A curious incident of the debate was its interruption by
a stranger in the gallery, who turned out to be (as it is alleged) O'Donovan Rossa, and who had to be removed finally from the House and its precincts. He wanted, it is said, to make some attack on Mr. Labonchere on account of some remarks attributed to that gentleman. Of course he was at once silenced and expelled, and the officers of the House were warned not to allow him to enter it again. But the irruption of so notorious a Fenian into the debates of the House of Commons was not an auspicious event for the party which was attempting to strip the Government of all the very moderate securities for the peace of Ireland, which the (at present) inoperative provisions of the Crimes' Act would at any time afford the Government of the day. As Colonel Saunderson remarked, in the course of the debate, Ireland remains herself from one generation to another. And Ireland without a certain number of such noisy and dangerous appendages as O'Donovan Rossa, would not be Ireland, would not be herself.
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