I
couldn't understand how the man could go on talking to empty benches,
but W. told me he was quite indifferent to the attention of his
colleagues,--his speech was for his electors and would appear the next
day in the _Journal Officiel_. I remember one man talked for hours about
"allumettes chimiques."
Leon Say was a delightful speaker, so easy, always finding exactly the
word he wanted. It hardly seemed a speech when he was at the tribune,
more like a causerie, though he told very plain truths sometimes to the
peuple souverain. He was essentially French, or rather Parisian, knew
everybody, and was au courant of all that went on politically and
socially, and had a certain blague, that eminently French quality which
is very difficult to explain. He was a hard worker, and told me once
that what rested him most after a long day was to go to a small
boulevard theatre or to read a rather lively yellowbacked novel.
I never heard Gambetta speak, which I always regretted--in fact knew
very little of him. He was not a ladies' man, though he had some devoted
women friends, and was always surrounded by a circle of political men
whenever he appeared in public.
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