On Wednesday Sir Richard Webster, the Conservative Attorney-General, made a
speech at Ryde, in which he spoke of any concession of an Irish Parliament as wholly out of the question as an item of Conservative policy. "Whatever might be the programme which Lord Salisbury might unfold with regard to the way in which the Irish Question should be dealt with, there would be no truckling or tampering with ideas which need tend to the establishment of a separate Parliament in Ireland." That means, we suppose, that the suggestions thrown out in Lord Salisbury's Newport speech have been warmly repudiated by his colleagues; for assuredly the compari- son between the Hungarian Diet and Home-rule for Ireland was not thrown out as a mere straw to see which way the wind was blowing, but did represent some political speculation to which Lord Salisbury at the time was more or less inclined. _Since then, however, the Conservatives have had the advantage of seeing how much more Conservative-minded are many of the Moderate Liberals than their own great chief; and accordingly, they intend to pose as Conservatives, being encouraged thereto by the genuine Conservatism of the Liberal Party. That only goes to illustrate what we have always contended, that Liberals are the true Conservatives as well as the true Liberals, caring a great deal more to prevent revolutionary violence than even the so-called Tories, and taking much the better way to ensure sweetie.
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