"But I warrant you," said Howard, "that in his secret mind he put himself at the head of it."
The Judge looked at him. "Warrants issued by you, sir, are not always returnable accompanied by the facts."
"No, I wouldn't issue a warrant for the arrest of a fact. Truth ought to be at large."
Florence glanced at the Judge and saw him slowly close his eyes and slowly open them. "You think Hugo lovely," said the old man, speaking to Agnes. "But what do you think of Zola?"
"I don't know anything about him. But some of the girls said he was horrid," she answered.
"It is a good thing for you that you don't know anything about him, and it reflects credit upon the judgment of the girls who pronounced him horrid," said the Judge. "His influence upon his own country, and upon this country, too, has been most pernicious."
William was usually most prompt at meal time, but now he was for some unaccountable reason delayed; but he came in just as the Judge closed his remark concerning Zola, sat down and began to tuck a napkin under his chin. The Judge had more than once hinted his displeasure at this vulgarity, but his brother continued to practice it, not without heeding the hint, but with a defense of his custom. He had elected governors, and was not to be ruled into discomfort by a woman who had written a book on etiquette. He knew politeness as well as the next man or next woman, for that matter. Many a time had he seen Senator Bascomb, who owed his election to him, sit down to table in his shirt sleeves, with a napkin tucked into his bosom, and Washington City was compelled to acknowledge him a man of brains. The Judge stared at William, and was doubtless about to repeat his hint, when Florence said something to attract his eye, and shook her head at him.
"What have we under discussion this morning?" said William, squaring in readiness to defend himself, for he ever expected an attack.
"French literature," Howard answered.
"French fiddlesticks," William replied. "There is no French literature. They have slop that they call literature."