2 JANUARY 1886, Page 9

Mr. Trevelyan made a very remarkable speech at Snitterfield, near

Stratford-on-Avon, on Wednesday, in which he spoke out his own mind very frankly on the subject of Ireland. "17nless we intend to keep the care of law and order in all its depart- ments in the hands of the Central Government, we had much better go in at once for repealing the Union. I can understand granting independence to Ireland as an act of grace, and hoping that good would come from it, however little I might myself share that hope. But to keep up the name and outward semblance of a Union, and at the same time to put into the hands of the enemies of that Union fall license to keep Ireland in disorder, is a policy which I do not think will commend itself to those who best know the country." That is perfectly clear, and seems to us admirable sense. Separation is the real alternative policy to keeping the fall command of the machinery for main- taining law and order in the hands of the Central Government, so long as Ireland remains, as she is now, thoroughly hostile to the Union. Of the Federal proposal Mr. Trevelyan speaks with perfect frankness. It would amount, he says, to giving the Irish fall control of their own Parliament, and as much control of the Imperial or Federal Parliament as they have now. They always voted on the Egyptian policy, for instance, solely with a view to extorting concessions for Ireland, and they would do the same under a Federal system. They would never give a vote in so-called Imperial affairs that was not carefully calculated to extort some fresh boon for Ireland, and conceived with no other view whatever.