Mr. Parnell, who has summoned the Home-rule Members to attend
Parliament as if be were still their chief, while Mr. McCarthy has issued no notice, made on Saturday a speech at Tralee, on which we have commented sufficiently elsewhere. It was couched in the old tone of haughty moderation, and contained a definite programme,—the removal of the landlords by purchase, the grant to every labourer of an allotment, and a determined effort to compel the Liberals to renew the alliance with the Parnellite Party, under penalty of a permanent exclu- sion from power. Mr. Parnell stated distinctly that "he had come to an understanding with Mr. William O'Brien a fort- night ago." At Athlone, however, on Monday, Mr. Parnell was again violent, and spoke of the "souping parsons" of England—" souper " is the old Irish expression of hatred for Catholics who become Protestants from hunger—and of the insufficient measure of Home-rule which Mr. Gladstone meant to place "on the backs" of Irishmen, He was, however, personally courteous to the Liberal leader, and was careful to say that "not many" of the Irish Members had been captured by English promises. One wonders from day to day whether Mr. Parnell the statesman, or Mr. Parnell the truculent demagogue, is the real man. If he is both, he must have a rare contempt for a portion of his countrymen, or he would never think that they would take his cayenne-pepper for nourishing diet.
