Sketches In The House (1893) by T. P. O\'Connor

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_Sketches in

The House_.

The Story of a Memorable Session.

By

T.P. O'CONNOR, M.P.

WARD, LOCK & BOWDEN, Limited.
London: Warwick House, Salisbury Square, E.C.
New York and Melbourne.
1893.

ESTABLISHED 1851.

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NOTE.

_The Sketches contained in the following pages originally appeared in
the _WEEKLY SUN_, under the title, "At the Bar of the House." Owing to
the reiterated requests of many readers they are now republished in
their present form._

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I. PAGE
OPENING OF A HISTORIC SESSION 9

CHAPTER II.
THE HOME RULE BILL 31

CHAPTER III.
A SOBER AND SUBDUED OPPOSITION 40

CHAPTER IV.
THE PERSONAL ELEMENT 49

CHAPTER V.
OBSTRUCTION AND ITS AGENTS 67

CHAPTER VI.
GLADSTONE AND THE SURVIVAL 82

CHAPTER VII.
A FORTNIGHT OF QUIET WORK 96

CHAPTER VIII.
THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM 111

CHAPTER IX.
THE END OF A GREAT WEEK 131

CHAPTER X.
THE BUDGET, OBSTRUCTION, AND EGYPT 146

CHAPTER XI.
THE BILL IN COMMITTEE 164

CHAPTER XII.
RENEWAL OF THE FIGHT 178

CHAPTER XIII.
THE SEXTON INCIDENT 198

CHAPTER XIV.
THE BURSTING OF THE STORM 207

CHAPTER XV.
MR. DILLON'S FORGETFULNESS 219

CHAPTER XVI.
REDUCED MAJORITIES 229

CHAPTER XVII.
THE FIGHT IN THE HOUSE 242

CHAPTER XVIII.
IRELAND'S CHARTER THROUGH 254

CHAPTER XIX.
HOME RULE IN THE LORDS 269

CHAPTER I.

OPENING OF A HISTORIC SESSION.

[Sidenote: Memories.]

There is always something that depresses, as well as something that
exhilarates, in the first day of a Session of Parliament. In the months
which have elapsed, there have been plenty of events to emphasize the
mutability and the everlasting tragedy of human life. Some men have
died; figures that seemed almost the immortal portion of the life of
Parliament have disappeared into night, and their place knows them no
more; others have met the fate, more sinister and melancholy, of
changing a life of dignity and honour for one of ignominy and shame.

[Sidenote: The irony of the seats.]

But no such thought disturbed the cheerful souls of some of the Irish
Members; in the worst of times there is something exuberant in the Celt
that rises superior to circumstance. This was to be an Irish Session;
and the great fight of Ireland's future government was to be
fought--perhaps finally. But there was another circumstance which
distinguished this Session from its predecessors. The question of seats
is always a burning one in the House of Commons. In an assembly in which
there is only sitting accommodation for two out of every three members,
there are bound to be some awkward questions when feeling runs high and
debates are interesting. But at the beginning of this Session, things
had got to a worse pass than ever. The Irish Party resolved to remain on
the Opposition side of the House, true to their principle, that until
Ireland receives Home Rule, they are in opposition to all and every form
of Government from Westminster. The result was the bringing together of
the strangest of bedfellows in all sections in the House. There is none
so fiercely opposed to Home Rule as the Irish Orangeman. But the
Orangemen are a portion of the Opposition as well as the Irish
Nationalists, with the inconvenient result that there sat cheek by jowl
men who had about as much love for each other's principles as a country
vicar has for a Northampton Freethinker. On the other hand, a deadlier
hatred exists between the regular Liberal and the Liberal Unionist than
between the ordinary Liberal and the ordinary Tory. But by the irony of
fate, the action of the Irish Party compelled the Unionists to sit on
the Liberal benches again, with the result that men were ranged side by
side, whose hatreds, personal and political, were as deadly as any in
the House.

[Sidenote: Watchers for the dawn.]

As a result of all this, there occurred in the House on Tuesday morning,
January 31st, a scene unparalleled since the famous day when Mr.
Gladstone brought in his Home Rule Bill in 1886. Night was still
fighting the hosts of advancing morn, when a Tory Member--Mr.
Seton-Karr--approached the closed doors of the House of Commons, and
demanded admission to a seat. For nearly an hour he was left alone with
the darkness, and the ghosts of dead statesmen and forgotten scenes of
oratory, passion, and triumph. But as six o'clock was striking, there
entered the yard around the House two figures--similar in
purpose--different in appearance. Mr. Johnson, of Ballykilbeg, is by
this time one of the familiar types of the House; and, from his evident
sincerity, is, in spite of the terrible and mediaeval narrowness of his
creed, personally popular. Mr. Johnson is an Orangeman of Orangemen. Now
and then he delivers a speech, in which he declares that rather than see
Home Rule in Ireland, he and his friends will line the ditches with
riflemen. The Pope disturbs his dreams by night and stalks across his
speeches by day; and there is a general impression about him that he is
resolved, some time or other, to walk through a good large stream of
Papist blood. He is also a violent teetotaller; and is so strong on this
point that he is ready to shake hands, even with the deadliest Irish
opponent, across the back of a Sunday Closing Bill. Like most
Parliamentary fire-eaters, he is a mild-mannered man. Time hath dealt
tenderly with him. But still he is well on to the seventies: his hair,
once belligerently red, is thin and streaked with grey; and he walks
somewhat slowly, and not very vigorously. Dr. Rentoul is a man of a
different type. What Johnson feels, Rentoul affects. He is a tall,
common-looking, heavily-built, blustering kind of fellow; great, it is
said, on the abusive Tory platform, almost dumb and utterly impotent in
the House of Commons. These were the vanguard of the Orange army, and
they proceeded to appropriate the first and best seats they could lay
their hands upon.

[Sidenote: Dr. Tanner and his waistcoat.]

Dr. Tanner, soon after this, appeared blazing on the scene; and sorrow
came upon him that any of the enemy should have forestalled him. Like
Mr. Johnson, Tanner is a Protestant--but, unlike him, is as fiercely
Nationalist as the other is Orange; and, whenever the waves are
disturbed by the Parliamentary storm, Tanner is pretty sure to be heard
of and from. Viewing the scene of battle strategically, Tanner struck on
an idea which was certainly original. Accounts differ as to whether he
was the possessor of one hat or several; but tradition would suggest
that he had more than one. It is certain, however, that he did take off
his coat and waistcoat; and stretching these across the unclaimed land
of seats, did thereby signify to all mankind that the seats thus
decorated were his. But the novel form of appropriation--it suggests a
wrinkle to prospectors in mining countries--was held to be illegal; and
the poor doctor had to content himself with using the hat, or hats, as a
means of securing seats.

[Sidenote: Colonel Saunderson.]

Colonel Saunderson--another of the Orange army of fire-eaters--was early
at the trysting-place; and this brought about one of the curiosities of
the sitting. On the first seat below the gangway sat Dr. Tanner; on the
very next seat, as close to him as one sardine to another in a box, sat
Colonel Saunderson. Not for worlds would these two men exchange a
syllable; indeed, it was a relief to most people to find that they did
not break out into oaths and blows. What rendered the situation worse,
was that Dr. Tanner has a fine exuberant habit of expressing his
opinions for the benefit of all around him. At his back sat William
O'Brien, with his keen thin face, his eyes full of latent fire, his
stern, set jaw--his glasses suggesting the student and philosopher, who
is always the most perilous and fierce of politicians; and to William
O'Brien, Tanner made a running and biting commentary on the speeches--a
commentary, as can easily be guessed, from the extreme National point of
view. This was the music to which the Orange Colonel had to listen
through the long hours that stretched between his early morning arrival
and midnight. How men will consent to go through all this travail is, to
easy-going people, one of the curiosities of political struggle.

[Sidenote: The Chamberlain Party.]

Meantime, there had been another and an equally important descent. Mr.
Chamberlain made his son the Whip of the Unionist Party. The resemblance
between father and son is something even closer than that usually
noticed between relatives. The son looks a good deal more gentlemanly
than the father. But the single eyeglass--which no man can wear without
looking more or less of a snob--is even less becoming to the youthful
Austen than to the parent; and gives him even a coarser air. There is a
suspicion that young Chamberlain also came to the House armed with a
goodly supply of hats; at all events, he and his friends managed to
secure a large number of seats for the Unionists. Chamberlain and his
friends sat together on the third bench below the gangway--a position of
'vantage in some respects--from which they could survey the House. The
first seat was occupied by Mr. Chamberlain; next him was Sir Henry
James, and then came Mr. Courtney, in a snuff-coloured coat and drab
waistcoat; for all the world like an old-fashioned squire who has not
yet learned to accommodate himself to the sombre garments of an
unpicturesque age. The dutiful Austen left himself without a seat, and
was content to kneel in the gangway, and there take sweet counsel from
his parent.

[Sidenote: Enter the G.O.M.]

Mr. Gladstone, as everybody knows, was not technically a member of the
House of Commons when it met at the beginning of the Session. He had to
be sworn, and the first business of the House was to witness this
ceremony. I remember the first day I was a member of the House, and saw
a similar spectacle--it was in 1880. Then the House was crowded, and
there was a tremendous demonstration; but on the opening day of the
Session just ended, the ceremony came off a little earlier than had been
expected, and the House was not as full as one would have anticipated.
Then there was a great deal of work to be done; every section of the
House was busy with the attempt to get an opportunity of bringing in
Bills. The Irishmen are always to the front on these occasions, with the
list of a dozen Bills, which they seek to bring forward on
Wednesdays--the day that is still sacred to the private member anxious
to legislate. The Welsh members have now taken up the same lesson; the
London members are likewise on the alert. Now, in order to get a chance
of bringing in a Bill, it is necessary to ballot--then it is first come,
first served. To get your chance in the ballot, you must put your name
down on what is called the notice paper, where a number is placed
opposite your name. The clerks put into the balloting-box as many
numbers as there are names on the notice paper--they approached 400 on
the day in question--and then the number is drawn out, and the Speaker
calls upon the member whose number has proved to be the lucky one. A
whole crowd of members were standing waiting their turn to do this the
very moment when the Old Man walked up the floor of the House to take
the oaths, and there was a great deal of noise and confusion; but his
advent was noted instinctively and rapidly, and there was a mighty cheer
of welcome.

[Sidenote: How he looked.]

Mr. Gladstone walks down to the House, unless on great occasions. Then
there would be an obvious danger, from the enthusiasm of his admirers,
if he were on foot. Whenever there is any chance of a demonstration,
accordingly, he comes down in an open carriage, with Mrs. Gladstone at
his side. On that 31st of January, the enthusiastic love of which he was
the object, had several times overflowed; it had brought a huge crowd to
Downing Street, and it had dogged the footsteps of the Prime Minister
wherever he was seen. With bare head--with eyes glistening--with a cheek
whose wax-like pallor was touched with an unusual gleam of colour--the
Grand Old Man came down to his greatest Session, amid a thicket of
loving faces and cheering throats. I fancy one of Mrs. Gladstone's
heaviest tasks is to look after the clothes of her illustrious husband.
He manages to make them all awry whenever he gets the chance. He may be
seen at the beginning of an evening with a neat black tie just in its
proper place; and towards the end of the evening the same tie is away
under his jugular--as though he were trying experiments in the art of
expeditiously hanging a man. But on these great occasions he is always
so dressed as to bring out in full relief all the strange and varied
beauty of his splendid face and figure. For nature--in the richness and
abundance of her endowment of this portentous personage--has made him
not only the greatest man in the House of Commons, but also the
handsomest. He was dressed in the solemn black frock coat which he
always wears on great occasions, and in his buttonhole there was a
beautiful little boutonniere of white roses and lilies of the valley.
The waxen pallor was still relieved by the glow caused by his
enthusiastic reception from the people, as, with his son Herbert on the
one side and Mr. Marjoribanks, the chief Liberal whip, on the other, he
walked up the floor of the House.

[Sidenote: The new Ministry.]

One after another, the new Ministers followed--their receptions varying
with their popularity--and at last they were all seated on the Treasury
Bench. In their looks there was ample indication of the intellectual
supremacy which had raised them to that exalted position. Mr. Gladstone
had Sir William Harcourt--his Chancellor of the Exchequer--on his right,
and on his left sat Mr. John Morley, with his thin face and smile, half
ascetic, half kindly. Then came the newest man of the Government, that
fortunate youth to whom power and recognition have come, not in withered
or soured old age, but in the full prime of his manhood. Mr. Asquith
takes his seat next Mr. Morley; and it is, perhaps, the close proximity
which suggests the strong physical likeness between the two. Both are
clean shaven; both have the long narrow profile that is called
hatchet-faced; in both there is the compression of lips that reveals
depths of strength and tenacity; both have the slightly ascetic air of
the philosopher turned politician; both look singularly young, not only
for their years, but for the dazzling eminence of their positions.

[Sidenote: Other groups.]

Meantime, there are other groups in the House that are gradually
forming, and that have since played a momentous part in this great
Session. Mr. Labouchere sits in his old place below the gangway--a seat
which has become his almost by right of usage, but which he has to
secure still every day, by that regular attendance at prayers which is
so sweet to a devout soul. Next him sits Mr. Philipps--one of the
younger generation of Radicals; and then comes Sir Charles Dilke--very
carefully dressed, looking wonderfully well--rosy-cheeked, and
altogether a younger-looking and gayer-spirited man than the haggard and
pale figure which used to sit on the Treasury Bench in the days of his
glory. John Burns is up among the Irish and the Tories, in visible
opposition to all Governments. There is something breezy about John
Burns that does one good to look at. He wears a short coat--generally of
a thick blue material, that always brings to one's mental eye the
flowing sea and the mounting wave. A stout-limbed, lion-hearted
skipper--that's what John Burns looks like. There is plenty of fire in
the deep, dark, large eyes, and of tenderness as well; and all that
curious mixture of rage and tears that makes up the stern defender of
the hopeless and the forlorn and weak. On the opposite side, in the
Liberal ranks, sits Sam Woods--the miners' agent, who was sent from the
Ince Division of Lancashire instead of an aristocrat of ancient race;
also a remarkable man, with the somewhat pallid face of the life-long
teetotaller, and eyes that have the mingled expression of wrath and pity
common among the leaders of forlorn hopes and new crusades. Mr. Wilson,
the member for Middlesbrough, is restless, and moves about a good deal.
He has resolved to bring in a Bill to improve the wretched condition of
"Poor Jack," in whose company he spent many years of his own hard life;
and there is a gleam of triumph as an Irish member, in accordance with a
previous arrangement, gives notice of a Bill for that purpose when the
hazard of the ballot gives opportunity.

[Sidenote: Mover and Seconder.]

It is an honourable but a painful distinction to have either to move or
to second the reply to the Speech from the Throne. One of the silly
survivals of a feudal past still obliges men who have to perform this
duty to make perfect guys of themselves, by wearing some outlandish
uniform. Even the sturdiest Radical has to submit to this process;
though I hope when John Burns comes to figure in that honourable
position he will insist on retaining his breezy pea-jacket and his
billycock hat. It was very late in the evening when Mr. Lambert--the
victor in the great South Molton fight--had the opportunity of rising;
and it was even still later when Mr. Beaufoy rose. I must pass over
their speeches by saying that both speakers did extremely well. Even Mr.
Balfour had to compliment them; and the Old Man almost went out of his
way to express his gratification.

[Sidenote: Mr. Balfour.]

It was everywhere remarked that most of the leaders of parties began the
Session in excellent fighting trim. Mr. Morley has been living in the
pleasant green meadows and fields of the Phoenix Park, and looks five
years younger than he did last year. The Old Man astounded everybody by
his briskness; and Mr. Balfour also entered on the fray with every sign
of being in excellent health and spirits. There had been a great roar of
triumph when he came into the House, and throughout his speech--clever,
biting, and adroit--his party kept up a ringing and well-organized
chorus of pointed cheers. The speech was a significant departure from
the ordinary stamp--a fact which Mr. Gladstone, who is notably a great
stickler for tradition, did not fail to notice. For the almost unbroken
tradition of the House of Commons is that the first night shall be one
of almost loving-kindness between the one side and the other. I remember
well _Punch_ indicated this once by representing Mr. Gladstone and Mr.
Disraeli beginning a Session by presenting each other with roses, while
behind their backs was a thick bundle of whips.

[Sidenote: The fray opens.]

But Mr. Balfour is independent of tradition, and demonstrated it at once
with a speech almost vehement, in part, in its attack. He had a whole
host of flings at Mr. Justice Mathew and the Evicted Tenants'
Commission--his hits, though sufficiently obvious, and almost cheap,
being rapturously received. Altogether, it must be said the Opposition
were in excellent form, and cheered their man with a lustiness which
did them infinite credit. The Liberals, on the other hand, with forces
somewhat scattered--the round Irish chorus being especially so, in the
remote distance--did not seem equally well-organized from the point of
view of the _claque_. With the dynamite prisoners Mr. Balfour dealt so
gingerly that it was evident he knew the weakness of the Tory case, and
was very apprehensive that Mr. Matthews would be found to have sold the
pass. The ex-Home Secretary, meantime, was still disporting himself
around the Red Sea or in the Straits of Bab-el-mandeb; and Mr. Balfour,
who has notoriously a bad memory, was left groping in the cobwebs of his
brain, trying to recollect which of the dynamitards it was Mr. Matthews
intended to retain and which to release. Attacking the action of Mr.
Morley with regard to the liberation of the Gweedore prisoners, Mr.
Balfour brought upon himself a series of sharp interruptions from Mr.
Morley; and there was some very pretty play, Mr. Balfour retorting now
and then with considerable skill and readiness. Altogether it was an
excellent fighting speech, and a good beginning. There were, in addition
to what I have mentioned, plenty of shots about the foreign policy of
the Government, especially in Uganda and Egypt; and it is needless to
say that Mr. Balfour accused his successors of swallowing in office all
the principles they had professed in Opposition.

[Sidenote: The Old Man rises.]

Mr. Gladstone had to stand silent for a few minutes in face of the
thunderous welcome which he received from the Irish benches. Though the
reception was gratifying, he seemed to be impatiently awaiting its
termination, for he was full of vigour and eagerness for the attack, and
never in his most youthful hours did he display a greater readiness to
meet all assaults half-way. Those who are accustomed to the Old Man are
in the habit of noting a few premonitory signs which will always pretty
well forecast the kind of speech he will make. If he starts up flurried
and excited, it is ten chances to one that the speech will not remain
vigorous to the end; that there will be a break of voice and a weakening
of strength, and that the close will not be equal to the opening. But
when the voice is cold--though full of a deep underswell at the moment
of starting--when Mr. Gladstone moves his body with the easy grace of
perfect self-mastery, then the House is going to have an oratorical
treat. So it was in this initial speech. There was just a touch of
hoarseness in the voice, but it had a fine roll, the roll of the wave on
a pebbly beach in an autumn evening; and he carried himself so finely
and so flauntingly that there was no apprehension of anything like a
loss or a waste of strength.

[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. Altogether it was a splendid
fighting speech, and dissipated in a few moments all prophecies of gloom
and forebodings of dark disaster which have been prevalent for so many
weeks with regard to the health of the old leader. Thus in fire and fury
began the Session, the leaders on both sides fully equal to their
reputation and at their best, and all the dark and slumbering forces
that lie behind them as yet an undiscovered country of grim and strange
possibilities.

[Sidenote: Lord Randolph.]

But the solid and united ranks of the Tories were broken by one figure
that was once the most potent among them all. I had been strangely moved
at a theatre, a week or so before, as I looked at Lord Randolph
Churchill. I remembered him twelve years ago--a mere boy in appearance,
with clean-shaven face, dapper and slight figure, the alertness and
grace of youth, and a face smooth as the cheek of a maiden. And
now--bearded, slightly bowed, with lines deep as the wrinkles of an
octogenarian, he sometimes looks like the grandfather of his youthful
self. It is in the deep-set, brilliant eyes that you still see all the
fire of his extraordinary political genius, and the embers, that may
quickly burst into flame, of all the passion and force of a violently
strong character. For the moment he sits silent and expectant. He has
even refused to take his rightful place among the leaders of the party
on the Front Opposition Bench. Still he sits in the corner immediately
behind, which is the spectral throne of exiled rulers. He has the power
of all strong natures of creating around him an atmosphere of
uncertainty, apprehension, and fear. Of all the many problems of this
Session of probably fierce personal conflict, this was the most
unreadable sphinx.

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