Mr.. Parnell has been speaking at Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Cardiff,
and at all places has been received with a courtesy which, we fear, would not be shown, say, to Mr. Bright in any Nationalist town in Ireland. He has everywhere repeated his usual promises that Ireland will accept this measure as final, that Protestants will not be persecuted, and that the unity of the Empire will be maintained. He may be sincere in all, and is certainly sincere as to the second ; but in all he is going far beyond his mandate. Let him remember the scene at Galway, when he differed from his followers, and owed his safety to Mr. Healy's interference. The Irish would part with him, if he ceased to gratify them, without so much as a sigh. Mr. Parnell everywhere showed himself anxious to prove that the Tories had tacitly promised him Home-rule, and insisted that the five millions advanced in the last Purchase Bill was " given " him as earnest of what they would do. As nothing was given, the state- ment has no meaning ; but the phrase should be remembered. It shows the view taken by Mr. Parnell, and therefore still more strongly by his followers, of these large loans to Ireland. In their minds they are gifts, not advances, and to ask for repay- ment is, if not dishonest, mean.
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