The debate on Tuesday in the House of Commons on
the third reading of the Irish Land Bill forms encouraging read- ing. Mr. J. Redmond considered the Bill as amended " a really great measure, and one which was eminently calculated to go along way towards the settlement of the Irish land question over a large portion of Ireland " ; but, in his opinion, "the successful working of the Bill would depend more upon the landlords than upon the tenants." Colonel Saunderson believed that " the passage of this Bill, far from promoting a Home. rule measure, would have exactly the opposite effect." Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman said that the Liberal party had been but onlookers during the passage of the Bill, and although they were hopeful of its results, " it will be perhaps too much to say that we are sanguine." He agreed with Mr. John Morley in regarding it as "a social and a political revolution." Mr. Balfour declared that the Bill greatly advanced the two causes which he had most ;it heart in relation to his Irish policy,—the questions of land purchase and the Congested Districts Board. He did not think the Bill would help Home- rule. It removed, by removing injustice, the temptation to confound the issue of Home-rule with that of the land ques- tion. He looked forward with the utmost confidence to the success of the measure. The Bill was also blessed by Mr. Dillon, Mr. Healy, and Mr. T. W. Russell, and the third reading was carried by a majority of 297 in a House of 337. This extra- ordinary unanimity among speakers of such divergent political opinions augurs well for the effect of the Bill. On Wednes- day the London Education Bill was also advanced a stage and passed through Committee. That the Bill emerges from the House better than it went in is agreed on all hands.
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