ABSTRACT
The Minister had been speaking for an hour. He was no orator: he lacked fire and polish. Rather was he a modest speaker, one who did not strive after effects in political eloquence, and who said things concisely, in the logical, mathematical order in which they presented themselves to a square, solid brain. The discourse, as was natural, bristled with figures, was an interminable procession of numbers. He uttered them with a certain deliberation, as if he wanted them weighed by friends and foes. His voice was too gentle, too familiar, perhaps, but was plainly audible in the silence. He might have been taking part in a Cabinet Council; the Parliamentary pitch of voice was altogether absent. The Minister stopped occasionally to wipe his nose on a large silk handkerchief, checked in red and black. As a matter of fact, in that short, stout little person plainly dressed in black, in that placid face, shaved on the lips and chin, but flanked with whiskers at the side in English fashion, in those plump, white hands, in the whole atmosphere of repose and thoughtfulness which he exhaled, one might divine the indefatigable workman of the study, the man who spent twelve hours a day at the Ministerial offices, behind a desk covered with documents – writing, reading, verifying registers, advising with heads of departments, with general directors. Thus, the Minister, the man of meditation, seemed out of place in debate with the members; and in announcing the most important facts, in rendering matters exact and profound, he spoke with the easy simplicity of a scientist setting forth his vast learning in popular language.
