“'Mr. Chairman,' said he, 'gentlemen and dear brothers'—here he paused a moment, whilst calmly removing the tumbler out of his way that he might have room to place his hand upon the table and gently lean towards the chairman. He then serenely smoothed down the frill of his shirt, during which his friends cheered—and ere commencing he gave them another short, and, as it were, parenthetical bow. 'Mr. Chairman, gentlemen, and dear brothers, I do not rise upon this very unpleasant occasion—unpleasant to me it is, but not on my account—for the purpose of giving vent to the coarse effusions of an unlettered mind, that shapes its vulgar outpourings in bad language and worse feeling. No, I am incapable of the bad feeling, in the first place, and, thanks to my education, of illiterate language, in the second. It has pleased my friend Mr. Yellowboy—if he will still allow me to call him so—for I appeal to you all whether it becomes those who sit under this hallowed roof to disagree—it has pleased him, I say, to bring charges against me, to some of which I certainly must plead guilty—if guilt there be in it. It has pleased him to charge me with the unbrotherly crime, the unchristian crime, the un-orange crime'—here he smiled more blandly at every term, and then brought his smiling eye to bear on his antagonist—'of lifting him out of the channel about twelve o'clock at night, where he lay—I may say so among ourselves—in state of most comfortable, but un-orange-like intoxication.'
“The audience now being mostly drunk, were tickled with this compliment to their sobriety, and cheered and shouted for more than a minute. 'Go on Cantwell! By Japers, you're no blockhead!'
“'Under Providence, and with all piety I say it, he will vanquish the yallow sinner over there.'
“'Brother Cantwell,' observed Mr. M'Slime, 'go on—the gift is not withheld.'
“Another smiling bow to M'Slime, as much as to say, 'I know it's not—I feel it's not.'
“'This, gentlemen, and dear brothers, was my crime—I acted the good Samaritan towards him—that was my crime. May I often commit it!'
“'Is that your pretended charity, sir?' said Yellowboy, whose temper was sorely tried by the other's calmness; 'don't you know, sir, that you cannot become the Samaritan unless I become the drunkard? and yet you hope often to commit it!'
“No notice whatsoever taken of this.
“'—But perhaps there was still a greater crime in this affair. I allude to the crime of having, after the account of his frailty had taken wind through the whole country, ventured to defend it, or rather to place it in such a light as might enable the public to place it to the account of mere animal exhaustion, independent of the real cause. And I have reason to know, that to a very enlarged extent I succeeded—for many persons having heard of the circumstance in its worse and most offensive sense, actually came to my office—'
“'Yes, after you had made it public, as far as you could.'