In the first place, the electors made few inquiries about Ireland.  They disliked the subject; they had not realized its supreme importance.  Those of us who felt anxious to explain our views (as was my own case) had to volunteer to do so, for we were not asked about them.  The Irish party in the constituencies was in violent opposition to Liberal candidates; it did not interrogate, but denounced.  Further, it was felt that the issue was mainly one to be decided in Ireland itself.  The question of Home Rule was being submitted, not, as heretofore, to a limited constituency, but to the whole Irish people.  Till their will had been constitutionally declared at the polls it was not proper that Englishmen or Scotchmen should anticipate its tenour.  We should even have been accused, had we volunteered our opinions, of seeking to affect the result in Ireland, and, not only of playing for the Irish vote in Great Britain, as we saw the Tories doing, but of prejudicing the chances of those Liberal candidates who, in Irish constituencies, were competing with extreme Nationalists.  A third reason was that most English and Scotch Liberals did not know how far their own dispositions towards Home Rule were shared by their leaders.  Mr. Gladstone’s declaration in his Midlothian address was no doubt a decided intimation of his views, and was certainly understood by some (as by myself) to imply the grant to Ireland of a Parliament; but, strong as its words were, its importance does not seem to have been fully appreciated at the moment.  And the opinions of a statesman whose unequalled Irish experience and elevated character gave him a weight only second to that of Mr. Gladstone—­I mean Lord Spencer—­had not been made known.  We had consequently no certainty that there were leaders prepared to give prompt effect to the views we entertained.  Lastly, we were not prepared with a practical scheme of self-government for Ireland.  The Nationalist members had propounded none which we could either adopt or criticize.  Convinced as we were that Home Rule would come and must come, we felt the difficulties surrounding every suggestion that had yet been made, and had not hammered out any plan which we could lay before the electors as approved by Liberal opinion.[7] We were forced to confine ourselves to generalities.

Whether it would have been better for us to have done our thinking and scheme-making in public, and thereby have sooner forced the details of the problem upon the attention of the country, need not now be inquired.  Any one can now see that something was lost by the omission.  But those who censure a course that has actually been taken usually fail to estimate the evils that would have followed from the taking of the opposite course.  Such evils might in this instance have been as great as those we have encountered.