Ursus made a pause, in which he placed a gnashing of his teeth.  Homo, provoked, added a second, and Govicum a third.

Ursus went on,—­

“The women are worse than the men.  The moment is unpropitious, but it doesn’t matter!  Let us try the power of a speech; an eloquent speech is never out of place.  Listen, Gwynplaine, to my attractive exordium.  Ladies and gentlemen, I am a bear.  I take off my head to address you.  I humbly appeal to you for silence.”  Ursus, lending a cry to the crowd, said, “Grumphll!”

Then he continued,—­

“I respect my audience.  Grumphll is an epiphonema as good as any other welcome.  You growlers.  That you are all of the dregs of the people, I do not doubt.  That in no way diminishes my esteem for you.  A well-considered esteem.  I have a profound respect for the bullies who honour me with their custom.  There are deformed folks amongst you.  They give me no offence.  The lame and the humpbacked are works of nature.  The camel is gibbous.  The bison’s back is humped.  The badger’s left legs are shorter than the right, That fact is decided by Aristotle, in his treatise on the walking of animals.  There are those amongst you who have but two shirts—­one on his back, and the other at the pawnbroker’s.  I know that to be true.  Albuquerque pawned his moustache, and St. Denis his glory.  The Jews advanced money on the glory.  Great examples.  To have debts is to have something.  I revere your beggardom.”

Ursus cut short his speech, interrupting it in a deep bass voice by the shout,—­

“Triple ass!”

And he answered in his politest accent,—­

“I admit it.  I am a learned man.  I do my best to apologize for it.  I scientifically despise science.  Ignorance is a reality on which we feed; science is a reality on which we starve.  In general one is obliged to choose between two things—­to be learned and grow thin, or to browse and be an ass.  O gentlemen, browse!  Science is not worth a mouthful of anything nice.  I had rather eat a sirloin of beef than know what they call the psoas muscle.  I have but one merit—­a dry eye.  Such as you see me, I have never wept.  It must be owned that I have never been satisfied—­never satisfied—­not even with myself.  I despise myself; but I submit this to the members of the opposition here present—­if Ursus is only a learned man, Gwynplaine is an artist.”

He groaned again,—­

“Grumphll!”

And resumed,—­

“Grumphll again! it is an objection.  All the same, I pass it over.  Near Gwynplaine, gentlemen and ladies, is another artist, a valued and distinguished personage who accompanies us—­his lordship Homo, formerly a wild dog, now a civilized wolf, and a faithful subject of her Majesty’s.  Homo is a mine of deep and superior talent.  Be attentive and watch.  You are going to set Homo play as well as Gwynplaine, and you must do honour to art.  That is an attribute of great nations.  Are you