And then came the other and the tragic note. Again I have to quote the exact words to convey the impression and explain the description:—
"If I were in the position of one of those gentlemen—if I had seen the wrongs and the sufferings of Ireland in former times, if the iron had entered into my soul as it had entered into theirs, it would have been impossible. I should not have been more temperate possibly than some of them under those circumstances of the language I used. (Cheers.)"
It was when he uttered the words, "if the iron had entered into my soul," that Mr. Gladstone ventured on the bold gesture of striking his hand against his breast—a simple gesture, and not an uncommon gesture in itself—but you should have heard the resonant and thrilling voice—you should have been under the entrancing and almost bewildering spell beneath which at this moment all the imagination and emotion of the House lay supine, helpless, and drugged—to have understood the shiver of feeling which passed through everybody. And so he went on—rising higher and higher—a deeper harmony in every note—a more splendid strength in every sentence—till you almost thought you were looking at some great bird—with the strength and splendour of the eagle, the full-hearted and passionate melody of the lark—as it soared on, on its even and well-poised wing, higher and higher to the dim and blue ether of the upper air.
A strange scene.
Right to the last word, there was the same unbroken, passionate strength and fervour, so that when it was all ended the House gave a start as though it had to rouse itself from some splendid vision. And then came that rude and quick awakening which, in the world of actualities, always bursts in upon the most solemn and moving hours. At about half-past eight every evening the Speaker or Chairman—whichever is in the chair—gets up and goes out to tea. Before doing so the presiding officer calls upon the next speaker, and when the speaker has been named, cries "Order, order!" and promptly disappears into the room where his meal is laid. Scarcely had Mr. Gladstone sat down when Mr. Mellor called upon Sir Richard Temple, then cried "Order, order!" and, almost within a couple of seconds after Mr. Gladstone had concluded, had vanished from the House. This was immediately followed by the stampede of the rest of the House—for by half-past eight everybody was famished with hunger—and the Chamber was left empty, silent, and dim, with a suddenness that was startling, disconcerting, and a little disillusioning. And then it was that the strongest proof was given of the effect of the speech.
The outburst.
The House, I say, became empty—but not altogether. The Irish Benches, which had become crowded as the great apology for Ireland was being pronounced, remained still full—full, but silent. There was something strange, weird, startling in those benches, full and yet silent, amid all this emptiness and almost audible stillness; and some of the Liberal members, who had left the House in the mad rush to dinner, quietly stole back to see what was going to happen. The explanation of the mystery soon came. After he sat down, ghastly pale, almost painfully panting after this tremendous effort, Mr. Gladstone tarried a little to recover himself—to say a few words to Mr. John Morley—to scribble a note. At last he rose, and then came the moment for which those silent Irish Benches had been waiting. With one accord, with one quick and simultaneous spring, the Irish members were on their feet—hats and handkerchiefs were waved; there was the suggestion of tears under the swelling cheers. Nor were the Irish left alone. The Liberals who had slipped back joined in. The effectiveness of their cheers was heightened by the fact that they were not in their places, but standing on the floor. From out their cheering ranks stood the splendid figure—the broad shoulders, the massive head, the shaggy beard and hair, all the virility and sensitiveness that are found in the splendid form of Mr. Allen—manufacturer and workman, poet and Radical. The Old Man, splendidly composed, and yet profoundly moved, looked back, gave a courtly bow, and then went out. And here it was that a little scene took place of which the public prints have hitherto contained no mention. In her corner place in the gallery had sat throughout this dazzling speech that best of friends and truest of wives, who has been the guardian angel of Mr. Gladstone's life; and with outstretched hands and dim eyes, she received her triumphant husband in the corridor, where she had been waiting for him.
Deeper and deeper.
Friday, May 12th, I may dismiss in a few words. As the closure had been refused on Thursday night, the Obstructives started again on the first clause on Friday afternoon—Mr. T.W. Russell leading the van. He had nothing to say beyond what he had said a hundred times already, even in the course of the present Session; and his speech would have passed unnoticed had it not been for a brisk but odious and ignoble little storm which he and the Tories managed to raise between them. Mr. Russell declared that he heard the phrase across the floor, "What the devil are you saying?" and stopped as if the heavens and the earth must refuse to go round on their axes because of this introduction into Parliament of the negligences of private conversation. Mr. Gibbs—a very pestilent and very empty member of the young army of silly obstructives—moved that the words be taken down—an ancient formula not heard of for years till the present Session, when everything is turned to account for the purpose of occupying time and breaking down the House of Commons, and at the same time accused Mr. Swift McNeill of having used the words. Mr. McNeill indignantly denied the charge: then Mr. Macartney attributed them to Mr. Sexton—another and equally indignant denial; and then much uproar and contradictions and apologies—the lubberly and unmannerly interventions of Lord Cranborne as usual conspicuous—and, finally, the end of the storm in a teacup. Positively loathsome—the whole business methods of the Tories to grasp at everything to rouse a storm or provoke a scene; and altogether disheartening to those who don't wish to see the House of Commons reduced to the drivel and turbulence and anarchy of a French Convention. Finally, a little after six o'clock, the first clause of the Bill had passed, with a majority of 42. The House of Commons had decided that there shall be established in Ireland a Legislature of two Chambers. Then in a graceful, well-delivered, and pleasant little speech, Mr. Victor Cavendish opened the fight on the second clause. The evening was devoted to the Anti-vaccinationists—answered triumphantly in an admirable and unanswerable little speech by Sir Walter Foster—with as many as seventy men voting against vaccination. I had no idea previously that the proportion of lunatics in the Assembly was so large.