THE RADICAL CURE FOR IRELAND. BY CHICHESTER'S GHOST. I. THE MALADY. 1. NEARLY three hundred years ago I lived, and worked, and left my mark in Ireland. Since then I have watched the course of English mismanagement with an ever-growing painful interest. The time is now ripe for me to preach with some hope of prevailing. I speak the words of fresh knowledge in the light of old experience. Hear me ! 2. Said Mr T. W. Russell, M.P. (who probably knows more about Ireland than any other member of the House of Commons), speaking on the occasion of Mr Chamberlain's visit to Belfast (12th October 1887), "The real solution of the Irish difficulty lies in the fact that the laws in Ulster and the rest of Ireland A are the same, but the people are different. The other three provinces are governed by priests, patriots, and publicans, and between them these have gone far to make mendicancy a virtue and laziness a fine art, and utterly destroyed the self-reliance of the great mass of the people. The greater part of the population south of Dublin lives in a state of Micawberism, waiting for something to turn up; and if the English and Scottish elements could be abstracted from the commerce of Dublin and Cork, those cities would be left wildernesses." 3. Said Lord Rosebery (who probably knows as little about Ireland as any member of the House of Lords), speaking a week earlier at Ipswich, "The Irish have an association (the National League) of which I do not know enough to say one thing or another, to say either good or evil about it, except this, that Sir Redvers Buller, the permanent UnderSecretary for Ireland, said of it in public evidence, that the people of Ireland considered it their salvation. Either the people of Ireland must be very bad, or the association must be very good, that a nation should hold such an opinion about it." 4. The Union party will not be troubled by this imaginary dilemma. Every honest and competent observer will answer without hesitation, that the Irish people—meaning, of course, the Roman Catholics (as does Lord Rosebery)—are very bad indeed. Not altogether bad as human beings. Besides some glittering sham virtues, which are apt to impose greatly on first acquaintance, they have some real virtues, |