[Sidenote: A pounce.]
At once he pounced on a passage in the speech of Mr. Balfour, who had
made the statement that such a policy as Home Rule had always led to the
disintegration and destruction of empires. He rolled out the case of
Austria, which had been preserved from ruin by Home Rule; and when there
was a sniff from the Tory benches, Mr. Gladstone, in tones of thunder,
referred to the speech of Lord Salisbury in 1885, when he was angling
for the Irish vote, and when he pointed to Austria as perhaps supplying
some indication of the method of settling the Irish question. This was
good old party warfare; the Liberals cheered in delight, and the old
warrior glowed with all his old fire. There was a softer and more
subdued tone when the Prime Minister referred to Foreign Affairs,
speaking of these things with the slowness and the gravity which such
ticklish subjects demand. But again Mr. Gladstone was in all the full
blast of oratorical vehemence when he took up the attack that had been
made on the Irish policy of Mr. Morley. Now and then prompted by that
gentleman, and with an occasional word from Mr. Asquith, the Old Man
gave figure after figure to show that Ireland has vastly improved since
coercion had been dropped as a policy.
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