ons stood firm and unbroken. The law, when
at length it became law, effected the national purpose with extraordinary
thoroughness and precision. And the enterprise was inspired, guided,
propelled, perfected, and made possible from its inception to its close by
the resource, temper, and incomparable legislative skill of Mr. Gladstone.
That the removal of the giant abuse of protestant establishment in Ireland
made a deeper mark on national well-being than other of his legislative
exploits, we can hardly think, but--quite apart from the policy of the act,
as to which there can now be scarcely two opinions--as a monument of
difficulties surmounted, prejudices and violent or sullen heats overcome,
rights and interests adjusted, I know not where in the records of our
legislation to find its master.

(M77) With characteristic hopefulness and simplicity Mr. Gladstone tried
to induce Archbishop Trench and others of the Irish hierarchy to come to
terms. Without raising the cry of no surrender, they declined all
approaches. If Gladstone, they said, were able to announce in the House of
Commons a concordat with the Irish clergy, it would ruin them both with
the laity of the Irish establishment, and with the English conservatives
who had fought for them at the election and might well be expected, as a
piece of party business if for no better reasons, to fight on for them in
the House of Lords. Who could tell that the Gladstone majority would hold
together? Though "no surrender" might be a bad cry, it was even now at the
eleventh hour possible that "no popery" would be a good one. In short,
they argued, this was one of the cases where terms could only be settled
on the field of battle. There were moderates, the most eminent being
Bishop Magee of Peterborough, who had an interview with Mr. Gladstone at
this stage, but nothing came of it. One Irish clergyman only, Stopford the
archdeacon of Meath, a moderate who disliked the policy but wished to make
the best of the inevitable, gave Mr. Gladstone the benefit of his
experience and ability. When the work was done, Mr. Gladstone wrote to the
archdeacon more than once expressing his sense of the advantage derived
from his "thorough mastery of the subject and enlightened view of the
political situation." He often spoke of Stopford's "knowledge, terseness,
discrimination, and just judgment."

Meanwhile his own course was clear. He did not lose a day:--

_Dec. 13, 1868._--Saw the Queen