countries cannot be politically united unless they are subject to a common legislative power, the slightest knowledge of lands outside England is sufficient to make manifest his ignorance.  When, however, the instances on which the induction is supposed to be founded are carefully scrutinised, it will be discovered that those examples which deserve attention are far less numerous than might be supposed from a glance over the lists now well known to the public of what may be termed successful experiments in Home Rule, and, further, that this limited number of instances do not go far to make out the conclusion in favour of which they are adduced.

At the present stage of my argument I purposely omit all minute examination of the applicability to the relations between England and Ireland, either of the English Colonial system or of federalism as it exists in the United States or in Switzerland.  Any scheme of Home Rule must follow in some degree one or other of these models.  It will, therefore, be necessary to consider in subsequent chapters how far either of them may admit with advantage of imitation.  Two observations, however, may even at this point not be out of place.  An English colony, such as Victoria, is a virtually independent country, attached to England mainly by ties of loyalty or of well-understood interests, but placed at such a distance from the mother country that England could without inconvenience, and would without hesitation, concede to it full national independence when once it was clear that Victoria desired to be a nation.  Victoria, in short, is a land which might at any moment be independent, but which desires to retain or strengthen the connection with England.  Ireland, on the other hand, is a country lying so near to the English coast that, according to the views of most statesmen, England could not with safety tolerate her independence, and also a country, which, to put the matter in the least exaggerated language, feels the connection with England so burdensome that the greater part of her population desire at least the amount of independence conceded to a self-governing colony.  The case of Victoria and the case of Ireland each constitute, so to speak, the antithesis to the other.  There is, therefore, at any rate no a priori ground for the assumption that the system which successfully regulates the relation of England to Victoria is equally adapted for regulating the relation between England and Ireland.  The federalism, again, of America or of Switzerland is the consequence of the existence of the States which make up the Federation.  The United Kingdom does not consist of States.  The world has heard of the difficulty of forming a republic without republicans:  this feat would appear to be easy of performance in comparison with the achievement of erecting federation without the States which form its natural members.  In America or in Switzerland federalism has developed because existing States wished to be combined into some kind