In many ways, the most remarkable event of the week
was Mr. Balfour's reception in Dublin on Saturday last. Not only did he address a densely packed and enthusiastic meeting at the Leinster Hall, but he was actually drawn through the streets of the Irish capital at the head of a torch-light pro- cession. As the Times' correspondent remarks, this was a feat which neither Parnellites, Anti- Parnellites, norHealyites would "dare so much as essay." Well might Mr. Balfour say that "never till the end of his life would the memory of these stirring days fade away from his recollection." What makes the enthusiasm of the Irish Unionists more remarkable is the paralysis which has fallen on the Nationalists of both factions. They are in the frame of mind of the labourer who is said to have declared that now Home-rule was in sight he felt like a man who had been crying all his life for the moon, "and now that it's dropped in the back garden, I don't know what to do with it." "How can we decently be rid of it and get back our legitimate grievance F" is the feeling of half the Nationalists. Mr. Balfour's speech was remarkable for an excellent passage on Irish patriotism. Mr. Gladstone had not surrendered to Irish patriotism, which was a noble if mis- taken quality, but to Irish crime. The English people, how- ever, had not been captured, and till they were, Home-rule was an absolute impossibility.
