“You have a population as hostile to Irish rule as the rest of Ireland is to British rule, yea, and as ready to rebel against it as the rest of Ireland is against British rule—­as alien in blood, in religious faith, in traditions, in outlook—­as alien from the rest of Ireland in this respect as the inhabitants of Fife or Aberdeen.  To place them under National rule against their will would be as glaring an outrage on the principles of liberty and self-government as the denial of self-government would be for the rest of Ireland.”

The Government were, therefore, prepared, said Mr. Lloyd George, to bring in Home Rule immediately for that part of Ireland that wanted it, but not for the Northern part which did not want it.  Mr. Redmond made a fine display of indignation at this refusal to coerce Ulster; and, in imitation of the Unionists in 1914, marched out of the House at the head of his party.  Next day he issued a manifesto to men of Irish blood in the United States and in the Dominions, calling on them to use all means in their power to exert pressure on the British Government.  It was clear that this sort of thing could not be tolerated in the middle of a war in which Great Britain was fighting for her life, and at a crisis in it when her fortunes were far from prosperous.  Accordingly, on the 16th of March Mr. Bonar Law warned the Nationalists that their conduct might make it necessary to appeal to the country on the ground that they were obstructing the prosecution of the war.  But he also announced that the Cabinet intended to make one more attempt to arrive at a settlement of the apparently insoluble problem of Irish government.

Two months passed before it was made known how this attempt was to be made.  On the 16th of May the Prime Minister addressed a letter in duplicate to Mr. Redmond and Sir John Lonsdale, representing the two Irish parties respectively, in which he put forward for their consideration two alternative methods of procedure, after premising that the Government felt precluded from proposing during the war any measures except such as “would be substantially accepted by both sides.”

These alternatives were:  (a) a “Bill for the immediate application of the Home Rule Act to Ireland, but excluding therefrom the six counties of North-East Ulster,” or, (b) a Convention of Irishmen “for the purpose of drafting a Constitution ... which should secure a just balance of all the opposing interests.”  Sir John Lonsdale replied to the Prime Minister that he would take the Government’s first proposal to Belfast for consideration by the Council; but as Mr. Redmond, on the other hand, peremptorily refused to have anything to say to it, it became necessary to fall back on the other alternative, namely the assembling of an Irish Convention.