NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE announcement that the Government and Sinn Fein have come to terms has, of course, eclipsed all other news of the week. We believe that there is at last to be peace, if only because practically everybody concerned wants it. Whatever surprises and vicissitudes there may still be in store the dramatic conclusion of an agreement at the eleventh hour between the Government and the Irish delegates will always remain one of the most memorable facts in our history. It is the duty of everyone now to secure, if this can possibly be done, that the proposed settlement shall be translated into solid fact. Every- body can help if recrimination is put away and we set our gaze upon the future instead of upon the past. Our readers know well how much we have hated and deplored that management of Irish affairs by the Government which, step by step, made the recognition of a bloodstained organization inevitable. But having made that reservation we should think it not merely ungenerous, but unjust, not to congratulate the Government., and the Prime Minister in particular, upon the extraordinary perse- verance, patience and political skill with which success was snatched out of what seemed only a few hours before to be a hopeless situation.
