ll's interest, to postpone the discussion until
they could ascertain the views of their constituents, and then meet in
Dublin. It was past midnight. The large room, dimly lighted by a few lamps
and candles placed upon the horse-shoe tables, was more than half in
shadow. Mr. Parnell, his features barely discernible in the gloom, held a
printed list of the party in his hand, and he put the question in cold,
unmoved tones. The numbers were 29 for the motion--that is to say, for him,
and 44 against him. Of the majority, many had been put on their trial with
him in 1880; had passed months in prison with him under the first Coercion
Act and suffered many imprisonments besides; they had faced storm,
obloquy, and hatred with him in the House of Commons, a place where
obloquy stings through tougher than Hibernian skins; they had undergone
with him the long ordeal of the three judges; they had stood by his side
with unswerving fidelity from the moment when his band was first founded
for its mortal struggle down to to-day, when they saw the fruits of the
struggle flung recklessly away, and the policy that had given to it all
its reason and its only hope, wantonly brought to utter foolishness by a
suicidal demonstration that no English party and no English leader could
ever be trusted. If we think of even the least imaginative of them as
haunted by such memories of the past, such distracting fears for the
future, it was little wonder that when they saw Mr. Parnell slowly casting
up the figures, and heard his voice through the sombre room announcing the
ominous result, they all sat, both ayes and noes, in profound and painful
stillness. Not a sound was heard, until the chairman rose and said without
an accent of emotion that it would now be well for them to adjourn until
the next day.

This was only the beginning. Though the ultimate decision of the party was
quite certain, every device of strategy and tactics was meanwhile
resolutely employed to avert it. His supple and trenchant blade was still
in the hands of a consummate swordsman. It is not necessary to
recapitulate all the moves in Mr. Parnell's grand manoeuvre for turning the
eyes of Ireland away from the question of leadership to the question of
liberal good faith and the details of home rule. Mr. Gladstone finally
announced that only after the question of leadership had been disposed
of--one belonging entirely to the competence of the Irish party--could he
renew former relat