I have never heard such a scoring from one man to another.

It was magisterial in its dignity, deadly in its diction.

Nothing short of a duel could have settled it in the olden time.

But when Lamar, white with rage, had finished, Toombs without a ruffle said, "Lamar, you surprise me," and the host, with the rest of us, took it as a signal to rise from table and rejoin the ladies in the drawing-room.

Of course nothing came of it.
Toombs was as much a humorist as an extremist.