It is noteworthy that in this prolonged debate there was no reference to the new fact of a second volunteer force. But on February 12th a question was asked about it. On the 17th there was allusion to another growing element of danger—the discussions among officers of the Army of a combined refusal to serve against Ulster. All these factors must have weighed with Redmond and with his chief colleagues in their discussions with the Government during the next three weeks. "Friendly consideration" passed into acceptance on March 9th, when Mr. Asquith, introducing the Home Rule Bill for its passage in the third consecutive session (as required by the Parliament Act), outlined the proposed modifications in it. They involved partition. But the exclusion was to be optional by areas and limited in time.

The proposal to take a vote by counties had, it will be remembered, been originally suggested by Mr. Bonar Law, and in following the Prime Minister he could not well repudiate it. The test, however, which he now put forward was whether or not the proposals satisfied Ulster: and he fixed upon the time-limit of six years as being wholly unacceptable. Redmond, on the other hand, while declaring that the Government had gone to "the extremest limits of concession," said that the proposals had one merit: they would "elicit beyond doubt or question by a free ballot the real opinion of the people of Ulster." This indicated his conviction that if Home Rule really came the majority in Ulster would prefer to take their chances under it; the proposal of exclusion being merely a tactical manoeuvre to defeat Home Rule by splitting the Nationalists.

Its efficacy for that purpose was immediately demonstrated. Mr. O'Brien followed Redmond with a virulent denunciation of "the one concession of all others which must be hateful and unthinkable from the point of view of any Nationalist in Ireland." Opposition from Mr. O'Brien and from Mr. Healy was no new thing. But by acceptance of these proposals the Nationalist leader made their opposition for the first time really formidable. Telegrams rained in that March afternoon—above all on Mr. Devlin, from his supporters in Belfast, who felt themselves betrayed and shut out from a national triumph which they had been the most zealous to promote. From this time onward the position of Redmond personally and of his party as a whole was perceptibly weakened. Especially an alienation began between him and the Catholic hierarchy. It was impossible that the clergy should be well disposed towards proposals which, as Mr. Healy put it, would make Cardinal Logue a foreigner in his own cathedral at Armagh.

Yet upon the whole the shake to Redmond's power was less than might have been expected—largely, no doubt, because the offer was repelled. Sir Edward Carson described it as "sentence of death with stay of execution for six years." With a great advocate's instinct, he fastened on the point in the Government's proposal which was least defensible.

In my opinion these modifications of the Bill were never adequately discussed in the meetings of the Irish party. All was done between the Government and Redmond's inner cabinet, consisting of Redmond himself, Mr. Dillon, Mr. Devlin and Mr. T.P. O'Connor. The negotiations were most delicate and difficult, and above all secrecy is hard to maintain when a body of over seventy men, each keenly concerned for the view of his constituents, comes to be consulted. Yet I think it a pity that the party never thrashed this question out. Once the principle of option was admitted, a great deal had to be considered. Voting must be a referendum either to the province as a whole, to the constituencies separately, or to local units of administration. A referendum by constituencies was as impossible as one by parishes: for instance, Mr. Devlin's West Belfast, out of the city's four divisions, would certainly have voted to remain under the Irish Parliament, and an absurd situation would have resulted. The choice lay between a vote by counties or by the province as a whole. In the province, three counties out of nine were as predominantly Nationalist as any part of Leinster. In two others, Tyrone and Fermanagh, Nationalists were about 55 per cent of the electorate. But the bulk of the population of Ulster resided in four counties of the north-east, so that Protestants over the whole province had a majority of some two hundred thousand. An appeal to the province, therefore, might involve the exclusion from Home Rule of a very large area which was thoroughly Nationalist. On the other hand, every scheme of exclusion had in view the possibility of the excluded area changing its mind on the question after a short trial. To separate the four overwhelmingly Protestant counties was to set up a body in which a change of vote would be much harder to bring about than in the province. As a matter of statesmanship there was much to be said for closing with the Ulstermen's original demand that the province should come in or stay out as a whole. It satisfied Ulster's sentiment and lessened the chances of crystallizing a Protestant block of excluded territory, which would tend to become less and less Irish.

The answer to this was that Nationalists would never consent and did never consent to the possibility of permanent exclusion for any part. Insistence on the time-limit was from this point of view a matter of absolute principle. Yet many believed then, and believe now, that if any part of Ulster were excluded by legislation it would certainly come in voluntarily after a short period. On the other hand, if any part were excluded even for a year, it was difficult to believe that it could ever be brought in except by its own consent. The view, however, to which we were committed (with the party's general approval), was expressed by Redmond at the customary St. Patrick's Day Nationalist banquet in London.

"To agree to the permanent partition of Ireland would be," he said, "an outrage upon nature and upon history." He quoted a phrase used by Mr. Austen Chamberlain, who had described it as "the statutory negation of Ireland's national claim." But, he argued, no such sacrifice of principle had been made. The demand of Nationalists was for a Parliament for the whole of Ireland, having power to deal with "every purely Irish matter." Temporary limitations of this demand had already been accepted.

"We have agreed, as Parnell agreed in the Bill of 1886, and as we all agreed in the Bill of 1893, that the power of dealing with some of the most vital of Irish questions should not come within the purview of the new Parliament for a definite number of years." The control of police, for instance, was reserved to the Imperial Parliament in all those Bills for a term of years. But this did not mean that Parnell or we abandoned Ireland's right to manage her own police. Reservation of the police in perpetuity would have been impossible to accept. In the same way, said Redmond, "the automatic ending of any period of exclusion is for us a fixed and immutable principle."

To maintain this conformity with national sentiment great advantages were sacrificed. The whole debates of this period turned on the question of the time-limit. If it had never been raised, opposition would still have existed, but the fact would have been plain from the outset that Protestant Ulster claimed to dictate not only where it had the majority, but where the majority was against it. Redmond probably believed that the opinion of Nationalists in the North could not be brought to consent to abandonment of the time-limit. If so, he probably underrated, then as always, the influence he possessed. It is always easy to persuade Irishmen that if you are going to do a thing you should do it "decently." What is more, a real effect could have been produced on much moderate opinion in Ulster by saying to Ulster: "Stay out if you like, and come in when you like. When you come in, you will be more than welcome." But the decision for this course would have needed to be taken before the proposals were made, since any attempt to enlarge them was bound to renew and intensify the inevitable storm of Nationalist dissent. Whatever the proposal, it should have been absolutely the last word of concession.

If a clear proposal of local option by counties without time-limit had been put before Parliament and the electorate, I do not think our position in Ireland would have been worse than it was made by the proposal of temporary exclusion, and it would have been greatly strengthened in Parliament and in the United Kingdom. All moderate men, and many pronounced Unionists, were becoming uneasy under the perpetual menace of trouble. Events which now followed rapidly turned the uneasiness into grave anxiety, but did not turn it to the profit of the Government.

The policy which was adopted in Mr. Asquith's proposal of March 9th was the policy which Mr. Churchill had pushed from the first introduction of the Home Rule Bill, even when it was formally disavowed by the Prime Minister. Contemptuous rejection of it by the Ulstermen when it was proposed was not calculated to strengthen Mr. Churchill's personal position, or to soothe his temper, and on March 14th he made a speech at Bradford which very greatly stirred public feeling. If Ulster really rejects the offer, said Mr. Churchill, "it can only be because they prefer shooting to voting and the bullet to the ballot." Should civil war break out in Ulster, the issue would not be confined to Ireland: the issue would be whether civil and parliamentary government in these realms was to be beaten down by the menace of armed force. Bloodshed was lamentable, but there were worse things. If the law could not prevail, if the veto of violence was to replace the veto of privilege, then, said the orator, "let us go forward and put these grave matters to a proof."

When Mr. Churchill next appeared in the House of Commons, a great outburst of cheering showed what a volume of feeling had found expression in his speech. Redmond came to the St. Patrick's Day banquet under the impression of that scene, and he spoke with a confidence which gives to his words a tragic irony to-day. He cited "the superb speech of Mr. Churchill" as evidence that "what is our last word is also the last word of the Government."

"If the Opposition have spoken their last word," he said, "the Bill will now proceed upon its natural course. It will proceed rapidly and irresistibly, and in a few short weeks become the law of the land."

The weeks have lengthened into years, and so much has happened in them that I keep no clear memory of that evening, though I was present. But it represented the temper of the time, among Home Rulers, and more particularly among Irish Nationalists, who generally held the opinion that the military preparations in Ulster were, as Mr. Devlin called them, "a hollow masquerade."

We saw the other side of the picture on Thursday, March 19th, when a Vote of Censure was moved. Mr. Bonar Law launched on the House of Commons a new and sinister suggestion.

"What about the Army? If it is only a question of disorder, the Army I am sure will obey you, and I am sure that it ought to obey you; but if it really is a question of civil war, soldiers are citizens like the rest of us."

Sir Edward rose immediately the Prime Minister had replied to Mr. Bonar Law, and his speech was furious. "In consequence of the trifling with this subject by the Prime Minister and the provocation, which he has endorsed, by the First Lord of the Admiralty last Saturday, I feel I ought not to be here but in Belfast," he said; and he indicated his intention of proceeding there as soon as he had spoken. What he had to say chiefly concerned the Army, and the preparations which were being made at the War Office for the despatch of troops to Ulster. He suggested that there was the intention to provoke an attack so that there might be "pretext for putting them down."

"You will be all right. You will be no longer cowards. The cowardice will have been given up. You will have become men in entrenching yourselves behind the Army. But under your direction they will have become assassins."

With these words—memorable in connection with what happened later, but not in Ulster—the Ulster leader left the House, followed by Captain Craig. Friday's papers were of course full of the debate. At noon on that day, March 20, 1914, General Sir Arthur Paget, Commander-in-Chief in Ireland, held a meeting with the officers at the Curragh and received the intimation that the majority of them would resign their commissions rather than go on duty which was likely to involve a collision with Ulster.

It seems only fair in dealing with this whole incident to print here an account of what happened, written from the soldier's point of view, by the man who was the spokesman and leader of the resigning officers—Brigadier (now Lieutenant) General Sir Hubert Gough.[2]

'"I never refused to obey orders. On the contrary, I obeyed them. I was ordered to make a decision—namely, to leave the Army or 'to undertake active operations against Ulster.' These were the very words of the terms offered. As I was given a choice, I accepted it, and chose the first alternative, and as a matter of fact I have a letter in existence written the night before the offer was made by Sir A. Paget to my brother, saying: 'Something is up' (we had been suddenly ordered to a conference). 'What is it? If I receive orders to march North, of course I will go.'"

'All the officers of the 3rd Cavalry Brigade took the same line' (continues the correspondent of the Manchester Guardian) 'and resigned. This decision seems not to have been expected by the authorities, and caused great perturbation. General Gough was urged by Sir Arthur Paget to withdraw the resignation. Sir Arthur Paget told them that the operations against Ulster were to be of a purely defensive nature. Unfortunately, Sir Arthur Paget based his appeal on expediency and private interest, and not sufficiently on the call of public duty. This failed to influence the officers. They persisted in their resignations, and only finally withdrew them on receiving a written undertaking from the War Office that they would not be again presented with the alternative of resigning or attacking Ulster.'

The Irish Party had no guess at the inner aspect of the occurrence. Naturally, but regrettably, we were the section of the House which had least touch with what was thought and felt in barrack-rooms and regimental messes. Naturally, but most regrettably, the opinion of the Army regarded us traditionally as a hostile body; and at this time every effort to accentuate that belief was made by the political party with which the Army had most intercourse and connection.

Writing now, as I hope I may write without offence, of a state of things not far off in time, but divided from us of to-day by the marks of a vast upheaval, it can be said that the old professional Army was a society governed in an extraordinary degree by tradition. Part of that tradition was that the Army had no politics; and as everyone knows, the man who says he has no politics is in practice almost invariably a Conservative. In the Army, usage was at its strongest—stronger even than at a public school; it was almost bad manners, "bad form," to hold political opinions differing from those of your mess. Political discussion was sharply discouraged; but this never meant that a man might not express vehemently the prevailing opinion. On the broad facts it was inevitable that the prevailing opinion should be unfriendly to Irish Nationalists. Irish Nationalists had taken passionately the line of opposition to the South African War; they had been sharply critical of all the minor campaigns in which the Army had been engaged for repression or for conquest during the whole period since Parnell began his leadership. In Ireland itself, every man who reflected for a moment saw at the Curragh the very embodiment of that force which had maintained for over a hundred years a Government which had not the consent of the governed; and unless he was one of those who regarded themselves as "England's faithful garrison in Ireland," protestations of enthusiasm for the armed forces of the Crown could not be the natural expression of his feelings.

Yet mingled with the Nationalists' attitude of estrangement from the forces which upheld a detested system of government there was a deep-seated pride in the exploits of Irish troops; and no man ever felt this more strongly than Redmond. He seldom spoke of the distinguished men he met, but again and again I remember hearing him mention with pleasure some talk over a dinner-table with this or that famous soldier—Sir John French (as he then was), for instance. It was happiness for him to find himself on friendly terms with the service to which so many sentiments bound him. The Curragh incident was to him more than a grave political event; it pained him beyond measure that this opposition should be headed by a representative of one of the Irish families most famous for their military record. In the debates which dealt with all this matter he said no word, and he kept our party silent—a wise course, and one to which every instinct prompted him.

In its political aspect, this action of General Gough and the fifty officers allied with him revealed a new and formidable impediment on the path to Home Rule; yet it was one of those barriers which rally forces rather than weaken them, and in surmounting which, or sweeping them aside, a new impetus may be gained. The incident was first discussed in the House on Monday, March 23rd, and continued to dominate all other questions for several days. From the Labour benches Mr. John Ward (now Colonel), who had been a private soldier, gave the first indication of the volume of resentment. His speech, remarkable in its power both of phrasing and of thought, was delivered quite unexpectedly in a thin House; but its effect was electrical. Later, Mr. J.H. Thomas spoke in the same strain. When a railway strike was threatened, the soldiers had been called out and had come without a murmur. Was the Army to be used against all movements except those under the patronage of the Tory party? If so, he would tell his four hundred thousand railway men to equip themselves to defend their own interests.

These speeches set people thinking very gravely, but their effect was to increase the confidence of Home Rulers—the more so as Sir Edward Grey, in one of his rare moments of emphasis, declared his determination to go as far as either speaker if the case which they foreshadowed should arise. But new occurrences disquieted the public; the bungling which had characterized dealings with the officers at the Curragh was not ended there. General Gough received a document from Colonel Seely, Secretary of State for War, countersigned by Sir John French and Sir Spencer Ewart, the military heads of the War Office; and this document was in part disavowed by the Cabinet. The two Generals resigned and Colonel Seely followed their example. I have never seen the House of Commons so completely surprised as on the afternoon when the Prime Minister announced that he himself would succeed to the vacant office. The surprise passed at once into a feeling of immense relief, very widely shared by all parties. The right thing had been done in the right way, and it was clear that Mr. Asquith possessed enormous authority, if he chose to assert it.

The effect of all these happenings was immediately perceptible in the resumed discussion on the Home Rule Bill. Mr. Dillon, speaking on the second day, said: "Yesterday for the first time I heard this question debated in a spirit of reasonableness and conciliation and with an evident desire on both sides to reach an agreement." A proposal frequently put forward from the Tory side suggested exclusion until a federal arrangement for the United Kingdom could be completed. The official Tory demand was for either a referendum or a general election. But, as Redmond pointed out when he spoke on the fourth and last day of the debate, any proposal for a settlement must be a settlement which Ulster would accept, and Ulster declared that it would not be influenced by any vote of the British people or by any Act of Parliament. In a passage of very genuine feeling he indicated what Ulster might do to assist him in securing for Ulster the extremest limit of concession:

"Anything which would mean burying the hatchet, anything which would mean the consent of these Ulstermen to shake hands frankly with their fellow-countrymen across the hateful memories of the past, would be welcomed with universal joy in Ireland, and would be gladly purchased by very large sacrifices indeed. If the right honourable and learned gentleman (Sir Edward Carson) would say to me, 'We are both Irishmen; we both love our country; we both hate—and I am sure this is absolutely true of both of us—we both hate all the old sectarian animosities, all the old wrongs, all the old memories which have kept Irishmen apart; let us come together and see what we can do for the welfare of our common country, so that we can hand down to those who come after us an Ireland more free, more peaceful, more tolerant, an Ireland less cursed by racial and religious differences'; if an appeal like that were made to me, I say without the smallest hesitation that there are no lengths that Nationalist Ireland would not be willing to go to assuage the fears, allay the anxieties, and remove the prejudices of their Ulster fellow-countrymen.

"But, alas! that is not the position. Even the permanent exclusion of Ulster is not put forward as the price of reconciliation; it is simply put forward as the one and sole condition upon which they will give up their avowed intention of levying war upon their fellow-countrymen."

He dealt with the federal proposal, and once more avowed his desire for that solution. "I have been all my political life preaching in favour of federalism." But he could not consent that the exclusion of Ulster should be prolonged indefinitely pending a settlement on federal lines, nor consent to any "watering down of the powers in the present Home Rule Bill."

What remained then, if Ulster would not accept the offer? Nothing but "to proceed calmly with the Bill." Threats of civil war he discounted. Disturbances there would probably be; but when the first Home Rule Bill was defeated, there were weeks of the most terrible riots in Belfast. The House could not afford to be deterred from any course by threats of violence; and he was confident that the Bill would pass into law and profoundly confident it would never be revoked.

He gave his reasons for that confidence in a passage almost autobiographical in character—if only because it made the House realize how completely this man's whole adult life had been devoted to this one long service, and how far the labours of our party had achieved their purpose.

"In a sense I may say I have lived my whole life within these walls. I came in here little more than a boy, and I have grown old in the House of Commons, and in the long space of years which have passed since then I have witnessed the most extraordinary transformation of the whole public life of this country, and I have witnessed an almost miraculous change in the position and the prospects of the Irish National Cause. When I came to this House, Irish Nationalist members, in a sense, were almost outcasts. Both the great British parties—there was no Labour party then—divided on everything else, were united in hostility to the national movement and the national ideal. Home Rule seemed hopelessly out of the range of practical politics. There were only a handful of men in this whole House of Commons besides us who were in favour of any measure of Home Rule for Ireland. Outside, the public opinion of this country was ignorant, and it was actively hostile, and we found it impossible to gain the ear of the democracy of England for the voice of Ireland. All that has vanished into thin air. All that has radically changed. The change has been slow and gradual, but it has been continuous and sure. Such a change as that can never be reversed. You might as well talk of the world going back to the days before electricity or petrol as hope to bring back the prejudices and the ignorance of the masses of the people in this country about Ireland, as they existed in the past."

His confidence was strong and it communicated itself to Ireland. But whatever could be said to shake confidence was said by Mr. O'Brien and Mr. Healy, who denounced the Bill as worthless when linked to the plan of even temporary partition, and declared that, whatever the Government might say at present, we had not yet reached the end of their concessions. On the division they and their party abstained, so that the majority dropped to 77.

Up to this point it is still true to say that the Nationalist party were constant to their faith in strictly constitutional action. But a new development was imminent. On the night of Friday to Saturday, April 24th-25th, Ulstermen brought off their first overt act of rebellion. They seized the ports of Larne and Donaghadee, cut off telephone and telegraph, landed a very large quantity of rifles and ammunition, and despatched them to every quarter of the province by means of a great fleet of motor-cars which had been mobilized for the occasion. It was a clean and excellent piece of staff work, planned by a capable soldier and carried out under military direction: and the Tory Press hailed it with no less enthusiasm than was elicited by the most important victories in the recent war.

One coastguard, running to give the alarm, died of heart failure: otherwise there was no casualty. The police and customs officers were confronted with force majeure and submitted without show of resistance. The Prime Minister, in answering a question as to the action which he proposed to take, used these words:

"In view of this grave and unprecedented outrage the House may be assured that His Majesty's Government will take without delay appropriate steps to vindicate the authority of the law and protect officers and servants of the King and His Majesty's subjects in the exercise of their legal rights."

The Opposition was noticeably silent, and next day some embarrassment was apparent when they proceeded with a previously arranged Vote of Censure on the Government for the military and naval movements in connection with which the Curragh incident had occurred. The sum of these movements amounted to despatching four companies to points in Ulster at which very large stores of arms and ammunition were lying under very small guard—and at one of which there was a battery of field guns with no protecting infantry. It was regarded as at least possible that the stores might be rushed by "evil-disposed persons, not fully under the control of their leaders." It was also regarded as possible that the movement of these companies might be resisted and that much larger operations might be thereby involved. The stationing of the Fleet opposite the Belfast coast was part of the measures taken against this latter contingency.

All this preparation was denounced as a conspiracy organized by Mr. Churchill with intent to provoke rebellion and put it down by a massacre. In view of the important military operation which Ulster had just carried out against the Crown, Mr. Churchill was not without justification in comparing the motion to a vote of censure by the criminal classes on the police. Yet, after much hard hitting in speech, he once more led the way in retreat from the Government's position. Sir Edward Grey had declared, speaking for the Government, that beyond the six years' limit they could not go. Mr. Churchill himself had declared the Government's offer would be and should be their last word. Yet now, avowedly on his own account, and not speaking for the Cabinet, he proposed that a new negotiation should be opened with Sir Edward Carson.

This proposal elicited no response, and the debate continued that day in a line of violent recrimination. But next day Sir Edward Carson rose and affirmed that he had previously declared his willingness to advise Ulster to close with a proposal giving exclusion until a Federal scheme had been considered, when the whole matter should be reviewed "in the light of the action of the Irish Parliament and how they got on." Now he said:

"I shall try to make an advance on what I said before. I will say this—and I hope the House will believe me, because, though I do not want to be introducing my own personality into it, I am myself a southerner in Ireland—I would say this: That if Home Rule is to pass, much as I detest it, and little as I will take any responsibility for the passing of it, my earnest hope, and indeed I would say my most earnest prayer, would be that the Government of Ireland for the South and West would prove, and might prove, such a success in the future, notwithstanding all our anticipations, that it might be even for the interest of Ulster itself to move towards that Government, and come in under it and form one unit in relation to Ireland. May I say something more than that? I would be glad to see such a state of things arising in Ireland, in which you would find that mutual confidence and goodwill between all classes in Ireland as would lead to a stronger Ireland as an integral unit in the federal scheme. While I say all that, that depends upon goodwill, and never can be brought about by force."

Redmond remained silent; but months later it became known that he had taken action to foster this new spirit. He advised the Prime Minister not to proceed with the prosecution which had been threatened against the Larne gun-runners. But at the same time he urged upon Government that they should withdraw the proclamation against importing arms: and for this he had good reason. The Larne affair had rendered the movement in support of the Irish Volunteers irresistible, and Redmond had decided to throw himself in with it.

The result was an amazing upward leap in the numbers of the Volunteers. On June 15th a question brought out that they were estimated at 80,000 against 84,000 of the Ulster force; but the Nationalist body was increasing at the rate of 15,000 a week. By July 9th they were reckoned (on police information) at 132,000, of whom nearly forty thousand were Army reservists.

These facts now dominated the situation. It was now abundantly clear that if passing Home Rule meant civil war, so also would the abandonment of Home Rule. On June 16th Lord Robert Cecil raised a debate on the new danger. In that debate words were quoted from Sir Roger Casement, one of the most active promoters of the movement: "When you are challenged on the field of force, it is upon that field you must reply." Mr. Dillon, who exulted in the "splendid demonstration of national sentiment shown in the uprising of the National Volunteers," urged strongly that the growth of a rival body was not a menace to public order but an added security. The armed Ulstermen would be "much slower to break the peace" when they realized the certainty of formidable resistance—and this, be it said, was no ungrounded observation. Yet at the same time the very success of the Volunteer movement was disquieting Redmond. He was not in the same position as Sir Edward Carson, who from the first had directed, presided over, and controlled the raising and equipment of his force; and unless the force were to be a menace to his leadership, he must secure control. As Mr. Bulmer Hobson puts it in his History of the Irish Volunteers:

"The Volunteers had men in their ranks who were political followers of Mr. Redmond's, and men who were not, and who never had been. The latter were willing to help him if he had been ready to help them; they would have made terms with him, but were not prepared to be merely absorbed into his movement."

The strength of Redmond's position lay in the fact that the vast majority of the enrolled men looked to him as their leader: his weakness, in that the committees under which enrolment had taken place were largely composed of the extremist section. He now determined to unite the Volunteers with the parliamentary party as the Ulster Volunteers were linked with Sir Edward Carson and his civilian organization.

The men with whom he had to deal were principally Professor MacNeill and Sir Roger Casement. His first proposal was to replace the existing Provisional Committee by another, consisting of nine members, with Professor MacNeill, who was regarded as a general supporter of Redmond's, in the chair. Oddly enough, the negotiations broke down because Redmond nominated Michael Davitt's son along with Mr. Devlin and his own brother to be representatives. The young Davitt had at an early stage expressed dissent from the movement, and this, coming from his father's son, left bitter resentment. The existing Committee now proposed to call a National Convention of the Volunteers. Such a body would clearly have become a rival, and a powerful rival, to the National Convention of a purely citizen type, and Redmond felt himself forced to take drastic action. In a public letter dated June 9th he wrote:

"I regret to observe the controversy which is now taking place in the Press on the Irish National Volunteer movement. Many of the writers convey the impression that the Volunteer movement is, to some extent at all events, hostile to the objects and policy of the Irish party. I desire to say emphatically that there is no foundation for this idea, and any attempts to create discord between the Volunteer movement and the Irish party are calculated in my opinion to ruin the Volunteer movement, which, properly directed, may be of incalculable service to the National Cause.

"Up to two months ago I felt that the Volunteer movement was somewhat premature, but the effect of Sir Edward Carson's threats upon public opinion in England, the House of Commons, and the Government; the occurrences at the Curragh Camp, and the successful gun-running in Ulster, have vitally altered the position, and the Irish party took steps about six weeks ago to inform their friends and supporters in the country that in their opinion it was desirable to support the Volunteer movement, with the result that within the last six weeks the movement has spread like a prairie fire, and all the Nationalists of Ireland will shortly be enrolled.

"Within the last fortnight I have had communications from men in all parts of the country, inquiring as to the organization and control of the Volunteer movement, and it has been strongly represented to me that the Governing Body should be reconstructed and placed on a thoroughly representative basis, so as to give confidence to all shades of National opinion."

Redmond's proposal was that to the existing Committee there should be added twenty-five representative men from different parts of the country, nominated at the instance of the Irish party and in sympathy with its policy and aims. Failing this, he intimated that it would be "necessary to fall back on county control and government until the organization was sufficiently complete to make possible the election of a fully representative Executive by the Volunteers themselves."

The intimation was not at once accepted. An order was issued calling on the Volunteers to elect additional representatives by counties to be added to the Committee. Redmond at once publicly declared that this amounted to refusal of his offer, and he put the issue very plainly. The Provisional Committee was originally self-constituted and had been increased only by co-option. The majority of its members, he was informed, were not supporters of the Irish party: of the rank and file at least 95 per cent., he said, were supporters of the Irish party and its policy.

"This is a condition of things which plainly cannot continue. The rank and file of the Volunteers and the responsible leaders of the Irish people are entitled, and indeed are bound, to demand some security that an attempt shall not be made in the name of the Volunteers to dictate policy to the National party who, as the elected representatives of the people, are charged with the responsibility of deciding upon the policy best calculated to bring the National movement to success.

"Moreover, a military organization is of its very nature so grave and serious an undertaking that every responsible Nationalist in the country who supports it is entitled to the most substantial guarantees against any possible imprudence. The best guarantee to be found is clearly the presence on the Governing Body of men of proved judgment and steadiness."

As a last word he renewed his threat of calling on his supporters to organize separate county committees independent of the Dublin centre. This was carrying matters with a high hand, and the fact that he succeeded proves the greatness of his prestige at the moment. The Committee in a published manifesto accepted his terms, but accepted them with declared regret, and eight of the original members seceded. Among them was Patrick Pearse, with whom went three others who suffered death in Easter week two years later.

All this was a disastrous business, and the worst part of it lay in the public avowal of divided councils. Moreover, a committee so constituted could not, and did not, operate efficiently. The original members were primarily interested in the Volunteer Force; the added ones primarily in the parliamentary movement. Nearly all of the latter—selected for their "proved judgment and steadiness"—were men past middle age; and of the whole twenty-five Willie Redmond alone subsequently bore arms.

There was indeed an underlying difference of principle. Redmond knew well, and all parliamentarians with him, that under the terms of the Home Rule Bill no army could be raised or maintained in Ireland without the consent of the Imperial Parliament. The original Volunteer Committee laid it down as an axiom that the Volunteer Force should be permanent; they were, as Casement put it, "the beginning of an Irish army." Sir Edward Carson's policy had produced a new mentality among Irish Nationalists, and it made many take Redmond's constitutionalism for timidity.

But in the eyes of the world and of Ireland generally, Redmond was just as much as Sir Edward Carson the accredited and accepted leader of his Volunteer organization, and to him the Volunteers looked for provision of arms and equipment. One of his chief preoccupations in those months was with this matter, and it explains his desire to have the proclamation against the import of arms withdrawn. The Larne exploit had proved the futility of it; articles by Colonel Repington in The Times testified to the completeness of the provision which had been made for Ulster. But smuggling is always a costly business, and Nationalists were hampered by the cost. More than that, there was ground for suspicion that the scales were not equally weighted as between Ulster and the rest of the country. On June 30th Redmond wrote a letter to the Chief Secretary repeating his case for withdrawal of the proclamation. It is all memorable, but especially the warning which concludes the following passages from it:

"In the South and West of Ireland, not only are the most active measures being taken against the importation of arms, but many owners of vessels are harassed unnecessarily.

"The effect of this unequal working of the proclamation has been grave amongst our people, and has tended to increase both their exasperation and their apprehensions.

"The apprehensions of our people are justified to the fullest. They find themselves, especially in the North, faced by a large, drilled, organized and armed body. Furthermore, the incident at the Curragh has given them the fixed idea that they cannot rely on the Army for protection. The possession of arms by Nationalists would, under these circumstances, be no provocation for disorder, but a means of preserving the peace by confronting one armed force with another, not helpless but, by being armed, fully able to defend themselves.

"Finally, we want to call your most serious attention to the grave and imminent danger of a collision between Nationalists and the police in the effort to import arms. The police in the South and West might not be so passive as they were in the recent affair at Larne, and there might be serious conflicts, and even loss of life, and from this day forward every day which the proclamation is enforced as strictly as it is now against the Nationalists brings increased danger of disastrous collision between the police and the people."

Within a fortnight a minor incident illustrated the "unequal working" referred to in the first of these points. General Richardson, who commanded the Ulster Force, had issued on July 1st an order authorizing all Ulster Volunteers to carry arms openly and to resist any attempt at interference. In Ulster accordingly no search was ever attempted. But on July 15th Mr. Lawrence Kettle, brother to Professor Kettle, who had from the first been a prominent official of the Volunteers, was returning in his motor from the electric works at the Pigeon House; he was stopped by the police and his car searched for arms. Such an occurrence in Ulster would have been held to justify immediate rebellion, and would have been carefully avoided. In Dublin there was no such avoidance of provocation.

Yet the avoidance of anything which might precipitate strife was indeed in these days most desirable. June 28th saw the murder of the Archduke at Sarajevo. The European sky grew rapidly overcast. Days passed, and the possibility of civil war was exchanged for the near probability of European war which might find the British Empire divided against itself.

It was necessary in the highest interests of State for the Government to make an effort to compose the cause of so much violent faction, which might at any moment assume acute form. The Amending Bill, introduced in the House of Lords with the Government's offer embodied in it, had been altered by the Peers in a manner which Lord Morley described as tantamount to rejection. In this shape it was to come before the House of Commons on July 20th. But on that Monday, when the House reassembled after the weekly holiday, the Prime Minister rose at once and announced in tones of no ordinary solemnity that the King had thought it right to summon representatives of parties both British and Irish to a Conference next day at Buckingham Palace, over which Mr. Speaker would preside.

Redmond in two brief sentences guarded his attitude. He disclaimed all responsibility for the policy of calling the Conference and expressed no opinion as to its chances of success. The invitation had reached him and Mr. Dillon in the form of a command from the King, and as such they had accepted it.

Some may remember how radiantly fine were those far-off days in July which led us up to the brink of such undreamt-of happenings. On the Tuesday night I was sitting alone on the Terrace, when Redmond came out. For once, he was in a mood to talk. His mind was full of the strangeness and interest of that first day's Conference—a council, or parley, so momentous, so unprecedented. It touched what was very strong in him—the historic imagination. He told me how the King had received them all, stayed with them for some intercourse of welcome, and had been specially marked in his courtesy to Redmond himself, who had of course never before been presented to him. Then, he had accompanied them to the room set apart for their deliberations and had left them with their chairman, the Speaker. When I think over Redmond's description of the Sovereign's personality, it seems to me that he was describing one so paralysed, as it were, by anxiety as to have lost the power of easy, genial and natural speech. But the dominant thought in his mind did not concern King George. One figure stood out—Sir Edward Carson. "As an Irishman," Redmond said, "you could not help being proud to see how he towered above the others. They simply did not count. He took charge absolutely."

As I gathered, the eight members sat four on each side of a long table, with the Speaker at the head. The Irish leaders were on his right and left, and the discussion was chiefly between them.

It turned mainly on the question of the area to be excluded. Enormous trouble had been taken, and Redmond told me later that a great map in relief had been constructed, showing the distribution of Protestant and Catholic population. This brought out with astonishing vividness the contrast: the Catholics were on the mountains and hill-tops, the Protestants down along the valley lands.

Nothing could be more cordial, Redmond said, than Sir Edward Carson's manner to him. They met as old friends, and I believe that when they parted, one asked the other that they should have "one good shake-hands for the sake of old times on the Munster circuit." But it was clearly recognized that there was a point beyond which neither of them could take his followers, and these points could not be brought to meet. Even if adjustment had been possible on the question of time-limit, neither would give up the debatable counties, Tyrone and Fermanagh, in which the Nationalists had a clear though small majority of the population, but in which the Ulster Volunteer organization was very strong. On Friday, July 24th, Mr. Asquith announced the failure of the attempt. "The possibility of defining an area for exclusion from the operation of the Government of Ireland Bill was considered, and the Conference being unable to agree either in principle or in detail on such an area, it concluded."

An incident which did not lack significance was that on the second day of these meetings Redmond, returning with Mr. Dillon along Birdcage Walk to the House, was recognized by some Irish Guards in the barracks, who raised a cheer for the Nationalist leaders which ran all along the barrack square. The Army was not all disposed to take sides with Ulster and against the Nationalists.

But parts of it were. The collision between forces of the Crown and Irish Volunteers trying to land arms, which Redmond had foretold and deprecated in his letter of June 30th, was fated to occur.

On Saturday, July 25th, five thousand Ulster Volunteers, fully armed, with four machine guns—in short, an infantry brigade equipped for active service—marched through the streets of Belfast, no one interfering. On Sunday, the 26th, a private yacht sailed into Howth harbour with eleven hundred rifles on board and some boxes of ammunition. By preconcerted arrangement a body of some seven hundred Irish Volunteers had marched down to meet the yacht. These men took the rifles, and with them set out to march back in column of route to Dublin. Two thousand rounds of ammunition were with them in a truck-cart, but none was distributed.

Meanwhile the telephones had been busy. The Assistant-Commissioner of Dublin Police, Mr. Harrel, an energetic officer, was informed, and he acted instantly. The Under-Secretary, permanent official head of Dublin Castle, was at his Lodge in the Phoenix Park some two miles distant: Mr. Harrel informed him of what was happening and was ordered to meet him at the Castle. But Mr. Harrel was not content to delay. He called out what police he could muster, some hundred and eighty men, and judging that they would be insufficient, decided on his own authority to requisition the military. At the Kildare Street Club he found the Brigadier-General in command of the troops in Dublin, and this officer immediately ordered out a company of the King's Own Scottish Borderers. With this force of soldiers and police Mr. Harrel proceeded to a point on the road from Howth to Dublin and blocked the way. When the body of Volunteers reached him, he demanded the surrender of their rifles. This was refused. He then ordered the police to disarm the men. A scuffle followed, in which nineteen rifles were seized. Some of the Volunteers without orders fired revolvers, and by this firing two soldiers were slightly wounded. One Volunteer received a slight bayonet wound.

Then there was a stop and a parley, and the Volunteer leaders threatened to distribute ammunition. While the parley lasted the Volunteers in rear of the column dispersed, carrying their rifles, leaving only a couple of ranks drawn across the road in front, who blocked the view. When Mr. Harrel perceived what was happening, he ordered the soldiers to march back to Dublin and took the police with him.

By this time wild rumours had spread through the city, and on the way back the troops were mobbed. They were pelted with every kind of missile and many were hurt, though none seriously; and it understates the truth to say that they were in no danger. They had their bayonets, and from time to time made thrusts at their assailants. At last, on the quays, at a place called Bachelor's Walk, the company was halted, and the officer in command intended, if necessary, to give an order for a few individual men to fire over the heads of the crowd. But the troops had lost their temper, and without order given a considerable number fired into the crowd. Three persons were killed and some thirty injured.

The first that I knew of these events was on the Monday, when I got the paper at a station in Gloucestershire, on my way to the House. The railway-carriage was full of casual English people, and I have never heard so much indignant comment on any piece of news. "Why should they shoot the people in Dublin when they let the Ulstermen do what they like?" That was the burden of it. It is easy to guess what was felt and thought and said in Dublin and throughout Ireland.

What Redmond said in the House of Commons is characteristic of his attitude. He demanded that full judicial and military inquiry into the action of the troops should be held, and that proper punishment should be inflicted on those found guilty.

"But," he said, "really the responsibility rests upon those who requisitioned the troops under these circumstances. So far as the troops are concerned, I deplore more than I can say that this has occurred—this incident calculated to breed bad blood between the Irish people and the troops. I deplore that. I hope that our people will not be so unjust as to hold the troops generally responsible for what, no doubt, taking it at its worst, was the offence of a limited number of men."

I do not think any soldier could have wished for a fairer or more friendly statement; and a chance assisted to realize his hope that the troops generally would not be held responsible. One of the killed was a woman whose son was a Dublin Fusilier. This man published a letter in the Press calling on all Dublin Fusiliers and all soldiers who sympathized with him to attend the funeral. It was well that the populace should feel on such a matter as this that all the troops were not against them; and well that they should be counselled by the leader of their nation to be reasonable in the direction of their resentment.

This whole incident should never be forgotten by those who are disposed to judge the Irish harshly for what they did, and did not do, in the succeeding years. Above all, it should be remembered that the news of it, terribly provocative in itself to any people, but tenfold provocative by reason of the contrast which it revealed as compared with the treatment of Ulster, was published to the world less than ten days before Redmond had to face the question, What should Ireland do in the war?

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: Manchester Guardian, February 4, 1919]



CHAPTER V

WAR IN EUROPE

I

The week which began on Monday, July 27th, was feverish and excited. Formal discussion on the occurrences at Clontarf and Bachelor's Walk was confined to the Monday; but each day had a stormy scene during question-time arising out of it. The Amending Bill from the Lords was to have been taken on Tuesday, but Mr. Asquith postponed it till Thursday, to get a calmer atmosphere. When Thursday came, it was postponed again and indefinitely. "We meet," said the Prime Minister, "under conditions of gravity which are almost unparalleled in the experience of any one of us." It was therefore necessary to "present a united front and be able to speak and act with the authority of an undivided nation." To continue the Home Rule discussion must involve the House in acute controversy in regard to "domestic differences whose importance to ourselves no one in any quarter of the House is disposed to disparage or belittle."

The Leader of the Opposition assented. Two sentences in his speech have importance. The first laid it down that this postponement should not "in any way prejudice the interests of any of the parties to the controversy." The second indicated that he spoke not only for the Unionist party but for Ulster.

It is very difficult now, after all that has crowded in upon us, jading the sensitive recipient surface of memory, to reconstitute the frame of mind in which we passed those days. One thing I clearly remember, perhaps worth noting for its significance. In a division lobby, probably on the Wednesday night, I came in touch with a friend, then a subordinate member of the Government, who had been among the keenest advocates of our cause. I asked how he thought things were going. My question had reference to our affairs, which had been for so many months the dominant issue; but he answered with reference to the European situation, as if that alone existed. Looking back, it seems to me strange that one should have been so engrossed in any preoccupation as in reality to ignore the vast and imminent possibilities. Yet, after all, I believe my case was typical of many. For us Irish, this was the crucial point, the climax of a struggle which had been intense and continuous now for a period of four years—which in its wider sense had gone on, with ebb and flow, yet always in progress during the whole adult lifetime of our leader and his principal colleagues. For more than us, for scores of Labour men and Liberals, it had become almost a fixed belief that European war was only a nightmare of the imagination. War in the Balkans, war possibly in the East of Europe, we could think of; but war flinging the complex organization, so potent yet so delicate, of great and fully civilized States into the melting-pot—that we never really believed in. Prophets of finance, prophets of the labour world, had told us the thing was impossible. Even our most recent experience, the irruption of armed forces into the political arena, had contributed to fix in our minds the view that all armaments were merely in terrorem, part of a gigantic game of bluff.

In a world organized as was Europe in 1914 on the basis of universal military service, it is dangerous, not only materially but morally and intellectually, to be as the people of these islands were, segregated from all military experience. We were almost like children in a magazine of explosives: we knew, of course, that there were dangerous substances about us; but we did not realize how suddenly and irretrievably the whole thing might go off.

I do not know how Redmond gauged the situation. But he spent the end of the week in town, and must have been less unprepared than was one like myself, who during the Saturday, Sunday and the Monday Bank Holiday was away in a most peaceful country-side, remote from news. Even on the Tuesday, the instant bearing on our own questions and our own lives of what we read in the newspapers was not clear to me. There was to be a debate, of course; but only when I saw the attendants setting chairs on the floor of the House itself—a thing which had not been done since Gladstone introduced his second Home Rule Bill—did I grasp the fact that something wholly unusual was expected.

My strong impression is that the House as a whole was in great measure unprepared for what it had to face. You could feel surprise in the air as Sir Edward Grey developed his wonderful speech. Men, shaken away from all traditional attitudes, responded from the depths of themselves to an appeal which none of us had ever heard before.

Having failed to secure my place on the Irish benches, I was sitting on one of the chairs close by the Sergeant at Arms, just inside the bar of the House, so that I saw at once both sides of the assembly: there were no parties that day. The Foreign Secretary's speech, intensely English, with all the quality that is finest in English tradition, clearly did not in its opening stages carry the House as a whole. Passages struck home, here and there, to men not to parties, kindling individual sentiments. Appeal to a common feeling for France did not elicit a general response; but here and there in every quarter there were those who leapt to their feet and cheered, waving the papers that were in their hands; and the two figures that stand out most vividly in my recollection were Willie Redmond, our leader's brother, and Arthur Lynch. We were in a very different atmosphere already from the days of the Boer War.

It was not until the speaker reached in his statement the outrage committed on Belgian neutrality that feeling manifested itself universally. Appeal was made to the sense of honour, of fair play, of respect for pledges, by a man as well fitted to make such an appeal as ever addressed any audience; and it was the case of Belgium that made the House of Commons unanimous.

Later in the evening speeches from the Radical group made it clear that unanimity was not yet definitive. Labour was hesitant; Germany had still to complete Sir Edward Grey's work. With this disposition in England itself, what was likely to be the feeling in Ireland? Nobody, I think, expected that anything would be said from our benches. There had been no consultation in our party, such as was customary and almost obligatory on important occasions. I have said before that Redmond's position was by understanding and agreement that of chairman, not of leader. Mr. Dillon, by far the most important of his colleagues, was away in Ireland. Any action that Redmond took he must take not merely in an unusual but in a new capacity, as leader, at a great moment, acting in his own right.

Neither had there been any consultation between him and the Government. He knew only what the general public knew. Parts of Sir Edward Grey's speech were to him, as to the other members of the House, a surprise at many points. At one point it certainly was. After summing up the situation, first in relation to France, then in relation to Belgium, the Foreign Secretary, speaking with the utmost gravity, foretold for Great Britain terrible suffering in this war, "whether we are in it or whether we stand aside." He made it clear that the island safety was not unchallengeable; there could be no pledge to send an expeditionary force outside the kingdom. Then, with a sudden lift of his voice, he added: "One thing I would say: the one bright spot in the very dreadful situation is Ireland. The position in Ireland—and this I should like to be clearly understood abroad—is not a consideration among the things we have to take into account now."

The history of this passage is strange. All who heard assumed that the speaker relied on definite promises. Such a promise had been given, from one party. The Ulster leader had, with the sure instinct for Ulster's interest which guided him throughout, conveyed to the Government through Mr. Bonar Law an assurance that they could count on Ulster's imperial patriotism. Ulster, so far as pledges went, was the bright spot. Where Germany had counted on finding trouble for Great Britain, no trouble would be found. But Sir Edward Grey at that moment of his career was lifted perhaps beyond himself, certainly to the utmost range of his statesmanship. He was a chief member of the Ministry which had brought to the verge of complete statutory accomplishment the task which the Liberal party inherited from Gladstone. He knew—his words have been already quoted—what Ireland's gratitude to Gladstone had been even for the unfinished effort; and now, in this crucial hour, he counted upon Ireland. From Ulster, which had its bitter resentment, assurances were needed: but if Ulster were contented to fall into line, then all was well with Ireland. Speaking as one who had done his part by Ireland, with the confidence that counts upon full comradeship he assumed the generosity of Ireland's response. That did not fail him, sudden and unforeseen though the challenge came—for it was an appeal and a challenge to Ireland's generosity.

When the notable words concerning Ireland were spoken, Redmond turned to the colleague who sat next him, one of his close personal friends, and one of his wisest, most moderate and most courageous counsellors. He said: "I'm thinking of saying something. Do you think I ought to?" Mr. Hayden answered, "That depends on what you are going to say." Redmond said: "I'm going to tell them they can take all their troops out of Ireland and we will defend the country ourselves." "In that case," said Mr. Hayden, "you should certainly speak." Redmond leant over to Mr. T.P. O'Connor, who sat immediately below him, and consulted him also. Mr. O'Connor was against it. Though the war had no more enthusiastic supporter, he thought the risk too great. It was just a week and a day since Redmond had moved an adjournment to consider the occasion when Government forces were turned out to disarm Irish Volunteers, and when troops fired without order on a Dublin crowd. Ireland was still given over to a fury of resentment, issuing not alone in speeches but in active warlike preparation. On Sunday, August 1st, memorial masses for the victims were held up and down the country. In Belfast there was a parade of four thousand Irish Volunteers; and finally, at a point on the Wicklow coast, some ten thousand rifles were landed and distributed in defiance of Government and its troops. Now, forty-eight hours after these demonstrations, would the Irish leader ask his countrymen to blot from their minds and from their hearts so recent and so terrible a wound? Would he attempt to change the whole direction of a nation's feeling? The boldest and the most generous might well have hesitated. Redmond did not.

This is not to say that he spoke without full reflection. He always thought far ahead; and in these tense days of waiting upon rumour, he must have pondered deeply upon all the possibilities—must have had intuition of what this opportunity, England's difficulty, might mean for Ireland. Other minds were on the same trail. In the Dublin papers of that morning were two letters of moment—one of them from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

"The chief point which has divided Protestant Ulster from the rest of Ireland," he wrote, "is that Nationalists were not loyal to the Empire." Then, recalling briefly the extent to which Irish Nationalists had helped in creating that Empire, he went on: "There is no possible reason why a man should not be a loyal Irishman and a loyal Imperialist also.... A whole-hearted declaration of loyalty to the common ideal would at the present moment do much to allay the natural fears of Ulster and to strengthen the position of Ireland. Such a chance is unlikely to recur. I pray that the Irish leaders may understand its significance and put themselves in a position to take advantage of it."

The other letter, written from a different standpoint, was signed by Mr. M.J. Judge, a most active Irish Volunteer who had been wounded in the scuffle on the way back from Howth. "England," he said, "might inspire confidence by restoring it. She could bestow confidence by immediately arming and equipping the Irish Volunteers. The Volunteers, properly armed and equipped, could preserve Ireland from invasion, and England would be free to utilize her 'army of occupation' for the defence of her own shores."

Redmond could not have seen either of these letters, but those two trains of thought were blended in his speech—which was less a speech than a supreme action. It was the utterance of a man who has a vision and who, acting in the light of it, seeks to embody the vision in a living reality.

Mr. Bonar Law followed Sir Edward Grey with a few brief sentences of whole-hearted support. Then Redmond rose, and a hush of expectation went over the house. I can see it now, the crowded benches and the erect, solid figure with the massive hawk-visaged head thrown back, standing squarely at the top of the gangway. While he spoke, as during Sir Edward Grey's speech, the cheering broke out first intermittently and scattered over the House, then grew gradually universal. Sitting about me were Tory members whom I did not know; I heard their ejaculations of bewilderment, approval and delight. But in the main body of the Unionists behind the front Opposition bench papers were being waved, and when Redmond sat down many of these men stood up to cheer him. In five minutes he had changed the whole atmosphere of domestic politics in regard to the main issue of controversy.—Here is the speech:

"I hope the House will not think me impertinent to intervene in the debate, but I am moved to do so a great deal by that sentence in the speech of the Foreign Secretary in which he said that the one bright spot in the situation was the changed feeling in Ireland. Sir, in past time, when this Empire has been engaged in these terrible enterprises, it is true that it would be the utmost affectation and folly on my part to deny that the sympathies of Nationalist Ireland, for reasons deep down in the centuries of history, have been estranged from this country. But allow me to say that what has occurred in recent years has altered the situation completely. I must not touch upon any controversial topic, but this I may be allowed to say—that a wider knowledge of the real facts of Irish history has altered the view of the democracy of this country towards the Irish question, and I honestly believe that the democracy of Ireland will turn with the utmost anxiety and sympathy to this country in every trial and danger with which she is faced.

"There is a possibility of history repeating itself. The House will remember that in 1778, at the end of the disastrous American War, when it might be said that the military force of this country was almost at its lowest ebb, the shores of Ireland were threatened with invasion. Then a hundred thousand Irish Volunteers sprang into existence for the purpose of defending those shores. At first, however—and how sad is the reading of the history of those days! no Catholic was allowed to be enrolled in that body of Volunteers; yet from the first day the Catholics of the South and West subscribed their money and sent it for the army of their Protestant fellow-countrymen. Ideas widened as time went on, and finally the Catholics of the South were armed and enrolled as brothers-in-arms with their fellow-countrymen. May history repeat itself! To-day there are in Ireland two large bodies of Volunteers, one of which has sprung into existence in the North and another in the South. I say to the Government that they may to-morrow withdraw every one of their troops from Ireland. Ireland will be defended by her armed sons from invasion, and for that purpose the armed Catholics in the South will be only too glad to join arms with the armed Protestant Ulster men. Is it too much to hope that out of this situation a result may spring which will be good, not merely for the Empire, but for the future welfare and integrity of the Irish nation? Whilst Irishmen are in favour of peace and would desire to save the democracy of this country from all the horrors of war, whilst we will make any possible sacrifice for that purpose, still, if the necessity is forced upon this country, we offer this to the Government of the day: They may take their troops away, and if it is allowed to us, in comradeship with our brothers in the North, we will ourselves defend the shores of Ireland."

It needed no gift of prophecy to be certain that such a speech would be popular in the House of Commons, and many Unionists that day were almost aggrieved that Sir Edward Carson had not risen at once to reply to the offer in the same spirit. They did not realize the difficulty of the Ulster leader's position. To admit and welcome the unity of Ireland was to give away Ulster's case. To accept the Nationalist leader's utterance as sincere, still more to assume that Ireland as a whole would endorse it, was to weaken, if not to give away, Ulster's best argument, and from that hour to the end of the war Sir Edward Carson was most loyal to Ulster's interests.

Further, it is conceivable that by some who cheered it the speech may have been misunderstood. Yet it is not probable that many who heard Redmond believed that in order to serve England he was flinging away Ireland's national claim, to the successful furtherance of which his whole life had been devoted. The Unionist party as a whole certainly understood that to accept Redmond's offer in the spirit in which it was made meant accepting the principle of Home Rule: and on that afternoon in August they were not unready to accept it. They felt, for the speech made them feel, that a great thing had happened. Yet they might well be pardoned for some scepticism as to how the utterance might be taken in Ireland, and how it would issue in action. A famous Nationalist said some ten days later: "When I read the speech in the paper, I was filled with dismay. Now I recognize that it was a great stroke of statesmanship which I should never have had the courage to advise."

Redmond's instinct had been right. He trusted in the appeal to national pride and to the sense of national unity. Ireland was perfectly willing, and he knew it, to give loyal friendship to England on the basis of freedom. But the test of freedom had now come to be the right to bear arms, and this was a proposal that Ireland should undertake her own defence. Ireland was sick of the talk of civil war, and this was a proposal that Ulstermen and the rest should make common cause. It was an appeal addressed by an instinct, which was no less subtle than it was noble, to what was most responsive in the best qualities of Irishmen. None the less it was a statesman's utterance addressed to a people politically quick-minded; Ireland saw as well as Redmond himself that what stood in the way of Ireland's national aspiration was the opposition of one section of Irishmen. To that extent, and to that extent only, was the speech political in its purpose. Whatever made for common action made for unity; and whatever made for unity made for Home Rule. That is the key to Redmond's attitude throughout the war—perhaps also to Sir Edward Carson's.

II

The response from Nationalist Ireland had not long to be waited for—although the inquest on the victims of the Bachelor's Walk tragedy was in progress on the very day when Redmond's speech appeared in the Press. Waterford Corporation instantly endorsed their member's utterance, and throughout the week similar resolutions were passed all over the country, Unionist members of these bodies joining in to second the proposals. In Cork, the City Council had before it a resolution condemning the Government for its attempt to disarm the Irish Volunteers, and calling for stringent penalties on the offenders in the Bachelor's Walk affair: the resolution was withdrawn and one of hearty support to Redmond's attitude adopted.

Yet Irish opinion did not go so far as Mr. William O'Brien, who proposed the complete dropping of the Home Rule Bill till after the war, in order to bring about a genuine national unity. The action of the Offaly corps of Volunteers, for instance, was typical. They agreed to offer their services gladly on two conditions: first, that the Home Rule Bill should go on the Statute Book; secondly, that the Volunteers should be subsidized and equipped by Government.

But it was assumed in Ireland that no question arose about the safety of the Bill, and people gave themselves to the new emotion. Troops were cheered everywhere at stations and on the quays: National Volunteers and local bands turned out to see them off. Even the battalion of King's Own Scottish Borderers, which had been confined to barracks since the events of July 26th, was cheered like the rest as it marched down to the transports ready for it.[3]

This was the attitude of the general populace. Broadly speaking, Redmond's speech pleased the people. It was welcomed by generous-minded men in another class, who responded at once in the same spirit. Lord Monteagle wrote: "Mr. Redmond has risen nobly to the occasion"; Lord Bessborough, that he trusted all the Unionists in the South would at once join the Irish Volunteers. The Marquis of Headfort, the Earls of Fingall and of Desart, Lord Powerscourt, Lord Langford, all chimed in with offers of help. Mr. George Taaffe wrote: "I thank God from the bottom of my heart that to-day we stand united Ireland." In county Wexford sixty young Protestants came in a body to join up, led by a very Tory squire.

It should be clearly noted that while Redmond's aim was to make this Ireland's war, in which Irishmen should serve together without distinction of North or South, all that he asked of the land in his speech of August 4th was that the Volunteers should undertake duties of home defence. This was precisely what Sir Edward Carson had asked of Ulster. On August 14th, in a letter to the Press, the commander of a Fermanagh battalion of Ulster Volunteers wrote: "No one will be asked to serve outside Ulster until Sir Edward Carson notifies that he is satisfied with the attitude of the Government with regard to the Home Rule Bill and Ulster."

Redmond neither could nor did ask any man to serve outside Ireland till he was satisfied with the Government's attitude in regard to Home Rule. In the first days of the war, however, the critical question for him was to know how his offer of assistance from the Volunteers would be accepted by the Government, and at the outset all promised favourably. On August 8th a telegram was sent to the Lord-Lieutenant:

"His Majesty's Government recognize with deep gratitude the loyal help which Ireland has offered in this grave hour. They hope to announce as soon as possible arrangements by which this offer can be made use of to the fullest possible extent."

That unquestionably represented the mind of Mr. Asquith and his civilian colleagues. But a new power had transformed the Cabinet. Lord Kitchener, refusing to accept the post of Commander in Chief, had insisted on becoming Secretary of State for War.

No one is likely to underestimate Lord Kitchener's value at that hour. But probably no one now will dispute that the political control which this soldier obtained was excessive and was dangerous. Years of fierce faction had shaken the public confidence in politicians, and a soldier was traditionally above and beyond politics. But in Lord Kitchener's case the soldier was certainly remote from and below the regions of statesmanship. Narrow, domineering, and obstinate, he was a difficult colleague for anyone; and for a Prime Minister with so easy a temper as Mr. Asquith he was not a colleague but a master. He claimed to be supreme in all matters relating to the Army, and in such a war this came near to covering the whole field of government. It most certainly covered the question of dealing with the Irish Volunteers and with the Ulster Volunteers, which meant in reality the whole question of Ireland.

Immediately on Lord Kitchener's appointment Redmond had an interview with him. Redmond's report was that he had been most friendly—and most limited in his expectations. "Get me five thousand men, and I will say 'Thank you,'" he had said. "Get me ten thousand, and I will take off my hat to you." Yet the very smallness of the estimate should have been a note of warning to us; it indicated a cynical view of Ireland's response to Redmond's public declaration.

On the question of the Volunteers he made friendly promises. As the Sirdar in Egypt he had been used to giving fair words to native chiefs. There is not the least reason to suppose that Lord Kitchener would have felt bound to show Redmond his real mind.

The truth was that Lord Kitchener held in respect to Ireland the traditional opinions of the British Army. Nobody could blame the professional soldier for dislike and distrust of Irish Nationalist politicians generally; but when at such a crisis a professional soldier, by no means conspicuous for breadth of mind, came to hold such a position as Lord Kitchener seized, the result was certain to be disastrous for Irish policy unless Liberal statesmanship exercised a strong control over him. Neither Mr. Asquith nor Mr. Birrell was likely to do this.

Two views were taken of the proposal to encourage and utilize the Irish Volunteers. The first view was that Volunteers of any kind were a superfluous encumbrance at a moment when the supreme need was for men in the actual fighting-line; that encouragement of Volunteers gave an excuse for shirking war; and further, that Volunteers outside the State's control were a danger; that the danger was increased when there were two rival Volunteer forces which might fly at each other's throats; and that it was a matter for satisfaction that one of these forces should be very greatly inferior to the other in point of arms and equipment, so that considerations of prudence would lessen the chance of collision. This satisfaction was greatly heightened by the reflection that the armed force was thoroughly loyal to the Empire and could be trusted to assist troops in the case of any attack upon the Empire begun by the other—a contingency which should always be taken into account.

This line of thought was certainly Lord Kitchener's. He had no distrust of Irish soldiers in ordinary regiments; no professional soldier ever had. But he had a deep distrust of a purely Irish military organization under Irish control. At the back of Lord Kitchener's mind was the determination "I will not arm enemies." This was the very negation and the antithesis of the second view, which was Redmond's.

Redmond's aim was to win the war, no less than Lord Kitchener's. But if Lord Kitchener realized more clearly than other men in power how far-reaching would be the need for troops, Redmond realized also far more than the men in power how vital would be the need for America. He saw from the first, knowing the English-speaking world far more widely than perhaps any member of the Government, that the Irish trouble could not limit its influence to Ireland only. Greater forces could be conciliated for war purposes by reconciliation with Ireland—by bringing Ireland heart and soul into the war—than the equivalent of many regiments. Yet even from the narrower aspect of finding men, he regarded the same policy as essential. He assumed that recruiting in Ireland must always be voluntary—at any rate a matter for Ireland's own decision: the question was how to get most troops. Knowing Ireland, he recognized how complete was the estrangement of its population from the idea of ordinary enlistment. The bulk of the population were on the land, and in Ireland, as in Great Britain, "gone for a soldier" was a word of disgrace for a farmer's son. More than that, the political organization of which he was head had inculcated an attitude of aloofness from the Army because it was the Army which held Ireland by force. Enlistment had been discouraged, on the principle that from a military point of view Ireland was regarded as a conquered country. A test case had arisen over the Territorial Act, which was not extended to Ireland, any more than the Volunteer Acts had been. We had voted against Lord Haldane's Bill on the express ground that it put Ireland into this status of inferiority and withheld from Irishmen that right to arm and drill which was pressed upon Englishmen as a patriotic duty. We had explicitly declared then in 1907 that our influence should and must be used against enlistment.

These facts of history had not merely produced in Ireland an attitude of mind hostile to the idea, so to say, of the British Army as an institution, though the individual soldier had always been at least as popular as anyone else. They had produced a population extraordinarily unfamiliar with the idea of armament. The old Volunteers and the Territorials had at least conveyed to all ranks of society in Great Britain the possibility of joining a military organization while remaining an ordinary citizen. In the imagination of Ireland, either you were a soldier or you were not; and if you were a soldier, you belonged to an exceptional class, remote from ordinary existence. To cross that line was a far greater step to contemplate with us than in England. Redmond reckoned, and reckoned rightly, that to bring Irishmen together in military formations, learning the art of war, was the best way to combat this disinclination to enter the Army—this feeling that enlistment meant doing something "out of the way," something contrary to usage and tradition. He reckoned that the attitude of Nationalist Ireland would alter towards a Government which put arms in their hands on their own terms; and that with a great war on foot a temper of adventure and emulation would very soon draw young men flocking to the ranks in which they could see the reality of war. That was Redmond's policy and it was the statesman's. Nationalist Ireland was perfectly ready to adopt the ideals which moved the British Empire at home and overseas in the war: but first the British Empire must show that it respected the ideals of Nationalist Ireland. The Empire's statesmen did so: the British democracy did so: but Lord Kitchener stood in the way.

From Ulster, it was clear that immediate cordial co-operation could not be anticipated. Yet Redmond had implicit faith in the ultimate effect of comradeship in danger, and here we know he was right. He was to pay a heavy price in blood for the seal set upon that bond; but in the end the seal was set. For the moment, Ulster as a whole was sullen and distrustful. Feeling that to admit the good faith of Nationalists jeopardized their own political cause, they belittled what in the interests of the common weal it would have been wise even to over-value. At the outset "An Ulster Volunteer" wrote to the papers "Let us all unite as a solid nation"; but such an utterance was exceptional. Hardly less exceptional was the line taken by "An Officer of National Volunteers" who wrote, "If the necessity arose to-morrow and the word went out from Headquarters, the National Volunteers would be prepared to fight to the very death in defending the homes and liberties of France and England." "For Ireland Only" was a motto much inculcated in those days among the Irish Volunteers. Suspicion on the one side bred estrangement on the other; and every hour lost increased the mischief.

Moreover, in spite of the generous action taken by outstanding individuals, the general mass of Unionist opinion was grudging and uncordial. A friend who was then closely in touch with it described to me the attitude of Dublin clubs: "They were almost sorry Redmond had done the right thing." Such men were part of Ireland, and all Ireland was remote from war. For them, now as always, Home Rule was the paramount consideration, and none could deny that the prospects for Home Rule were immensely improved by Redmond's action. In these days, when an end of the conflict was expected in three months, when every check to the Germans was magnified out of all reason, there was no sense of the relative value of issues. Everywhere in Unionist society and in the Irish Unionist Press there was ungenerous and unfriendly criticism which did much harm.

Two things could have checked these forces for evil. The first would have been an immediate decision to make Home Rule law. This would have put an end to the pestilent growth of suspicion among Nationalists, and it would have enabled Redmond to launch at once his appeal for soldiers. The other would have been a decision to make good the pledge contained in the Government's message to Lord Aberdeen and to accept in some practical way the offered service of the Volunteers.

The latter of these courses involved no controversy with Ulster, and to it Redmond first addressed himself. He made constant appeals in private to Ministers; he was angry and disappointed over the delay: and after a week he thought it necessary to raise the matter in the House. He asked the Prime Minister whether British Territorials were to be sent to Ireland to replace the troops which had been withdrawn—a step which would have been equivalent to a rejection of his offer. On this point he received satisfaction; Territorials would not be sent. He asked then if the Prime Minister could not say at once what steps would be taken to arm and equip the Volunteers. Mr. Asquith's reply emphasized the great difficulty which stood in the way. "I do not say," he added, "that it is insuperable." The first part was the voice of Lord Kitchener; the second, the voice of the Government which had sent the telegram of August 8th.

In the War Office the desire to give the National Volunteers as far as possible what they wanted did not exist, and the Government, who had that desire, had not the determination to enforce it. Such a position can never be for long concealed. Let it be remembered, too, that all through these days there was proceeding in Dublin a public inquiry into the events of the Howth gun-running and the affray at Bachelor's Walk, and some measure of Redmond's difficulties may be obtained.

Nevertheless, his policy was winning: and when Parliament rose for an adjournment, he spent his first Sunday in Ireland motoring to Maryborough, where he inspected a great muster of Volunteers, and was able to speak to them with gladness of the response to his appeal.

"From every part of Ireland I have had assurances from the Irish Volunteers that they are ready to fulfil this duty: and from every part—perhaps better and happier still—evidences of a desire on the part of men who in the past have been divided from us to come in at this hour of danger."

He told his audience how a battalion of that famous regiment, the Inniskilling Fusiliers, had been escorted through the town of Enniskillen, in which Orange and Green have always been equally and sharply divided, by combined bodies of the Irish and Ulster Volunteer Forces. Then turning to the question of equipment, and reminding them that the proclamation against importing arms had been withdrawn, he announced that he had secured several thousand rifles to distribute.[4] He went on then to pledge himself—it must be said with characteristic overconfidence—as to the intentions of the Government: "The Government—which has withdrawn its troops from Ireland and which has refused to send English Territorials to take their place—is about to arm, equip and drill a large number of Irish Volunteers." Very soon, he told them, every man in the force would have a rifle—and this involved a grave responsibility, and the need for discipline in the work which was laid upon them.

"I wish them God-speed with their work. It is the holiest work that men can undertake, to maintain the freedom and the rights and to uphold the peace, the order and safety of their own nation. You ought to be proud—you, the sons and the grandsons of men who were shot down for daring to arm themselves—you ought to be proud that you have lived to see the day when with the good will of the democracy of England you are arming yourselves in the light of heaven."

The note of exultation in this passage rings again and again through his utterances. He saw, or thought he saw, the symbol of achieved liberty in the muster of young men, ready to take up the sword, and no longer branded with the name of felons for so doing. Nor was he alone in his rejoicing. The host at that meeting was a great Irish landlord, Colonel Sir Hutcheson Poe. He, upon reading Redmond's speech of August 4th had written to the Press saying that since he was too old to serve he was taking steps to arm and equip a hundred National Volunteers. Now, in Redmond's presence, addressing a body of the Volunteers, he told them what he thought of Redmond's action.

"That five minutes' speech did more to compose our differences, to unite all Irishmen in a bond of friendship and good will, than could have been accomplished by years of agitation or by a conference, however well-intentioned it might be."

That was a notable tribute from one of the eight men who formed the historic Land Conference of 1902; and Sir Hutcheson Poe was not the man to rest on complimentary expressions. He set to work at once to promote a memorial praying for joint action between Ulster and the Irish Volunteers and for settlement of the political question which alone prevented such action.

Unhappily, this was not easy of accomplishment. When the House reassembled after its adjournment of a fortnight, negotiations were resumed, with the result that on August 31st the Prime Minister asked for a fresh adjournment for ten days, at the end of which time the Government hoped to be able to produce satisfactory proposals as to the Irish and Welsh Bills. Redmond felt himself obliged to enter a protest. It had been agreed that the circumstances of the war should not be allowed to inflict political injury on any party in the House; and he would give the friendliest consideration to any proposal for giving to the Opposition what they might have gained by a discussion on the Amending Bill.

"But we must emphatically say that any proposal which would have the effect of depriving us of the enactment of the Irish measure—and I presume I may say the same with reference to the Welsh measure—an enactment to which we were entitled practically automatically when the circumstances of the war arose, would do infinite mischief, and would be warmly resented by us.

"Just let me say one word more. There has arisen in Ireland the greatest opportunity that has ever arisen in the history of the connection between the two countries for a thorough reconciliation between the people of Ireland and the people of this country. There is to-day, I venture to say, a feeling of friendliness to this country, and a desire to join hands in supporting the interests of this country such as were never to be found in the past; and I do say with all respect, that it would be not only a folly, but a crime, if that opportunity were in any degree marred or wasted by any action which this country might take. I ask this House—and I ask all sections of the House—to take such a course as will enable me to go back to Ireland to translate into vigorous action the spirit of the words I used here a few days ago."

An angry scene followed. Mr. Balfour asked whether "it was possible decently to introduce subjects of acute discussion in present circumstances"—in other words, whether all mention of Home Rule must not be postponed till after the war. This provoked hot debate, checked only by a strong appeal from the Prime Minister. But the general effect was not reassuring to Ireland. The contrast with the Tsar's prompt grant of autonomy to Poland was sharply drawn. Nobody rated high the chances of an amicable agreement. On September 4th Sir Edward Carson outlined his views in Belfast. Home Rule "will never be law in our country." But "in the interests of the State and of the Empire we will postpone active measures." This indicated sufficiently that in his judgment the Bill might become law, and that they would not be encouraged to set up immediate resistance. The Prime Minister, as chief Minister of the nation, must be supported in the war at all costs.

Next day, renewing at Coleraine his appeal for recruits, he said:

"We are not going to abate one jot or tittle of our opposition to Home Rule, and when you come back from serving your country you will be just as determined as you will find us at home."

This was the answer to Redmond's proposal of fraternization. Clearly Sir Edward Carson had made up his mind that he could not prevent the passage of the Bill, and he decided upon the strongest course, which was to advocate unlimited support to the war. Any other course would have been ruinous to his cause, which depended always upon a profession of the extremest loyalty. Yet only a strong man, confident in his leadership, could have taken this line at a moment when Ulstermen were about to feel that all their preparations were wasted and that the game had been won against them by a paralysing chance.