscreet precipitancy. So far from it, previously to reading the extract from the constitution, I waited until the attention of every member present was attracted more forcibly by the dignity, deliberation, and gravity of my manner, than by the substance of what had yet been said. In the midst of this deep silence and expectation I read aloud, in a voice that reached every cranny in the hall—
“The great council shall, in no case whatever, pass any law, or resolution, declaring white to be black.”
If I had been calm in the presentation of this authority, I was equally self-possessed in waiting for its effect. Looking about me I saw surprise, perplexity, doubt, wonder, and uncertainty in every countenance, if I did not find conviction. One fact embarrassed even me. Our friends the Horizontals were evidently quite as much at fault as our opponents the Perpendiculars, instead of being, as I had good reason to hope, in an ecstasy of pleasure on hearing their cause sustained by an authority so weighty.
“Will the honorable member have the goodness to explain from what author he has quoted?” one of the leading Perpendiculars at length ventured to inquire.
“The language you have just heard, Mr. Speaker,” I resumed, believing that now was the favorable instant to follow up the matter, “is language that must find an echo in every heart—it is language that can never be used in vain in this venerable hall, language that carries with it conviction and command.”—I observed that the members were now fairly gaping at each other with wonder.—“Sir, I am asked to name the author from whom I have quoted these sententious and explicit words—Sir, what you have just heard is to be found in the Article IV., Clause 6, of the Great National Allegory—”
“Order—order—order!” shouted a hundred raven throats.