28 MARCH 1914, Page 13

"HELLISH INSINUATIONS."

[To TUB EDITOR or nal .8rannos.1

Sru,—Mr. Churchill having from his place in Parliament used these words: " When it was found that the precautionary movements of the military in Ireland bad been effected with- out opposition from the army of a hundred thousand men which has been raised to resist the authority of the Crown and Parliament . . ," was asked by Mr. Amery whether "he expected and loped that purely precautionary measures to look after stores would lead to fighting." Mr. Churchill charac- terized this interrogation as a " hellish insinuation." But why " insinuation" P There was no insinuation here, but a quite straightforward and unambiguous question. The question quite obviously was meant simply to elucidate what Mr. Churchill meant to insinuate by his taunt about the quiescent attitude of the Ulster Volunteers in face of movements which Mr. Churchill described as " precautionary." but which he apparently expected the Volunteers to regard as provocative. Did or did not Mr. Churchill mean to stigmatize this inaction as cowardly P If he did not, his words can have meant just nothing at all. And if he did, "hellish" would seem a com- paratively colourless epithet by which to describe his insinua-