of the land. But, returning to the Bill, the Government could promise to it no support, and enter into no undertaking to disturb the main provisions of the Land Act. It might be said, "Do you intend to introduce any Bill with regard to matters of detail?' The Government did not intend to introduce any such Bill. The need for amendments was a secondary need, and he was not prepared to undertake to burden the House with an embarrassment such as that, in addition to other embarrassments. Looking at the general interest of the empire as a whole, and looking especially at the interest of Ireland-looking at the sacrifices they had demanded and exacted from certain classes in Ireland it would be a violation of their duty were they now to give encouragement to the demand for new sacrifices which they did not think in the main justice required; while, as regarded the people of Irelandthey had done substantial justice to their demands, and they could not be too clear in announcing that no encouragement would be received from the Government to the entertaining of further schemes and proposals of change to which they were not prepared to give support, and which they did not believe would be either to the honour or advantage of the country.

Mr. Bryce, on behalf of the Independent Liberals, expressed his regret that the Government had given no promise that the questions dealt with in the Bill would be dealt with in the present, or at the latest, in the following Session. On a division Mr. Parnell's Bill was rejected by 250 to 63; all the Irish members, except the Conservatives, voting for the second reading; as did the bulk of the Independent English Radicals, whilst the majority was composed of the Conservatives, English, Scotch, and Irish, the Whigs and the Ministerialists.

Each of the

After a short, but somewhat bitter debate, on the condition of the Scotch crofters (March 20), the House adjourned for the Easter recess. Before this, however, the names of the newly established "Grand Committees" were reported. Committees was to consist of sixty-four members, Mr. SclaterBooth being the chairman of that relating to Law and Justice, and Mr. Goschen of that relating to Trade, Shipping, and Manufactures.

Outside the walls of Parliament public interest had been languidly moved by the Cabinet change, and the succession of Lord Carlingford to the Presidency of the Council, where he had been acting for Earl Spencer, attracted but little attention. It was announced also that Lord Spencer, as Viceroy, would remain a member of the Cabinet, a somewhat unusual arrangement, and that the duties of the yet uncreated minister of Agriculture would be assigned to the Lord President. Neither this reform nor the expected promotion of Lord Rosebery to be Lord Privy Seal, with a special interest in the management of Scotch business, was destined to be carried out.

Platform speeches, in spite of Parliament being in Session, were more numerous than ever; members of both Houses apparently

recognising that the party forces were best organised locally, and that to keep up an interest in political life, it was necessary that some of its chief actors should be constantly face to face with the electorate.

Thus Lord Carlingford, addressing a meeting at Coventry (February 27), declared emphatically that there was nothing more to know with respect to the Kilmainham transaction, and complained that this matter should be unscrupulously used for the direct purpose of damaging the Government in the opinion of their countrymen, and setting the English public against the remedial and reforming measures carried for Ireland. The Government were condemned not for what they did, but for what they never did-for what their accusers in the teeth of all evidence and assertions, in the teeth of their own assertions, in the teeth of the assertions of Mr. Forster himself, had assumed. This transaction, a simple, though an important and difficult one, had been disguised and overloaded with fiction and tales. There had been no new departure in the policy of the Government, and Lord Spencer had not changed his views, for he went to Ireland with the assurance that Government would obtain powers from Parliament against crime more effective than the former Act. The only change was that the terrible tragedy in Phoenix Park enabled the Government to press the Crimes Bill through the House of Commons without the operation of the new Rules. Lord Spencer's intentions and policy and plans of government had never changed and had remained the same as when he assisted in framing the Crimes Bill in Whitehall.

On the same night Lord Randolph Churchill, at Woodstock, denounced the Ministry as a Government of Imposture, an administration of make-believes, whose every act was a fraud or a sham. And in a more serious vein Lord Cranbrook, addressing a meeting of the Westminster Conservative Association, asked if they trusted the men in power or not. They had among those men-for the first time in the Government of this country-those who had pronounced opinions, which in fact amounted to Republicanism. They had men who were avowed enemies to the Church Establishment, and who were, he believed, bent on destroying the religious schools of the country, and again he would ask them, were they satisfied with the men? Were they satisfied with the policy? They had the House of Commons disorganised, they had Ireland in a condition that admittedly she had never been in for years before. Were they, too, satisfied because the Colonies were distracted and distrustful from what the men in power said? They had basely deserted their countrymen in the Transvaal, and were they satisfied with what was going on in Central Asia? They had ceased to talk of anything being formidable in Central Asia, but there was a Russian tide flowing unceasingly on there, and advancing on the mountains that formed the boundaries of our great Indian Empire. He did not say Russia would invade India, but

it was only by keeping up the feeling that England was predominant and all-powerful, and that there was no greater Power than the British one, that we could maintain our position. And yet what was the conduct of Mr. Gladstone now? Why, wilful ignorance closed his eyes, and enabled all this to go on as though he were not alive to the dangers and difficulties that were menacing our country.

The by-elections, meanwhile, had done nothing to indicate any great change in public feeling. At Newcastle (February 24), Mr. John Morley had, in spite of the divisions in the Liberal party in that city, carried the seat by 9,443 votes against Mr. Gainsford Bruce, the Conservative candidate, who polled only 7,187, although he had been promised by the leader of the Irish party some two or three thousand votes. Mr. John Morley, whose brilliant career as a publicist had not prevented him from looking at politics with a practical mind, had been accepted by the Liberal Association as its candidate in spite of the silent opposition of the senior member (Mr. Cowen) and his party, and in spite of the more open discontent of the working men who desired to send to Parliament a member of their own body. In the face of these difficulties his success was long regarded as doubtful, but when the result was known, the credit due to the Liberal Association and to the stanchness of its supporters was fully recognised. In other constituencies the "caucus" had failed, and had probably aroused discord instead of promoting union and displaying strength; but in Newcastle its selection was more than ordinarily fortunate; although Mr. Morley's success suggested that even with the caucus the personal qualifications of the candidate would still weigh for much. In Mid Cheshire the Conservatives showed (March 14) that there was no falling off in their attachment to their principles, and to their local leader. Hon. A. de Tatton Egerton polled a heavier vote (4,214) than had been given to either of the other members of his family who were returned at the head of the poll at the General Election. On the other hand, the Liberal candidate, Mr. G. W. Latham, polling only 3,592, showed that the Liberal party had lost upwards of 200 supporters since he had come forward as its champion three years previously.

The attempts of a gang of Irish Americans to blow up the Local Government Board and the Times office (March 15), although unattended with loss of life, produced a feeling of insecurity bordering on panic, not only in London but throughout the United Kingdom. Alarming stories of the discovery of arms and explosives were greedily swallowed, and the fears of the public were daily fostered by sensational reports of the most trivial circumstances. The Government, in possession of far more information than it allowed to transpire, unintentionally added to the alarm which it desired to allay. The police force was increased, the principal public buildings were placed under military guard; and Cabinet Ministers were constantly watched over at home, and in

the streets by detectives and ordinary constables. These were facts patent to all, and it is not surprising that on such a basis the wildest rumours arose. London was to be wrecked or destroyed by simultaneous explosions of dynamite in various districts; the Houses of Parliament, the Bank of England, the War Office, were to be blown up or burnt down. Woolwich Arsenal, Portsmouth Dockyard, and other such places were to be sacked and rendered useless. After awhile, and especially after the capture of Dr. Gallagher and his associates, through the instrumentality of the Birmingham police, the panic subsided; but the dread inspired by the knowledge that a new and most destructive agent, nitroglycerine, was practically within the reach of almost any miscreant with an aptitude for chemistry, was long in wearing off. It was, morever, admitted by the police at the trial of Dr. Gallagher that a very considerable quantity of this dangerous explosive had, in their belief, been manufactured, and that only a portion-the greater portion, it is true-had been discovered.

CHAPTER III.

The Easter Recess-Mr. Bright at Glasgow--The Birmingham Campaign-Mr. Childers' Budget-The Irish American Plot-The Explosives Bill-Mr. Bradlaugh and the Affirmation Bill-Government Defeat-Irish Bills and Irish Distress The Pensions to Lords Alcester and Wolseley-Mr. Pell's Resolution on Local Rating-The Agricultural Holdings Bill.

ALTHOUGH the short duration of the Easter recess hampered the movements of ministers who might have wished to have interviews with their constituents, the small opportunities offered were not wholly thrown away. Mr. Bright, in fulfilment of a long standing promise, went down to Glasgow to take his seat as Lord Rector of the University, an honour conferred on him some months before. The bestowal on him of the freedom of the city and other ceremonials afforded Mr. Bright ample scope for oratory. His speeches, however, for the most part dealt with the past, and sketched in vivid tones the political struggles in which he had played a prominent part. The first of these addresses was delivered in St. Andrew's Hall (March 21) on his installation as Lord Rector, an honour conferred upon Edward Burke exactly a hundred years before, and four years later upon Adam Smith. Mr. Bright spoke of his own disadvantage in never having had a university training, and said he felt a certain sense of humiliation in addressing such a body of people as that before him. He asked himself what it was that had brought him there in range of their sympathy and favour. It must be because of some sympathy with his political labours. He had taken some part in politics, and had perhaps been of some service in the administration of the government of the country, University education, however,

seemed to him very imperfect, since it had done so little in eradicating warfare. The poverty and misery which had so long existed in Great Britain were in great measure to be attributed to their having for centuries trodden in the footsteps of the Cæsars. There could be nothing better, nothing greater to interest students, than to direct their earnest attention to some of those questions in the great political field that immediately concerned them and those with whom they were connected. Referring to the struggle with slavery in America, Mr. Bright said there had been nothing perhaps in ancient or modern history to surpass or even to equal it, and remarked that if justice and morality had stepped upon the scene the whole of the vast calamity might have been avoided. The Crimean war, he said, had been caused by the passionate vindictiveness of a Minister abroad, and he held that Russia was not permanently weakened by the war in question, and Turkey was not permanently made in the least degree more secure. He also gave it as his opinion that where the greatest armies existed there nations were involved in the greatest peril. Mr. Bright next spoke at length on the colonies, referring to the wars in which we had been engaged at the Cape, in India, in China, in Abyssinia, and Egypt. These wars were, he said, the price we paid for the great historical and marvellous dependency of the Indian Empire.

On the following day, Good Friday (March 22), the freedom of the city of Glasgow was presented to Mr. Bright, who in returning his thanks expressed his surprise that so many differences of opinion existed on political questions. He believed the difficulty arose because men, in discussing political questions, or in examining them, did not go to the root of the question, but were influenced by the husk, and never got at the kernel, and fought about that which was really not the matter in dispute. When he looked back to the agitation for the abolition of the Corn Laws, it seemed astounding that there could on such a question have arisen so great a contest.

"At the present," he added, "we are all agreed upon the question, and we look into each other's faces and we ask, How is it possible that any body--that a great party in the country and the great majority in the House of Commons-when I went into the House there was a majority of thirty in favour of maintain ng the Corn Laws-how comes it that there could be such a Parliamentary party combined together for the purpose of supporting so iniquitous a law as that we were warring against? It ended, as you know, in the conversion of the Government that was elected to support that law. It went further. The party drove out of office their trusted leaders. But the law was repealed, and we have had the advantage of it. And we now, at thirty years, or five-and-thirty years' distance, look back with astonishment that there ever could have been such a contest over so simple a matter."

It was the same with the questions of Parliamentary reform, of