the stupid, incapable, and tyrannical politician. Whether
tried in Russia, in France, or in England of old, it has
invariably failed in its purpose. The stifling of the individual
voice becomes of small advantage when the object-lesson of its
possessor with a bandage across his mouth, and his hands tied
behind his back, is presented to the populace. Just as the gag
has failed elsewhere it is, we are glad to think, destined to
fail in Ireland also, and, indeed, if it were not so destined,
Ireland would be precisely the best country to live out of.

So much for absent-mindedness. It is pleasant to be able to agree with
the _Irish Catholic_ for once.

On the whole, the confusion is deepening. The Grand Juries of Ireland
are passing unanimous resolutions condemning the bill. The Nationalist
party condemns the bill. The Scottish Covenanters, who have not
delivered a political pronouncement for more than two hundred years,
and who never vote either way, have risen in their might and cursed
the bill, smiting the Papists hip and thigh with great slaughter, and
denouncing the movement as purely in the interests of Romanist
ascendency. Be it understood that these religionists live in Ireland
and date their malediction from Coleraine. But nothing will stop the
G.O.M.'s gallop over the precipice. Let him go, but let him not drag
the country after him. And in after years his Administration will be
described in words like those of Burke, who, speaking of the Gladstone
of his day, said, "He made an Administration so checked and speckled,
he put together a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically
dovetailed, a cabinet so variously inlaid, such a piece of diversified
mosaic, such a tesselated pavement without cement, that it was indeed
a curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch and unsure to stand upon.
The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards, stared at each
other, and were obliged to ask, 'Sir, your name?' 'Sir, you have the
advantage of me. Mr. Such-a-one, I beg a thousand pardons.' I venture
to say that persons were there who had never spoken to each other in
their lives until they found themselves together they knew not how,
pigging together heads and points in the same truckle bed." This is
prophecy.

Have you heard that Mr. Balfour, who went through Ireland without an
escort, is unable to move about England without the protection of a
hundred and fifty mounted police to save him from