Lord Rosebery, presiding at the first annual dinner of the
recently founded Lothians Association, gave a truly humorous sketch of the difficulties which had stood in the way of its establishment from the accession of James VL to the throne of England. The patriotic natives of Lothian, who then journeyed to London in the hope of lucrative employment, found to their disgust that they had been forestalled by their more wicleawake and equally patriotic fellow-countrymen from Dundee and Aberdeen. From that day till about eighteen months ago one obstacle after another had arisen. The men of the Lothians were divided in the Civil War; at the Restoration the idea again cropped up, -but it was found to be "so much of the nature of a portentous carousal that It was felt the association must no longer proceed." Later on the Jacobite question divided all Scotsmen ; later still, Catholics Emancipation, Reform, and finally, in 1886, Home. rule, when it was found that "no two Scotsmen could be safely trusted in a room together."—The tone of Lord Rosebery's reference to Home-rule, we may remark in passing, certainly bears out Mr. Parnell's opinion of the speaker as recorded in Mr. Barry O'Brien's memoir.—At last, in the period of "profound political calm" that was found to pre- vail some eighteen months ago, the scheme was finally realised. If we cannot agree with all that was said by Mr. Ure in proposing the health of the President of the Association, we readily admit that no living statesman makes a better after. dinner speech than Lord Rosebery.
Previous page
