Mr. Arthur Arnold (formerly M.P. for Salford), writes an interesting
letter to Monday's Times, in which he states that,. though not in Parliament, and not obliged therefore to take, sides, his faith in Mr. Gladstone, against whom he has often voted, was never so strong as it is now. He is an enthusiastic Home-ruler, and an enthusiastic supporter of Mr. Gladstone in refusing to co-operate with a party headed by Mr. Parnell.. He professes infinite faith in the impartiality of the future- Irish Legislature and Administration towards all classes of Irishmen, Protestant or Catholic; and further, if the Irish• Legislature fails in impartiality, he holds it to be the absolute- duty of Great Britain to overrule and rectify the blunders or partialities of the Home-rule Government. To sum up his- view, Mr. Arnold holds that the Irish Legislature and Adminis- stration ought not only to be nominally subordinate, but to be really subordinate to the central Legislature and Administra- tion at Westminster, and presses this doctrine with a good deal of emphasis on the Gladstonians. In other words, he would first introduce a multitude of new occasions for friction, and would then overcome that friction by sheer muscular force.. That is undoubtedly a bold view, but it is not one which would. promise him any alleViation of our present relations with Ireland, unless it were (as it obviously is) combined with a mighty act of faith in Irish reasonableness. But that faith is. certainly not founded on either reason or experience. We can- not imagine an experience less conducive to such faith than our experience of the party which has invented and acted upon the policy of boycotting and the " Plan of Campaign."
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