"
This proposition was received with one of those wild shouts of
approbation which indicate the orator has exactly hit his
audience between wind and water. The fact is the public mind
at this instant wanted to be led, and in Dandy Mick a leader
appeared. A leader to be successful should embody in his
system the necessities of his followers; express what every
one feels, but no one has had the ability or the courage to
pronounce.
The courage and adroitness, the influence of Gerard, had
reconciled the people to the relinquishment of the great end
for which they had congregated; but neither man nor multitude
like to make preparations without obtaining a result. Every
one wanted to achieve some object by the movement; and at this
critical juncture an object was proposed, and one which
promised novelty, amusement, excitement. The Bishop whose
consent must he obtained, but who relinquished an idea with
the same difficulty with which he had imbibed it, alone
murmured, and kept saying to Field, "I thought we came to burn
down the mill! A bloody-minded Capitalist, a man that makes
gardens and forces the people to wash themselves: What is all
this?"
Field said what he could, while Devilsdust leaning over the
mule's shoulder, cajoled the other ear of the Bishop, who at
last gave his consent with almost as much reluctance as George
the Fourth did to the emancipation of the Roman Catholics; but
he made his terms, and said in a sulky voice he must have a
glass of ale.
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