In less than half an hour the sitting was full.  Gossip was already at work about the new Lord Clancharlie.  Several peers had seen the Laughing Man, and they now heard that he was already in the Upper House; but no one noticed him until he rose to speak.

His face was terrible, and the whole House looked with horror upon him.

“What does all this mean?” cried the Earl of Wharton, an old and much respected peer.  “Who has brought this man into the House?  Who are you?  Where do you come from?”

Gwynplaine answered, “I come from the depths.  I am misery.  My lords, I have a message for you.”

The House shuddered, but listened, and Gwynplaine continued.

“My lords, among you I am called Lord Fermain Clancharlie, but my real name is one of poverty—­Gwynplaine.  I have grown up in poverty; frozen by winter, and made wretched by hunger.  Yesterday I was in the rags of a clown.  Can you realise what misery means?  Before it is too late try and understand that our system of society is a false one.”

But the House rocked with uncontrollable laughter at the face of Gwynplaine.  In vain he pleaded with those who sat around him not to laugh at misery.

They refused to listen, and the sitting broke up in confusion, the Lord Chancellor adjourning the House.  Gwynplaine went out of the House alone.

IV.—­Night and the Sea

Ursus waited for some time after seeing Gwynplaine disappear within Southwark Gaol, then he returned sadly to Tadcaster Inn.  That very night the corpse of Hardquanonne was brought out from the gaol and buried in the cemetery hard by, and Ursus, who had returned to the prison gate, watched the procession, and saw the coffin carried to the grave.

“They have killed him!  Gwynplaine, my son, is dead!” cried Ursus, and he burst into tears.

The following morning the sheriff’s officer, accompanied by Barkliphedro, waited on Ursus, and told him he must leave Southwark, and leave England.  The last hope in the soul of Ursus died when Barkilphedro said gravely that Gwynplaine was dead.

Ursus bent his head.

The sentence on Gwynplaine had been executed—­death.  His sentence was pronounced—­exile.  Nothing remained for Ursus but to obey.  He felt as if in a dream.

Within two hours Ursus, Homo, and Dea were on board a Dutch vessel which was shortly to leave a wharf at London Bridge.  The sheriff ordered the Tadcaster Inn to be shut up.

Gwynplaine found the vessel.

He had left the House of Lords in despair.  He had made his effort, and the result was derision.  The future was terrible.  Dea was his wife, he had lost her, and he would be spurned by Josiana.  He had lost Ursus, and gained nothing but insult.  Let David take the peerage; he, Gwynplaine, would return to the Green Box.  Why had he ever consented to be Lord Clancharlie?

He wandered from Westminster to Southwark, only to find the Tadcaster Inn shut up, and the yard empty.  It seemed he had lost Ursus and Dea for ever.  He turned and gazed into the deep waters by London Bridge.  The river in its darkness offered a resting place where he might find peace.