Lord Portarlington drew the attention of the Government on Monday
to a most important problem. If the Irish Church Bill should become law, how was it intended to appoint successors for the offices of Prelate, Chancellor, and Dean of the Order of St. Patrick ? The Archbishop of Armagh is at present Prelate, the Archbishop of Dublin Chancellor, and the Dean of St. Patrick Registrar of that Order. What was to become of the motto of the order, "Quiz separabit ?" after the separation had taken place ? Even if the present prelate, chancellor, and dean keep their rank by virtue of provisions in the Bill till they die, who is to succeed them ? And if the corporation of the disestablished Church refuse the order access to St. Patrick's Cathedral, where shall the order be conferred? The Earl of Portarlington remembered the splendour of the last installation, but, he said, unless the Govern- ment took care, that occasion might prove to have been the last ceremony of the kind, and the organist might appropriately have played Luther's hymn, " What do I see and hear ? The end of things created." The Earl of Portarlington evidently draws no distinction in his own mind between the last knight of the Order of St. Patrick and the last man. Whether Hope "lights her torch at Nature's funeral pile" or not, it is clear, he thinks, there will be no Hope to light her torch at the funeral pile of the Order of St. Patrick. What will Lord Portarlington do himself,
if his soul should prove to be immortal (which is possible), and the Order of St. Patrick not ? It is a pity Lord Spencer answered his question. Should not there be somebody to say • hush' to babies of rank, as well as to babies of a commoner kind?
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