Mr. Forster has declared agaiaat Home-rule for Ireland, as every
one supposed that he *out& do. Writing fromitbe Osborne Hotel, Torquay, he says,—me pvesame his communication was addressed to the Press, as it is not said, as quoted Mille Times, to be in a letter to any one person :—" To prevent miscon- straction, I wish to say that I do not believe that in Home-rule, or in any form of Irish Parliament, we should find a deliverance from the Irish diffiznity ; and I also think that they would be fraught with danger to Great Britain, as well as to Ireland itself." Mr. Trevelyan protested, we believe, against Mr. Childers's proposals at the time they were first pat forth ; and Mr. Campbell-Bannerman, though he declines at present to state his view, states that he has a very strong one, and that it is safe to express his view on at least one aspect of the matter :—" In my opinion, the best plan of dealing with the Irish question would be for the leaders of the two great political parties to confer together for the purpose of ascertaining whether some moans vivendi could not be arrived at by which the matter would be raised out of the area of party strife." Here, then, we have two ex-Secretaries for Ireland disapproving Home-rule, and the third deprecating any party action in relation to the question. Can it be doubted that all three are full of alarm at the prospect of Home-rule ?
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