“By the soul of Hercules! that fellow they call the King of Tenos is monstrous,” muttered the poet.
“Because he presents the front of a credulous Greek?”
Here their flattering comments were interrupted by the appearance of Stavros upon the stage. There was lively promise of what the French would call “une séance à sensation,” and all eyes were fastened curiously upon the lawyer and recreant politician. As for his views, we will not indicate them, nor attempt to reproduce his words. The evolution he attempted to accomplish and gracefully explain might fitly be described less delicately upon non-political ground, but the atmosphere is everything.
Stavros was tightly buttoned in a frock coat, as became a legal deputy. A semi-humorous, wholly false smile ran along his lips, and his audacious eyes twinkled pleasantly with appreciation of his difficulties. He saw Selaka, and he nodded deprecatingly, his smile growing sweet and unsteady. And then, with a preparatory sentence or two, he launched out on the sea of empty eloquence. He glided fluently over trivialities, and lost his listeners in a fog of vague ideas, stringing grandiose expressions with an abominable readiness, until weariness sat upon the spirit of sense and begat regret for the wisdom of silence. Alas! this is a wisdom the modern races are unwilling to acquire. The wordy eloquence of the parliamentarian delights depraved taste here as elsewhere, and as long as Stavros talked grandly of Europe, the Treaty of Berlin, the enlargement of the Greek frontier, the future grasp of Constantinople, he was quite able to drown his own particular villainy with these sprays of aspiration. Some might think him untrue to his political principles, but, after all, what principles could any honest politician have but the good of his country? It had been clearly demonstrated to him that his dear particular friend, Dr. Selaka, the distinguished member for Tenos, was an unfit candidate for the Mayoralty, and that the election of Kyrios Oïdas would redound to the honour and glory of Athens.
“How much has he paid you?” Selaka roared, jumping to his feet, and glaring at the orator.
“Come, Stavros, name the sum,” was shouted from the body of the hall.