Chamberlain had said. Now Mr. Balfour is in many points very superior to
Joe. He should leave personal vituperation to him: he is more active,
defter, and more willing to do such dirty work. Moreover, it is in the
recollection of the members that, in the Coercionist struggle, Mr.
Balfour seemed to have towards Mr. Dillon an unusual amount of personal
animosity. Speaking with want of grace and personal courtesy, which are
things, I am bound to say, uncommon with him, he accused Mr. Dillon of
deliberate and conscious hypocrisy. This also was a tactical blunder,
and will largely account for the transformation following, to which I am
going to refer.
[Sidenote: The transformation.]
The House on the following day, July 4th, was very still when Mr. Dillon
rose--evidently to refer to the incident of the previous night. His
address was quiet, brief, and graceful. With charming modesty, he
acknowledged the mistake he had made, and explained how, in running over
in memory the hundreds of speeches he had delivered, he had confounded
one speech with another. He was unable to understand how his memory,
which never before had played him false, had done him this ill turn, and
he appealed to the House generally, and declared that there was not even
amongst his bitter political foes one who would think him capable of
trying to palm off on the House a speech which could be so palpably and
so readily exposed.
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