The one relief of the situation was that some men kept their heads and looked on in sadness, while others, seeing only the comic side of the situation, smiled upon it all.
[Sidenote: Gladstone to the rescue.] Mr.Gladstone, who had been away to dinner, had meantime entered, and a look of pain and solicitude crossed his white face.

There is so much of innate gentleness--of inexhaustible kindliness, and of high-bred and scholastic spirit beneath all the vehemence of his political temper and the frenzied energy of his political life--that for such scenes he has never any stomach; and they always bring to his face that same look of shock and pain and humiliation.

And he it was who finally saved the situation.

Several times Mr.Brodrick would have been willing to withdraw, but Mr.Balfour was resolved to get Mr.Gladstone and Mr.
Sexton into a difficulty, to convict Mr.Sexton of disobeying the chair, to compel Mr.Gladstone to take action against his most useful friend and most powerful ally.

Over and over again, then, he refused to allow Mr.Brodrick to get rid of the whole situation by withdrawing his language, and so enabling Mr.Sexton to follow the example.