“If this be treason, let them that hear it make the most of it.
“From the eighth day of November we will not submit to Negro dominion another day, another hour, another moment! Back of every ballot is a bayonet, and the red blood of the man who holds it. Let cowards hear, and remember this! Man has never yet voted away his right to a revolution.
“Citizen kings, I call you to the consciousness of your kingship!”
Gaston closed and turned toward his seat, while the crowd hung breathless waiting for his next word. When they realised that he had finished, a rumble like the crash in midheaven of two storms rolled over the surging sea of men, broke against the girders of the roof like the thunder of the Hatteras surf lashed by a hurricane. Two thousand men went mad. With one common impulse they sprang to their feet, screaming, shouting, cheering, shaking each other’s hands, crying and laughing. With the sullen roar of crashing thunder another whirlwind of cheers swept the crowd, shook the earth, and pierced the sky with its challenge. Wave after wave of applause swept the building and flung their rumbling echoes among the stars. These patient kindly people, slow to anger, now terrible in wrath, were trembling with the pent-up passion and fury of years.
What power could resist their wrath!
Through it all Gaston sat silent behind the group of the majority of the platform committee, with eyes devouring a beautiful face bending toward him from the gallery. She was softly weeping with love and pride too deep for words.
While the tumult was still raging, before he was conscious of his presence, General Worth’s stalwart figure was bending over him, and grasping his hand.
“My boy, I give it up. You have beaten me. I’m proud of you. I forgive everything for that speech. You can have my girl. The date you’ve fixed for the marriage suits me. Let us forget the past.”