1.  Well, to begin with, this Ill-pause was a filthy Diabolonian varlet; a treacherous and a villainous old varlet, the author of the Holy War calls him.  Now, what is a varlet?  Well, a varlet is just a broken-down old valet.  A varlet is a valet who has come down, and down, and down, and down again in the world, till, from once having been the servant and the trusty friend of the very best of masters, he has come to be the ally and accomplice of the very worst of masters.  His first name, the name of his first office, still sticks to him, indeed; but, like himself, and with himself, his name has become depraved and corrupted till you would not know it.  A varlet, then, is just short and sharp for a scoundrel who is ready for anything; and the worse the thing is the more ready he is for it.  There are riff-raff and refuse always about who are ready to volunteer for any filibustering expedition; and that full as much for the sheer devilry of the enterprise as for any real profit it is to be to themselves.  Wherever mischief is to be done, there your true varlet is sure to turn up.  Well, just such a land-shark was this Ill-pause, who was such an ally and accomplice to Diabolus that he had need for no other.  What possible certificate in evil could exceed this—­that the devil took not any with him when he went out on his worst errand but this same Ill-pause, who was his orator on all his most difficult occasions?

2.  Ill-pause was a varlet, then, and he was also an orator.  Now, an orator, as you know, is a great speaker.  An orator is a man who has the excellent and influential gift of public speech.  And on great occasions in public life when people are to be instructed, and impressed, and moved, and won over, then the great orator sets up his platform.  Quintilian teaches us in his Institutes that it is only a good man who can be a really great orator.  What would that fine writer have said had he lived to read the Holy War, and seen the most successful of all orators that ever opened a mouth, and who was all the time a diabolical old varlet?  What would the author of The Education of an Orator have said to that?  Diabolus did not on every occasion bring up his great orator Ill-pause.  He did not always come up himself, and he did not always send up Ill-pause.  It was only on difficult occasions that both Diabolus and his orator also came up.  You do not hear your great preachers every Sabbath.  They would not long remain great preachers, and you would soon cease to pay any attention to them, if they were always in the pulpit.  Neither do you have your great orators at every street corner.  Their masters only build theatres for them when some great occasion arises in the land, and when the best wisdom must straightway be spoken to the people and in the best way.  Then you bring up Quintilian’s orator if you have him at your call.  As Diabolus has done from time to time with his great and almost