As a matter-of-fact, he did not mince matters. Endowed with unbounded
courage and an extraordinary command of language, when he got upon his
feet he spoke his mind in a way that was good to hear. Moreover, he had
the strong oratorical temperament that forces attention and commands men
in a body. He said that things were wrong and should be put right; and
when he had said so for half an hour to a couple of thousand people, most
of them were ready to follow him out of the hall and go and put things
right on the spot, with their own hands. As yet the opportunity had not
offered for proceeding in so simple a manner, but the aforesaid Bostonians
of the graver sort said that John Harrington would some day be seen
heading a desperate mob of socialists in an assault upon the State House.
What he had to do with socialism, or to what end he should thus fiercely
invade the headquarters of all earthly respectability, was not exactly
apparent, but the picture thus evoked in the minds of the solemn burghers
satisfactorily defined for them the personality of the man, and they said
it and said it again.
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