Let it be admitted that since the Government have been shamed into dropping their denials of “reprisals” and taken them in hand themselves the military destruction has at least been carried on with some show of reluctance and humanity by the regular army, but it cannot be too strongly emphasised that the disbandment and deportation of “the Black and Tans” is the first condition of any return to civilised warfare or to any respect for the good name of England or her army.

If I were asked to state some of the essentials of peace I would say it must depend first of all on the re-establishment of a belief in the good faith of England.  This belief, and for the reasons which I have attempted to outline in the preceding chapters, has been shattered into fragments.  There is a strong feeling in Ireland that the Prime Minister’s recent peace “explorations” are not honestly meant—­that they are intended to rouse the “sane and moderate” elements in opposition to Sinn Fein.  Whilst this feeling exists no real headway can be made by those who seek a genuine peace along rational and reasoned lines.  The Prime Minister must be aware that when he professes his readiness to meet those who can “deliver the goods” he is talking rhetorical rubbish.  “Delivering the goods” is not a matter for Irishmen, but for British politicians, who have spent the last twenty years cheating Ireland of the “goods” of Home Rule, which they had solemnly covenanted again and again to “deliver.”

Mr Lloyd George’s conditions for a meeting with “Dail Eireann” are so impossible that one wonders he took the trouble to state them—­viz. (1) that “Dail Eireann” must give up to be tried (and we presume hanged) a certain unspecified number of their own colleagues; (2) that they must recant their Republicanism and proclaim their allegiance to the Empire; (3) that negotiations must proceed on the basis of the Partition Act and the surrender of one-fourth of their country to the new Orange ascendancy.

No section of honest Irishmen will dream of negotiating on such a basis, and any attempt to make use of “sane and moderate” elements to divide and discredit the elected representatives of the people will be met by the universal declaration that the “Dail Eireann” alone is entitled to speak for Ireland.  Until this primary fact is recognised the fight in Ireland must go on, and many black chapters of its history will have to be written before some British statesman comes along who is prepared to treat with the Irish nation in a spirit of justice and generosity.

Peace is still perfectly possible if right methods are employed to ensure it.  It is futile to ask Sinn Fein to lay down arms and to abjure their opinions as a preliminary condition to negotiations.  I doubt whether the Sinn Fein leaders could impose such a condition upon their followers, even if they were so inclined—­which they are not and never will be.  Let there, then, to start with, be no