[Sidenote: 103 v. 80.]
At last Mr. Redmond seemed to hit off the situation by a proposal to
omit a couple of sub-sections in the ninth clause. But Mr. Redmond had
scarcely spoken when the House found itself in an extraordinary and most
embarrassing dilemma. The object of Mr. Redmond was plain enough; what
he desired to do was to retain the Irish members in the Imperial
Parliament in their present, that is to say, in their full,
strength--103 they are now, 103 he wanted them to remain. The position
of the Government was equally clear. With emphatic language--with a
superabundance of argument--Mr. Gladstone stated his conviction that the
Irish members should not remain in such large numbers and that the
number should be 80. This was all clear enough; but what about the
position of all the other parties in the House?
[Sidenote: Tot homines, tot sententiae.]
At first sight, it would appear that this ought to be very clear. The
Tories and the Unionists had several amendments on the paper. One wanted
the Irish members reduced to 48, one wanted to have them reduced to 40,
and several of them desired that they should be reduced still
further--in fact, should reach the irreducible minimum of none at all.
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