On the 5th he had asked a question in Parliament—­the last he was to ask there.  It concerned the starting of a factory for the manufacture of aircraft in Dublin—­one of the things for which he was pressing in his ceaseless effort to bring Ireland some industrial advantage from the war.  I saw him towards the end of that month in his room at the House, and he commented bitterly upon a raid carried out by Sinn Feiners, in which some newly erected buildings were destroyed at one of the aerodromes near Dublin which he had helped to establish.  But the main thing he had to say concerned the course of the Convention.  Everything, in his judgment, was wrecked; he saw nothing ahead for his country but ruin and chaos.

He spoke of his health.  A bout of sickness which had prostrated him at Christmas in Dublin had left him uneasy.  He was at the time, I thought, unduly alarmed about himself, and I believed that the continuance of this frame of mind was simply characteristic of a man who had very little experience of ill-health.  I left him with profound compassion for his trouble of spirit, but without any serious apprehension for his state of body.

The Convention reassembled on February 26th to consider the result of the delegation, which was summed up in a letter from Mr. Lloyd George.  This well-known document begins with a definite pledge of action.  On receiving the report of the Convention the Government would give it immediate attention and would “proceed with the least possible delay to submit legislative proposals to Parliament.”—­The date of this pledge was February 25, 1918.—­Mr. Lloyd George pressed, however, for a settlement “in and through the Convention”; and he declared his conviction that “In view of previous attempts at settlement and of the deliberations of the Convention itself, the only hope of agreement lies in a solution which on the one side provides for the unity of Ireland by a single Legislature, with adequate safeguards for the interests of Ulster and of the Southern Unionists, and, on the other, secures the well-being of the Empire and the fundamental unity of the United Kingdom.”

Ireland’s strong claim to some control of indirect taxation was admitted; but it was laid down that till two years after the war the fixation and collection of customs and excise should be left to the Imperial Parliament:  and that at the end of the war a Royal Commission should report on Ireland’s contribution to Imperial expenditure and should submit proposals as to the fiscal relations of the two countries.

For the war period, Ireland was to contribute “an agreed proportion of the Imperial expenditure,” but was to receive the full proceeds of Irish revenue from customs and excise, less the agreed contribution.  The police and postal services were to be reserved also as war services.

These provisions were laid down as essentials.  A suggestion was made of an Ulster Committee within the Irish Parliament, having power to modify or veto measures, whether of legislation or administration, in their application to Ulster.