Page:A letter to the Right Hon. Chichester Fortescue, M.P. on the state of Ireland.djvu/97

 can go on without him. (Laughter.) "We had a 'Corn Law Letter.' Then we had the Durham Letter. Now I see advertised 'A Letter from Earl Russell to the Right Hon. C. Fortescue on the State of Ireland.' We all know what that means. (Hear, hear.) That trumpet may be blown; it was blown once last Session, on the subject of education, but so feebly that it came to nothing. But now it means that we are to have the old faction cries, and that Ireland is to be made a battle-ground, not for its own sake, but for the sake of party strife.

We must be indifferent to these sarcasms. We are fated to show the way of Reform to Tory Ministers. So it has been with Catholic Emancipation; with the Corn Laws; with the Reform Act of 1867. For fifteen years we preached in vain that the admission of the working classes to the franchise was required by the state of society, and that it would strengthen the Constitution.

Let me take an illustration.

When our troops landed in Abyssinia, it was found that the mountain paths were so obstructed by rocks, and were so narrow, that the horses, mules, and animals of inferior dignity could not pass along them. Engineers and pioneers were sent forward, and smooth wide roads were made, along which all the animals can pass. We Liberals are these engineers and -pioneers. And as the horses and mules and animals of inferior dignity, when they reached the green pastures and clear streams, were heard to neigh and bray with delight, so the party for whom we have smoothed the rocks, and opened the road to the pas-