THE EXULTANT GLADSTONIANS.
SIR WILLIAM HARCOU.RT'S and his colleagues' screams of triumph at the National Liberal Club on Wednesday, because the not very real amendments on the Address had been defeated by adequate and once at least by much more than adequate majorities, sound more like the wild. " hooroosh" of Donnybrook Fair, than the satisfaction of the House of Com- mons. It is certain that the G-ladstonians are infected not a little by the emotions, no less than by the morals, of their close Irish allies. And there is a pathetic simplicity about this premature delight at the issue of a few preliminary skirmishes which have not even been so much as reconnaissances in force. For our own parts, were we not inclined to fear that the Conservatives are already beginning to betray that drea.d of the new and heavy fine on their purses which afresh appeal to the country would in- volve, a dread of which we warned our readers a few weeks ago, we should be inclined to approve these preliminary checks to the ardour of premature and rather partisan attacks on the Government, administered in the debate on the Address. If they be due to the feeling,—as, we think, the legitimate feeling,—that the Government should be encouraged to lay their full policy before the country with the least possible delay, we should be heartily glad to find that such a feeling prevails. For our own part, we agree with Mr. Gladstone that it is quite a mistake to censure the Ministry for not having gone further in the multiplication of promises which no one believes that they can perform. The Government are well aware that no remedy for the extreme depression of agriculture has been suggested, or can be suggested, which would warrant it in postponing the full declaration of its Irish policy for a single week ; nay, that no remedy for the exodus of labour from the rural districts has been suggested, or can be suggested, which would warrant the Government in delay- ing its declaration of Irish policy for a single week. It may be true, as Mr. Jesse Collings says, that the English labourers ought to have all the benefit of the Irish Acts for improving the cottages of the agricultural population. But, in the first place, there is every reason to believe that even if such Acts were passed, the exodus would go on,— it arises, we believe, from causes which the improve- ment of their cottages would not seriously affect,— and in the next place, as Mr. Collings himself admitted, a very great improvement is taking place in many of the English counties without any legislation at all. Besides, the claims of the Home-rule Bill on Mr. Gladstone's Government are paramount over all other claims, and it is a great mistake first to censure him (as we think most justly) for his reluctance to confide to the country frankly his Irish policy, and then to find him excuses and, more than excuses,—justifications,—for delay. Every thinking statesman knows that the complaints which have been made of the number and magnitude of Mr. Glad- stone's promises are just, and that if this be so, to complain in addition of the number and magnitude of his omissions, is unjust. It is unfortunate that we should have begun to fight at all before the real battle can be joined. There will be enough hard conflict then to make either party repent the expenditure of surplus energy on more recriminations. We do not at all deny that Mr. Gladstone's use of the agricultural labourers' question to expel the Government of 1885 from power was an unscrupulous use, and was shown to be so by his complete indifference to it on his accession to power. But that is no reason for imitating his error. And, comparatively short as the debate on the Address seems likely to be,—apparently it will have ter- minated within the fortnight,—we could have wished that it had been shorter, and that none of the legitimate com- plaints made by the Opposition had been pushed to a division at all. Everything waits for the Irish Bill, and the Opposition should have done all in their power to encourage its production, its discussion, the careful sifting of all its proposals, and the illustration of its true signifi- cance before every electorate in the Kingdom. While so far agreeing with the Government, it is almost pathetic to notice the premature exultation with which they rejoice over the very reasonable reluctance of the Opposition to muster their forces for these displays of partisan wrath. How great must have been the G-ladstonians' fear of the real conflict, when they are so disproportionately over- joyed that a mere trial of strength has failed to break their ranks. For our own parts, we are very well pleased that it is so. We should not profit in the least by finding out that the Welsh Members are disaffected, or that the Labour Members are half-hearted towards Mr. Glad- stone. It could. be nothing but a misfortune to complicate the issue by such evidence not of the strength of the Unionists, but of the mutual jealousies of the Home- rulers. What good would it be to us to know, if it were so, that the Welsh Members, though eager, perhaps, for a Home-rule of their own, are so angry that Church Disestablishment is not taken up seriously at once, that they have no objection to mortify the Government by abstaining from the division ? We do not want to expose the indifference of real,— and, perhaps, even exaggerated,—Home-rulers to the Government of their choice, but rather to elicit the true and patriotic fears of those who tremble at disintegration, —at the dangers which lie before the country,—when once those dangers are plainly visible. What good could it be to Unionists as Unionists to show, if it were possible to show, that Mr. Keir Hardie and his party, though well disposed to give Ireland her way, care less about pleasing the Irish Home-rulers than frightening the Government into what is called Labour legislation ? We should only thereby win a temporary victory, which might at any moment be re- versed just when a reverse would be most fatal. What we want is to clear up the mind of the country on Mr. Gladstone's policy,—which Sir George Trevelyan, in his speech at the National Liberal Club, openly admits to involve, logically at least, and, to his mind, to involve practically, real Home-rule all round,—in other words, the restoration of the Heptarchy with a federal Government at top. We want to know what the country says to a policy of that kind,—the turning back of our history, the loss of all our Constitutional traditions, the beginning of a new era which it would be almost reasonable to mark, as the French did their revolutionary period, by new names for the months and a new commencement of the federal period superseding the old A11310 Domini reckoning. We should not find out that, or approach to finding out that, by dis- playing the mutual animosities of Welsh Disestablishers, Scotch Disestablishers, and English Labour Members. We cannot, then, at all regret the failure of these pre- mature attacks upon the Government. But, at the same time, the exultation of the Ministerialists does seem to us astoundingly excessive. They have defeated what should never have been attempted, and they take it as an omen that they can carry what should never have been pro- posed. We trust that they will be disappointed. When the country comes to realise with Sir George Trevelyan that, both logically and prospectively, Mr. Gladstone's measure means dissecting the United Kingdom as it is dissected in a dissected map, we hope and believe that there will be one loud cry of astonishment and dismay. That is what we want to elicit ; and, as for these premature efforts to mortify the Government because it has not multiplied its unreal promises beyond all measure, we can only say that we regret them, and are not sorry to see them fail.
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