Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 2.djvu/189

 CHAPTER IV

IN OFFICE

inducements to accept office in the new Government were strong, even imperative. I belonged to a group of friends who were disparaged because they did not succeed in Ireland. I was eager to show that we were not unfit to bear the burthen of a State. Here was a country freer than anything but separation would have made Ireland. The Imperial Government could not appoint or dismiss a clerk, nor apply a shilling of the public revenue to any purpose until it was voted by the local Parliament. In such an Australia I might aim to show what could be accomplished in such an Ireland. 171