Lord Carnarvon was claimed far and wide as a decided Home Ruler upon the strength of Mr Parnell's account of the interview, adopted by Mr Gladstone in defiance of Lord Carnarvon's statement. A few days only before his letter to Mr Tait, Mr Gladstone had made this interview the subject of one of his interminable railway-station speeches, and had declared his wish "to put these two questions to Lord Carnarvon,- What did you say to Mr Parnell? and to whom did you make known your conversation with Mr Parnell?" Surely it is not unreasonable that at the present juncture we should put the same questions to Mr Gladstone with respect to the Hawarden conference, and his refusal to "make a clean breast of it" justifies belief in Mr Parnell's recollection, whilst at the same time it furnishes an additional example of consistency on the part of the eminent statesman who now refuses to his countrymen the information which in their name and on their behalf he was so desirous to extort from Lord Carnarvon. The idle excuse put forward by Mr Gladstone that "in 1886 there was contradiction between Lord Carnarvon and Mr Parnell; the contradiction is now between Mr Parnell in 1889 and Mr Parnell in 1890," will deceive no one that does not wish to be deceived. If there is now no contradiction between Mr Gladstone and Mr Parnell, it is either because Mr Gladstone cannot deny Mr Parnell's assertions, or because he remains obstinately silent for reasons of his own. In either case his silence is a corroboration of Mr Parnell, and we are constrained to believe that in the main facts of the interview the statement of the latter is in accordance with the true facts of the case. But however interesting may be the inquiry into the relative accuracy of Messrs Gladstone and Parnell, there is something more interesting and more valuable to Unionists in the direct and ample fulfilment of their predictions with respect to the Home Rule cry. We have already recalled our own repeated warnings that the first attempt at practical legislation upon this subject would split the Gladstonian party just as it did in 1886, and entirely fail to satisfy anybody. We based our belief upon the fact that, if words meant anything, the Home Rulers of Great Britain and those of Ireland neither intended nor desired the same thing by Home Rule. We pointed out that Great Britain would never give that which Irish Home Rulers wanted, and that Irish Home Rulers would never be contented with what Great Britain would give. We showed, moreover, that whilst an extension of local government,-under such restrictions as would prevent the gross misapplication of public funds of which Irish local authorities have in some instances been accused,-might be possible if desired, and would be readily given by the British Parliament, nothing could or would be given in the direction of what is called a National Parliament. Yet the Irish demand was that a National Parliament should be given, and that Ireland should "take her place among the nations of the world." How, then, could British Home Rulers, who were not prepared to accede to this demand, be honestly allied with those who made it an initial and fundamental article of their political creed? The thing was impossible; and for a long time past it has only been a question of how and when the want of identity in the demands of Irish Nationalists and British Gladstonians would bring their alliance to an end. That this must occur at some time or other must have been all along as evident to Mr Gladstone as to our selves; but the one great object of the old parliamentary hand was to postpone its occurrence until the constituencies should have been hoodwinked and deceived at the general election by the apparent unity of the Home Rule party. It is melancholy to reflect upon the dishonesty of such a policy, and upon the degradation into which British politics must have fallen when it is sought to further the interests of party by such a deliberate attempt to "jockey" the electoral body. The exposure of the attempt has justly followed; and the damage which it must have inflicted upon the Gladstonian party has been thoroughly well deserved. Meanwhile the proceedings of the Irish party have been watched with interest by all thinking politicians. These proceedings have thrown some light upon past events, and have at the same time given us a fair idea of what would have been the result of passing a Home Rule bill with limitations upon the Irish Parliament, and to what sort of men Mr Gladstone would have handed over the lives and properties of our loyal fellowsubjects in Ireland. They have made it clear beyond all doubt that limitations of any kind would have immediately been made the basis of a new agitation, in which, of course, the popular candidates would have been those who demanded the removal of all limitations and restrictions upon the power of the National Parliament. A majority of Irish representatives imbued with this view and pledged to this demand would have created as much disturbance as the present generation of Home Rulers have done, and the difficulty of governing Ireland would have been greater than ever. A striking commentary upon Mr Gladstone's "union of hearts" and his recent declaration in Scotland "that no one desires to repeal the Union," and a remarkable instance of the real aim and object of the Irish Nationalists, has just been given in a "manifesto" of Mr Dillon, who deplores the quarrels of his associates because " they might render it more difficult for us to fight together in the future as comrades against the union of Ireland with Great Britain as we have done during the past ten years." Surely after this the Gladstonians must submit to be called "Separatists" whilst their present alliance with the Nationalists still endures. But the proceedings of the Irish Parliamentary party have shown us something more than the impossibility of any reasonable settlement of the Home Rule question. They have shown a marked difference between British and Irish opinion upon important principles, quite apart and distinct from the question of Home Rule. It would have been impossible for any British statesman to have continued at the head of a British party after an exposure in the Divorce Court such as that which has befallen Mr Parnell. Still, a large amount of British public opinion regarded the retention and unanimous re-election of Mr Parnell as an instance of the impulsive generosity of Irishmen, and a mark of fidelity to the leader. This generosity and fidelity, however, were in many instances shown to be of a transitory and evanesNo sooner had cent character. the blast of Mr Gladstone's trumpet been blown than schism showed itself in the Irish camp. Men who 1 Mr Dillon's Manifesto, 'Times,' December 17. owed their political existence to Mr Parnell, who had been brought into parliamentary being by his aid, and had been bound to him by every tie which could unite follower and leader, turned round at Mr Gladstone's invitation to snarl and snap at the kindly hand which had fed them, and lent themselves to the attempt to crush their leader and benefactor with an alacrity and vehemence which seemed to indicate some more selfish and jealous motives than the pure patriotism which they paraded as the mainspring of their insidious action. The course taken by those men was not one likely to be approved by the warm-hearted Irish race, or by British lookerson who had seen with surprise the sudden change of front on the part of the patriotic majority of the Irish Parliamentary party. Acteon eaten by his own hounds is not a gratifying spectacle, and certainly not one which excites our sympathy for the hounds. It is scarcely surprising, therefore, that -without any desire to palliate his moral offence or to approve his political vices-no inconsiderable amount of sympathy should have been felt for Mr Parnell and the faithful followers who stood by his side during his struggle for political life. Nor can we avoid the remark that throughout the whole of the debates in which the Irish Parliamentary party have recently been engaged, the intellectual superiority of Mr Parnell to those who have been promoting his deposition has been conspicuously shown, and his strategical powers have been proved to be of a high order. Nothing, indeed, has occurred in the history of political warfare for many years which has been more amusing and instructive than the termination of the Irish wrangle so far as concerned the Irish Members of Parliament. As soon as Mr Parnell's opponents discovered that they were in a majority, they appear to have been somewhat alarmed at their own success, and to have hesitated as to the most desirable way in which to use the independence to which they had so long been unaccustomed. Perhaps even at the last moment some reluctance to cut themselves finally adrift from the leader whom they had re-elected and deserted within one week still lingered in the breasts of some of those who had conspired together for his overthrow. Perhaps they honestly wished to wring some advantage from the "English wolves" to whom they were about to abandon their chief, so that, to use Mr Parnell's own words, they might not sell him "without obtaining value for him." In any case, they fell into the trap prepared for them by their astute leader, and agreed to the appointment of a committee to confer with Mr Gladstone, Sir William Harcourt, and Mr Morley, "in view of the difference of opinion which has arisen between Mr Gladstone and Mr Parnell as to the accuracy of Mr Parnell's recollection of suggestions offered at Hawarden in reference to suggested changes in and departures from the Home Rule Bill of 1886, on the subjects of the control of the Constabulary and the settlement of the land question." It was understood that, if satisfactory assurances upon these points were obtained from Mr Gladstone and his colleagues, Mr Parnell would retire from the leadership, and with his assurances to this effect the mutinous majority were content. They were apparently unable to perceive that, whilst their failure to obtain such assurances would vastly strengthen Mr Parnell's position, and largely increase the number of those who believed in his version of the Hawarden conference, the opposite result would enable Mr Parnell's friends to point to his having been the person who, by voluntary selfsacrifice, had forced such assurances from the leaders of the Liberal party, and would make it more unpopular and more difficult than ever to depose him from the leadership. Mr Parnell, how ever, was quite safe in his conditional offer to resign. He had already designated Mr Gladstone as a man from whom it was "impossible to obtain a simple answer to a simple question," and was sufficiently well acquainted with the veteran statesman to anticipate without apprehension the result of the deputation. Mr Gladstone was apparently upon the horns of a dilemma. If he boldly consented to guarantee that in his next Home Rule Bill he would hand over to the Irish Parliament the control of the constabulary and the settlement of the land question, he ran no small risk of alienating some of the best of his English supporters. If, on the other hand, he declined to give any such guarantee or pledge, the Irish Parliamentary party had pledged themselves not to consider such a reply as satisfactory, and never to accept a Home Rule Bill which fell short of their demands under the two heads specified in their resolution; and in this case they would have no justification, from their own point of view, in consenting to his commands that Mr Parnell should be cashiered. Mr Gladstone's difficulty was not small; but he was in a measure equal to the occasion. First, he objected to the form in which the deputation had approached him, and declined to consider his conference with them as in any way connected with recollections of the Hawarden suggestions. Then he declared that he could make no statement of his intentions as regards a Home Rule Bill in connection with the leadership of the Irish party, a question "which belongs entirely to their own competence," and that, when it should have been settled, he would be ready to enter without prejudice into confidential communications such as have heretofore taken place. When we speak of Mr Gladstone as being, in this reply, only in a measure equal to the occasion, it is because we are inclined to think that, having two objects in view, he has only accomplished one, and that after an incomplete fashion. Mr Gladstone's objects were, first, to oblige the Irish party to get rid of Mr Parnell; secondly, to restore and confirm their confidence in himself. As regards the first object, success has so far followed Mr Gladstone's tactics that the majority have boldly decreed the deposition of their leader. But they have done so, not only in such an informal and irregular manner as to justify his refusal to accept their verdict, but actually without having received the pledges which they solemnly agreed should be asked from Mr Gladstone as a condition of Mr Parnell's resignation. This they have done, moreover, after a transaction which has made it more clear than ever that they have simply obeyed the dictation of the English leader of the Gladstonian-Liberal party. It is childish for Mr Gladstone to speak of the election of their leader being "within the competence" of the Irish party, and to indulge in the expression of his desire to "uphold the independence of the Irish Parliamentary party," whilst at the very same moment he tells them that he can only hold con fidential communication with them when they have decided the question "in such a manner as will enable me to renew the former relations"-or, in other words, when they have finally forsaken and deposed Mr Parnell. In gaining, therefore, his first object, Mr Gladstone has enabled Mr Parnell to appeal to public opinion in Ireland against an act of dictation which may or may not be justifiable, but which cannot be fairly described as anything but dictation pur et simple, and which is more than anything else calculated to arouse Irish feeling on behalf of the chief whom Mr Gladstone and no one else has deposed. But if he has indeed gained his object for the moment in this respect, what shall we say of the second object-namely, the restoration of confidence in himself? It is hardly to be supposed that even the deserters who have forsaken their leader at the instance of Mr Gladstone can be deceived by his quasi-assurances on the subject of Home Rule. He has indeed justified Mr Parnell's description of the difficulty in obtaining from him "a direct answer to a simple question." Let us contrast the position of the two men upon the points which Mr Gladstone calls "two out of many points vital to the construction of a good measure of Home Rule." Mr Parnell agrees that they are most vital points, and he says, "Let Mr Gladstone give a pledge that he will support the Irish party's view these points, and I will retire." Mr Gladstone on the other hand says, "Turn Mr Parnell out of the leadership, and I will enter without prejudice into confidential communications with you." But is this loyal and straightforward conduct either to the Irish party or to the country? The country has a right to know whether Mr upon If Gladstone intends to hand the control of the constabulary over to an Irish Parliament, and whether he is prepared to allow the settlement of the land question to be also left to such a body. These are not details; they are grave matters of principle and crucial points upon which public opinion should be informed as to the intentions of those who demand that they should be supported upon the broad principle of Home Rule for Ireland. Mr Gladstone's letter is carefully scrutinised, it will be found to contain no promise or pledge of any kind whatever. It is general in its language and evasive in its spirit; and if the Irish party are deceived by it, they must indeed be of a simple and trustful nature. It will be remembered that when Mr Gladstone introduced his Home Rule Bill in 1886, he proposed that "the constabulary should remain under the same terms of service, and under the present authority," although he took care to qualify the statement by adding, "I do not say that this is to be so for ever"; and stated moreover that he and his colleagues had "no desire to exempt the police of Ireland in its final form from the ultimate control of the legislative body." If, therefore, Mr Gladstone intimated to Mr Parnell at Hawarden that which Mr Parnell states him to have done, he was moving upon the same lines as in 1886, and nothing is more probable than that he desired to conciliate British and Ulster feeling by retaining imperial authority over the constabulary. Whether he is of the same mind to-day as in 1886, or at the time of the Hawarden conference, is of course doubtful. His letter binds him to nothing, and in any communications which he may hold with the majority caucus of the Irish party, he may |