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asks, with the notorious Tweed, 'What are you going to do about it?' The Irish hold the balance of power. If the Democrats do not please them, they vote for the Republicans, as did Patrick Ford and his 'physical force' friends in the last election; and were rewarded by the practical excision of the dynamite clauses,' and the extension of the clause excepting 'political offences' in the recent extradition treaty with Great Britain, as well as by the appointment of Patrick Egan as United States Minister to Chili. In this connection, it is instructive to note that in an extradition treaty entered into with Japan in 1886, the Senate of the United States confirmed a clause in which 'malicious destruction' was made an extraditable offence, in language akin to that originally introduced into the English treaty but then there are no Japanese-born voters in the United States. Besides the comic papers, there are certain weekly journals which are independent in politics, and can, therefore, afford to be indifferent to 'catching the Irish vote.' 'America,' published in New York and Chicago, is somewhat too bitter to be altogether trustworthy. It is 'Orange' in its sympathies, and we know in what lurid tints the Orangeman is apt to paint the portrait of his 'Popish' countryman. There is a rankling sense of injustice to account for this; the Catholic societies are allowed to parade on St. Patrick's Day; the Orange societies are strictly forbidden. It is true that permission was granted one 12th of July, early in the Seventies, for the Orangemen to have a parade similar to that held by the Irish on St. Patrick's Day; but the result was an opposing mob, a riot, the calling out of the militia, and several deaths; proving that an Orange parade is impossible in Irish-governed New York.

These Irish rulers of the ruling nation' to what country do they owe allegiance? To America, or to the 'uncrowned king' of the Irish Republic'? are they Irish at heart or Americans? Let us attempt to decide the question by judging of their

actions.

On March 14, 1888, two resolutions were passed by the New York Board of Aldermen. One of these resolutions requested the Mayor' to cause the National State and Municipal flags, and the Irish National flag, to be displayed on the flagstaffs on the City Hall, on Saturday the 17th instant, in honour of the celebration by the Irish civic and military organizations in this City, of the anniversary of the natal day of Ireland's patron saint.' The other resolution requested the Mayor' to place at half-staff a flag on flagstaff of the City Hall on the day of the funeral of the lamented Kaiser William.'

Observe, the Irish National flag—the green flag of the Irish Republic

Republic-as truly a rebel flag as that of the 'Southern Confederacy.' Observe also, no mention of the German flag in the second resolution; though 28.93 per cent. of the population of New York City are of German birth or descent. The inference is obvious: the German-Americans are loyal to their adopted country; the Irish-Americans are Irish at heart. Mayor Hewitt, although a Democrat, declined on grounds of principle and public policy to allow any flags, except the American, to float over the City Hall. The flag,' he says in his message vetoing the resolution, is the symbol of sovereignty. The public buildings are peculiarly the home of that sovereignty. In them only one jurisdiction can be recognized and suffered to prevail. Over them should float only the flag of the country to which they belong. . . The display of a foreign flag over a public building is in direct contradiction of the fundamental principle of Home Rule. . . which doubtless you intended to emphasize by your resolution.' Further on, he defines what he understands by Home Rule: 'If it be right that Ireland should be governed by Irishmen, as France is governed by Frenchmen, and Germany by Germans, then it is equally true that America should be governed by Americans, and that so far as the flag is the symbol of Home Rule, it, and it alone, should float from the seat of sovereignty.'

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At the November elections of that year, 1888, Mr. Hewitt, though by far the most popular candidate, was defeated by the Irish vote, and an Irish-American, the son of a liquor-dealer, was raised to the Mayoralty; those rulers of the city being resolved to elect a man who would do as they wished. At least so the subsequent events would seem to indicate, for on the 17th of March, 1889, the Irish flag floated proudly over 'the seat of sovereignty' in conjunction with the National and Municipal flags. It waved there again in 1890: the Irish cause had triumphed. Everywhere the green flag was in evidence over every imaginable kind of building. Were Ireland a first-rate European Power, and the best and truest ally of the States, no greater honours could have been paid to it. Let us see what the Irish themselves say about their allegiance. At a meeting held in New York in this year to celebrate the anniversary of Robert Emmet's birthday, these resolutions were passed:That the Irish-American people, as loyal citizens of this Republic, need no instruction from the American press, as regards their citizen duty to the commonwealth.' Again: That no power on this earth, no matter what threats may be made, or what inducements may be offered, can divorce the hearts of the Irish-American people from the cause of the

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Mother

Mother Land; and that, in so declaring, we show our unmistakable appreciation of free American institutions.'

'From this,' remarks America' (March 6, 1890), it would appear that our Irish-American friends need instruction from some source as to making a choice between allegiance to the land of their birth or the land they have adopted for strategic reasons.' New York, therefore, since it is governed by its Irish citizens, can hardly lay claim to the possession of American Home Rule. Irish Home Rule in New York does not appear to have proved a very successful experiment during the past twenty years; and yet an American speaker, at a dinner on St. Patrick's Day, declared that 'the success of self-government in America was the best augury for the eventual establishment of such government in Ireland.' Judging by the success of selfgovernment in New York, the augury would not seem to be a very favourable one. Bad servants do not make good masters; and bad subjects make excessively bad rulers.

The picture we have here drawn is that of Irish Home Rule in New York; the question follows, Will it prove a greater success in Ireland itself?

This inquiry must be constantly present in the minds of British Unionists. And the reply should correspond with the admitted facts of Irish Home Rule in Ireland and in America. In New York fraud, corruption, wholesale robbery, and wanton murder; in Ireland coercion, boycotting, malversation, and evictions wholesale under the auspices of the Land League, with midnight assassinations, mutilations, and cruelty, all undenounced by the acknowledged leaders of the Home Rule party. To the unspeakable degradation of association with these people has the great, historic Liberal party been betrayed by the man who had so fervently denounced the objects that he now supports.

Mr.

The present Ministry has a very different record. Gladstone's Government entirely failed to govern Ireland; Mr. Balfour has entirely succeeded. Ireland is more tranquil than it ever has been within living memory, though never have the incentives to disorder been so regularly organized; and this is the great claim of the present Government on the support and confidence of the nation; they have maintained the Union, and have governed well. But, besides all this, they have legislated with acknowledged wisdom in the main. They brought forward the Licensing Clauses with the sole view of promoting temperance, and they could not fairly anticipate that Mr. Gladstone, Sir William Harcourt, and Mr. John Morley would repudiate their own recorded principles.

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The trouble that occurred about these clauses has already passed away; but the occasion of it will not be forgotten. Extreme men may be excitable and threateningly demonstrative; but the good sense and moderation of the English people is more quiet and more resolute, and will eventually prevail. In home, and foreign, and colonial, affairs the present Government have been remarkably successful; no Ministry since the first Reform Bill has conducted the administration of the country with more success, and none has faced so unprincipled and factious an Opposition. They have the well-merited respect of the public, who are ready to support them heartily when they occasionally stumble, or are treacherously treated. They are, above all other things, a Union Government; and wise men of all parties, Conservatives, Liberals, and Radicals, continue united to maintain them in their Unionist and progressive policy.

ART.

THE

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

ART. I.-Letters of Philip Dormer, Fourth Earl of Chesterfield, to his Godson and Successor. Edited from the Originals, with a Memoir of Lord Chesterfield, by the Earl of CarSecond edition. Oxford. At the Clarendon Press.

narvon.

1890.

There The editing of these Letters was the last service

this volume now belongs a mournful and pathetic

which one of the most accomplished and scholarly of English noblemen was to render to literature. It was undertaken, not as a labour of love in the ordinary sense of the term-for Lord Carnarvon has himself admitted that he had at first little pleasure in his task-but as a labour of love in another and higher sense. It was undertaken with the pious intention of fulfilling the wishes of the dead, and of contributing to lighten the obloquy which had long rested on the memory of the dead. With characteristic unobtrusiveness, Lord Carnarvon has made no allusion to the circumstances which must have rendered his self-imposed task doubly irksome. Our respect for the honourable motives, which prompted him to devote his leisure to the least attractive of literary employments, passes into admiration when we know, as we now know, that it was not only under the pressure of habitual ill-health, but often in the midst of severe distress and pain that this work was carried on. It is gratifying to think that he lived to receive his reward. The high opinion, which he had himself formed of the letters, was amply corroborated by the popular judgment. Very shortly after the appearance of the first edition of his work, a second and cheaper edition was called for, and he had the satisfaction of feeling that, if his labours had not exactly added to the fame of Chesterfield, they had at least revived it. They had done more. They had furnished, as all allowed, conclusive testimony that Vol. 171.-No. 342.

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