A.D. 1880.] DECLINES RAILWAY CHAIRMANSHIP. 215 punity; juries were afraid to convict, witnesses terrified into silence as a contemporary rhymester rendered it— "The difference 'twixt 'moonlight' and moonshine The people now well understand: The Government, recognising the hopelessness of ruling Ireland under the ordinary law, resolved on the prosecution of the Land League, and the introduction of special legislation to restore order. In January 1881, Smith received a proposal which testified to the esteem in which his business capacity was held by those best able to form a judgment thereon. The largest railway company in Great Britain, and therefore the largest in the world, invited him to become their chairman. I had the offer of the chairmanship of the London and NorthWestern Railway made formally to me yesterday. It is the unanimous wish of the Board that I should come to preside over them, and they say they would do everything in their power to lighten my labours if I would consent. They begged me to take time and not to answer off-hand, and so I said I would give my answer on Monday. He did so, in the negative, after consulting Lord Beaconsfield, who said to him: "Politics is a jealous mistress; hitherto you have been singularly successful; it falls to the lot of few men to be six years consecutively in office, and during half that time in such a high and important office as First Lord of the Admiralty." Parliament was summoned to meet earlier than usual this year, owing to the gravity of the situation in Ireland; and in order to be at his post at the commencement of business, Smith had to hasten back through some extraordinarily heavy weather from Beyrout, where he was cruising in the Pandora. The special business of Parlia ment was marked out in the Queen's Speech : The anticipation with which I last addressed you, of a great diminution of the distress in Ireland, owing to an abundant harvest, was realised; but I grieve to state that the social condition of the country has assumed an alarming character. Agrarian crimes in general have multiplied far beyond the experience of recent years. Attempts upon life have not grown in the same proportion as other offences, but I must add that efforts have been made for personal protection, far beyond all former precedent, by the police, under the direction of the Executive. The Speech went on to advert to the frustration of justice, owing to intimidation of witnesses and juries: An extended system of terror has been established in various parts of the country, which has paralysed almost alike the exercise of private rights and the performance of civil duties. This formed the justification of a new Coercion Bill for Ireland, of which Mr Forster gave notice on the first night of the session-adequate, stringent, and lacking only one element of efficiency, that it was limited to four years' duration. Forster hated having to bring in such a measure: the probable necessity for it had been weighing on his mind when he spoke so gloomily to Smith at the beginning of the Administration; and now that the attempt to govern Ireland without extraordinary powers had ended in bloody failure, he relished his task none the more because he could not evade it. The scenes of disorder and rampant obstruction to which the discussion of Forster's bill gave rise were utterly beyond anything recorded in the proceedings of the House of Commons, and proved that the amended Rules of Procedure were as useless in controlling licence of speech as—to use a Scottish proverb-a boiled carrot would be to bar a door. A sitting of twenty-two hours' duration was followed by one of forty-one hours, and the latter was only brought to a close by the Speaker taking the extreme course, which noth A.D. 1881.] BEACONSFIELD'S LAST APPEARANCE. 217 ing but desperate circumstances could be held to warrant, of refusing to call upon any more members to speak. A meeting of the Conservative party was held at Lord Beaconsfield's new house in Curzon Street, to consider the Prime Minister's proposals to put down obstruction. It was a scene very different from that of the last occasion when Beaconsfield had addressed his followers. Instead of the vast saloon at Bridgewater House, the sober colouring of the walls and the mellowed gilding of the picture frames, there was the newly upholstered drawing-room, tricked out with blue and gold, and gaudily carpeted. Beaconsfield stood upon a high stool placed at the angle between the front and back rooms—a lean, dark, feeble figure, against a tinselly background. It was thus that the rank and file of the Conservative party-in great measure his own creation -were to look upon Benjamin Disraeli for the last time. Few of those present ever saw him again. On the very day when Mr Gladstone's motion on Procedure was down for discussion-February 3—a fresh objectlesson was forthcoming of how little modern men were to be restrained by ancient rules or traditions. The Home Secretary, Sir William Harcourt, in answer to a question, announced the arrest of Michael Davitt, a prominent Land Leaguer. Mr Gladstone rose to move his resolution, and at the same moment Mr John Dillon sprang to his feet. The Speaker calling on Mr Gladstone, Mr Dillon cried out, "I demand my privilege of speech." There followed a scene of great confusion. Mr Dillon stood erect, with arms folded, pale and determined. “Name him! name him!" shouted members on both sides. Then was solved a question which a former Speaker of the House once declared himself unable to answer. "What would happen," he was asked, "if a member persisted in disregarding the ruling of the Chair?" "It would be the duty of the Speaker to name that member," was the reply. "And what would happen next?" "Heaven only knows!" was all the answer the Speaker could give. What happened on this occasion was that the Speaker "named " Mr John Dillon. The Prime Minister then moved that Mr Dillon be suspended from the service of the House, which having been put and carried on a division, the offender was directed to withdraw. This he refused to do, whereupon the Speaker ordered the Serjeant-at-Arms to remove him. The Serjeant, Captain Gossett, walked to where Mr Dillon sat immovable, and touched him on the shoulder. Still Mr Dillon sat motionless; and the Serjeant, turning towards the door, beckoned to his assistants, five of whom obeyed his summons. It looked as if the House was to be scandalised by a scene of physical force; but just as this seemed inevitable, Mr Dillon rose, and, after bowing to the Chair, left the chamber in company with the Serjeant-atArms. But the end was not yet. Thirty-six Irish members proceeded, one after another, to defy the Speaker's authority, and each in turn had to be suspended on the motion of the Prime Minister. It was a painful and humiliating scene, showing, as it did, how defective the best considered devices of human government prove if there arises the determination of a minority to defeat them. After the ejection of the Irish members, the House agreed to the rule of Urgency of Debate proposed by its leader. On April 19 the Earl of Beaconsfield breathed his last, and in him the Conservative party lost a sagacious leader at a time when they could ill afford to part with the only personage who could be matched with Mr Gladstone. Two days later Smith wrote to his wife : Lord Beaconsfield will be buried at Hughenden on Tuesday morning, and we shall all go down to his burial. I have seen him for the last time, and he looked better in death than in life, but there was a sort of evidence of struggle on his face which had ended. Northcote A.D. 1882.] ELECTION AT WESTMINSTER. 219 had been obliged to go to Hatfield, but I think it is arranged that I shall not speak on Monday. I must, however, come up, as most of my friends will be in town, and consultation is necessary. Already men are asking who is to be the future Chief, and I am afraid that question will have to be settled. The question was settled by the appointment of a duumvirate Lord Salisbury becoming leader of the Peers, as Northcote already was of the Commons. After the rising of Parliament, Mr Forster carried into vigorous effect the new powers with which he had been armed. Messrs Parnell, Sexton, Dillon, and O'Kelly, Members of Parliament, were, with other officials of the Land League, arrested and confined in Kilmainham Prison, and the League itself was proclaimed as an unlawful association. CHAPTER XV. 1882-1884. Smith's colleague in the representation of Westminster, Sir Charles Russell, was obliged to resign his seat at this time owing to ill health, and the Conservative party in the borough unanimously selected Lord Algernon Percy, second son of the Duke of Northumberland, as their candidate. The nomination took place on February 10, and, for the first time in its history, Westminster elected a Conservative without opposition-remarkable evidence of the powerful influence which Smith had established upon its political character. It was the general belief that the electors would have accepted any candidate whom their senior member had chosen to suggest. Smith, who had spent ten days in the autumn of 1881 in cruising round the Irish coast, landing at various places, and |