yET. 37]              BEPLY TO ME. FORSTEE                      11
terrible courses into which the Government appear determined to lead Ireland. Sir, I believe they will reject these guides and leaders with as much determination, and just as much relief, as they rejected the services of the right hon. gentleman the member for Bradford.'
When Parnell ended I was in the Lobby. There was a rush from the House. I met an English Liberal member. I asked, * How has Parnell done ?' He answered, * Very badly. He has made no reply at all. He has ignored the whole matter, and says that he cares only for the opinion of Ireland; but it won't go down in this country.' Later on I met an Irish member. I said : ' What do you think of Parnell's speech ?J He replied, ' Splendid! He just treated them in the right way ; declined to notice Forster's accusations, said he cared only for Irish opinion, and that Ireland would stand by him. Quite right; that is the way to treat the House of Commons/
The following account of the scene from the pen of a British politician of Cabinet rank is fair and judicial: . ' Two things were remarkable about Mr. Parnell in the House of Commons—his calm self-control, and his air of complete detachment from all English questions, coupled with indifference to English opinion. Never were these more conspicuous than on the night when, at the beginning of the session of 1883, Mr. W. E. Forster, no longer bound by the trammelling reserve of office, delivered an elaborate and carefully prepared attack upon him. The ex-Chief Secretary had accumulated a number of instances of outrages, and incitement to outrage, perpetrated or delivered in Ireland, and of the language used from time to time by Irish members encouraging, or palliating, or omitting to