During this time the Government had given no sign that the Devolution movement might not find favour in their sight.  Had its main objects met with a more cordial reception from the arbiters of the national policy it is more than probable that the Unionist Government would have stood sponsor for a large and generous instalment of self-government which would have received the joyous assent of the Liberal Party and passed through both Houses of Parliament with the acclamations of everybody.  In his first speech at Cork after his election Mr O’Brien sought to rouse the country to a real perception of the momentous issues that were at stake.  He pointed out that the proposals of the Reform Association were only “mere preliminary materials for discussion and negotiation and that they are rather addressed towards the removal of the prejudices of Unionists than put forward as a final and unalterable answer to our national demand.”  And then he went on to say:  “Lord Dunraven and his friends may be all that is diabolical, but at least they are not such born idiots as to expect us to surrender our own organisation, or, as it has been absurdly put, to coalesce with the new Association on such a programme.”  As a matter of fact, Lord Dunraven had, in the most outspoken manner, stated that he expected nothing from the Nationalists except friendly toleration and fair play, whilst he and those associated with him were engaged in the hard task of conquering the mass of racial prejudice and sectarian bigotry that had been for so long arrayed against the National claim.

The efforts to induce in the intransigeant section of the Party a spirit of sweet reasonableness were, however, foredoomed to failure.  Mr Dillon declined to address a meeting at Limerick, specially summoned to establish a concordat between the Irish leaders.  Mr Redmond and Mr O’Brien accepted the invitation, and the former made it clear that he still regarded the Land Conference policy as the policy of the nation.  He said:  “It has been stated in some newspapers of our enemies that the Land Conference agreement, which was endorsed by the Irish Party, endorsed by the Directory of the League and endorsed by the National Convention and accepted by the people, has been in some way repudiated recently by us.  I deny that altogether....  I speak to-day only for the people and, so far as the people are concerned, I say that the agreement, from the day it was entered upon down to this moment, has never been repudiated by anybody entitled to speak in their name.”

Had the spirit of the Limerick meeting and the unity which it symbolised been allowed to prevail, all might yet have been well and the national platform might have been broadened out so that all men of good will who wished to labour for an independent and self-governed Ireland could stand upon it.  But such a consummation was not to be.  There was no arguing away the hostility of Mr Dillon, The Freeman’s Journal and those others upon whom they imposed their will.  Mr Dillon could give no better proof of statesmanship or generous sentiment than to refer to “Dunraven and his crowd” and to declare that “Conciliation, so far as the landlords are concerned, was another name for swindling.”