re jockeying him, and through him the British
Empire, to go to the Divil. Then we'd have a fine flare-up. Virtuous
indignation and patriotic virtue to the fore! The Irish members will
rush over to Ireland, and great demonstrations will be the order of
the day. The Irish love demonstrations, or indeed anything else which
gives a further excuse for laziness. The priests will orate, the
members will prate, the ruffians elate will shoot or otherwise murder
a few people, who will have Mr. Gladstone to thank for their death.
For what we wanted was twenty years of resolute government, just as
Lord Salisbury said, and if Mr. Balfour had been left to carry it out
Ireland would have come her nearest possible to prosperity and
contentment. But with steady rule one day, and vacillation, wobbling,
and surrender the next, what can you expect? The Irish are very smart,
cute people, and they soon know where they can take advantage of
weakness. The way these poor Achil folks, those who have been to
England, can reckon up Mr. Gladstone! They call him a traitor now. And
yet he promises to let the Irish members arrange their own finance!
'Here, my boys,' says he, 'take five millions and spend it your own
way.' Will John Bull stand that? Will he pay for the rope that is to
hang himself? Will he buy the razor to cut his own throat? Where are
his wits? Why does he stand by to witness this unending farce, when he
ought to be minding serious business? This Irish idiocy is stopping
the progress of the Empire. Why does not Bull put his foot on it at
once? He must do so in the end. Where are the working men of England?
Surely they know enough to perceive that their own personal interests
are involved.

"In Achil we have practically peasant proprietary and nothing else.
Eleven hundred men and women are at this moment in England and
Scotland from Achil alone. They will return in October, each bringing
back ten, fifteen, or twenty pounds, on which they will live till next
season. The Irish Legislature would begin by establishing peasant
proprietary all over Ireland. The large farmers would disappear, and
men without capital, unable to employ labour, would take their place.
Instead of Mayo, you would have the unemployed of the whole thirty-two
counties upon you. Ireland would be pauperised from end to end, for
everybody who could leave it would do so--that is, every person of
means--and as for capital and enterprise, what little we have would
leave u