FOOTNOTES:

'That any person found communicating with a few obnoxious individuals in this locality will be expelled from the league. That every person presenting cattle for sale at a fair shall produce his card, and that no buyers shall purchase from any person without producing the same.'That no individual shall sell to any dealer without presenting hiscard, as it is the only way to detect those employed by the Defence Unionists, and that we call on the other branches to follow this example.'—'United Ireland,' Dec. 12th, 1885.

'That no individual shall sell to any dealer without presenting hiscard, as it is the only way to detect those employed by the Defence Unionists, and that we call on the other branches to follow this example.'—'United Ireland,' Dec. 12th, 1885.

As the power of the League became better established, the subscribers were guaranteed against the caprice of their customers by such resolutions as the following, adopted at New Ross:—

'That we hereby give final notice to Mr. Murtagh Stafford, that if he does not give back his work to the Nationalist blacksmiths, Messrs. Bowe and Busher, we cannot retain him on our league. That we inform all members of our branch that we expect them to patronize National blacksmiths, artisans, etc., if they wish to remain members.'—'New Ross Standard,' Jan. 9th, 1886.

The complicated equities, which arose under the operation of these local tribunals, are illustrated by another case reported from Wexford.

'Farrell and a man named Shee had been partners in a thrashing machine. Shee was boycotted in 1883 for having taken an evicted farm, and accordingly the machine was allowed to remain idle. Under these circumstances both agreed to dissolve partnership, and Farrell purchased Shee's share in the machine for 370l., a sum of 60l.being paid in ready cash and the remainder being secured by a bill of sale. Farrell then went to the Tullogher branch to get "absolution for the machine," but his application was refused, it being decided that Shee still had a certain interest in it. In the "New Ross Standard," on Sept. 30th, 1885, Farrell, it is reported, being desirous of appealing to the Central League in Dublin, had forwarded his statement to the Tullogher branch and declared he was now ready to verify it on oath. His request to have it sent on to the Central League was, however, refused by the local branch.'—'New Ross Standard.'

The election to local public offices soon engaged the attention of the League. The branches were not content with nominating candidates and interfering with the elections; they next assumed the direction of the proceedings of Boards of Guardians and Town Councils. At Ennis this intervention was publicly announced by resolution.

'That in every future election to any office under the board, no candidate shall be supported by the National Guardiansunless he be a member of the National Leaguefor at least six months previous to the date of the election, and produces his certificate, signed by the chairman and secretary of the branch, and further, that when selecting a candidate to be put forward for election, the minority of the National guardians should be bound to act on vote with the majority present and voting.'—'Clare Journal,' Nov. 11th, 1885.

Contracts were only to be given to Members of the League. No one could be elected to a country dispensary or engaged as solicitor by any electoral body without the sanction of the League. A large portion of the struggling professional classes in the South and West were forced by a sense of self preservation to join the local associations. To remain outside the ranks of the League was to forfeit a man's best chances of getting on in life, and might any day become a personal danger. Mr. Harrington M.P., who has been for some years in charge of the Central Office of the League, tells us that 'at Meetings of the branches of the Organization discussions frequently occur upon incidents in the locality.' We can quite believe it, and are not surprised to find from the columns of 'United Ireland' what is the result of these discussions.

In a system of pillage and tyranny so elaborated, there was no necessity to perpetrate acts of violence, frequently or continually. The daily operation of the League was a standing outrage, bringing a proof of its power to every man's door. A limited number of conspicuous crimes was sufficient for the purposes of the League. Curtin was murdered in November; Finlay, in the West of Ireland, in February; and the local persecution of the families of the victims was even a more awful tribute to the sway of the popular organization.

It is not surprising that Mr. Lecky, in former years the most distinguished advocate of Irish Nationalism, in what may be called its social aspects, should say of the organ of the National League, 'United Ireland,' 'any English statesman who reads that paper, and then proposes to hand over the property and the virtual government of Ireland to the men whose ideas it represents, must be either a traitor or a fool.'

There is no occasion to dwell on the existence of this body or the character of its operations. They are part of the case of the Government. Mr. Morley has frankly told us, that we ought to pass the new Bill, because the League is so strong. If we did not, we should have to quarrel with the League, and to meet not only this great association as we knew it in its times of prosperity, but the League as supported by all the reserve forces of Mr. Egan and Mr. Ford. At present these leaders of public opinion send money; but if the National League, its staff, its secretaries, its branches, its newspapers and Members of Parliament, are not enough, they are ready to send dynamite.

One remarkable fact, however, in connection with the National League deserves special consideration, for it illustrates the singularly disastrous character of Mr. Gladstone's interposition in Irish affairs. The society, which we have endeavoured todescribe, and which Mr. Morley recommends to our attention as thelocum tenensof dynamite and the dagger, is now officered in nearly every village by the priests of the Roman Church. At the beginning of his career, Mr. Parnell personally was regarded by the Roman Catholic hierarchy with suspicion, if not with hostility. Mr. Butt had never succeeded in securing their hearty co-operation in his Home Rule scheme. Mr. Parnell was not only a Protestant, but expressed his contempt very freely for the adherents of the Roman Church, whilst he avowed his sympathy with Revolutionists, whom the Irish Catholic had been taught to regard as enemies of the Holy Father. We can always trace in the history of this Church two forces at work; the principle of order and authority, worldly and calculating, in sympathy with the powers that be, trusting by skill and caution to manipulate them for its own ends; and on the other hand, the wilder spirit of sacerdotal ambition ready to ride the storm and dare catastrophe. Before Mr. Gladstone's second Administration, the former influence was gaining much strength in Ireland. Even if we make allowance for the social origin of the Irish priests, filled from their infancy with the rebel sentiment of the peasantry, there are many sins that the disposition of their Church was until very recently to rely upon intrigue and organization for gaining its ends, rather than to ally itself openly with the Irish Revolution. Even after Mr. Parnell had secured the allegiance of the farmer class by his great largess in the shape of 20 per cent. reduction of rent, not only did Cardinal McCabe continue to oppose him, but Archbishop Croke evinced a desire to act on the side of Government.

Such a line of action, however, was only possible on the supposition, that government was to be maintained in Ireland; and the tenure of Ireland by Lord Spencer gave no such assurance. We know the passionate efforts which Mr. Gladstone made to exclude Archbishop Walsh from the See of Dublin. Sir George Errington was sent to Rome to get the Pope to do what Mr. Gladstone dare not do himself—bid defiance to the Irish leader. That resolute politician had a policy; the English Minister had none. A quarrel with the Nationalist party meant to the Roman Church loss of income, loss of influence—influence which, in these iconoclastic days, it might take them generations to recover; and, after all their sacrifices, they might find that Mr. Gladstone had capitulated, and had handed them and the rest of Ireland over to the National League. Their only practical course, as discreet politicians, was to throw in their lot with the great Nationalist leader, relying on the oldtraditions of the Irish peasant to protect clerical interests against the host of Revolutionists, who would, on Mr. Parnell's triumph, flock into Ireland from all the ends of the earth. The priests do not forget that the member for Cork denounced their co-religionists. They have no enthusiasm for a revolutionary dictator, who, whatever his opinions on religious matters, cannot be claimed as a son of the Church. Mr. Gladstone, however, left the sacerdotal power no choice but to make the best terms they could with the Irish leader, who was only too glad to secure their co-operation. Archbishop Walsh has been accepted as a sort of ecclesiastical assessor to Mr. Parnell's government, and at the last election the priests went as one man for the National League.

It is an Ireland, thus abandoned for years to the evil spirits evoked by the rhetorician of Southport—an Ireland, in which the natural springs of Conservatism have been dried up by the fever of slumbering revolution—that England is now called upon to deal with, and the remedy of the Ministry is to call into power a public opinion schooled in conspiracy and violence; for now at length Mr. Gladstone has given up the notion of intervening between Mr. Parnell and the Irish crowd. The preachers of the gospel of plunder are invited to share in the government of a part of the Kingdom.

We shall not attempt to examine further the scheme which Mr. Gladstone has foreshadowed, but which, as we write, is not yet published in detail. One characteristic, we may note, in the Prime Minister's speech was very unusual with him. It is full of admissions which seem to be due not so much to his habitual daring as to unconsciousness of their import. He is ready to buy out the landlords at a great cost to the English taxpayer, because the idea of landed property came to the Irishman in English garb, and is therefore not likely to be respected in the new system; but why should he be obliged to make special provision for the Irish judges? They are men of ability, of stainless character. They do not belong to any particular party, or race, or creed; they are members of a great profession which all civilized societies require. They have that experience of their profession which would make their services particularly useful to a community entering on a new social stage; but the mere fact, that they have been engaged in applying the law, makes their position dangerous, and Mr. Gladstone is obliged to ask England to provide that they shall not suffer in purse from the opening of the new era which he proposes in that part of the United Kingdom where he has undertaken to reconstruct society.

For the moment Mr. Morley prefers therôleof Siéyes rather than of Danton, but the outcome of the legislation, proposed by the Ministry with the assent of Mr. Parnell, must be to advance, if not to consummate, the theory of Irish Independence. We thus arrive at that result which Mr. Morley, on his own principles, would find it difficult to refuse assent to. He has told us that his policy is to be 'thorough.' A separate Irish nationality or reconquest must be the ultimate consequence of any substitution of local institutions in Ireland for the Parliament at Westminster, unless so far as the proposed substitution were part of a scheme common to all four components of the kingdom. Most people will agree with the old Duke of Wellington, that 'the repeal of the Union must be the dissolution of the connection between the two countries.'

To withdraw the English flag from Ireland as we did from the Ionian Isles, to have a Convention called at Dublin to determine the future government of the Island, such a plan would have the advantage that it recognizes the one political opinion, which we can trace in Irish popular expression—the desire to be done with England. It is true, that the policy of Irish ideas declared at Southport was a means to an end—the better union of the two countries—but pledged to two antagonistic principles, Mr. Gladstone must some time choose which he will abandon.

On the other hand, in accepting Irish independence we shrink from responsibility for the acts of England. We know that the disorder now ruling in Ireland is, to some extent, the result of English misgovernment in past generations, and instead of attempting by firmness and patience to remedy the mischief our fathers have done, we leave the future to Providence. In this aspect of the question, we would remind our readers of the words used in our article on 'Disintegration' not three years ago:—

'The highest interests of the Empire, as well as the most sacred obligations of honour, forbid us to solve this question by conceding any species of independence to Ireland; or, in other words, any licence to the majority in that country to govern the rest of Irishmen as they please. To the minority, to those who have trusted us, and on the faith of our protection have done our work, it would be a sentence of exile or of ruin. All that is Protestant—nay, all that is loyal—all who have land or money to lose, all by whose enterprize and capital industry and commerce are still sustained, would be at the mercy of the adventurers who have led the Land League, if not of the darker counsellors by whom the Invincibles have been inspired. If we have failed after centuries of effort to make Ireland peaceable and civilized, we have no moral right to abandonour post and leave all the penalty of our failure to those whom we have persuaded to trust in our power. It would be an act of political bankruptcy, an avowal that we were unable to satisfy even the most sacred obligations, and that all claims to protect or govern any one beyond our own narrow island were at an end.'—'Quarterly Review,' October, 1883, pp. 593, 594.

Mr. Gladstone assured his hearers last week, that he was bent on consolidating the unity of the kingdom; he would not tolerate that his new constitution should be called a repeal of the Union; but his final argument was this, 'Do not let us disguise this from ourselves. We stand face to face with what is termed "Irish nationality."' Now, what is this 'Irish nationality'? Let us examine it from the point of view of the welfare of the Irish population. It may be conceded at once that there is a strong current of local sentiment running through the Irish population of the south and west. This is a tender, home feeling—a very different thing from the stronger, more complex, and more highly developed, conception round which a political nationality gathers. It is such a sentiment as exists in one form or another in every group of counties, in every county, in every country-side, in almost every village. It is a kindly recollection of old memories, associated with a disposition to stand up for our own. It is the result of intimate knowledge of certain habits and ideas, and a tender reminiscence of the best types of character associated with those habits. This sentiment of local feeling is the germ of nationality, but it exists in many regions where the wider ideas of nationality have never supervened. There are many other places again, where this same feeling remains fresh and vigorous after the political nationality connected with it has passed away, merged in larger conceptions, in a sense of more extended interests.

Such was the feeling of Cicero when he said that he had two countries. His Volscian home was the country of his affection, but Rome that of duty and right. Arpinum will always be my country, said he, but Rome still more my country, for Arpinum has its share in the honours and dominion of Rome.

Such is the feeling of the proud and vigorous nationality occupying North Britain, various in race, in creed, and in social condition, but united in mutual knowledge, in local sympathies, and in self-respect. The Scotch, as an aggregate, are intellectually, physically, and in their local institutions and habits one of the most distinct national types existing. They are drawn together by a strong sentiment of patriotism, but they are as little likely to demand a separate political system, a parliament sitting at Edinburgh, as the members from Hampshireand Wiltshire are likely to combine for the establishment of parliamentary government on the banks of the Itchin.

Now what is Ireland, and what indications has that portion of the population known as Nationalist given of a capacity to form itself into a nation? Ireland has a geographical boundary in a sea channel crossed from Great Britain in three hours or in an hour and a-half, according to the line of passage selected. It is inhabited by some five millions, whose native language is English, with the exception of a decimal percentage of mountaineers, who nearly all speak English as well as Irish. The race is more mixed than in any other district of the kingdom containing the same amount of population. The northern coasts are thickly peopled by Scotch settlers. In the south and west are many varieties of race not of English introduction, but strongly different from each other. In many of the most Catholic districts of Munster and Leinster we find, in the names, physique, and temper, of the people, evident results of the Cromwellian settlements, although the faith and political principles of their forefathers have passed away. With this mixed population we have a social cleavage probably the most remarkable in Europe. The mass of the people, except in about one-fifth of the island on the north-east coast, are Roman Catholic, Celtic in their traditions and habits, and extremely poor. The Northern fifth is industrious, order-loving, prosperous, Protestant, and British in sentiment. Next to the masses of the population in importance are the great landowners, of whom six-sevenths are Protestants, and nearly the whole of Norman, Scotch, or English origin. There is no important mercantile class, except in the towns of Belfast, Dublin, and Cork; and the professional classes, with the exception of the Catholic priesthood, are chiefly Protestant and British.

This population, so strangely wanting in homogeneity, have no history which might attract them into unconsciousness of their differences. It has been well said, that 'anybody who knew nothing of the Irish past, except what he got from the speeches of Irish Nationalists, would suppose that at some comparatively recent period the green flag had floated over fleets and armies, and that Irish kings had played a part of some kind in the field of modern European politics.' But as a matter of fact Ireland has no part in European history before its conquest by England. Not only was the kingdom of Ireland, as the style of the island went before 1800, an English creation; but the name of Ireland has never had any political significance except in connection with the English crown.

External signs of difference between English and Irish thereare many; nimble apprehension, fluent utterance, genial demeanour, the attraction of the flashing Celtic face, distinguish an Irish from an English group, but characteristics like this do not prove any original or consistent power of thought. They rather perhaps indicate the absence of it. It is not on qualities like these, cemented even by strong feelings of home sentiment, that we can expect to see the foundation of a new Nationality happily laid. With one exception there is not a single idea, which an orator could present to an Irish crowd, that could not be urged with equal chance of sympathy upon an English crowd. Personal liberty, the principles of no taxation without representation, of trial by jury, freedom of conscience, sympathy with the prosperity of the greatest number, all these are English ideas and must be illustrated, where they need illustration, by the events of history peculiar to England or common to the British dominion. The one topic, which is specially attractive to an Irish meeting, is abuse of England as the source of Irish misery. Community of hatred the mixed Nationalist population has, but whether such a passion is sufficiently creative to build up a new national type the reader can judge for himself. With this exception, laws, political teachings, commercial habits, are all of English origin.

Mr. Gladstone, in recommending to the House of Commons his scheme for the establishment of an independent Parliament in Ireland, cited as precedents the independent Legislatures of Sweden and Norway, and of Austria and Hungary. He dwelt particularly upon the precedent of Norway:—

'The Legislature of Norway has had serious controversies, not with Sweden, but with the King of Sweden, and it has fought out those controversies successfully upon the strictest constitutional and Parliamentary grounds. And yet with two countries so united, what has been the effect? Not discord, not convulsion, not danger to peace, not hatred, not aversion, but a constantly-growing sympathy; and every man who knows their condition knows that I speak the truth when I say, that in every year that passes the Norwegians and the Swedes are more and more feeling themselves to be the children of a common country, united by a tie which never is to be broken.'

If Mr. Gladstone had been better acquainted with the recent historic and economic condition of Norway, of which we have given some account in our present number,[104]he might have quoted that country as a warning rather than an example. The 'Storthing,' or Parliament of Norway, is omnipotent, and two-thirds of its representatives are permanently in the hands of thepeasant proprietor. The King has only a suspensive veto on Bills enacted by the Storthing, which therefore become law, if passed in their original form by three successive triennial Parliaments. The recent dispute between the King and the Parliament, to which Mr. Gladstone alluded, related to the right of the King to exercise an absolute veto in the case of Bills affecting the principles of the Constitution. The existence of such a right was denied by the Radical majority in the Storthing, which established in 1884 a Supreme Court of Justice composed exclusively of Radical members, and the Judges of the ordinary High Court of Justice. It was a packed Court, bound to secrecy; and the tribunal thus constituted condemned, in violation of the first principles of justice, all the King's Ministers in Norway to deprivation of office and to pecuniary fines, for having advised their master, that the Constitution could not be altered without his sanction. The King was compelled to yield, though he was supported in his opposition to the Storthing by his Swedish Cabinet; and his ultimate submission to the Radical majority in Norway was followed by a Ministerial crisis in Sweden. The Swedes rightly argue that, if the King has no absolute veto on matters affecting the principles of the Constitution in Norway, there is no obstacle to an abolition of the Monarchical form of government in that kingdom, or to a repeal of the union between the two countries. There is in consequence much discontent in Sweden at the conduct of Norway; and the Norwegians, on their side, have an intense and ever-growing 'hatred and aversion' to the Swedes. Hence has arisen a considerable tension in the official relations between the two countries instead of the 'constantly growing sympathy' of which Mr. Gladstone spoke. It is characteristic of the Prime Minister's mode of stating a case, that he tells us the Norwegian controversies are 'not with Sweden but with the King of Sweden.' Sweden has nothing to say in Norwegian affairs, except in the person of the King. The King is the only connecting link between the two countries. If the Dublin Parliament should impeach the Irish Viceroy, we suppose Mr. Gladstone would tell us that the difficulty was not with England but with Queen Victoria.

Nor was Mr. Gladstone much happier in his allusion to Hungarian Nationality in recent times. For more than 150 years Austria endeavoured to extinguish the national life of Hungary. In 1867 this policy was definitely abandoned, and Hungary was called to a share in the Empire of the Hapsburgs. As recently as last October Mr. Parnell, when insisting that Ireland must have an independent Parliament, said: 'Wecan point to the example of other countries—to Austria and to Hungary—to the fact that Hungary, having been conceded self-government, became one of the strongest factors in the Austrian Empire.' The favour, with which these references have been received by the Liberal party, is a singular example how far afield they are ready to go in search of an argument. Austria, in 1867, was a great military despotism, tottering to its fall amidst a group of eager rivals. A general appeal to the nation, such as France made at the commencement of the Revolutionary war, was out of the question. Differences of race, differences of language, differences of social condition, made national unity impossible within the wide dominions of the House of Austria. The government at Vienna consented to the division of its territories into groups of nearly equal strength. In each of these groups various alien nationalities were clustered round a central power more advanced in politics, in civilization, and in wealth, than the adjacent territories. Instead of trying to weld their multiple varieties of race into one great popular community, Austria, smitten at Sadowa, shared her dominion with Hungary, and asked her to take charge of the Government of the East Leithan Slavs, whilst the German population of Austria dealt with the Czechs and Moravians and Carinthians on the western side of the river.

Sir Henry Elliott has well pointed out, that what success the experiment has had is in no small degree due to the large powers still enjoyed by the Crown, and to the personal character and influence of the Emperor Francis, the connecting link between the two dominions; but apart from this actual result, the feasibility of the dual scheme depended on the following considerations. In the first place, there was no alternative in the condition in which the House of Austria found itself in 1867, defeated in battle and bankrupt in finance. Without some such arrangement civil war was inevitable, with the ultimate prospect of the absorption of the various races by the hostile neighbouring Powers. In the second place, the allies were pretty nearly equal in strength as regards each other, whilst they were each similarly weighted by the difficulty of holding their own within the respective territories assigned them. They were each so busy with their subordinate territories and the less advanced populations inhabiting them, that it was not their interest or their inclination to bring about conflicts with each other. Hungary boasts a larger area than Austria, and a population equal to three-fourths that of the Western Monarchy. On the western side of the Leitha the dominant race, dominant by force of nature, by brain power, and the traditions andacquirements this power has given them, are 36 per cent. of the whole population. In the Transleithan provinces the race similarly situated, the Magyar, constitutes about 40 per cent. of the whole population.

There is not a single circumstance in the relations between England and Ireland to make reference to the creation of the Empire-Kingdom anything but an absurdity. Ireland never can compare with Great Britain in material resources. Her population is hardly one-sixth that of the larger island, whilst her area is little more than a third. She is deficient in climate, in soil, in mineral resources, and in population. Not only is she without a well-organized aristocracy skilled in political science, such as Hungary boasted; Ireland, as the term is understood by the National League, is without an educated class. Her intellect is represented by the moonlight maurauder and the fanatic priest. As regards England, the parallel is still more preposterous: She is not a military despotism, but a well-organized community, boasting parliamentary traditions of a thousand years. Her shores are guarded by sea from foreign interference. Notwithstanding many scandalous shortcomings in her rulers, her influence and her power are still unrivalled in the world. However long Mr. Gladstone may rule, her Sadowa is yet to come; and, if it did come, the example of the Dual State would offer no solution of our Irish difficulties, for none of the conditions which made the Dual State possible exist in the case of the two chief British Islands.

The delusive character of Mr. Gladstone's reference to the Dual State is best illustrated by the facts, that the council for common affairs consist of an equal number of representatives from each side of the dominion, that this council is concerned with military and foreign affairs, two subjects on which, according to the new scheme, Ireland is to have no vote.

It will be found, on a little examination, that appeals to the example of the foreigner are as misleading as the theory of nationality. All such arguments are only endeavours to divert the public from the exercise of their own judgment and common-sense in dealing with the mischiefs which the perverse genius of Mr. Gladstone has created. Recognized principles of government, the ordinary traditions of England applied with the happy immunity from friction, which the commercial policy of modern times makes possible, would have long since settled the difficulty, but it would have been settled in disregard of that popular Irish feeling which, in 1867, Mr. Gladstone pledged himself to follow. He would have had to admitthat his new Irish policy was a mistake; and he never admits that he has made any mistake—unless it be in Egypt—or in acting on the opinion of other people. When he has discovered a new line of policy, he believes himself infallible. Let us assume for a moment, that the combination of the personal adherents of Mr. Gladstone and of Mr. Parnell enables the Prime Minister to pass some measure on the lines he has selected, or on those laid down by Mr. Davitt, and that the rowdy treason of a Dublin Cabinet proceeds to bring within the sphere of its operations what wealth and civilization has hitherto escaped the National League.

In the struggle which must ensue, we shall have within three hours of our shores a raging volcano of revolution, threatening the peace of Europe and our own. Fenians, Nihilists, and Irish Yankees, will flock to the new vantage ground. The conflict between Socialism and property, between infidelity and superstition, will be fought out amidst the strangest complications of local hatred and of fiscal disorder. If foreign governments abstain from interfering, and we escape consequent difficulties with them, are we sure that we ourselves will be able to remain passive spectators? Many of us are old enough to recollect the agitation which shook this kingdom during the struggle between North and South on the other side of the Atlantic. No question of Home politics for generations past had so deeply moved our people. It required all the exertions of the most sober part of the nation to prevent our becoming involved in the conflict, and we recollect the help this party of wisdom got from the impulsive statesman who has undertaken for the third time the final settlement of the Irish question. If the great American Civil War, desolating a country three thousand miles away, thus stirred popular feeling, what will be the result of a Civil War between, on the one side, the Irish Celt animated by religious hatred and love of plunder, and supported by the Irish American, and on the other the loyalty, endurance and Protestantism of Ulster—a Civil War almost within sight of our shores?

But, if we turn from the suggestions of empiricism and vanity and come to those practical considerations which affect men's minds in matters so important as political organization, the main argument pressed on English people is that we cannot go on as we are. 'Irish Government is a failure.' 'We must close this terrible crisis as rapidly as possible.' 'Separation itself, could not be worse than the present state of things.' 'The Act of Union has completely failed. After eighty-four years it has given an Ireland more hostile to England than at any period ofits history.' Mr. Gladstone recites the number of Coercion Acts, which have been passed since 1832, and declares 'we are like the man who, knowing that medicine may be the means of his restoration to health, endeavours to live upon medicine.'

Before considering whether this confession of failure is true, we would remind our readers what it implies, what it leads up to. It is now proposed as an argument for establishing a separate Parliament in Dublin. The establishment of this separate Parliament is necessary, because we must give Ireland the opportunity of doing what we ourselves are unable to do, to find the best machinery they can to carry on the business of government. But, when this machinery is once found and invested with the resources and influence of a Government, we cannot suppose that our troubles will be at an end. If disputes arise in the working out of the new Irish Constitution, the popular majority will not be slow to call in the aid of the American Irish who have founded the National League. Mr. Jennings, whose opinion on this matter is entitled to great weight, from his long residence in the United States, reminded the House that

'one consideration which they must bear in mind was that of the formidable difficulties which would inevitably arise from the action of the great body of Irish Americans. If this Bill granted to Ireland a free and independent Parliamentary Assembly with full powers over the Executive, as proposed by the Prime Minister, there would inevitably come a time when either the payment of the interest due, or some other cause, would bring the Irish Parliament into antagonism with the English. If they were to endeavour to demand what was necessary, whether payment of interest or what not, and to threaten to use force, could any one suppose that the great body of Irish Americans would stand by silently and see that done? He believed that the United States would say to them: "You have acknowledged your incompetence to govern Ireland; you have given her practical independence, now you must take your hands off her; we will not stand by and see her crushed." He believed that there was no government in the United States which could withstand such pressure as that which would be brought to bear on it by the Irish Americans, especially if a Presidential election were near.'

But is this allegation of failure actually true? For our part we are inclined to agree with Lord Hartington, that the argument founded on the paralysis of government in Ireland in recent years is allowed more weight in this question than it should have. In the first place, it is difficult to see how any government conducted as ours has been during the last few years, could be other than disastrous, Mr. Gladstone, at the commencement of his careeras leader of the Liberal party, pledged himself to the policy of Irish ideas, ignorant, if not reckless, of what the term meant. Year by year he has been getting a closer view of the creed he had unconsciously adopted, and, after a struggle, he accepts one dogma, then another. The great dogma of all in the Home Ruler's creed, that Englishmen should be sent bag and baggage out of Ireland, has not yet been adopted; and naturally the Home Ruler keeps his resources ready for that ringing of the chapel bell to which Mr. Gladstone alluded in speaking of the Clerkenwell explosion and its effect on the question of the Irish Establishment. The 'dynamite and the dagger,' to which Mr. Morley recently appealed as conclusive reasons for passing the Cabinet scheme, retain their fascination for the Irish mind.

As long as Mr. Gladstone is a power in English public life, and his pledges given in Lancashire are unredeemed or unrepudiated, the Home Rule party will press him without mercy; but it is not reasonable to argue from their success, a success which Mr. Gladstone has given them, that they exercise a permanent influence on Irish affairs. When the Southport pledges were given, the Irish land laws were yet without that reform which a series of Governments, Tory as well as Whig, had admitted to be necessary. It could not be said until after 1870 that the book of English neglect of Irish interests was finally closed, and that is only sixteen years ago. During this period we have seen the great English Parliamentary Ruler continually plunging after coercion, and returning to make some other big concession to agitation. Thus Ireland has had no chance of trying what a good system of laws consistently administered could supply. The principle of the Land Act of 1870 was a provision for the protection of property—the tenants' property recognized by custom during a long course of years, although ignored by the law and exposed to confiscation by the reckless Whig legislation of 1850-2. The Land Act of 1881 was an arbitrary attempt to remedy the misfortunes of an improvident agricultural interest by legislative interference with contract. Contracts were readjusted and finally settled for fifteen years to come. Political economy was bidden to take itself off, but prices varied quite regardless of Mr. Gladstone's arrangements, and the weather did not pay them the least consideration. The passion for revolution was stimulated, and a large number of Mr. Gladstone's clients are as badly off as before. Might it not be worth while to try for a time how far good government, after the removal of all substantial grievances, might supply that 'real settlement,' 'that finality,' which the country is now asked to find inDublin Parliaments, First Orders, and bribes at the cost of the English taxpayer?

This counter-policy of maintaining order and good government in Ireland should be emphasized by measures to make that island, even more completely than she now is, a part of the United Kingdom. The Queen's laws in Ireland are the same, except in some slight details, as in England. The Irish judicature might be made part of the High Court at Westminster. The Queen's writs from Westminster should run throughout Ireland as they have done for hundreds of years throughout Wales. Limerick or Sligo are not so remote from London now as Harlech or Durham were in the reign of George I. The Irish judges would form no undistinguished addition to the English Bench, while the presence of English judges on circuit in Ireland would have the best effect in disarming the animosity of the people against the law. It is too often forgotten in these days that, however rapidly we move from place to place, however swift the transmission of intelligence, the human mind has not yet acquired the nimbleness of the telegraph needle. Habits of thought are not changed as rapidly as the fashions of our dress. It is only sixteen years since our Irish legislation has assumed its present form, and we are ready to throw to the winds all maxims of statecraft, all principles hitherto recognized in the delicate work of government. We are in despair, and call in the company ofà prioristatesmen—men whose sole qualification to deal with complex questions is the fact that they have studied the science of revolution. Why should we not try, now that we have provided for manifest Irish grievances, what time, and resolution, and common-sense, might do for us and our Irish fellow-subjects?

The first part of the Government policy is disclosed. We have still to learn what its complement, the Land Purchase Bill, is to be, what proposal is to be made about loyal Ulster, the subject on which Mr. Gladstone was so strangely vague, on which Mr. Parnell was discreetly silent. These further manifestations of Cabinet wisdom can hardly save the scheme now lingering on to death. We wish we could be certain, that this collapse would rid Parliament and Ireland of all such projects for the future. But, whatever be the fate of the present Ministry, we may be sure that the end is not yet, unless Mr. Parnell's faction is completely broken, unless the policy urged by Lord Hartington is firmly adopted, and party life reorganized in England, on the principle of excluding the Irish vote from consideration in our party conflicts. If no such resolution is enforced by English patriotism, Irish Nationalists will return totheir demands, enhanced in power and renown by the tribute they have extorted from the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

On these events of the future we shall not now speculate; but if past history throws any light on the character of our population, one thing may be confidently predicted. If Home Rule should be ultimately conceded to Ireland, the political party which may be responsible for the carrying of the scheme, will have to look forward to a long period of exclusion from public confidence. However the British people may be worried or deluded into forgetfulness of their duty to themselves and to Ireland, the working of a Dublin Parliament will soon rouse them, the reaction will set in; and the authors of the scheme will have before them as lengthened a banishment from power, as the country gentlemen suffered when their chivalrous devotion to the House of Stuart blinded them for a time to the practical interests of England; as was the fate of the Whigs at the beginning of this century, when they identified their party with implacable opposition to Pitt's struggle to deliver Europe from the tyranny of Bonaparte.

FOOTNOTES:[104]See Art. IV. 'Yeomen Farmers in Norway.'

[104]See Art. IV. 'Yeomen Farmers in Norway.'

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