The Home-rule Bill still marches slowly, and at the present
rate cannot possibly be sent up to the Lords this Session. Besides the Ninth Clause, upon which discussion ought to be endless, there are the financial clauses, which have been recast, the Inland Revenue Board having made a blunder of £360,000 a year as to the income from the spirit duties, and which apparently must either leave Ireland bankrupt or involve a fresh oppression on Great Britain. Ministers, how- ever, continue cheerful, and Mr. Gladstone is so debonair and so willing to accept amendments, that those accustomed to his ways suspect him of keeping some strong card up his sleeve. According to one account, he intends to dissolve, thus, in fact, referring his Bill to a pl6biecite ; according to another, he will withdraw half the clauses of the Bill, leaving only those which grant to Ireland a subordinate Parliament and an income ; and according to a third, he will, after the Ninth Clause, apply the Closure every night. Of these rumours, the most probable is the mutilation of the Bill, but that will only increase the vigilance of the Opposition as to the schedules which are indispensable, and provide the Lords with a new justification for throwing out the measure. It is better, on the whole, to await the Ninth Clause and see what lappens, as the result of that debate may profoundly affect not only the decisions but the fate of the Administration. The eagerness of Scotland to be outvoted for all time and as to her internal affairs by eighty Irish Catholics, is not yet a demonstrated proposition.
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