utant-General, Sir Henry Sclater, of his own motion approached
Redmond. He suggested a meeting between Redmond and the War Office, with
Sir Matthew Nathan and General Parsons in attendance. Redmond agreed to
the proposal, but formulated his views in a lengthy memorandum. The
first three points dealt with matters directly concerning the Sixteenth
Division, but in the fourth, weighty emphasis was laid on the suggestion
of recruiting Volunteers for Home Defence. Sir Henry Sclater's reply
omitted completely all reference to this last--an omission on which
Redmond commented sharply. He elicited the official answer that by
urging men to join on a special enlistment for home service the numbers
who would join for general service would be reduced. This was
diametrically opposite to Redmond's view, and he said so, and urged
again that the Irish Command was of his opinion.

The proposed conference resolved itself--to Redmond's indignation--into
a discussion of Redmond's memorandum between the Adjutant-General and
Sir Lawrence Parsons. Only in September, when at Lord Wimborne's
instance he interviewed Lord Kitchener, did he have the opportunity of
raising the matter by direct speech. Lord Kitchener then declared
himself willing to admit that on the question whether enlistment for
Home Defence would promote or retard recruiting, Redmond's judgment was
probably more valuable than his own, and he promised to review the
question of Home Defence again in the light of it. But of this promise
nothing came.

Meantime Redmond was being warned that the Volunteer organization as it
stood had exhausted its usefulness; its enthusiasm was gone--a natural
result of having no purpose. A new opening seemed to be created by the
Bill which Lord Lincolnshire introduced to recognize a Volunteer Force
in Great Britain which should perform military duties under the War
Office control. Redmond hoped to see this carried with an extension of
it to Ireland, and this was the practical proposal with which he
concluded his speech when, on November 2nd, for the first time in that
year, he raised in debate the questions to which so much of his time and
thought had been given.

How was the Irish recruiting problem to be dealt with? He declared
himself absolutely against compulsion, to impose which would be "a folly
and a crime" unless the country was "practically unanimous in favour of
it." The voluntary system had never had fair play--at all events in
Ireland