ama all around. And there was something of the same look on the
profile of Mr. Carson--I could almost have pitied him and the party and
traditions and past which he represented as I saw its death-throes
marked on his suffering and fierce face.

But the speech of Mr. Carson was a clever one. Whatever the inner eye
may see in the depths of Mr. Carson's soul, to the outward eye he has an
appearance of a self-possession amounting almost to the offensive. He is
dressed almost as well as Mr. Austen Chamberlain, but, unlike Mr.
Chamberlain's promising lad--who still has much of the graceful shyness
and unsteady nerve of youth--Mr. Carson has all the coolness,
self-assertion, and hardness of the man who has passed through the
fierce and tempestuous conflicts of Irish life. Mr. Carson stands at the
box and leans upon it as though he had been there all his life; he
shoots his cuffs--to use a House of Commons' phrase--as dexterously and
almost as frequently as Mr. Gladstone; his points are stated slowly,
deliberately, with that wary and watchful look of the man who has been
accustomed to utter the words that consigned men to the horrors of
Tullamore. The speech of Thursday evening was a clever speech. It wasn't
broad--it wasn't generous--there was not a note in it above the tone of
the Crown Prosecutor, but it was subtle, well-reasoned--the blows were
happy, and told--and the Tories and Unionists were hugely and justly
delighted.

[Sidenote: The approach of the division.]

At last we are within sight of the end. Friday had come, and everybody
knew that this was the day which would see the division; and, after all,
the division was the event of the debate. In moments such as these you
can hear the quickened throb of the House of Commons, and if you fail to
notice it you soon learn it from the public. In the lobbies outside
stand scores of excited men and women begging, imploring,
threatening--using every means to get admission into the galleries to
witness a historic and immortal scene. Outside there is an even denser
crowd--ready to hoot or cheer their favourites. The galleries are all
crowded; peers stand on each other's toes, and patiently wait for hours.
About ten o'clock a man rushes into the lobby, and there is a movement
that looks most like a scare--as though the messenger were some herald
of disaster. In a few minutes you see a great stir and a curious
suppressed excitement in the lobby, and then you observe that the Pri