Lord Carson- and Ireland -

The Life of Lord Carson. Vol. II. By Ian Colvin. (Gollancz. 15s.)

SIR EDWARD CARSON, to call ...m by the name which he bore. during the four years covered by Mr. Colvin's volume, is.,

one of the great controversial figures of British polities, romantic in his affections, violent in his aversions, formidable in debate, and widely honoured for -his flawless integrity

and . courage. In his own profession of the law he was not only pre-eminent as an advocate,- but. held, and continues. to hold, the admiring confidence of . his_ fellow lawyers. Even

in the fiercest moments of the Home . Rule fight liberal

barristers like Asquith showed him a conspicuous, .a_ one

might almost have thought a disarming measure of con-,

sideration. Mr. COlvin quotes a letter from Sir John Simon, written at a time when. Sir John was Attorney-General and Sir Edward a conspicuous rebel, which goes to very great lengths in its expressions of admiring and affectionate grati- tude.

In Ulster, where he stood out as the personification of the classic Protestant hatreds, Carson was adored. -" A Belfast clergyman," writes Mr. Colvin, " inspecting a boys' school asked the question, Can any of you tell. me who is the Supreme Being ? ' With one accord they cried ' Carson,' all except one little lad who timidly suggested a more orthodox hypothesis. Ah, • you Papist ! ' they shouted at the apostate." In the South of Ireland where theological instruc- tion is perhaps more thorough, the school children drew a marked distinction between Sir Edward and the Supreme Being. It was, however,, present writer's experience in .1918 that to most of the children in County Kildare his was the one known name in English government.

Mr. Colvin's vigorously written Life deals with those angry and anxious years.(1910-14) when Britain was brought to the very edge of civil war by the sharp clash of the two Irish factions. Carson, of course, was in the very centre of the storm, the hope of unbending Ulster, the vigorous and implacable enemy of the Catholic South. Yet neither Carson nor Redmond, his antagonist, were free agents. There were Protestant fanatics behind Carson and Catholic and Nationalist fanatics behind Redmond, who would not permit their leaders to cede an inch of. ground. That was what made the situation desperate. The Tory party was ridden boot and spur by Carson, the Liberal party by Red- mond, and behind each Irish- leader were furious charioteers applying the lash at the least suspicion of faintheartedness or compromise. Mr. Colvin quotes one.. of many telegrams received by Sir Edward during the Buckingham Palace Con-, ference which shows how fiery was. the temper of his Ulster following.

" To Sir Edward Carson,-Conference Room, Buckingham Palace. Act. the patriot. Do not play the part of the harlot against whom Solomon decided."

A biography, suffused with such an atmosphere as this, does not make very agreeable reading. The song of praise, and Mr. Colv;n is whole-hearted in admiration of his hero, is too

intimately blended with the hymn of hate., While nothing. is too good for Sir Edward who makes a proposal which lie

knows in advance will be unacceptable to Dublin, Mr. Lloyd George is overwhelmed with reproaches for advancing a, sug, gestion which he knows will be rejected in Belfast. In such a situation, with each of the Irish parties surrendering itself

to the luxury of hate, nothing useful could be done. " Sir Edward," shouted a red-haired giant., of an Ulsterman after one of Carson's .meetings, are ye a good hater.?" I am,"

said Carson, looking him in the eye. Then give me a grip of your hand, man ! " " They could hate these people," continues Mr. Colvin approvingly, " and the measure of their hatreds was the measure of their loves." Mr. Colvin does not pretend to be impartial, but at least his spirited volume exhibits the degree to which the animosities of the Orange and the Green poisoned English politics on the eve of the Great War and emptied them of Christian content, - The present writer, who was travelling through India in the spring of 1914, remembers hearing from - an English teacher in the Missionary College at Delhi that Sir Edward Carson was the students' hero. Here was a man, thought these young hotheads, who, acting within the four corners of the law, had assembled a body of volunteers, smuggled arms, set up' the framework of a provisional government, and thrown down 'the gauntlet lo the British Empire. The young Indian nationalists regarded the Irish leader as a pioneer in successful rebellion and' the herald of England's downfall. So widely flung and unexpected were the reactions set up by the 'Ulster revolution.'

With such distant consequences and ramifications of the quarrel Mr. Colvin is itokeonCerned. What he doeS'ialto tell with effective lucidity, and with the aid of material- some of which is new, the story of the Ulster movement in its various phases, of the volunteers, of the meeting at the Ciirragh, of the vain search for reconciling formulae, and of the gun- running at Lame. The reader cannot fail to conclude that the Germans had every excuse for thinking that the urgent pressure of the Irish feud would keep England aloof from the Continental War.

In the event, the resistance of Ulster did not, as Sir Edward anticipated, kill Home Rule. Rather its chief effect was that after destroying the authority of the old Nationalist party, who had failed to ,` deliver the goods," it surrendered Ireland into the hands of Sinn Fein. Redmond could not accept partition. Carson could .not accept anything less. It is difficult to say to whicli' of these two leaders the present situation of Ireland, at once self-governing and partitioned,