Sir Roundell Palmer, in a peculiarly striking speech, drew from
Mr. Bright's admission the inference that the spirit of Protestant ascendancy, however broken, still lingers amongst us, and shows itself in this inability of the British Parliament to apply the surplus as an Irish Parliament would certainly apply it. To use his own words, he "tore the mask" from the face of those who cry "Justice to Ireland ! " while nothing will induce them to do justice as the Irish would most like to have it done, and feared that this shortcoming would not be easily forgotten in Ireland. Perhaps not. But Sir Roundell Palmer was so well pleased to show that, after all, the boasted justice is but half-justice, that he almost represented half-justice as worse than that entire injustice which we have been doing so efficiently for centuries.
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