Sketches in the House: The Story of a Memorable Session (1893)

by T. P. O'Connor

What a cruel face!

"Ah, what a cruel face!" exclaimed an Irish Member by my side as Mr. Lowther turned back and shouted, "Order, order!" at the Irish benches—the good-humoured smile absent for a few moments, and revelations given into abyssmal depths. But Mr. Lowther soon recovered himself, smiled with his usual blandness, and once more dropped the hood over his inner nature. But it was a moment which brought its revelations to any keen observer; especially if he could have seen the answering looks from a pair of blazing Celtic eyes—also characteristic in their way of all the passion, rage, and secular intrepidity of the smaller and weaker race that has carried on a struggle for seven centuries—over battlefields strewn with the conquered dead—past gallows stained by heroic blood—past prisons and hulks where noble hearts ate themselves wearily and slowly to death. It was as in one glance all the contrast, the antipathies, the misunderstanding which had separated one type of Irishmen from one type of Englishmen through hundreds of years.

The bond of the Railway Rates.

These are somewhat remote reflections from the squat figure, the harsh and grating voice, and the commonplace rhetoric of Mr. Bartley—so far can fancy and insight lead one astray in that great stage of Titanic passions which is spread on the floor of the House of Commons. And what significance of great historic issues and reminiscences there were in the scene were likewise lost on Dr. Hunter. To him the universe at the moment—all the tremendous destinies on the knees of Mr. Gladstone—all the millionfold hopes and hungering longings that were involved—were as nought in comparison with the fact that the motion of Mr. Gladstone deprived him of the opportunity of raising a debate on Railway Rates. Coldly, calmly, self-confidently, Dr. Hunter attacked the Government in its weakest place, and drove the dagger home through the vulnerable side. The weakness of the position was this: there was a strong, vehement, and widespread revolt in the House against the exactions of the railway companies. Liberal members had on the subject exactly the same feelings as Tories; nightly a score of questions were asked on the subject. Altogether, indignation had broken down party lines, and against the railway companies Liberal and Tory made common cause. Unfortunately, Dr. Hunter's case had been strengthened by a somewhat weak yielding of Mr. Gladstone to a demand for a day on Bimetallism. This demand had, it is true, been urged upon him from various parts of the House, including his own, and he seemed to be yielding to a pretty universal demand. But Bimetallism was a craze with no chance of even distant success, while Railway Rates were at that very moment urgently calling for redress from hundreds of threatened industries. It would be seen then what a dexterous weapon for striking the Government the selection of the day for Railway Rates was.

No Tory Leader.

The Tories ought to have at once perceived the value of the weapon which a Liberal had thus placed in their hands. Some of them did so, and, undoubtedly, if a man with the Parliamentary instinct of Lord Randolph Churchill had been at their head, they would at once have made deadly and, haply, destructive use of the opportunity. But Mr. Balfour was away. Lord Randolph sate, dark and solitary, at a remote seat, and Mr. Goschen can always be confidently relied upon to do the wrong thing. It will be seen presently how he helped to save the Government it was his duty to destroy. No; the danger of the situation came not from the Tory, but from the Liberal benches. There are in the Liberal, as in every party of the House, a number of young and new members who have not yet learned the secret and personal springs of action, and who, moreover, do not at once realize the vast underlying issues on an apparently small question. To them the Liberal intriguers against the Government had steadily and plausibly addressed themselves, and many of them were under the impression that the question raised by Dr. Hunter would decide nothing more serious than the special purpose to which one day of the Session could be devoted.

A coming storm.

But anybody with the slightest acquaintance with the House of Commons would have soon perceived that matter of much greater pith and moment was at stake. The Senior Ministerial Whip is the danger-signal of the House of Commons; and the danger-signal was very much in evidence. Mr. Marjoribanks—of all Whips the most genial, even-tempered, and long-suffering, as well as the most effective—was to be seen, rushing backwards and forwards between the lobby and the Treasury bench, where, with Mr. Gladstone, he held whispered and apparently excited conversations. Meantime, there grew up in the House of Commons that mysterious sense of coming storm which its quick sensibilities always enable it to see from afar. There came a sudden murmuring, and then a strange stillness, and older members almost held their breaths. From the Irish benches not a sound escaped. In most Parliamentary frays—especially when the storm rages—there are certain Irish members who are certain to figure largely and eminently; but on these benches there was a silence, ominous to those who are able to note the signs of the Parliamentary firmament. Anyone looking on could have seen that the silence did not come from inattention or want of interest, for the looks betrayed keen and almost feverish excitement.

Ireland in danger.

For what was going on was a fight whether Ireland was to be lost or saved, and lost through the folly, desertion, or levity of some of the men that had sworn to save her. Fortunately, the strains of the most tragic situations have their relief in the invincible irony of life, and there was a welcome break in the appearance on the scene of him whom all men know as "Alpheus Cleophas"—the redoubtable Mr. Morton. Some men are comic by intention, some are comic unconsciously and unintentionally, some men are comic half by intention and half in spite of themselves. To this last class belongs our Alpheus Cleophas. He played his part of comic relief with a certain air of knowing what was expected of him—you see this demoralizing House of Commons makes everybody self-conscious, and one could see that he himself anticipated the roar of laughter with which the House received his statement, "I have now a majority"—by which, for the moment, Alpheus appeared as the leader of the Government, and a party which controlled the destinies of the House of Commons.