hat with their stern irony so mock the
statesman's foresight, and shatter political designs in their most
prosperous hour. As a mightier figure than Mr. Parnell remorsefully said
on a grander stage, a hundred years before, cases sometimes befall in the
history of nations where private fault is public disaster.

At the end of 1889, the Irish leader had been made a party in a suit for
divorce. He betrayed no trace in his demeanour, either to his friends or
to the House, of embarrassment at the position. His earliest appearance
after the evil news, was in the debate on the first night of the session
(February 11, '90), upon a motion about the publication of the forged
letter. Some twenty of (M151) his followers being absent, he wished the
discussion to be prolonged into another sitting. Closely as it might be
supposed to concern him, he listened to none of the debate. He had a
sincere contempt for speeches in themselves, and was wont to set down most
of them to vanity. A message was sent that he should come upstairs and
speak. After some indolent remonstrance, he came. His speech was
admirable; firm without emphasis, penetrating, dignified, freezing, and
unanswerable. Neither now nor on any later occasion did his air of
composure in public or in private give way.

Mr. Gladstone was at Hawarden, wide awake to the possibility of peril. To
Mr. Arnold Morley he wrote on November 4:--"I fear a thundercloud is about
to burst over Parnell's head, and I suppose it will end the career of a
man in many respects invaluable." On the 13th he was told by the present
writer that there were grounds for an impression that Mr. Parnell would
emerge as triumphantly from the new charge, as he had emerged from the
obloquy of the forged letters. The case was opened two days later, and
enough came out upon the first day of the proceedings to point to an
adverse result. A Sunday intervened, and Mr. Gladstone's self-command
under storm-clouds may be seen in a letter written on that day to me:--

_Nov. 16, 1890._--1. It is, after all, a thunder-clap about
Parnell. Will he ask for the Chiltern Hundreds? He cannot continue
to lead? What could he mean by his language to you? The Pope has
now clearly got a commandment under which to pull him up. It
surely cannot have been always thus; for he represented his
diocese in the church synod. 2. I thank you for your kind scruple,
but in the country my Sundays are habitually and l