Chapter 15 - Page 2

hear his communication, told the
agent that it was too late to change his determination.

"I attended the meeting last night, Mr. Effingham," Aristabulus
commenced, "agreeably to our arrangement, and I feel the utmost
regret at being compelled to lay the result before a gentleman for
whom I entertain so profound a respect."

"There was then a meeting?" said Mr. Effingham, inclining his body
slightly, by way of acknowledgment for the other's compliment.

"There was, sir; and I think, Mr. Dodge, we may say an overflowing
one."

"The public was fairly represented," returned the editor, "as many as
fifty or sixty having been present."

"The public has a perfect right to meet, and to consult on its claims
to anything it may conceive itself entitled to enjoy," observed Mr.
Effingham; "I can have no possible objection to such a course, though
I think it would have consulted its own dignity more, had it insisted
on being convoked by more respectable persons than those who, I
understand, were foremost in this affair, and in terms better suited
to its own sense of propriety."

Aristabulus glanced at Mr. Dodge, and Mr. Dodge glanced back at Mr.
Bragg, for neither of these political mushrooms could conceive of the
dignity and fair-mindedness with which a gentleman could view an
affair of this nature.

"They passed a set of resolutions, Mr. Effingham;" Aristabulus
resumed, with the gravity with which he ever spoke of things of this
nature. "A set of resolutions, sir!"

"That was to be expected," returned his employer, smiling; "the
Americans are a set-of-resolutions-passing people. Three cannot get
together, without naming a chairman and secretary, and a resolution
is as much a consequence of such an 'organization,'--I believe that
is the approved word,--as an egg is the accompaniment of the cackling
of a hen."

"But, sir, you do not yet know the nature of those resolutions!"

"Very true, Mr. Bragg; that is a piece of knowledge I am to have the
pleasure of obtaining from you."

Again Aristabulus glanced at Steadfast, and Steadfast threw back the
look of surprise, for, to both it was matter of real astonishment
that any man should be so indifferent to the resolutions of a meeting
that had been regularly organized, with a chairman and secretary at
its head, and which so unequivocally professed to be the public.

"I am reluctant to discharge this duty, Mr. Effingham, but as you
insist on its performance it must be done. In the first place, they
resolved that your father meant to give them the Point."

"A