not exposed and made an end of him? The English people had too much respect for their institutions to believe in so incredible a story. The violence of the attacks recoiled upon their authors. With his accession to the Premiership he became an object of marked and general regard. When he went down to Parliament for the first time in his new capacity, he was wildly cheered by the crowds in Palace Yard. The shouts were echoed along Westminster Hall and through the lobbies, and were taken up again warmly and heartily in the House itself, which had been the scene of so many conflicts-the same House in which he had been hooted down when he first rose to speak there.

And the tribute was to himself personally. He was not the representative of any great or popular cause. Even in carrying his Reform Bill he had not stooped to inflated rhetoric, or held out promises of visionary millenniums. He was regarded merely as a man of courage and genius, not less honest than other politicians because his professions were few.

IRISH POLICY OF MR. GLADSTONE

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CHAPTER XIV

Reply of the Liberals to the Tory Reform Bill-State of Ireland-The Protestant Establishment-Resolution proposed by Mr. Gladstone -Decay of Protestant feeling in England-Protestant character of the Irish Church-The Upas Tree-Mr. Gladstone's Irish policyGeneral effect on Ireland of the Protestant Establishment-Voltaire's opinion-Imperfect results-The character of the Protestant gentry -Nature of the proposed change-Sprung on England as a surprise -Mr. Gladstone's resolutions carried-Fall of Disraeli's Government.

DISRAELI, in appropriating Parliamentary Reform, obliged the Liberals to look about them for another battle-cry at the next election-something popular and plausible which would touch the passions of the constituencies. The old subjects were worn out or disposed of. It had become necessary to start new game. The genuine Radical desires to make a new world by a reconstruction of society. He has his eye always on one or other of the old institutions, which he regards as an obstacle to progress. There are, therefore, at all times, a number of questions which are gradually 'ripening,' as it is called, but which wait to be practically dealt with till the opportunity presents itself. Among these the Liberal leader had now to make his choice. A small advance would not answer. Disraeli had ventured a long and audacious step. The other side must reply with a second and a longer if the imagination was to be effectively awakened.

The Established Church of England, the Land Laws, the House of Lords, perhaps the Crown, were eventually to be thrown into the crucible; but the nation was not yet prepared for an assault on either of these. The weak point was found in Ireland, which at all times had been the favourite plaything of English faction. Three millions of Irish had fled across the Atlantic to escape from famine since the failure of the potato. Some had gone of their own wills, some had been roughly expelled from their homes. With few exceptions, they had borne the cost of their own exportation. Those who went first sent home money to bring out their families and friends, and the economists had congratulated themselves that the Irish difficulty was at last disposed of, at no expense to the British taxpayer. A few insignificant persons, who understood the Irish character, knew too well that the congratulations were premature. If the poor Irish were really our fellow-subjects, these persons thought that some effort should have been made to soften their expulsion, and to provide or at least to offer them homes in the vast colonial territories which then belonged to us. Past efforts in that direction, indeed, had not been encouraging. For several generations we had poured shiploads of Irish into the West Indies. Scarcely a survivor of Celtic blood is now to be found in those islands. It would have been something, however, to have shown that we were generously anxious to bear our share in the undeserved calamity which had fallen on an ill-used people, and to try to repair the efforts of centuries of negligence. If we left them to their own resources without regret, with an avowed confession that we were glad to be rid of them, Irish disaffection would become more intense than ever. We did so leave them, They streamed across to the United States,

carrying hatred of England along with them, while the walls of the deserted villages in Connaught preached revenge to those who were left at home. The exiles throve in their new land-a fresh evidence, if they needed more, that English domination had been the cause of their miseries. They multiplied, and became a factor in American political life. They fought, and fought well, in the American Civil War. When the Civil War was over, they hoped for a war with England, and tried to kindle it in Canada. The 'Alabama' question having been settled peacefully, they failed in their immediate purpose; but none the less they were animated with an all-pervading purpose of revenge; and there were many thousands of them who had escaped the Southern bullets who were ready for any desperate adventure. An invading force was to cross the Atlantic, while Ireland organised itself in secret societies to receive them as it did to receive the French in 1797. Chester Castle and the Fenian rebellion of 1867 are not yet forgotten even in these days of short memories and excited hopes. The rising was abortive. It failed, as Irish rebellions have so often failed, because the Irish people trusted in their numbers and neglected to make serious preparations. The American general who came

over to take the command had been told that he would find ten thousand men drilled and armed. He did not find five hundred, and he left the enterprise in contempt. The scattered risings which followed were easily suppressed, and were suppressed with gentleness. The exhortation of a leading Liberal journal to make an example of the rebels in the field, because executions afterwards were inconvenient, was happily not attended to. But the leniency with which the leading insurgents were treated was construed into a confession of weakness. The rebellious spirit was fed from

America, and detached acts of violence, attempted rescues of prisoners, and blowing up of gaols showed that Ireland was as unsubdued as ever. The great Liberal champion saw the occasion which he required. The Clerkenwell explosion, he explained afterwards, had brought the Irish question within the range of practical politics, and in this extraordinary acknowledgment invited an inflammable people to persevere in outrage if they desired to secure their rights. He declared in a memorable speech that the cause of Irish wretchedness had been Protestant Ascendency. Protestant Ascendency was the Irish upas-tree, with its three branches, the Church, the land, and the education. The deadly growth once cut down, the animosity would end, and the English lion and the Irish lamb would lie down together in peace. That to disarm the garrison was a likely mode of reconciling an unwilling people to a connection which they detest, was an expectation not in accordance with general human experience; still less when it was confessedly recommended as a reward of insurrection. But the Irish question was ingeniously selected as a counterstroke to Disraeli's Reform Bill. Had Disraeli but left Reform to its owners the Liberals would have been provided with work at home and have left Ireland alone. But the deed was done, and many circumstances combined to suggest to the eminent statesman who had discovered the secret of Irish disaffection that here was the proper field for his genius, and that he was peculiarly the person to put his hand to the plough. The Irish Church had long been a scandal to Liberal sentiment, and Disraeli himself had denounced it. The land was the favourite subject of Radical declamation. Land-owning in Ireland showed under its least favourable aspect, and could there be assaulted at best advantage. It was true that the control