The Home Rule Struggle (1893)

Chapter XXXI

The Home Rule Struggle (1893)

My absence from Dublin at the Meath petitions for three weeks lost me the control of the Freeman. This is touched on in the following letters to my brother:

Kilkcaldy,

5th January, 1893.

“We had a good meeting in Newcastle-on-Tyne. I called on Joe Cowen, M.P. and had a long friendly conversation with him. His chief writer on Irish topics is a young fellow called Garvin, who is clever, but a bitter Parnellite. He is correspondent for United Ireland, in which you may have noticed able attacks on us.”

In the middle of the negotiations with the Liberal Cabinet as to the Home Rule Bill-which the Redmondites were certain to denounce as inadequate - Dillon tried to get control of the Freeman by driving Murphy and myself oft the board. With this object he was continually visiting Archbishop Walsh, who was naturally anxious for peace with Redmond’s party as well as for a satisfactory measure of Home Rule. I felt that if Dillon captured the Freeman any weakness in the Home Rule Bill would be condoned, and that, as the Redmondites now distrusted him more than myself, the hope of his conciliating them was a delusion.

I wrote Maurice

Dublin,

13th January, 1893.

“Dillon, abetted by Sexton, has been trying to drive me and Murphy off the Freeman Board. The plea is that a commerical [Sic. KF.]board is needed. They have been interviewing the Archbishop of Dublin, and carried a resolution to consult Alderman Kernan in my absence. Sexton has recently been a regular attendant at the board. They on Monday saw the Archbishop for the third time.

I said I would not agree to any reconstruction of the board until I knew who were to be our successors. I proposed that, to obviate scandal in the middle of the Home Rule crisis, we should agree to work on quietly with the board as it is, and avoid topics except business at the annual meeting. Dillon, however, that day carried a vote condemning the editor for publishing the list of Mrs. O’Shea’s creditors, which Sexton said caused “a pang” to thousands of families.

Young Gray is with me for the suggestion to have no row at the annual meeting. Sexton agreed also, and so did every one but Dillon, who refused to bind himself, or even to be absent from the meeting, although he has no money in the concern. It being after 10 p.m. I left, having during the course of the evening spoken of my feelings towards Dillon, which he said threatened a vendetta against him.

After I left, Dillon proposed Sexton as Chairman of the Company, without notice. Murphy protested, and put on his coat to follow me, whereupon Sexton said he was not going to remain either. Mooney, who has been acting firmly, says Dillon got frightened, but Gray, who was in the chair by rotation, insisted that he should put the motion. This was done, and so the matter stands. I believe there is a majority of the Party “anti-bounder” and I mean to test this.

Sexton wrote to ask me to call on him to-day about the financial memorandum he is drafting for the Cabinet on behalf of the Party. I did so, and complimented him highly upon it. I believe every question on the Home Rule Bill has been settled except finance, and I can’t say how far our contentions on this will be yielded. That we should make our claims vital to the existence of the measure, Sexton agrees. He has been seeing the Treasury officials, and believes they mean to swindle us, as if we were green.

I am sorry to have trouble with Sexton about the Freeman, for originally I would gladly have accepted him as Chairman, though not as an ally of the “bounders.” My supposed interference with the paper, as you may imagine, is nil. Sexton is competent to encounter the Treasury on the financial question.

Dublin,

20th January, 1893.

“There is no reason to be discouraged, as you suppose, because Dillon and O’Brien have made a fissure in the Party. It ran smoothly until they were released from jail. The Freeman business culminated on Tuesday in a resolution by Dillon to publish the election of Sexton to the Chair. I said I would, side by side with that statement, reveal the circumstances under which the trick was accomplished. I told Sexton that “the receiver was as bad as the thief” and in the end they funked the publication. They then suggested a meeting privately called of the shareholders of over £50, which I pointed out was a franchise selected to exclude the National Press proprietors, and therefore we would attend no such meeting, but would probably convene a counter-gathering.

In the middle of this Captain O’Conor made a suggestion which had previously been broached to him by Murphy, that we should all place our resignations in the hands of the Archbishop, leaving His Grace to reconstitute the board. I agreed, and in turn so did every one. Dr. Walsh is therefore master of the situation, and I have no doubt he will leave myself, Gray and Dillon off the new board. He sent yesterday for Henry Gill, ex-M.P., who declined to join the board, and I have no idea where His Grace is casting his lines, as I have no communication from him or knowledge of his intentions. I fear he is advising exclusively with Sexton and Alderman Kernan, who is alarmed for his property. I don’t think the solution a good one, and regard it as scarcely tolerable, but the strain was getting unbearable, and our financial weakness was such that we could not rally the shareholders enthusiastically… ”

Dublin,

25th January, 1893.

“The Archbishop [of Dublin] wrote me on Monday saying he found it impossible to do anything to construct the Freeman Board, as all his efforts had failed, and he therefore washed his hands of it. Sexton then asked us to meet to-morrow to see if we could agree to anything among ourselves, but there is no prospect of this. I will not make up my mind what course to take until we see how we succeed as to the Parliamentary Committee.”

Such was the plight into which the National organ had been landed, with a fierce opposition journal published by the Redmondites containing daily misrepresentations of our attitude and denouncing us as “Whigs” and “traitors.” The saddest part of the intrigue lay in the fact that we were now at odds with Gladstone as to the finance of the proposed Home Rule Bill-which ultimately turned out to be unsatisfactory. I wrote Maurice:

Dublin,

27th January, 1893.

“The Archbishop yesterday, in reply to an unauthorized communication from Sexton, wrote a further letter asking for a month to patch up the Freeman Board, and we are now squabbling over Dillon’s having visited His Grace meanwhile. Murphy was to see His Grace to-day before we meet this afternoon and learn what transpired.

At a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee yesterday Sexton reported an unsatisfactory proposition about finance from Gladstone, which we unanimously rejected. There are besides awkwardnesses arising as to the police. The Government also want the Land Purchase Commission to be an Imperial Body. Sexton is splendidly equipped for them on finance, and Morley is in our favour. The Committee of the Cabinet is with us in everything except finance, but I fear Harcourt is fighting against us. Rosebery is helping us, and so is Asquith, but neither of them is on the Committee. I think things will be right except finance. How that will be I don’t know. Gladstone is worried over our obduracy, but we will not accept any scheme such as he suggests.”

Dublin,

January, 1893.

“Before the Freeman meeting yesterday Murphy went to see the Archbishop, and found him quite friendly, and he explained that Dillon’s visit was for the purpose of asking him to continue the negotiations without regard to his views previously expressed. We therefore reauthorized the Archbishop to rearrange the board, and extended the time for another month. I don’t think much will come of it. The Archbishop saw Kernan and got him to urge H. J. Gill to consent to act, but he refused.”

In the end the Archbishop was told by some of his visitors that if William Murphy and I were left on the Freeman Board, or given influence on it, a reign of ” Keogh and Sadleir” would be inaugurated under a Home Rule administration - as we had nothing but corruption and selfishness in view. His Grace, therefore, moulded a board to include a majority of Dillon’s supporters.

Shareholders’ meetings of ratification were commingled with fun. At one of them David Sheehy, M.P., a partisan of Dillon, described John Barry’s view as a “dernier entendre”! He corrected it when laughed at by saying he meant a “double ressort”! These blunders became a political shibboleth.

That evening the proprietor of the Ship Hotel, Stephen Cunningham, who bad won over our garrison in United Ireland against Parnell in December, 1890, waggishly rose to address the shareholders. Affecting great solemnity, he declared:

“All my life’s fortune is invested in the Freeman’s Journal. Yet I have now to leave for the G.P.O. to see a man about a dog. Before I go may I avail of my acquaintance with the French language to make a last and almost dying declaration. It is to say how profoundly I was affected by Mr. Healy’s statement that he would ‘sell his shirt’ to pay off Mrs. Gray and the Freeman owners. I cannot bid you good-bye without expressing the hope that he may never be obliged to sever himself from his’ dernier entendre’!

Dillon’s plans to oust us from the board led to the Daily Nation being started, which Murphy largely financed.

In April, 1893, Gladstone, aged 83, introduced the Home Rule Bill. After its second reading when walking next day, Saturday, through Whitehall on my way to the Library of the Commons, I saw a carriage and pair emerge from Downing Street. It held an old couple who were trying to talk to each other, their necks bent cross-wise, for each wished to reach the “good ear” by which the other heard. They had sacrificed convenience to etiquette in their places in the carriage.

The pair were Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone. Their attempt to converse with one another was touching, and I felt this the more, being deaf in one ear myself. I sent Mrs. Gladstone a note that evening, expecting no reply, but she answered:

10, Downing Street,

Whitehall,

23rd April 1893.

Dear Mr. Healy, -

“Let me thank you with all my heart for a letter which lifts one up high.

There are times in our life when such words come to do special good. As anxiety and joy alternate they require more than usual wise balance. Your touching words touch the right chord, as you recall for our comfort the great heart of Ireland praying on many affairs. Who then ought to be faint-hearted?

My husband read your letter and was much moved. No trouble and no pains will he spare for Ireland’s great cause! Misunderstandings will vanish more and more as he continues to fight in a just and glorious cause. I cannot help mentioning our loved and precious niece, Lady Frederick Cavendish - the tears of hope and comfort your letter brought.”

Believe me,

dear Mr. Healy,

Yours truly,

Catherine Gladstone.

Lady Frederick Cavendish was the widow of the Chief Secretary, murdered on the 6th May, 1882, in the Phoenix Park, Dublin. She died in 1925.

In the debates on the Home Rule Bill the breakdown of Lord Randolph Churchill could not be hidden. As he rose to oppose it the House hushed, prepared to hang on his words, but he hardly uttered a sentence before he became unintelligible. Members fled into the Lobby. To check the outrush I cried, “Order! Order!” and Randolph turned to me, saying, “I thank the honourable gentleman.” The incident is recorded only in the Shipping Gazette, edited by a Welsh M.P. named Jones.

A few weeks later, as I was sitting next William Johnston, of Ballykilbeg (the Orange leader), Randolph sprang up to move that my words “be taken down.” Johnston protested that I had not opened my mouth. Mr. Speaker skilfully passed over the calamity.

Sir Henry Lucy told me that Randolph came that evening to a dinner party, where both were guests, and proclaimed, “I have just got Healy suspended!”

A note reached me from the stricken man next day:

50 Grosvenor Square, W.,

2nd May, 1893.

My Dear Sir, -

“On reading the parliamentary reports this morning, on reflection over all the circumstances in connection with the accusation I made against you last evening in the House, I write to you to inform you that I am convinced my ears quite deceived me, and that I was wrong in making the charge that you had used the words which I attributed to you. Perhaps I ought to have said this last night, but there was so much excitement in the House, and I was so puzzled about the whole matter that I wanted to think it all over.

The delay, however, will not, I think, cause you to doubt the sincerity with which I now write to you to offer you a very full expression of regret for what I said against you, and a complete withdrawal by me of the charges.

Trusting you will accept this in the spirit in which it is written.”

I am,

Yours very faithfully,

Randolph S. Churchill.

T. M. Healy, Esq., M.P.

P.S. - “Of course you will make what use of this letter as seems good to you.”

I replied that I would not dream of publishing his apology, glad as I was to get it.

He answered:

50 Grosvenor Square, W.,

13th May, 1893.

Dear Mr. Healy, -

“I am extremely obliged to you for your amiable letter.”

Yours very truly.

Randolph S. Churchill.

During the Home Rule debates Gladstone invited me to dine at Downing Street. It was embarrassing, but I could not refuse. At dinner I noted with pleasure that he sipped his wine like a youth, and enjoyed the meal. When he took coffee some undissolved sugar remained in the cup, and he spooned and ate it with childlike enjoyment. This relish of life gave me cheer. Lord Acton was the only other guest that I remember.

During dinner I asked Gladstone if he had seen much of Daniel O’Connell. “Well,” he mused, “I once served on an election petition with him as to a Windsor contest.” He was precise in calling Dan “Mr.” O’Connell, and I recalled that in a speech of 1881, when moving a grant for a statue to Disraeli, he spoke of Pitt (who had been dead nearly 80 years) as “Mr. Pitt.” The House did not catch the “mistered” name, and cried, “Who?

So Gladstone solemnly repeated, “Mr. Pitt.” He spoke to me of “Mr.” O’Connell in 1893, and with a boyish smile told that the landlady of a Windsor hotel, accused of “treating” voters, was required to give evidence before a Committee of the House of Commons. Instead of attending she sent a doctor’s certificate assigning illness as an excuse. “Her testimony was vital,” Gladstone said, “and Mr. O’Connell, in his rotund voice, declared, ‘If the mountain will not come to Mahomet, let Mahomet go to the mountain!’ So a four-in-hand was ordered, and,” Gladstone said, “we drove to Windsor, and I spent a most pleasant day with Mr. O’Connell, and enjoyed the drive with him on the box-seat.”

He made no comment on O’Connell’s character, nor recalled any other of his sayings nor discussed his policy.

I talked to him about the Turks and tried to defend them as a religious people, however mistaken, He bristled. “Well,” said I, “take their prayer carpets and the fact that the Muezzin ascends the tower for prayer every day at noon.” Sharply he answered, “I got one of them to ascend at 10 o’clock for five piastres! ” We then spoke of the obstinacy of the Sultan in 1881 in obstructing the Treaty of Berlin as regards Montenegro. Gladstone and Tennyson were partisans of Montenegro because of its century-old resistance to the Turks. The British fleet had concentrated at Besika Bay, and I asked Gladstone what he would have done if the Sultan had proved obdurate. “Sir,” said he, with a flashing glance, “I should have seized Smyrna!” After a pause he added, “Yet never was I so thankful as when, on a Sunday afternoon, I saw Granville smilingly approaching Downing Street by the private entrance with the news that the Turks had yielded.”

In 1893, on the Committee stage of the Home Rule Bill, there arose a bout of fisticuffs without precedent in the annals of the Mother of Parliaments. It is described in Hansard of the 27th July, 1893. As I stood in the gangway at the height of the scrum my brother quoted lines from Kipling’s “Belts”

The English were too drunk to know; The Irish didn’t care.

Nobody was drunk (except with fury), and the cause of the uproar requires hindsight to understand.

The Closure rule was in operation, and it mechanically ended debate at 10 p.m. Chamberlain was speaking at that moment upon an amendment hostile to the Bill moved by one of the Redmondites.

He compared Gladstone to Herod, and as he concluded, T. P. O’Connor shouted, “Judas! Judas! Judas!” A Tory moved that these words be “taken down” just as the division began. The Chairman had not heard the words, and the Opposition refused to clear the House (i.e., enter the division lobbies) unless the Chair took action.

A device of ex-Chancellor Ritchie’s had been adopted to save a few seconds in the lobbies. Each party then, instead of leaving by opposite doors, passed out beyond the Speaker’s Chair in commingled streams. Sir J. W. Logan, a Liberal, blocked by the throng, seated himself on the front Opposition Bench to allow the block to clear.

Deeming this an intrusion, Hayes Fisher, ex-secretary to Mr. Balfour, thrust him off. Logan, so buffeted, turned on Fisher with his elbow. Then they got to grips, and a fight became general. The scene was due to a misunderstanding between individuals, and was stopped by hisses from the Strangers’ Gallery. The hisses voiced the opinion of onlookers, and was the only admonition by “strangers” ever known to affect the House.

The Speaker was sent for, and after some exchanges T.P. apologized. Thirty years later he explained in the Press that he didn’t mean to insult Chamberlain!

I must have been depicted by the American Press as a prominent combatant, for next day I got a cablegram from the Mayor and Corporation of Alexandria, La. (Louisiana), declaring that the city had voted me a silk hat to replace one battered by my prowess against the Tories. The message asked for the measurement of my head by return cable. My headgear, however, was unharmed, but at the cost of several silk hats I cabled thanks, and received an elegant “topper” (alas! too small) in a handsome case. In gratitude to the Mayor and Corporation of Alexandria, La., I crushed it on my head, and for the next 20 years wore it until my resignation from the House in October, 1918.

During the fight a strange omen appeared in the Commons. A rail of the second bench below the gangway loosened in the turmoil, stood upright-like a dead arm thrusting itself from a corpse in rigor mortis.

An attempted onset on me by Harry Foster was baffled, and we afterwards became friends. Irish members then used to study personal history affecting opponents, so that we could thrust a spear into weak places in their armour. I had been told that Foster was one of a group which floated “Warner’s Safe Cure,” a genuine medicament, and that the shares were “over-sold” on the Stock Exchange. Jobbers could therefore not escape a “squeeze,” and paid large sums to “get out.” There was nothing wrong in this, as everything took place in accordance with the rules of the Stock Exchange. The “bears” were cornered, and this led only to amusement. When Foster entered the House of Commons he asked Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, Minister for War, as to the prevalence of “glanders” amongst horses in a cavalry barracks, and received a reply which he deemed unsatisfactory. He pressed the necessity of applying a remedy, and the Minister blurted out,” We have tried every possible remedy without success.”

I inquired, “Has the right hon. gentleman tried ‘Warner’s Safe Cure’?

Sir Harry, naturally, after this wished to get back “a bit of his own.” He failed, and we soon were reconciled.

During the debates of 1893, Michael Davitt, then a new Member of the House, met with an interruption from Mr. Brookfield (brother of the actor), who objected to his speaking from notes. Davitt’s loss of an arm caused an awkward manipulation of his notes, and this doubtless led to the charge that he was reading his speech - contrary to the practice of Parliament. Mr. Speaker was reluctant to interfere with a maiden speech, delivered under difficulties, yet he had to rule in Brookfield’s favour, but his manner was kindly and his judgment suave. On subsequent days Brookfield rose several times, but did not “catch his eye.” Irish Members were much gratified, and Dr. Tanner determined to take further vengeance on him.

One night, when Brookfield had risen frequently, but in vain, Tanner sent him an imaginary letter from Mr. Speaker in terms such as these:

9 p.m.

Dear Mr. Brookfield, -

“I regret very much that in spite of the number of times you have risen, you have failed to catch my eye. I write this to assure you that when next you get up I shall certainly call you.”

Sincerely yours,

Arthur Peel.

Tanner got this delivered by one of the Speaker’s attendants, and Brookfield swelled importantly. He went to his place at once, and when the previous orator finished, rose confident that he would be “taken.” The Speaker, however, called on quite a different person, and Brookfield remained on his legs challenging possession.

Sternly Mr. Speaker called him to order, and bade him resume his seat. The jeers of the Irish Members, who had mustered for the comedy, were galling. He muttered an indignant protest, and sat down. Then he went round to the Chair to complain. “You promised, sir, to call on me,” he protested.

“What!” quoth Mr. Peel. “The Chair does not bargain with Members.”

“But I have it from you in writing.”

“Never, sir.”

“But here’s your letter.”

“My letter!” replied the Speaker. “I wrote you no letter.”

“Look at that,” said Brookfield, producing the document. “A forgery, sir! ” was the reply. ” I care not who is involved in it. Retire to your place!

The Irish Members could hardly retain their convulsions. That day they talked no more.

The Redmondites gave all the trouble they could during the session. Nine in number, they voted against Gladstone’s nominee for Speaker when Mr. Peel resigned, and supported the Tory.

The third reading of the Home Rule Bill was only carried by a majority of 38. Redmond likened the measure to a “toad, ugly and venomous, yet wearing a precious jewel in its head,” although knowing that the House of Lords would reject it.

After the third reading my brother and I sat up all night at the lodgings of Chance and O’Driscoll to catch the morning mail at Euston. We had not been home for two months. Maurice, to while away the time, argued with O’Driscoll (a Protestant) on religion. After some hours Chance interjected, “If you persist in your logic you will destroy his invincible ignorance - his only hope of salvation!”

Our attendance in the House of Commons, because of the narrowness of the majority for Home Rule, was so continuous that my brother, when applied to by the Income Tax authorities for his profits, returned them as nil. The officials disbelieved this, and sent inspectors to examine his books.

After inquiries for many days they went away, acknowledging that his return was correct. To swell the Lords’ division lists a few insane aristocrats were enlarged from asylums, and piloted through the lobbies by noble “keepers.”

When Parliament adjourned in 1893, after the Lords’ rejection of Home Rule, the Redmondites started an agitation, as to evictions on the estate of Lord de Freyne. His agent, Blakeney, was accused of burning houses to expedite evictions. The Government, however, only arrested the tenants’ supporters and sent them for trial, but refused to prosecute Blakeney.

I wrote Morley:

I Mountjoy Square,

Dublin,

Saturday, 11.11.‘93.

Dear Mr. Morley, -

“I am not aware if any member of our Party has thought it a duty to it or to you to represent privately on these calamitous de Freyne prosecutions. Until the Crown case had concluded on the first summons I thought it fair to assume that some weighty evidence would develop which would justify the action taken.

I have, however, come to the conclusion that you have been led into a pitfall by some officials of the R.I.C., or your law advisers, and as apparently you are to recommence a second batch of summonses on Tuesday, I implore you for your own sake, and for ours, to give the matter further consideration.

First as to procedure, I am not familiar with prosecutors’ law, but I thought that having got the defendants returned for trial already, the Attorney-General could send up an indictment on any further charges at Assizes, and although technically the course being taken is fairer to the prisoners, and is the right one, surely good policy and common sense dictate the winding up of this woeful exhibition as speedily as can be, A conviction before a jury you never can get, and in any case, the only result of the proceedings must be either a nolle prosequi, or a disagreement, or acquittal (unless you pack a jury also) with a foundation beautifully laid by your own trowel for the Tory case for a Coercion Act.

Next would you take into view, not merely the Irish prejudice, but the English law against burning people’s houses? The old West-Cork Act (1828), it is true, is repealed, but when your own unreformed Parliament made it a felony punishable with death to burn down an empty dwelling in our country, and by the Repealing Act imposed penal servitude for life for burning down one that was inhabited, it behoved you to walk warily over hot embers. The evicted allege that Blakeney fired the thatch while a girl (or person) was inside, and the Government, which pounces to prosecute in the de Freyne interest is going to leave the arraignment of Blakeney in the hands of a private prosecutor!

How is it the police can always get Information to warrant proceedings against the tenants and their friends, but never against landlords or agents? An echo from the Ponsonby clearances might, however, have served as “bold advertisement” for Blakeney to the most purblind of your advisers.

As for the stab which these proceedings have given us, and the help they have lent to the Parnellites, I pass that sadly by - it is doubtless no affair of yours. I didn’t, however, believe that without a hint to anyone you would, with so light a tread, have taken this leap in the dark.

Where it will lead you to, if the Parnellites press their advantage, God only knows. You have delivered yourself and us into the hands of our enemies.

Yours truly,

T. M. Healy.

I cannot trace a reply from Morley, but believe he parried forcibly. The Redmondites failed to take advantage of the situation, and a drawn battle fizzled out. The estate was afterwards sold to the tenants.

A letter to my brother dealing with other topics runs:

House of Commons,

13th December, 1893.

"" … I read about Larminie’s book in United Ireland, and Douglas Hyde mentions in one of his books that Larminie possessed this collection. O’Neill Russell brought Hyde to my house last Friday, and we had a pleasant evening. Russell is opposed to phonetic spelling, but says he has so much respect for us he would not gainsay anything we said! Then he laid his head on the table and laughed boisterously and at his ease, over your representation of the “Our Father” in Irish spelling of the English words. He thinks that since Shakespeare this is the greatest thing ever done. He forgives you the outrage on the “ollavs,” principally, I think, because this mockery of yours offended MacSweeney of the Royal Irish Academy, who, he maintains, cannot read either ancient or modern Irish! I think Russell the most delightful human animal I have ever known: his honesty, sincerity, enthusiasm and genuine love for Ireland and Celtic things, in a man of his years and Protestant training, are marvellous. He is just as much embittered against Scotch Gaelic spelling as he was when l heard him thundering against it in 1878, with Butt in the chair, at the Westminster Palace Hotel. He has evidently never forgiven Parnell for his want of interest in that lecture.

Hyde, another Protestant, is a nice modest fellow - a student without any dogmatism, and quite unlike what I expected. I told him you and I would be glad to contribute to help his publications, but all he asked was that we would get his stuff regularly into the Weekly Freeman - for which he is not paid. It’s heartbreaking to think men like him are neglected, and their work undervalued. Russell said, when I spoke about your proposed textbook, that Hyde would be glad to correct it for you, and Hyde quietly assented. He seems to have no strong opinion on the phonetic question. Russell now and then would assail his pronunciation of Irish, as I heard him assail the proprietor of Cowell’s public-house in Holborn on that subject 15 years ago. I have seldom spent a pleasanter evening than I did with these men. Russell is to eat his Christmas dinner with me. Hyde is returning to Roscommon.

The Weekly Freeman says they only have enough Irish type to print O’Growney’s proposed lessons, and must exclude Hyde’s stuff. I am pressing for space for Hyde, who has some analysis or disquisition on the old poetry which he says is the result of four years’ study, and which he is anxious about. He told me he picked up Irish from an old gamekeeper, who had only a few words of English, with whom he used to go sporting as a boy.

I wish you would make some attempt at your Irish text-book. Hyde says Larminie’s phonetics were acquired from Sweet, and that he knows they are accurate, because he read for him things that Larminie did not understand, but which he had noted so accurately that Hyde understood it. I would willingly give £50 to help any publication in which these men are interested, relying on Providence to be able to earn it.”

In February, 1894, when Gladstone was about to resign, Morley used to come to my house in Mountjoy Square to tell me what was going on.

He was a pleasant man to meet, but sensitive to criticism. Opposed to Harcourt becoming Prime Minister, he did not favour Rosebery, and evidently fancied himself, if he could get Irish help. We, however, abstained from participation in the intrigue, and Morley’s opposition to Harcourt created the Rosebery premiership. Harcourt’s speech on Gladstone’s retirement showed deep emotion, and the House of Commons felt that a great light had gone out.

Lord Rosebery’s Government began in February, 1894, and ended in July, 1895. It was unfruitful for Ireland. The “predominant partner” watchword in his first speech helped the Redmondites. One thoughtful thing he did for England was to pay honour to the inventor of phonography by knighting Isaac Pitman. A note to me from Sir Isaac sets forth:

Bath,

25th June, 1894.

From Isaac Pitman.

My Dear Healy, -

“The last month has been a pleasant one to me, because of the elevation of phonography and spelling reform in the public mind, and a very trying one because I have been unable to keep abreast of my daily work, chiefly as to letters.

I thank you and all the members of the House of Commons who assisted in strengthening Lord Rosebery’s desire to do honour to the phonetic movement. The Countess, his late beloved wife, was a very fair writer of phonography, having taken lessons of a gentleman in some Government office (I forget his name). But the calls of the society in which Lord Rosebery moves prevented her from giving sufficient time to writing shorthand to do it with speed.

I and my wife take a rest, and a great enjoyment at the Handel Festival. We shall come back to the “Metropole” each evening.

I have printed a card as an acknowledgment of the congratulations of my friends, and will try to remember and post you one from the Metropole. Please give these tracts to the shorthand members of the House.”

Farewell.

Pitman was one of the greatest men of the Victorian era. He revolutionized and methodized shorthand. To teach longhand phonetically he cast founts of type adapted to Roman letters which enlarged the alphabet by a dozen extra signs.

Rejecting c, q, and x, he provided a letter for every sound in English. He printed children’s lesson books in the new notation, which shortened by years the time now thrown away by the young in learning to read in the old style.

Like many a genius, he carried his theories too far. In advocating reform of the “Three R’s” (reading, writing, and reckoning) he invaded the accepted numeral system. To “ten” he gave the power of twelve, and devised two new figures of the value of the present “ten” and “eleven.”

An unselfish man, Pitman sacrificed profit to logic in his publications. When he made changes in his shorthand system he scrapped everything already printed to advance his ideals.

In 1875 a Japanese deputation to Europe, sent to acquire Western knowledge, visited him at Bath. Its members favoured a scheme to adopt English as the Japanese tongue with phonetic spelling and a reformed grammar. Thereunder” good, better, best “would have been straightened into “good, gooder, goodest,” and everything irregular was to be regularized. They took from Pitman founts of his new type. His paper, however, pathetically recorded that their vessel of hope foundered in sight of Japanese shores.

When I was 20, I paid a visit of homage to Bath. In 1877 I revised Pitman’s Shorthand Teacher - his first elementary book. Most of my “outlines” and proposals were accepted by him and embodied in a new edition.

When he was knighted (the Copyright Act had not then been amended) I advised Sir Isaac to promote a private Bill to lengthen the period of his copyright in order to preserve his system from innovators or pirates after his death, telling him the House of Commons was sympathetic. He replied that there was no urgency, as he was only eighty, and intended to live to a hundred or thereabouts. A year or two afterwards he died. Pitman was a vegetarian, a total abstainer, an anti-tobacconist, a Swedenborgian, and anti-vaccinationist. He was a correspondent of Dr. Walsh, Archbishop of Dublin, and friendly to the Irish cause. I took shorthand lessons in 1872 in Manchester from his brother Henry - a charming and handsome personality. Another brother, Benn, published changes in Isaac’s system in America which its inventor resented.

Esteem for Pitman will grow amongst thinkers of future generations. German youth (thanks to a phonetically-spelt tongue) learn to read in three months, and can thus devote the rest of their school years to purposeful use. English-speaking children, after three years at school, fail to read correctly a printed page.

Objections to the reform of English and Gaelic spelling on etymological grounds infest both islands. After 50 years’ consideration, although linotype, the typewriter, and the Morse code have standardized what is dubbed “orthography,” I feel that these inventions supply no answer to the truth that children taught phonetically acquire the power to read the old notation years sooner than they otherwise would.

The effect of phonetic change on the French in Canada and the Dutch in South Africa needs no stressing. I once proposed to debate the waste of school years in the House of Commons, but Pitman feared the “reform” if advocated by an Irish Nationalist might be prejudiced.

President Roosevelt rushed the question in America and caused official documents to be printed phonetically. This was not the way to bring about reform. His principles were sound, but reform must begin in schools as a labour-saving device.

In 1906, when the New York Press visited him at Oyster Bay, their yacht’s sail was daubed with the satire, “Pres Bot”! In the three years of the Gladstone-Rosebery administration, when a majority of 40 was seldom mustered, the Redmondites boasted continually that, although only nine strong, they could reduce the majority to 20. A cant phrase of theirs was, that each vote” counted two on a division.” This was prettily availed of by Richard Adams, Q.C., at the Cork Assizes in 1893 in a libel action in which he appeared for Redmond’s paper against Alderman Condon, M.P., Mayor of Clonmel. The Mayor’s speech in returning thanks after presiding at a municipal poll was reported with the insertion of “hiccough” after each sentence - a disgraceful innuendo. At the trial Condon, a big, genial, likeable fellow, never given to excess, owned that from 8 a.m., when the poll opened, till its close at 8 p.m., he had partaken of four glasses of whisky, mostly at lunch and dinner time.

Adams, gloating over this admission, affected horror, and apostrophized the jury, “Four glasses, gentlemen! Eight half-glasses - counting sixteen on a division in his stomach!”

Adams jested endlessly, but with a spice of malice. Told that a prominent ex-M.P., who accepted a municipal office in Dublin, would become henceforth “an extinct volcano,” he said, “No, an extinct fusee!”

Of a colleague on whose orthodoxy he cast doubt he cried, “That man got baptism and vaccination on the same day, and neither ‘took.’ When acting as Barrister to revise the voters’ lists in Dublin, his delight was to pillory any friends who appeared as claimants. He affected not to know them. The chief reporter of the Freeman, a wonderful old man named MeWeeney, came up, and Adams pretended to disbelieve everything he swore.

“Who are you, sir? ” said he sternly. “Are you of age? (McWeeney was over 60.) He answered, “Oh, yes, yes.” Richard said, “Well, tradition is that in 1798 you were flogged in the Riding School by Major Sirr. You have no other qualifications for the franchise, but having suffered for your country your vote is allowed.” When adjourning for lunch, he turned to my brother, saying, “Mr. Healy, could you lend the Court a bob?”

I used to drop into his house at midnight occasionally. Once his wife, hearing a hum of conversation, called down, “Who’s there, Richard? Why don’t you come up?” He replied, “A civil engineer, my dear, is with me. We are holding a consultation in a building case for to-morrow.” I protested, lest she might appear. ” Oh, what matter,” he laughed, “my wife has caught me out in whole regiments of lies!”

She wished to go with him to London in 1892, after the Liberals came in, but he said it could not be, as he was going to stay at “Morley’s Hotel.” There, he told her, ladies were not admitted.

To this she replied, ‘Well, let’s go to another hotel.” “My dear,” he protested, “do you think I could forsake John Morley’s hotel?” The hotel had no connection with Morley, but Morley had become Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Dick wished to convey that his promotion might be imperilled if he did not stay at his supposed hotel.

That Christmas, when his wife aroused him for last Mass, he refused to get up, as it was wintry and he had a cold. She rigorously threw open the windows and pulled off the bedclothes. Quizzically came his reproach, “Woman! I never interfere with your religion, why should you interfere with mine? ” (Both were Catholics.)

Wilkinson, of the Manchester Guardian, said of Mrs. Adams that her Cork accent was so pretty he could listen to it all day long.

They lived in Mountjoy Square, where the residents pay a frontage-rent entitling them to entry to the gardens on which their houses look out - the money being spent solely on flowers and shrubs. The Chairman of the Square Committee, Baron Dowse, a famous wit, wrote Adams for payment of the Square tax. Dick had been a colleague of William O’Brien, M.P., on the Freeman in former years, but cherished no love for him. O’Brien was in prison, and had suffered indignity for refusing to wear convict clothes. So Adams replied to Dowse:

Dear Baron,

“How can you expect me to pay this iniquitous British Square tax while that Pure-souled patriot William O’Brien, languishes in Tullamore Jail?”

Adams was no admirer of the Chief Justice, Lord O’Brien. He refused some “motion” of his, and Adams returned to the Law Library kindling with indignation. Juniors gathered round to hear his quips like bees seeking honey. Thrusting one leg on a chair, Adams soliloquized.

“The new Oxford dictionary will, it is said, contain 120,000 words. This is a great advance on Webster or Sheridan, and still more on Dr. Johnson, whose compilations hardly contain 30,000 words.” No smile lit his face as he proceeded: “Shakespeare uses hardly more than 15,000 words, the Bible somewhat less. The vocabulary of the most educated speakers in England does not exceed 10,000 words. The Irish peasant probably commands 4,000 words; the English labourer not a thousand. The Kaffir in an African kraal has a mastery of 500 words; Lobengula probably 600. The most degraded Australian aborigine has only 100 words - the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland fifty words!”

This sally was, of course, conveyed to the Chief Justice, but Dick did not care. He followed Lord O’Brien to Homburg when King Edward was there. On his return a delighted auditory learned that His Majesty received the Irish Chief Justice with his accustomed bonhomie. Adams added this invention, that when Lord O’Brien left the presence, the King turned to an aide-de-camp, saying, “O’Brien, O’Brien, who is he? Was not there something about his breeches?

Only Dick could have fashioned that double-edged barb.

After he was made County Court Judge of Limerick he told me that a suitor, against whom he had decided, met him on a country road, when Adams said, “If you knew I was coming this way, I suppose you would have had me pelted with rotten eggs?

The reply (in the Anglo-Irish idiom) came, “There’s not a hen in Ireland would lay an egg to be flung at your Honour!”

In 1895 a vacancy in the Irish bench befell, on the death of Judge Monroe of the Landed Estates Court. He was ill nearly 12 months, but his friends would not allow him to resign until the Tories came back to office; in order to keep out the Liberal Attorney-General (McDermott).

Taxing-Master Coffey, originally a pillar of Whiggery, and registration agent for the Irish Liberal Party, had found salvation in Unionism. His son-in-law, the late William Kenny, Q.C., M.P., was naturally ambitious of the judgeship. John Ross, afterwards Sir John Ross (last of the Irish Chancellors), was given the appointment, and Master Coffey expressed his indignation to Adams “Oh,” Dick replied, “how could the Government appoint your son in law to the Landed Estates Court? “Why not,” grumbled Coffey “The landlords would never tolerate it” laughed Adams “Nonsense,” said Coffey “Well,” Dick replied do you think the Irish gentry would allow their estates to be turned into a coffee plantation’?”

William Kenny, on reaching the Bench made an excellent Judge, and was scrupulously fair At first he could not get rid of his Bar dislikes. Who can? Thomas O’Shaughnessy afterwards Judge, who held a brief in nearly every case at Nisi Prius in an action in which we were opposed, found that Kenny was “down” on both of us. As, however, O’Shaughnessy was appearing for Coastguards, who were Crown servants, the Judge charged in his favour and secured him a verdict.

O’Shaughnessy was not conciliated, and next day he and I were together before the late Judge Madden for a firm of undertakers with an Italian name. Determined to “get some of his own back” against Kenny, he descanted on the antiquity of his clients as carriage proprietors and “jobmasters,” and told the jury that he was old enough to remember a scurrilous paragraph in the Evening Mail wherein an announcement appeared that his clients had been appointed “jobmasters to the Castle.” To this, he said, with affected horror, the Mail appended the footnote, “What will become of Master Coffey?”

Judge Madden rolled in his chair at the drollery.

Kenny’s “edge” against me was more than justifiable. Politics ran high in 1892 when he was elected to Parliament. The incoming Liberal Government had released prisoners connected with the murder of Inspector Martin in Donegal, and Kenny questioned Morley as to the grounds for this clemency. Morley pompously told the House, “I released them after consultation with the Lord High Chancellor of England and the Lord High Chancellor of Ireland.” Kenny aptly inquired, “But did the right hon. gentleman act on settled practice by consulting the learned judge who tried the prisoners, Mr. Justice Gibson?

Morley coloured, and showed that he felt “caught out.” Seeing his confusion I interposed to create a diversion, and asked, “Has the right hon. gentleman also failed to consult another legal luminary, Master Coffey?”

Kenny turned white, and in the gusts of laughter that followed, the Speaker called on the next question, and Kenny’s interrogatory was never answered. We were “out for scalps” in those days.

When I got back to the Four Courts later on, Walker, Lord Chancellor, passing through the colonnades in the dusk, squeezed my hand but said nothing.

Judge Kenny was an ornament to the Bench and always strove to be impartial. A jury over which he presided in Cork disagreed on the trial of an American ex-soldier named Cadogan for the murder in Bantry of a land agent named Bird. There was a doubt, yet the Crown prosecutors, George Wright, a Tory (afterwards Judge), and R. Barry (afterwards Liberal Lord Chancellor), joined in framing a telegram to the Attorney-General in London (now Lord Atkinson): “Disagreement, after putrid charge by Kenny.”

Before the message was sent off “putrid” was changed to “weak.” At the next Assizes Cadogan was convicted before another judge, and hanged.

Sir John Ross tells that in Ireland it required “no ability to act as a judge, but great ability to get appointed to a judgeship!

A barrister from India, suffering from sunstroke, pestered the Dublin tribunals in those days, and a doctor was brought to listen to his mouthings so that he might be certified insane. A Bar jest became current that the doctor agreed to certify two of the judges to be “cracked,” but was not so certain as to the barrister.

A Lord Chancellor of England before the Treaty of 1921 declared to me that he told the Prime Minister the recruitment of the Irish Bench was “a disgrace to the Empire.” Here I must go back.

In 1894 the Liberals brought in an Evicted Tenants Bill, which was fought hotly by the Opposition. Chamberlain, on the 27th July, 1894, reproached me, saying, “The hon. and learned member for Louth, who seems to direct the proceedings - he directs the Government, and he would like very much to direct us.”

Mr. Healy: “The day is gone by, when I used to.”

Mr. Chamberlain: “I can remember the time when the hon. and learned gentleman was in very different relations, and when he was a suppliant for favours, but I do not think that this is relevant to the amendment.”

It then struck me that in ‘82, the night before the introduction of the Land Bill drafted in Kilmainham, Captain O’Shea came and pressed me to see Chamberlain. I consented; and this incident was all that Mr. Chamberlain, 12 years later, could furnish in justification of his phrase, “a suppliant for favours.” I left the Chamber to address him this letter:

House of Commons,

27th Jury, 1894.

Sir, -

“You have just stated across the House that you could name the day when I was “a suppliant for favours.” I shall thank you to name the day and the favours, and shall publish this letter and your reply, as it would not be in order in the debate now proceeding to discuss the question.”

He replied:

House of Commons,

July 27th, ‘94.

Sir, -

“In reply to your enquiry, I have to say that I was thinking of the time when you asked for an interview through Captain O’Shea. I think you referred to this interview yourself the other night, otherwise I should have considered it as confidential.”

Yours faithfully,

J. Chamberlain.

I answered:

House of Commons,

27th July, 1894.

Sir, -

“I never asked for an interview with you through Captain O’Shea or anyone else. Captain O’Shea came to me one night, and pressed me to see you, the day before the Land Dill drafted in Kilmainham was introduced. I consented, but I am not aware how this is being “a suppliant for favours.”

I consider your remark meant that I asked you, or the then Government, for something generally coming under the denomination of ”favours” - substantially so-called. If you withdraw that meaning to the phrase, in the House, I shall be content to let the matter rest there, as you regard my having met you in ‘82 as confidential.”

Chamberlain replied:

House of Commons,

July 27, ‘94.

Sir, -

“In answer to your statement, I can only say that I was told that you had asked for the interview. As, however, it is evident that you have misunderstood my meaning, I need not say more in reference to this matter.

You will bear in mind that you spoke in the House of “the day when I directed you.”

In contrast to this, I spoke of “the day when you asked for favours,” but did not intend to suggest favours the acceptance of which would be in any way dishonourable.

If you think that my words are likely to be misconstrued, I should be pleased to make this explanation either in the House or by letter for publication.”

Yours faithfully,

J. Chamberlain.

I answered:

House of Commons,

27th July, 1894.

Sir, -

“My remark, of which you complain, no doubt deserved a retort, but the charge of being “a suppliant for favours “is a direct insult, not a mere” retort.” You admit it is entirely groundless, and I should therefore be glad to end the matter, if you would take either of the courses you indicate, and thank you for suggesting that the interpretation suggested should be removed.”

If he had reflected for a moment he would have recalled that the Kilmainham business was a device of Parnell, chiefly moved by the wish to get back to Mrs. O’Shea at once. So Chamberlain asked leave to make a “personal explanation,” and said that he did not intend to impute to me that I would have accepted favours which it would be dishonourable to receive, and concluded: “I will only add that although he and myself have been bitterly opposed to each other, I never thought of attributing to him anything of a dishonourable character.” He was evidently misled by Captain O’Shea in 1882 into supposing that I sought the interview which then took place. O’Shea assured me Chamberlain wished to see me, and that Parnell (in Kilmainham) desired me to go to him. In 1894 he was discussing an amendment which proposed to exclude from the Evicted Tenants Bill refugees who had gone abroad. Hansard reports my reply, which drew praise from Chamberlain, Morley, and Balfour. I said:

“I invite the Committee to pause in dealing with the question of absenteeism. That is a large question and affects landlords as well as tenants… . A man can now be conveyed from Queens-town to New York for 38s. This is a recent reduction of the rate. Years ago the fare to Boston was £3, and it was a constant thing throughout Co. Donegal for large squads of poor men to cross the Atlantic after the harvest to earn enough to pay their rent, and return.

“What was the case with the evicted Olphert tenants? They lived in miserable shielings, places where no humane Englishman would put his dogs. I have seen a woman and three children issue from a den not two yards square, into which the rain dripped through the sods that formed the rough roof. The House is dealing with matters which touched the very heart-strings of the Irish people. The question of exile as well as of eviction is involved in those cases. Yet the right hon. member for Birmingham has nothing but gibes about ‘Tammany Hall’ and the ‘City Marshalship of Dublin.’ I invite English gentlemen to consider this matter carefully. Long ago because your fathers had suits of mail and muskets, and our fathers had only skians and saffron shirts, you are now the landlords and we the tenants.

“The English had no better title to Ireland than that they were better armed some hundreds of years ago than we were. The men who had been cleared out of their farms had gone to the only country which gave them ‘food and freedom and blessing,’ as John Bright said. To-day Birmingham casts back the blessings of John Bright; and when Parliament for the first time offered to Irishmen decent consideration and a decent tribunal, the Member for West Birmingham would shut out the exiles whom their laws had driven from their native soil.”

A Select Committee to consider amendments to the Land Acts was then sitting, and I later on wrote Maurice:

London,

9th August, 1894.

“Morley asked me to sketch the Land Report for him, and I got as far as enclosed, which he got printed, and gave me to-night after the third reading of the Evicted Tenants Bill. Look it over and return it with any suggestions you may have, correcting it fearlessly. Hack it any way you like, but I must have it by Friday, as it must be circulated on Monday.”

London,

12th August, 1894.

“I have adopted your suggestion about the Land Report. I have also given the parliamentary history of the” Healy Clause,” which Morley thinks valuable.

Last night I was at Morley’s house from 6 till 11 p.m., and he adopted everything I proposed…

The Report is the worst blow the landlords have got since 1881, and they are sure to scream. As a bonne bouche for Ulster I have recommended that the “Ulster custom” should be deemed to apply to every tenancy in that Province until the contrary is proved!

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