Your telegram received half-hour after Cabinet separated. Beach has just announced introduction of Bill by you on Thursday for suppression of National League and other dangerous associations, for the prevention of intimidation and for the protection of life, property and order in Ireland.[51] Of course, great sensation.
It is not improbable, however, that we shall be defeated to-night, in which case we shall resign. I showed your wire to Lord Salisbury. We both agreed you would not wish unanimous decision of Cabinet modified.
Mr. Smith arrived in London with the daylight, to read upon the early placards that the Government was out.
The famous Jesse Collings Amendment produced an interesting debate; but as the members listened to the opposing views of Mr. Chaplin and Mr. Joseph Arch, of Mr. Goschen and Mr. Bradlaugh, of Mr. Gladstone and Lord Hartington, they knew that behind the relevant arguments of the speakers, behind all the talk of peasant-proprietors, allotments, vegetables, and cows, stood a far greater issue. ‘If the result of this division,’ said the Chancellor of the Exchequer, ‘should be unfavourable to Her Majesty’s Government we shall accept that decision without regret. We assumed office reluctantly, and we shall leave it willingly as soon as we are assured that we do not possess the support of the House. But the success of this motion will have another and graver effect.... It will not only be a defeat of Her Majesty’s Government, but it will be a defeat of the policy ... which they believe it to be their duty to pursue with respect to Ireland.’
The Government were beaten on the division by seventy-nine votes, notwithstanding that sixteen Liberals, including Lord Hartington, Mr. Goschen and Sir Henry James, voted with them and fifty-six others stayed away. The next day Lord Salisbury’s Cabinet resigned.
Thus, after a brief but exciting reign, fell the ‘Ministry of Caretakers.’ They had confronted enormous difficulties with small resources. They existed at the caprice of their enemies. They had office, but not power. Yet they faced their task and their opponents with courage and skill. Their Administration was defended by powerful oratory; it was sustained—except in its dying moments—by sedate and efficient Executive action. In a few short months the Conservative party were freed from the reproach of irresponsibility and their capacity for government was recognised by the country. The peace of Europe was preserved amid grave embarrassments and under their guidance the nation emerged safely and honourably from the Russian crisis. They legislated with unexpected good fortune. They inaugurated a new policy, never since abandoned, of Land Purchase in Ireland. They restored and greatly strengthened the defences of India. They laid the foundations of Australian Federation, and by a successful, inexpensive and almost bloodless military expedition added a vast and fertile province to the dominions of the Crown.
CHAPTER XIII
HOME RULE
‘Vote it as you please. There is a company of poor men that will spend all their blood before they see it settled so.’—Carlyle, Cromwell.
ON the last day in January Mr. Gladstone undertook to form his Administration. Its complexion was indicated by the first of the new appointments: for Mr. Morley became Chief Secretary to the Lord-Lieutenant. This was followed, without delay, on the one hand by the statement that Lord Spencer had acquiesced in the new Irish policy and would be Lord President of the Council; and upon the other by rumours of Whig refusals. For some days negotiations were protracted with Lord Hartington, Mr. Goschen and Sir Henry James; but, whatever signs of hesitation had marked their previous course, their action now was decided. Sir Henry James was offered successively both the Lord Chancellorship and the Home Secretaryship, and even more important Executive offices were pressed upon the others. All were declined. Doubt and reluctance were also manifested by Mr. Chamberlain and Sir George Trevelyan and both required and received assurances that they were not committed, by joining the Government, to the support of any Irish policy which involved the creation of a separate Parliament. For the rest it may be noticed that Sir William Harcourt became Chancellor of the Exchequer; that Lord Rosebery went to the Foreign Office; and that neither Lord Derby nor Mr. Forster was included in the Government.
The traveller who visits an old battlefield can never fully understand what its various natural features meant to the combatants. He is shown, perhaps, a rocky ridge which is called the key of the position. He reads that it was taken and repurchased on hard terms more than once during the day. But it is an ordinary object in the landscape. A dozen such eminences have been seen during the morning’s ride. Was it really so important? Were the fortunes of kingdoms actually for some hours involved in the possession of those few acres of rank grass and scattered stone? As he stands serenely on ground where once the bravest soldier hardly dared to crawl, he can scarcely believe it. Yet, to the men who fought, those rocks meant much more than life or death. Duty was there; honour was there; and in the end victory. And if the smoky curtain that hangs about the field were lifted and the view enlarged, it might be seen that great causes of truth, or justice, or freedom, and long tranquil years in smiling lands depended indeed upon this ragged ridge, made famous by the blundering collision of two armies, worthless except for the tactical purpose of the moment and probably ill-adapted and wrongly selected even for that.