An experienced electioneerer said:—"We had an awful fight before we could return Lord Frederick Hamilton for North Tyrone. We had all our work cut out, for although we have on paper a majority of about one hundred, many of our people are non-resident landlords, or army and navy men, and they are not here to vote for us. So that our majority of forty-nine was a close thing, though not so close as we expected. The other side do not fight fair. Their tricks in the Registry Court are most discreditable. Both parties fight the register, the Nationalists expending any amount of time and money, and showing such enthusiasm as our people never show. And this is the reason. Our Scots farmers—for they are as Scottish as their ancestors of two hundred years ago—will stick to their work, and persist in making their work the paramount concern of their lives. They cannot believe that objections will be made to their names on the register, and when such objections have been raised they must appear in person, and there comes the difficulty. For if it's harvest time, or if engaged on any necessary work, you cannot get them to the Court. At Newtonstewart where the bulk of the voters are Protestant, no less than five substantial farmers were objected to successively. The inspector, that is, the Nationalist agent who is supposed to look into the claims of the Unionist party, said that one had assigned the farm to his son, or that another was not the real tenant, or that something else was wrong, and as this statement established a primâ-facie case, it became necessary for the persons whose votes were questioned to come into Court. Now, there is the rub. The objector calculates that some will not come, for he knows how hard it is to get them to come. Then they stuff the register with bogus names. They put down dozens of people who don't exist, with the object of polling somebody for them—if any of them should escape the scrutiny of the opposite party—and with the further object of causing the Unionist party expense and loss of time. For there is a stamp duty of threepence to be paid for every objection, and then the Loyalist lawyer and his staff are kept at work for six weeks, instead of a fortnight or three weeks, which should be the outside time taken. Then the annoyance and loss of time to the industrious Unionist voters, who have to leave their work. This does not hurt the opposite party, who have nothing else to do, and who in these wrangling affairs are in their native element, thoroughly enjoying themselves. What makes the work so hard for the Loyalist lawyer is the fact that our folks are all for business and look upon politics as a nuisance, while the other side make politics the principal business of their lives. They are tremendously energetic in this, but wonderfully supine in everything else. In politics they spare neither time nor money, nor (for the matter of that) swearing. The lying that goes on in the Registry Court would astonish Englishmen. The Papist party themselves admit that they are awful liars, but they laugh it off, and plead that all is fair in love and war.
"The priest sits in the Revision Court all day long. In these Revision Courts every priest is an agent of the Separatist party. They watch the inspectors and witnesses, keeping a keen eye on those who do not swear hard enough, ready to reward or censure, as the case may be. Every Sunday the people are instructed from the altar as to their political action. This eternal elbowing-on keeps them up to their work, as well as the promises of the good things to come. Our folks are never worked up. That makes it very hard for us. They came up pretty well last time, though. But when one side is all for business, and the other side all for politics, the business folks are handicapped.
"The Nationalists ran John Dillon on one occasion. We smashed him up. No respectable constituency would ever return any of his class, and we resented the attempt to couple us with a man of that stamp. He was beaten by several hundreds. Then they ran a Mr. Wylie, who had been a Land Commissioner for this district. We thought that positively indecent, and we wondered that any gentleman would put himself in such a position. He had been round here reducing rents, and then he came forward as a candidate. We accuse him of bad taste, nothing worse. He only made one speech, though, and that was to thank the people for placing him at the bottom of the poll. He confined himself to canvassing. If he had once mounted the hustings we would have heckled him about the Land Commission business. He knew that and never gave us a chance. It was a cute stroke of policy to bring him forward. He was a Presbyterian, and might be Land Commissioner again. At least the people thought so. Then they tried a Professor Dougherty, of Londonderry, another Home Rule Presbyterian; for there are a few, though you could count them off on your fingers, and they are a hundred times outnumbered by the Conservative Catholics. He belonged to Magee College, and we trotted out the whole of his co-professors against him. We never had a meeting without one or other of his colleagues pitching into him—a great joke it was.
"Over the water Mr. E.T. Herdman tried to get in for East Donegal, a very popular man who pays thirty or forty thousand pounds a year in wages. The people promised to support him. The priests promised to support him. They asked what would they do else, and what did he take them for? They are so anxious about employment, these good men. All they want is the good of the people. You saw how they ran after the Lord Lieutenant saying: Only find us work! You see how they run after the Countess of Aberdeen, who is encouraging industry (and about whom there are some pickings). What did the people of East Donegal do, under the guidance of their clergy? They returned Arthur O'Connor, who never did anything for them, who never darkens their doors, and who is utterly unknown to them. What can you say for them after that?"
The politician who was preferred to Mr. Herdman probably promised to give the people "all they want," while the Unionist was only paying them wages for working all the year round. And besides this, Mr. O'Connor's speeches were probably more full-flavoured, more soul-satisfying, than those of Mr. Herdman, who, being a practical man of business, and having a sense of responsibility, would only talk common-sense, and would promise no more than he could hope to perform. Mr. O'Connor speaks in the epic style. He reminds you of Bombastes Furioso, or Ancient Pistol, with a subtle admixture of Falstaff and Parolles. He belongs to the lime-light and blue fire school of oratory, and backs up a vivid imagination with a virulent hatred of England. The raging sea of sedition which surged around us is now silent enough. It Now hath quite forgot to rave While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave. The reason why is plain or should be plain to anything above the level of a Gladstonian intellect. It cannot be amiss, though, to recall a specimen of Mr. Arthur O'Connor's style, that so we may judge of his superior acceptability to the people of East Donegal. Speaking after the Union of Hearts had been invented and patented (provisionally), Mr. O'Connor said:—
"I know it to be a fact that in whatever war Great Britain may be involved, whatever Power she may have to struggle with, that Power can count on a hundred thousand Irish arms to fight under her flag against Great Britain—(great cheering). Does not the Government of the United States know perfectly well that at three days' notice it could have a force, of which one hundred thousand would only be a fraction, a force willing to serve against Great Britain for the love of the thing, without any pay?—(renewed applause). And it is not amiss that the Government of England should know it also"—(continued applause). The M.P. who made this speech is one of the politicians now dominating the English Parliament at Westminster. It is in response to the clamour of him and his sort that the gag is put on men like Balfour, Goschen, Chamberlain. This little gem set in the silver sea, this isle, this realm, this England, is becoming a paltry concern, is fast being Gladstoned into drivelling imbecility. What does O'Connor mean by the 100,000 Irish arms? Does he mean 50,000 Irishmen? The point is obscure, as will be seen from the oratory of another distinguished patriot, who said, "Ten millions of Irish hearts are beating with high anticipation, ten millions of eyes are looking forward to the passing of the bill." A very large number of one-eyed Irishry.
The Irish Catholic makes a slip. The journal approves of Mr. Gladstone's closure, but with reference to the refusal of a newspaper to print a Dr. Laggan's letter about, something delivers itself thus:—
The application of the gag in polities has always been the resort of the stupid, incapable, and tyrannical politician. Whether tried in Russia, in France, or in England of old, it has invariably failed in its purpose. The stifling of the individual voice becomes of small advantage when the object-lesson of its possessor with a bandage across his mouth, and his hands tied behind his back, is presented to the populace. Just as the gag has failed elsewhere it is, we are glad to think, destined to fail in Ireland also, and, indeed, if it were not so destined, Ireland would be precisely the best country to live out of.
So much for absent-mindedness. It is pleasant to be able to agree with the Irish Catholic for once.
On the whole, the confusion is deepening. The Grand Juries of Ireland are passing unanimous resolutions condemning the bill. The Nationalist party condemns the bill. The Scottish Covenanters, who have not delivered a political pronouncement for more than two hundred years, and who never vote either way, have risen in their might and cursed the bill, smiting the Papists hip and thigh with great slaughter, and denouncing the movement as purely in the interests of Romanist ascendency. Be it understood that these religionists live in Ireland and date their malediction from Coleraine. But nothing will stop the G.O.M.'s gallop over the precipice. Let him go, but let him not drag the country after him. And in after years his Administration will be described in words like those of Burke, who, speaking of the Gladstone of his day, said, "He made an Administration so checked and speckled, he put together a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically dovetailed, a cabinet so variously inlaid, such a piece of diversified mosaic, such a tesselated pavement without cement, that it was indeed a curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch and unsure to stand upon. The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards, stared at each other, and were obliged to ask, 'Sir, your name?' 'Sir, you have the advantage of me. Mr. Such-a-one, I beg a thousand pardons.' I venture to say that persons were there who had never spoken to each other in their lives until they found themselves together they knew not how, pigging together heads and points in the same truckle bed." This is prophecy.