Lord Derby commented on the growing reluctance of the Gladstonians
to make the Irish Question the subject of their attacks on the Government. Instead of this, they reproach the Liberal Unionists with having deserted their leader, whereas the truth is that their leader deserted them. As for the alliance with the Conservatives, had it resulted in a retrograde or a Liberal policy ? Could any one assert that the legislation of the last four years had been reactionary ? Could it be said that when Mr. Goschen joined the Govern- ment, he left his Liberalism outside? The question answers itself ; and if it did not, Mr. Goschen himself answered it by his eloquent little speech, in which he spoke of the Liberal Unionists as if they had "stood in the gap" like Leonidas and his Spartans, at a moment of great danger, though they had not been annihilated as he was, but had become the nucleus of a great historic party. Sir Henry James, in speaking of Mr. Chamberlain's great services, said that till 1886 it had been apparently true that the greatest hate was the hate of "a woman scorned," but since 1886 it appears that the greatest hate is the hate of "politicians bought" for those who could not be bought—the hate of which Mr. Chamberlain had been the object. We regret the phrase. Whatever may be justly said of the Gladstonians and their gyrations, there is no ground at all for speaking of any of them, so far as we know, as " bought " politicians. Mr. Chamberlain, in his final speech, dwelt humorously on his own political function in having acted so often as " whipping-boy " for their distin- guished guest.
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