On Friday, October 18th, Mr. Courtney made one of his
characteristically detached speeches to his constituents at Liskeard. The Liberal Unionists would, he said, remain an independent party, and would not be fused with the Conser- vatives, but would in the future, as in the past, be "loyal, cor- dial co-operators with the Conservatives." Neither party could live without the other, but happily the relations were not strained. The last General Election was said, with great truth, to have destroyed Home-rule. "They had a very able Lord- Lieutenant and a Chief Secretary who was fall of hope, and confidence, and faith in what he could do with respect to his charge. Mr. Gerald Balfour was the most intelligent, most able, and most promising Chief Secretary whom they could have selected under the present circumstances,—a man not inferior to his brother in intellectual ability, and one who would, he thought, prove not inferior to him in political power." They must, however, not be contented with things as they are in Ireland, but must deal with Local Government and the Land question. As regards the Education question in general, he did not believe that the Government contem- plated facing the danger of reconstructing the system estab- lished in 1870. In spite of the newspapers, he did not believe that either the leaders of the late Government or the present Government could abandon reform of the licensing laws. Possibly nobody was yet prepared with a scheme which would win the assent of the House of Commons ; but he advo- cated a serious examination of the various projects with a view to hammering out of them an acceptable scheme. That no doubt is true in the abstract ; but for some time it will, we fancy, remain a counsel of perfection.
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