will relish this when he comes to realise it, may be doubted.  Certainly no precedent can be cited for a Federal system under which all the common expenditure is borne by one of the parties.  And further, the present Government state freely that they hope to carry out their policy by introducing a Bill for Home Rule for Scotland and possibly also for Wales.  Will the Scotch and Welsh consent to contribute towards the government of Ireland; or will they demand that they shall be treated like Ireland, and leave the people of England to pay all Imperial services and to subsidize Ireland, Scotland and Wales?  Then again, Ireland is to send forty-two representatives to what is still sarcastically to be called the “Parliament of the United Kingdom,” but will no doubt popularly be known as the English Parliament.  They are to vote about the taxation of people in Great Britain, and to interfere in local affairs of that country, whilst the people of Great Britain are not to tax Ireland or interfere in any way with its affairs.  This is indeed representation without taxation.  Of course it is inevitable that the Irish members will continue to do what they are doing at present—­that is, offer their votes to whatever party will promise further concessions to Irish Nationalism; and they will probably find no more difficulty in getting an English party to consent to such an immoral bargain than they do now.

The provisions as to legislation for Ireland are still more extraordinary.  The Irish Parliament is to have complete power of legislating as to Irish affairs, with the exception of certain matters enumerated in the Act; thus it may repeal any Acts of the Imperial Parliament passed before 1914.  On the other hand, the English Parliament (in which Ireland will have only forty-two representatives) will also be able to pass laws binding Ireland (and in this way to re-enact the laws which the Irish Parliament has just repealed), and these new laws the Irish Parliament may not repeal or overrule.  Now this power of the English Parliament will either be a reality or a farce; if it is a reality, the Irish Nationalists will be no more inclined to submit to laws made by “an alien Parliament” in which they have only forty-two representatives than they are at present to submit to those made by one in which they have 103; if it is a farce, the “supremacy of the Imperial Parliament” is a misleading expression.  The Lord Lieutenant is to act as to some matters on the advice of the Irish Ministry, as to others on the advice of the English.  Anyone who has studied the history of constitutional government in the colonies in the early days, when the governor was still supposed to act as to certain affairs independently of ministerial advice, will see the confusion to which this must lead.  Suppose the Lord Lieutenant acts on the advice of the English ministers in a way of which the Irish Parliament do not approve, and the Irish Ministry resign in consequence, what can result but a deadlock?