ient servant,

"R. BAGWELL."

"Clonmell, December 27th."

Again an important extract:--

"This is Mr. Parnell's language at Nottingham, but would he venture to
use the same arguments in this country? Would he enumerate clearly to
an Irish audience the countless advantages they derive from Imperial
funds and Imperial credit, and tell them that the first step to Home
Rule is the sacrifice of all these advantages? Our great system of
national education is provided out of Imperial funds to the extent of
about a million a year; so are the various institutions for the
encouragement of science and art which adorn Dublin and our other
large towns. The Baltimore School of Fishery and other technical
training places, the piers and harbours on the Irish Coast, the system
of light railways, and the draining of rivers and reclamation of waste
lands, are all supported out of the Imperial Exchequer. The Board of
Works alone has been the medium of lending almost five millions of
money on easy terms under the Land Improvement Acts in the country.
Nor have the agricultural interests been neglected. For erecting
farmhouses alone over L700,000 has been given, while immense sums have
been spent in working the Land Acts. For drainage over two millions
have been lent, and a sum of over one million has been remitted from
the debt. A debt of eight and a-half millions appears in the last
return as outstanding from the Board of Irish Public Works, besides
three millions and a-half from the corresponding board in England. In
fact, there is not a project enumerated by Mr. Parnell as necessary,
under a new _regime_, to promote the 'Nationality of Ireland,' which
is not at present being helped on by the funds or the credit of the
'alien Government.' All these national advantages the supporter of a
shadowy Home Rule bids us give up."

If ever there was a case of the spider and the fly in human affairs
this mild and perfectly equitable reasoning of Mr. Parnell is the
illustration. How about the djinn crying inside the sealed jar, and
the fate of the credulous fisherman who obeys that voice and breaks
the seal which Solomon the Wise set against him?

In writing this pamphlet I have not cared for graces of literary style
or dramatic strength of composition; and I have largely supported
myself by quotations as a proof that I am not a mere impressionist,
but have a solid back-ground and a firm foothold for all that I have
said. Judged by these ex