Mr. Chamberlain seems to have spoken of Mr. Healy as
the most weighty politician of the Irish people, to an in- terviewer in New York. And certainly if "the most weighty" means the most practical, he was quite warranted in so speaking. But what will be the effect of that opinion on Mr. Healy's
influence with his fellow-countrymen It would be very difficult to predict, but in all probability it will rather enhance than undermine it. A certain section of Irishmen would, no doubt, take any praise of Mr. Chamberlain's as representing to their minds an equivalent for their own censure. But a great many more of them are, we think, disposed to think all -the more of a man when his ordinary opponents are com- pelled to respect him. They know that Mr. Healy has obtained some concessions for Ireland by his tenacity in supporting the Irish Land Bill in the House of Commons, and they think of Mr. Chamberlain as in all probability not particularly well disposed to those concessions, and as com- pelled to acknowledge Mr. Healy's capacity by the mere stubbornness of the facts. In any case, Irishmen seldom underrate in their own minds,—whatever they may think it well to say on the matter in pnblic,—the testimony of an able adversary to the achievements of one of their own people.
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