Mr. Parnell's death at Brighton on Tuesday night came like
.a shock upon politicians, a majority of whom were not aware that he had been in danger. He had, however, been ill for months, had grown thin and haggard, and complained much of rheumatic pain about the region of the heart. Though aware that he belonged to a family with weak constitutions, he would not spare himself, but went in all weathers to attend meetings and make speeches which were to him intolerable efforts. There can be no doubt, either, that recent events, the breach with Mr. Gladstone, the denunciation of the Catholic 'Church, the desertion of his followers, most of whom he had made, and the shower of insults falling on a man of proud and reserved temper, had greatly strained and diminished his constitutional strength. On Thursday week he returned home suffering from a severe chill, and never rose from his bed again, dying at last in a state of unconsciousness, from rheumatism of the heart. His death is a thunderbolt to his immediate followers, who are nothing without him, though they propose to make capital out of his public funeral in Dublin ; and it is supposed everywhere, in Ireland as well as England, that it will lead to a reconciliation within the Home- rule Party, and greatly smooth the path of Mr. Gladstone. We have given elsewhere reasons for doubting this latter con- clusion, but there is no doubt that this was the first instinctive judgment of politicians. Mr. Parnell was only forty-five, and had been sixteen years in Parliament, and for twelve of them the real or formal leader of the Irish Revolutionary Party.
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