ABSTRACT
Apart from the Irish Land Act, “progress” was virtually confined to the Abolition of Flogging in the Army and Navy. The Bill to set up elected County Councils in Ireland, for example, was abandoned before the end of the Session despite the hopes which had been cherished that moderate opinion in Ireland might come to accept it as a substitute for full “Home Rule.” When Parnell retorted with a charge that the Leeds speaking on Ireland had been unscrupulous and dishonest, his arrest was ordered amid almost universal approval on the British side of St. George’s Channel. Mr. Broadhurst, for instance, said he would rather have a thousand Parnells arrested than that the ‘starving Irish people’ should be withheld from the ‘blessings which the Legislature had conferred. Perhaps Chamberlain’s address of October 25th to the National Liberal Federation meeting at Liverpool was the friendliest to Ireland of all the prominent political speeches made at this time.
