Lord Randolph Churchill invited Mr. Balfour to address his Paddington
constituents at the Metropolitan Music-Hall, Edgware Road, last Saturday; and very lively the speeches were, though whether they were the wisest possible prepara- tions for the battle in Committee on the Home-rule Bill, may well admit of considerable doubt. Mr. Balfour commenced by insisting on the mistake of those Unionists who, because they do not think that any change can make the Bill tolerable, propose to abstain from proposing any amendment in Com- mittee. That practically means, no doubt, giving up the whole advantage of a detailed and thorough-going discus- sion, and leaving the field to the command of their foes; from which, of course, the mass of the electors would con- clude that instead of the Bill being absolutely intolerable in all its details, it is objectionable only in the abstract and on those general principles to which they assign no great weight. "I am certain," said Mr. Balfour, "that until you have torn every clause to tatters,—until you have excluded every operative proposal in it, you cannot make it any. thing which we should, under any circumstances, be content to accept. But though that is true, it is our duty, at all events as Members of the House of Commons, to vote for everything which would improve the Bill, and, above all, for everything which would destroy the Bill,"—a remark which will be understood to mean that the only im- provement can be got through destruction ; in other words, that Mr. Balfour measures the character of improvements by their tendency to destroy the Bill,—a dangerous in- dication of sinister purpose. The liveliest passage in his speech was his description of the hopeless impossibility of finding any feasible scheme for the representation of Ireland in the Imperial Parliament consistent with the establishment of a separate Irish Legislature. Mr. Gladstone must feel, he said, like a feverish patient who finds every position in turn intolerable, and changes it only to find the next position still more intolerable.
