Lord Randolph Churchill, who has shown a patient temper throughout
these proceedings, made on Wednesday an im- portant announcement. The Irishmen were nominally exposing "the mistakes and iniquities " of the Irish Board of Works, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer intervened, "in the hope, the vain hope, I fear," of contracting discussion. He thought that the functions of the Board of Works and the Local Govern- ment Board required most careful consideration, and the Government intended next Session to submit a measure which would place all those questions within the control of the Irish people. "Of course, that would be done within the limits fixed by the verdict of the constituencies at the last Election, limits which the Government had neither the power nor the wish to overstep." The Irish Members, in bri3ging up in such immense detail every imaginable grievance, were crippling those energies which it was the highest desire of the Government to devote to the Irish Question as a whole. The Irish cheered, but wrangled on till the time for business expired. It is absurd to hint, as the Daily News does, that Lord Randolph is thinking of Home- rule ; but he is, we fear, thinking of a very dangerous plan,—the complete transfer of local taxation and control to elective Boards. The Parnellites would then be in possession of an irresistible instrument.
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