ntry will soon be the history of the past.

Gentlemen, I said I had not come here to make a party speech. I
have addressed you upon subjects of grave, and I will venture to
believe of general, interest; but to be here and altogether silent
upon the present state of public affairs would not be respectful to
you, and, perhaps, on the whole, would be thought incongruous.
Gentlemen, I cannot pretend that our position either at home or
abroad is in my opinion satisfactory. At home, at a period of
immense prosperity, with a people contented and naturally loyal, we
find to our surprise the most extravagant doctrines professed and
the fundamental principles of our most valuable institutions
impugned, and that, too, by persons of some authority. Gentlemen,
this startling inconsistency is accounted for, in my mind, by the
circumstances under which the present administration was formed. It
is the first instance in my knowledge of a British administration
being avowedly formed on a principle of violence. It is unnecessary
for me to remind you of the circumstances which preceded the
formation of that government. You were the principal scene and
theatre of the development of statesmanship that then occurred. You
witnessed the incubation of the portentous birth. You remember when
you were informed that the policy to secure the prosperity of
Ireland and the content of Irishmen was a policy of sacrilege and
confiscation. Gentlemen, when Ireland was placed under the wise and
able administration of Lord Abercorn, Ireland was prosperous, and I
may say content. But there happened at that time a very peculiar
conjuncture in politics. The Civil War in America had just ceased;
and a band of military adventurers--Poles, Italians, and many
Irishmen--concocted in New York a conspiracy to invade Ireland,
with the belief that the whole country would rise to welcome them.
How that conspiracy was baffled--how those plots were confounded,
I need not now remind you. For that we were mainly indebted to the
eminent qualities of a great man who has just left us. You remember
how the constituencies were appealed to to vote against the
government which had made so unfit an appointment as that of Lord
Mayo to the vice-royalty of India. It was by his great qualities
when Secretary for Ireland, by his vigilance, his courage, his
patience, and his perseverance that this conspiracy was defeated.
Never was a minister better informed. He knew what