V

VMr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.VIWe now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]Committee Room Fifteenhis illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]The Irish BishopsIreland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]Break-Up Of The Irish Partyvalue to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278VIIA vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/[pg 455]Severe OrdealIn view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.VIIIA few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]Death Of Mr. Parnellof the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

VMr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.VIWe now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]Committee Room Fifteenhis illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]The Irish BishopsIreland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]Break-Up Of The Irish Partyvalue to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278VIIA vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/[pg 455]Severe OrdealIn view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.VIIIA few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]Death Of Mr. Parnellof the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

VMr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.VIWe now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]Committee Room Fifteenhis illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]The Irish BishopsIreland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]Break-Up Of The Irish Partyvalue to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278VIIA vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/[pg 455]Severe OrdealIn view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.VIIIA few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]Death Of Mr. Parnellof the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

VMr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.VIWe now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]Committee Room Fifteenhis illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]The Irish BishopsIreland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]Break-Up Of The Irish Partyvalue to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278VIIA vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/[pg 455]Severe OrdealIn view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.VIIIA few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]Death Of Mr. Parnellof the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

VMr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.

Mr. Parnell took up his new ground in a long manifesto to the Irish people (November 29). It was free of rhetoric and ornament, but the draught was skilfully brewed. He charged Mr. Gladstone with having revealed to him during his visit at Hawarden in the previous December, that in a future scheme of home rule the Irish members would be cut down from 103 to 32, land was to be withdrawn from the competency of the Irish legislature, and the control of the constabulary would be reserved to the Imperial authority for an indefinite period, though Ireland would have to find the money all the time. This perfidious truncation of self-government by Mr. Gladstone was matched by an attempt on my part as his lieutenant only a few days before, to seduce the Irish party into accepting places in a liberal government, and this gross bribe of mine was accompanied by a despairing avowal that the hapless evicted tenants must be flung overboard. In other words, the English leaders intended to play Ireland false, and Mr. Parnell stood between his country and betrayal. Such a story was unluckily no new one in Irish history since the union. On that theme Mr. Parnell played many adroit variations during the eventful days that followed. Throw me to the English wolves if you like, he said, but at any rate make sure that real home rule and not its shadow is to be your price, and that they mean to pay it. This was to awaken the spectre of old suspicions, and to bring to life again those forces of violence and desperation which it had been the very crown of his policy to exorcise.

The reply on the Hawarden episode was prompt. Mr. Gladstone asserted that the whole discussion was one of those informal exchanges of view which go to all political[pg 446]action, and in which men feel the ground and discover the leanings of one another's minds. No single proposal was made, no proposition was mentioned to which a binding assent was sought. Points of possible improvement in the bill of 1886 were named as having arisen in Mr. Gladstone's mind, or been suggested by others, but no positive conclusions were asked for or were expected or were possible. Mr. Parnell quite agreed that the real difficulty lay in finding the best form in which Irish representation should be retained at Westminster, but both saw the wisdom and necessity of leaving deliberation free until the time should come for taking practical steps. He offered no serious objection on any point; much less did he say that they augured any disappointment of Irish aspirations. Apart from this denial, men asked themselves how it was that if Mr. Parnell knew that the cause was already betrayed, he yet for a year kept the black secret to himself, and blew Mr. Gladstone's praise with as loud a trumpet as before?276As for my own guilty attempt at corruption in proposing an absorption of the Irish party in English politics by means of office and emolument, I denied it with reasonable emphasis at the time, and it does not concern us here, nor in fact anywhere else.

VIWe now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]Committee Room Fifteenhis illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]The Irish BishopsIreland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]Break-Up Of The Irish Partyvalue to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278

We now come to what was in its day the famous story of Committee Room Fifteen, so called from the chamber in which the next act of this dismal play went on.277The proceedings between the leader and his party were watched with an eagerness that has never been surpassed in this kingdom or in America. They were protracted, intense, dramatic, and the issue for a time hung in poignant doubt. The party interest of the scene was supreme, for if the Irishmen should rally to their chief, then the English alliance was at an end, Mr. Gladstone would virtually close[pg 447]

Committee Room Fifteen

Committee Room Fifteen

his illustrious career, the rent in the liberal ranks might be repaired, and leading men and important sections would all group themselves afresh.“Let us all keep quiet,”said one important unionist,“we may now have to revise our positions.”Either way, the serpent of faction would raise its head in Ireland, and the strong life of organised and concentrated nationalism would perish in its coils. The personal interest was as vivid as the political,—the spectacle of a man of infinite boldness, determination, astuteness, and resource, with the will and pride of Lucifer, at bay with fortune and challenging a malignant star. Some talked of the famous Ninth Thermidor, when Robespierre fought inch by inch the fierce struggle that ended in his ruin. Others talked of the old mad discord of Zealot and Herodian in face of the Roman before the walls of Jerusalem. The great veteran of English politics looked on, wrathful and astounded at a preternatural perversity for which sixty years of public life could furnish him no parallel. The sage public looked on, some with the same interest that would in ancient days have made them relish a combat of gladiators; others with glee at the mortification of political opponents; others again with honest disgust at what threatened to be the ignoble rout of a beneficent policy.

It was the fashion for the moment in fastidious reactionary quarters to speak of the actors in this ordeal as“a hustling group of yelling rowdies.”Seldom have terms so censorious been more misplaced. All depends upon the point of view. Men on a raft in a boiling sea have something to think of besides deportment and the graces of serenity. As a matter of fact, even hostile judges then and since agreed that no case was ever better opened within the walls of Westminster than in the three speeches made on the first day by Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy on the one side, and Mr. Redmond on the other. In gravity, dignity, acute perception, and that good faith which is the soul of real as distinct from spurious debate, the parliamentary critic recognises them as all of the first order. So for the most part things continued. It was not until a protracted game had gone beyond limits of reason and patience, that words sometimes[pg 448]flamed high. Experience of national assemblies gives no reason to suppose that a body of French, German, Spanish, Italian, or even of English, Scotch, Welsh, or American politicians placed in circumstances of equal excitement, arising from an incident in itself at once so squalid and so provocative, would have borne the strain with any more self-control.

Mr. Parnell presided, frigid, severe, and lofty,“as if,”said one present,“it were we who had gone astray, and he were sitting there to judge us.”Six members were absent in America, including Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien, two of the most important of all after Mr. Parnell himself. The attitude of this pair was felt to be a decisive element. At first, under the same impulse as moved the Leinster Hall meeting, they allowed their sense of past achievement to close their eyes; they took for granted the impossible, that religious Britain and religious Ireland would blot what had happened out of their thoughts; and so they stood for Mr. Parnell's leadership. The grim facts of the case were rapidly borne in upon them. The defiant manifesto convinced them that the leadership could not be continued. Travelling from Cincinnati to Chicago, they read it, made up their minds, and telegraphed to anxious colleagues in London. They spoke with warmth of Mr. Parnell's services, but protested against his unreasonable charges of servility to liberal wirepullers; they described the“endeavours to fasten the responsibility for what had happened upon Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley”as reckless and unjust; and they foresaw in the position of isolation, discredit, and international ill-feeling which Mr. Parnell had now created, nothing but ruin for the cause. This deliverance from such a quarter (November 30) showed that either abdication or deposition was inevitable.

The day after Mr. Parnell's manifesto, the bishops came out of their shells. Cardinal Manning had more than once written most urgently to the Irish prelates the moment the decree was known, that Parnell could not be upheld in London, and that no political expediency could outweigh the moral sense. He knew well enough that the bishops in[pg 449]

The Irish Bishops

The Irish Bishops

Ireland were in a very difficult strait, but insisted“that plain and prompt speech was safest.”It was now a case, he said to Mr. Gladstone (November 29), ofres ad triarios, and it was time for the Irish clergy to speak out from the housetops. He had also written to Rome.“Did I not tell you,”said Mr. Gladstone when he gave me this letter to read,“that the Pope would now have one of the ten commandments on his side?”“We have been slow to act,”Dr. Walsh telegraphed to one of the Irish members (November 30),“trusting that the party will act manfully. Our considerate silence and reserve are being dishonestly misinterpreted.”“All sorry for Parnell,”telegraphed Dr. Croke, the Archbishop of Cashel—a manly and patriotic Irishman if ever one was—“but still, in God's name, let him retire quietly and with good grace from the leadership. If he does so, the Irish party will be kept together, the honourable alliance with Gladstonian liberals maintained, success at general election secured, home rule certain. If he does not retire, alliance will be dissolved, election lost, Irish party seriously damaged if not wholly broken up, home rule indefinitely postponed, coercion perpetuated, evicted tenants hopelessly crushed, and the public conscience outraged. Manifesto flat and otherwise discreditable.”This was emphatic enough, but many of the flock had already committed themselves before the pastors spoke. To Dr. Croke, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 2):“We in England seem to have done our part within our lines, and what remains is for Ireland itself. I am as unwilling as Mr. Parnell himself could be, to offer an interference from without, for no one stands more stoutly than I do for the independence of the Irish national party as well as for its unity.”

A couple of days later (Dec. 2) a division was taken in Room Fifteen upon a motion made in Mr. Parnell's interest, to postpone the discussion until they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a printed list of the party in[pg 450]his hand, and he put the question in cold, unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion—that is to say, for him, and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm, obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until the next day.

This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manœuvre for turning the eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed of—one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party—could he renew former relations, and once more enter into confidential communications with any of them. There was only one guarantee, he said, that could be of any[pg 451]

Break-Up Of The Irish Party

Break-Up Of The Irish Party

value to Ireland, namely the assured and unalterable fact that no English leader and no party could ever dream of either proposing or carrying any scheme of home rule which had not the full support of Irish representatives. This was obvious to all the world. Mr. Parnell knew it well enough, and the members knew it, but the members were bound to convince their countrymen that they had exhausted compliance with every hint from their falling leader, while Mr. Parnell's only object was to gain time, to confuse issues, and to carry the battle over from Westminster to the more buoyant and dangerously charged atmosphere of Ireland.

The majority resisted as long as they could the evidence that Mr. Parnell was audaciously trifling with them and openly abusing his position as chairman. On the evening of Friday (December 5) Mr. Sexton and Mr. Healy went to Mr. Parnell after the last communication from Mr. Gladstone. They urged him to bend to the plain necessities of the case. He replied that he would take the night to consider. The next morning (December 6) they returned to him. He informed them that his responsibility to Ireland would not allow him to retire. They warned him that the majority would not endure further obstruction beyond that day, and would withdraw. As they left, Mr. Parnell wished to shake hands,“if it is to be the last time.”They all shook hands, and then went once more to the field of action.

It was not until after some twelve days of this excitement and stress that the scene approached such disorder as has often before and since been known in the House of Commons. The tension at last had begun to tell upon the impassive bronze of Mr. Parnell himself. He no longer made any pretence of the neutrality of the chair. He broke in upon one speaker more than forty times. In a flash of rage he snatched a paper from another speaker's hand. The hours wore away, confusion only became worse confounded, and the conclusion on both sides was foregone. Mr. McCarthy at last rose, and in a few moderate sentences expressed his opinion that there was no use in continuing a discussion that must be barren of anything but reproach,[pg 452]bitterness, and indignity, and he would therefore suggest that those who were of the same mind should withdraw. Then he moved from the table, and his forty-four colleagues stood up and silently followed him out of the room. In silence they were watched by the minority who remained, in number twenty-six.278

VIIA vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/[pg 455]Severe OrdealIn view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.

A vacancy at Bassetlaw gave Mr. Gladstone an opportunity of describing the grounds on which he had acted. His speech was measured and weighty, but the result showed the effect of the disaster. The tide, that a few weeks before had been running so steadily, now turned. The unionist vote remained almost the same as in 1885; the liberal vote showed a falling off of over 400 and the unionist majority was increased from 295 to 728.

About this time having to go to Ireland, on my way back I stopped at Hawarden, and the following note gives a glimpse of Mr. Gladstone at this evil moment (Dec. 17):—

I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.[pg 453]Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.[pg 454]Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/

I found him in his old corner in the“temple of peace.”He was only half recovered from a bad cold, and looked in his worsted jacket, and dark tippet over his shoulders, and with his white, deep-furrowed face, like some strange Ancient of Days: so different from the man whom I had seen off at King's Cross less than a week before. He was cordial as always, but evidently in some perturbation. I sat down and told him what I had heard from different quarters about the approaching Kilkenny election. I mentioned X. as a Parnellite authority.“What,”he flamed up with passionate vehemence,“X. a Parnellite! Are they mad, then? Are they clean demented?”etc. etc.

I gave him my general impression as to the future. The bare idea that Parnell might find no inconsiderable following came upon him as if it had been a thunder-clap. He listened, and catechised, and knit his brow.

Mr. G.—What do you think we should do in case (1) of a divided Ireland, (2) of a Parnellite Ireland?

J. M.—It is too soon to settle what to think. But, looking to Irish interests, I think a Parnellite Ireland infinitely better than a divided Ireland. Anything better than an Ireland divided, so far as she is concerned.

Mr. G.—Bassetlaw looks as if we were going back to 1886. For me that is notice to quit. Another five years' agitation at my age would be impossible—ludicrous(with much emphasis).

J. M.—I cannot profess to be surprised that in face of these precious dissensions men should have misgivings, or that even those who were with us, should now make up their minds to wait a little.

I said what there was to be said for Parnell's point of view; that, in his words to me of Nov. 25, he“must look to the future”; that he was only five and forty; that he might well fear that factions would spring up in Ireland if he were to go; that he might have made up his mind, that whether he went or stayed, we should lose the general election when it came. The last notion seemed quite outrageous to Mr. G., and he could not suppose that it had ever entered Parnell's head.

Mr. G.—You have no regrets at the course we took?

J. M.—None—none. It was inevitable. I have never doubted. That does not prevent lamentation that it was inevitable. It is the old story. English interference is always at the root of mischief in Ireland. But how could we help what we did? We had a right to count on Parnell's sanity and his sincerity....

Mr. G. then got up and fished out of a drawer the memorandum of his talk with Parnell at Hawarden on Dec. 18, 1889, and also a memorandum written for his own use on the general political position at the time of the divorce trial. The former contained not a word as to the constabulary, and in other matters only put a number of points, alternative courses, etc., without a single final or definite decision. While he was fishing in his drawer, he said, as if speaking to himself,“It looks as if I should get my release even sooner than I had expected.”

“That,”I said,“is a momentous matter which will need immense deliberation.”So it will, indeed.

Mr. G.—Do you recall anything in history like the present distracted scenes in Ireland?

J. M.—Florence, Pisa, or some other Italian city, with the French or the Emperor at the gates?

Mr. G.—I'll tell you what is the only thing that I can think of as at all like it. Do you remember how it was at the siege of Jerusalem—the internecine fury of the Jewish factions, the Ζηλωταί, and the rest—while Titus and the legions were marching on the city!

We went in to luncheon. Something was said of our friend ——, and the new found malady, Renault's disease.

J. M.—Joseph de Maistre says that in the innocent primitive ages men died of diseases without names.

Mr. G.—Homer never mentions diseases at all.

J. M.—Not many of them die a natural death in Homer.

Mr. G.—Do you not recollect where Odysseus meets his mother among the shades, and she says:—

Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279

Οὔτε τις οὖν μοι νοῦσος ἐπήλυθεν ...

ἀλλά με σός τε πόθος σά τε μήδεα, φαίδιμ᾽ Ὀδυσσεῦ,

σή τ᾽ ἀγανοφροσύνη μελιηδέα θυμὸν ἀπηύρα.279

J. M.—Beautiful lines. Πόθος such a tender word, and it is untranslatable.

Mr. G.—Oh,desiderium.

“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modusTam cari capitis.”280

“Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus

Tam cari capitis.”280

J. M.—The Scotch word“wearying”for somebody. AndSehnsucht.

Then Mr. G. went off to his library to hunt up the reference, and when I followed him, I found the worn oldOdysseyopen at the passage in the eleventh book. As he left the room, he looked at me and said,“Ah, this is very different stuff for talking about, from all the wretched work we were speaking of just now. Homer's fellows would have cut a very different figure, and made short work in that committee room last week!”We had a few more words on politics.... So I bade him good-bye.... #/

Severe Ordeal

Severe Ordeal

In view of the horrors of dissension in Ireland, well-meaning attempts were made at the beginning of the year to bring about an understanding. The Irish members, returning from America where the schism at home had quenched all enthusiasm and killed their operations, made their way to Boulogne, for the two most important among them were liable to instant arrest if they were found in the United Kingdom. They thought that Mr. Parnell was really desirous to withdraw on such terms as would save his self-respect, and if he could plead hereafter that before giving way he had secured a genuine scheme of home rule. Some suspicion may well have arisen in their minds when a strange suggestion came from Mr. Parnell that the liberal leaders should enter into a secret engagement about constabulary and the other points. He had hardly given such happy evidence of his measure of the sanctity of political confidences, as to encourage further experiments. The proposal was absurd on the face of it. These suspicions soon became certainties, and the Boulogne negotiations came to an end. I should conjecture that those days made the severest ordeal through which Mr. Gladstone, with his extreme sensibility and his abhorrence of personal contention, ever passed. Yet his facility and versatility of mood was unimpaired, as a casual note or two of mine may show:—

... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!

... Mr. G.'s confabulation [with an Irish member] proved to have been sought for the purpose of warning him that Parnell was about to issue a manifesto in which he would make all manner of mischief. Mr. G. and I had a few moments in the room at the back of the chair; he seemed considerably perturbed, pale, and concentrated. We walked into the House together; he picked up the points of the matter in hand (a motion for appropriating all the time) and made one of the gayest, brightest, and most delightful speeches in the world—the whole House enjoying it consumedly. Who else could perform these magic transitions?

Mr. G. came into the House, looking rather anxious; gave us an account of his interview with the Irish deputation; and in the midst of it got up to say his few sentences of condolence with the Speaker on the death of Mrs. Peel—the closing phrases admirably[pg 456]chosen, and the tones of his voice grave, sincere, sonorous, and compassionate. When he sat down, he resumed his talk with H. and me. He was so touched, he said, by those“poor wretches”on the deputation, that he would fain, if he could, make some announcement that would ease their unlucky position.

[A question of a letter in reply to some application prompted by Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone asked two of us to try our hands at a draft.] At last we got it ready for him and presently we went to his room. It was now six o'clock. Mr. G. read aloud in full deep voice the letter he had prepared on the base of our short draft. We suggested this and that, and generally argued about phrases for an hour, winding up with a terrific battle on two prodigious points: (1) whether he ought to say,“after this statement of my views,”or“I have now fully stated my views on the points you raise”; (2)“You willdoubtlessconcur,”or“probablyconcur.”Most characteristic, most amazing. It was past seven before the veteran would let go—and then I must say that he looked his full years. Think what his day had been, in mere intellectual strain, apart from what strains him far more than that—his strife with persons and his compassion for the unlucky Irishmen. I heard afterwards that when he got home, he was for once in his life done up, and on the following morning he lay in bed. All the same, in the evening he went to seeAntony and Cleopatra, and he had a little ovation. As he drove away the crowd cheered him with cries of“Bravo, don't you mind Parnell!”Plenty of race feeling left, in spite of union of hearts!

No leader ever set a finer example under reverse than did Mr. Gladstone during these tedious and desperate proceedings. He was steadfastly loyal, considerate, and sympathetic towards the Irishmen who had trusted him; his firm patience was not for a moment worn out; in vain a boisterous wave now and again beat upon him from one quarter or another. Not for a moment was he shaken; even under these starless skies his faith never drooped.“The public mischief,”he wrote to Lord Acton (Dec. 27, 1890),“ought to put out of view every private thought. But the blow to me is very heavy—the heaviest I ever[pg 457]have received. It is a great and high call to work by faith and not by sight.”

Occasion had already offered for testing the feeling of Ireland. There was a vacancy in the representation of Kilkenny, and the Parnellite candidate had been defeated.

To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.To Lord Acton.Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.To J. Morley.Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.

To J. Morley.

Hawarden, Dec. 23, 1890.—Since your letter arrived this morning, the Kilkenny poll has brightened the sky. It will have a great effect in Ireland, although it is said not to be a representative constituency, but one too much for us. It is a great gain; and yet sad enough to think that even here one-third of the voters should be either rogues or fools. I suppose the ballot has largely contributed to save Kilkenny. It will be most interesting to learn how the tories voted.

I return your enclosure.... I have ventured, without asking your leave, on keeping a copy of a part. Only in one proposition do I differ from you. I would rather see Ireland disunited than see it Parnellite.

I think that as the atmosphere is quiet for the moment we had better give ourselves the benefit of a little further time for reflection. Personally, I am hard hit. My course of life was daring enough as matters stood six weeks ago. How it will shape in the new situation I cannot tell. But this is the selfish part. Turning for a moment to the larger outlook, I am extremely indisposed to any harking back in the matter of home rule; we are now, I think, freed from the enormous danger of seeing P. master in Ireland; division and its consequences in diminishing force, are the worst we have to fear. What my mind leans to in a way still vague is to rally ourselves by some affirmative legislation taken up by and on behalf of the party. Something of this kind would be the best source to look to for reparative strength.

To Lord Acton.

Jan. 9, 1891.—To a greybeard in a hard winter the very name of the south is musical, and the kind letters from you and Lord Hampden make it harmony as well as melody. But I have been and am chained to the spot by this Parnell business, and every[pg 458]day have to consider in one shape or other what ought to be said by myself or others.... I consider the Parnell chapter of politics finally closed for us, the British liberals, at least during my time. He has been even worse since the divorce court than he was in it. The most astounding revelation of my lifetime.

To J. Morley.

Hawarden, Dec. 30, 1890.—I must not longer delay thanking you for your most kind and much valued letter on my birthday—a birthday more formidable than usual, on account of the recent disasters, which, however, may all come to good. If I am able to effect in the world anything useful, be assured I know how much of it is owed to the counsel and consort of my friends.

It is not indeed the common lot of man to make serious additions to the friendships which so greatly help us in this pilgrimage, after seventy-six years old; but I rejoice to think that in your case it has been accomplished for me.

VIIIA few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]Death Of Mr. Parnellof the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

A few more sentences will end this chapter in Mr. Gladstone's life. As we have seen, an election took place in the closing days of December 1890. Mr. Parnell flung himself into the contest with frantic activity. A fierce conflict ended in the defeat of his candidate by nearly two to one.281Three months later a contest occurred in Sligo. Here again, though he had strained every nerve in the interval as well as in the immediate struggle, his candidate was beaten.282Another three months, then a third election at Carlow,—with the same result, the rejection of Mr. Parnell's man by a majority of much more than two to one.283It was in vain that his adherents denounced those who had left him as mutineers and helots, and exalted him as“truer than Tone, abler than Grattan, greater than O'Connell, full of love for Ireland as Thomas Davis himself.”On the other side, he encountered antagonism in every key, from pathetic remonstrance or earnest reprobation, down to an unsparing fury that savoured[pg 459]

Death Of Mr. Parnell

Death Of Mr. Parnell

of the ruthless factions of the Seine. In America almost every name of consideration was hostile.

Yet undaunted by repulse upon repulse, he tore over from England to Ireland and back again, week after week and month after month, hoarse and haggard, seamed by sombre passions, waving the shreds of a tattered flag. Ireland must have been a hell on earth to him. To those Englishmen who could not forget that they had for so long been his fellow-workers, though they were now the mark of his attack, these were dark and desolating days. No more lamentable chapter is to be found in all the demented scroll of aimless and untoward things, that seem as if they made up the history of Ireland. It was not for very long. The last speech that Mr. Parnell ever made in England was at Newcastle-on-Tyne in July 1891, when he told the old story about the liberal leaders, of whom he said that there was but one whom he trusted. A few weeks later, not much more than ten months after the miserable act had opened, the Veiled Shadow stole upon the scene, and the world learned that Parnell was no more.284

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