At the Dolphin Society, Lord Ashbourne took exactly an opposite
view of the Evicted Tenants' Commission from that taken by Sir George Trevelyan. He remarked not only on the strong party character of the Commission, and the pillory- ing of Lord Clanricarde before any evidence had been taken, but on Sir James Mathew's one-sided examination of Mr. Roche, whom he questioned on all the evidence which he had given on the Parnell Commission, but omitted to question on the results of the cross-examination before the Commission,—a cross-examination which, said Lord Ashbourne, " powerfully qualified his direct evidence." Lord Ashbourne maintained that, under the circumstances of the case, the strong bias shown by the President of the Commission in his opening statement, the publication of the evidence from day to day, and the omission of any reference to the points on which Mr. Roche's evidence before the Parnell Commission had been qualified by cross- examination, the counsel for the landlords, Mr. Carson and Mr. Kenny, were justified in regarding the refusal to let them cross- examine as exposing the ex parte character of the inquiry. To our minds, it would have been much fairer and much more prudent to have tested the bias of the Commission further by suggesting questions in cross-examination for the President to put, and ascertaining whether or not he would have put them. It is always right to leave no stone unturned to test the fairness of an adversary, before you denounce him.
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