Of the speeches, Mr. William O'Brien's was the only one-
which attracted much notice, and that rather because it betrayed a feeling that he had put the Government in a difficulty by the tone which he had adopted in his speech on• the third reading of the Evicted Tenants Bill in the House of Commons, than because he showed any sense at all of the folly of extinguishing a great historical institution before he had found anything to put in its place. His chief contribution to thequestion of the day was a suggestion that the Government should introduce next year several of the measures demanded in the Newcastle programme in the Upper House, in the hope that it would reject them, and so hasten the policy of " filling up the cup " of the people's wrath against the House of Lords. He suggests especially a revised Employers' Liability Bill, an Irish County Councils Bill, a Bill to repeal the Coercion Act,. a Miners' Eight-hours Bill, and as many other Bills as possible• such as the Lords would be sure not to pass. In this way the Government might pile up every w in more evidence of the irre- concilable hostility felt by the H.RIll of Lords to the people..
That is an ingenious suggestion, it not give the Lords an initiative which they might tuilTigainst the Government, by so amending some of their Bills as to make them not less but more popular measures, whilst even as regards those which they might condemn for their rashness, since they would not have been passed by the House of Commons, they could not be paraded as representing the will of the people.
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