And he, all unconscious that he sat between a pair of
telegraphs, and heating more and more under his great recollections
and his hearers' sympathy, inthralled them with his tuneful voice, his
glowing face, his lion eye, and his breathing, burning histories.
Heart to dare and do, yet heart to feel, and brain and tongue to tell
a deed well, are rare allies, yet here they met.
He mastered his hearers, and played on their breasts as David played
the harp, and perhaps Achilles; Bochsa never, nor any of his tribe. He
made the old man forget his genealogies, his small ambition, his gout,
his years, and be a boy again an hour or two in thought, and blood,
and early fire. He made the women's bosoms pant and swell, and seem to
aspire to be the nests and cradles of heroes, and their eyes flash and
glisten, and their cheeks flush and grow pale by turns; and the four
little papered walls that confined them seemed to fall without noise,
and they were away in thought out of a carpeted temple of wax, small
talk, nonentity, and nonentities, away to sea-breezes that they almost
felt in their hair and round their temples as their hearts rose and
fell upon a broad swell of passion, perils, waves, male men,
realities. The spell was at its height, when the sea-wizard's eye fell
on the mantel-piece. Died in a moment his noble ardor: "Why, it is
eight bells," said he, servilely; then, doggedly, "time to turn in."
"Hang that clock!" shouted Mr. Fountain; "I'll have it turned out of
the room.
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