the poor organ-grinder who had only one tune. If it amuses you I am sure I have not the slightest objection to your playing it as long as you like, but do not press it too far. You remind Ime of an old Irish mastiff I once saw annoyed by a nasty ill-tempered little cur that was always yelping at his heels, and his yelp, I remember, had a strong resemblance to the Kentish fire. At last the big good-natured mastiff, provoked beyond all endurance, took him up and dropped him into a ditch; and when the little cur at last came to his good senses, he lifted him up again, gently patted him, and rubbed him down. Now we will do just the same with the leprechauns. Sir Arthur Guinness has said that I called the Protestants leprechauns. I never did. I never called the Protestants leprechauns. I never called the adherents of the Church of England leprechauns; but I called the little people who appear on the 13th of July, and exhibit themselves in curious-shaped hats, swallowtailed coats, and orange breeches, to speak of the Boyne and No Surrender. But do you think for one moment that

I could connect them with my Protestant brethren, or with men like Sir Arthur Guiuness? Indeed no. I have said we are willing still to hold out tlie hand of peace. Don't go too far. We are gentle, but we must have religious equality. We shall, keeping within the law, gain all we desire. Do you dare to talk of going beyond it? All of you know what the motto on the artillery of the Irish Volunteers was, 'Free-trade or else - Don't force us to raise as our motto, 'Religious equality or else

This is plain speaking, but it is Irish speaking. Listen now to Mr. Lowe, a remarkable member of Mr. Gladstone's proximate Administration, and observe how he deals, not with the universities of Oxford and Dublin alone, the former of which made him, but with the highest institutions of the country :

"He believed he had the honour of representing a constituency which would bear a comparison with any other in the kingdom, not excepting either of the elder universities, Oxford and Cambridge. Their degrees were granted after a more difficult and searching examination than was required for the ordinary degrees at either Oxford or

Cambridge.

Their Parliamentary representation, too, had not become, like that of the University of Oxford, a mockery and a misery. It had not, as at Oxford, fallen into the hands of persons who knew nothing of the University itself, and who only thwarted the wishes of the men who really performed the educational work of Oxford, and to whom Oxford owed all its efficiency and reputation. Neither had they become, like the University of Dublin, a close borough for the law officers of the Crown. In their university capacity they had no prejudices to consult. Among them there was a clear distinction made between the governing body and the examining body; and their examinations were in consequence conducted with a strictness and an earnestness which would never be found to exist in corporations in which it was naturally the interest and the desire of the examiners for degrees and honours to deal as leniently as possible with the candidates who came before them."

The next object of his care is the Imperial Parliament, of which he thus disposes. Referring to the repeal of various laws, and the effect produced thereby on the constitution of society in this country, he observes, sneering at the Tories:

"There was nothing. in fact, changed, except the basis of everything, and that change they ignored. He believed that we ought all now to endeavour to ascertain how that change was to be encountered; and in his opinion the wisest thing we could do was to profit by the lesson we might derive from the experience of the United States of America. The constitution of that country had, amidst novel and most trying social conditions, lasted at all events eighty years, and had survived the difficulties and dangers of one of the greatest civil wars by which any nation had ever been afflicted. He found that in America the power of the House of Assembly was controlled by the action of an independent Senate, by the rights of local State legislatures, and by the authority given to the courts of law of declaring whether any particular measure was opposed to the principles of the Constitution. In England the House of Commons was the supreme depository of all power, and he did not wish to disturb that arrangement. But he thought that the House of Lords might be strengthened, not by the

cour will settle with them old scores; that against his keen wit and stubborn logic neither the sophisms of Mr. Gladstone nor the wrath of Mr. Bright will afford any protection; and that the process of disintegration will begin among themselves on the very night when their Irish policy is fully disclosed. Meanwhile, for the reasons adduced in this paper, and for others which may be brought forward by-and-by,

carry its measure, and the whole
Radical plan will probably be, or
we are much mistaken, such as
neither the Lords nor the Crown
could accept.
Where shall we be
then? Thrown back upon fresh
combinations, and the construction
of a new party out of the better
elements of all the old parties, and
the ranging of the intellect and
political influences of the country
into two camps, one side prepared
to battle for the constitutional we return to the conclusion with
monarchy, the other for a course the record of which we opened:
which can end only in its down- There is every reason to believe
fall. Who is to be put forward as that the general condition of
this
the ostensible leader of this new country-of Ireland not less than
party we do not take it upon us to of England and Scotland will
say. But of this we can assure the in no very essential point be dif
Liberals in the meanwhile, that ferent twelve months hence from
their tenure of office, as long as it what it is at the present moment.
shall last, will not be to them a We may change our Administra-
season of recreation; that from his tion, but we shall not change our
place in the front rank of the Oppo- Constitution in Church or State,
sition benches the man whom they in the lifetime of the present gen-
have pursued with so much ran- eration.

P.S-As we send this paper to press, the news arrives that Mr. Gladstone has been rejected by South-West Lancashire. While supporting Lord Hartington in the Northern Division of the County, Mr. Gladstone said, "I tell you, upon a minute and careful examination of the promises of the men of South-West Lancashire, that if there is truth in man-and there is truth in man-and apart from any strange and unforeseen accidents, this day week (Wednesday), please God, if I live, I shall be Member for South-West Lancashire." He will now, we suppose, write another, autobiography, saying that he has changed his mind, and was wrong in supposing that there was "truth in man.

Lancashire must now prepare to share with Oxford the hostility of Mr. Gladstone; and Edinburgh University, which has just rejected him for its Chancellor, will also be out of favour. Mr. Gladstone's friends loudly assert that he is the most popular man in England-the Premierelect of the people; but surely Oxford University, Edinburgh University, and the men of Lancashire, form a jury entitled to give an opinion on this point. At all events, there is no mistake about their verdict. The most striking and gratifying fact that we have to record is, that in this, the first election under Household Suffrage, Lancashire, the great seat of English labour, has returned six Tories, and as yet not a single member of the self-styled Liberal party. This, coupled with the returns for Westminster, Middlesex, Liverpool, Manchester, and other vast constituencies, abundantly proves that the people begin to know who are their real friends. ཧཱུྃ། ས ཟླ་