The State prosecutions in Ireland have not produced the agitation
which was expected. On the contrary, there has been distinctly more order since the arrests than before them. The feeling of responsibility has come over the leading speakers. The change of tone is beat shown in Mr. Parnell's speech of Friday week, in the Rotundo. That gentleman, instead of urging on the people any breach of the law, told them to keep strictly within it, for that the object of the Government was to drive the people of Ireland. from constitutional agitation, and compel them to form secret associations, or to resort to a game- insurrection—in which the Government could beat them. The Irish must not follow the Government in its path of violence and disorder. That is a great improvement upon recent speeches, and one for which we may forgive Mr. Parnell his utterly unprincipled advice that unless the Liberal party opposed the prosecutions, the Irish Members should allow Lord Beaconsfield—whose name was received with shouts of "To hell with him !"—to continue to plunder the British taxpayer. As the British taxpayer is also the Irish taxpayer, this advice means that as Lord Beaconsfield oppresses Ireland, Irishmen should let him plunder her too, which is absurd. Bulls, however, are not incentives to treason, and do little harm, beyond unduly lowering the English idea of Irish political ability.
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