Mr. Gladstone made on Thursday a journey through Wales to
Swansea, which his followers hope will excite enthusiasm throughout the country. He was received at the different stations through which he passed with great enthusiasm, and made many short speeches, the burden of which was nearly always that the cause of Ireland was the cause of Wales, because if Home-rule were conceded to Ireland, some- thing not defined ought to be granted to Wales, under which "the questions that are exclusively Welsh would be settled by the opinions and the voice and the interests of Wales." This sentence was uttered at Llanymynech, and at Newtown their sense was repeated again, though Mr. Gladstone added that the grievances of Wales are by no means so great as those of Ireland, the main one apparently being that she is not attended to enough. Mr. Gladstone has so immersed himself in the Irish Question, that he now sees hope only in developing provincialism everywhere. At Bnilth, however, Mr. Gladstone quitted this topic; but only to point out that on most of the questions of the past half-century, those who ought to have led the people had led them wrong, and affairs were only ultimately brought right " by the prevalence of wiser and jester sentiments in the bulk of the nation." Does Mr. Gladstone class Sir Robert Peel and himself with the "balk of the nation " ? We should have thought that both belonged to the upper classes, and most assuredly they between them carried the most bene- ficial reforms of the half-century.
Previous page
