_Eaton Hall, Saturday._
[Illustration:]
DEAR TOBY,--I write to you from here where I stay a day or two on my
way to Dublin. I expect by the time it reaches you I will be installed
in the Chief Secretary's Lodge, and the National League may prepare to
sit up. I have been spending a week or two very agreeably in Scotland,
a little out of the way of letters or newspapers. I am told there has
been quite a demand for me, a sort of popular outcry that I should
forthwith proceed to Ireland. This is, of course, not unflattering.
It indicates a general belief which I, for one, am not disposed to
contest, that if Ireland is to be saved, I'm the man to do it. That's
all very well; but it is, doncha know, something of a boah to be thus
bothered at a time when one had two or three pleasant engagements on
hand. It used to be just the same in the House last Session. If I did
not really live there, entering with the Mace and the SPEAKER, and
leaving only at the cry of "Who goes home?" there were impetuous
protests. I put in KING-HARMAN at Question time, but they wouldn't
have him. Often, as I lay on the sofa in the Chief Secretary's room,
looking over _Punch_, or reading the proofs of the forthcoming new
edition of my _Defence of Philosophic Doubt_, I have heard the distant
growls of the Irish Members when KING-HARMAN rose to answer a question
addressed to me. Quite touching this personal attachment. At the same
time a little embarrassing.
Now I am really going to Dublin, and shall spend a cheerful November
there. GRANDOLPH, in his genial way, has tried to make things pleasant
by reminding me that from the drawing-room window of the Chief
Secretary's Lodge I can see the place where poor FREDDY CAVENDISH
fell. "They're sure to take a pot shot at you," he says; "but you're
all right. Unless a man can make sure of hitting a lamp-post at
fifty paces, it will be no use his trying to bring you down." A nice
companionable man GRANDOLPH. Always tries to say something pleasant.
But really I don't pay much attention to his kindly apprehensions. I
shall be boahed, I daresay; but not by the passage of a bullet, or the
thrust of a knife.
People evidently expect great things to follow on my arrival in
Dublin. To the accident of my holiday absence in Scotland they
attribute all the failures of the Executive. "If BALFOUR had been
there," they say, "W. O'BRIEN would now be comfortably in gaol and T.
D. S., Lord Mayor, would be laid by the heels." I weally don't
know. Fact is, I have not closely followed up affairs either in the
newspapers or despatches. There have been some rows, I understand.
But that is not unusual in Ireland. Where people are right in
kindly looking to me to restore peace and order in Ireland is in the
supposition that I have a plan. That is true, though I cannot claim
personal and private property in it. Fact is the plan is CROMWELL'S.
It worked admirably when originally put in practice, and I do not see
any reason why it should fail now. There are, of course, difficulties
in the way; prejudice to be overcome, legal forms to be dealt with,
and that sort of thing. There is also, next Session of Parliament to
be met, and awkward questions by TIM HEALY and the rest. But they
need not think to intimidate me by such reflections. I shall put
up KING-HARMAN to answer all inconvenient questions. Besides, it is
exceedingly probable that in the full development of my plan the Irish
Members who last Session distinguished themselves by "wanting to know"
will be unavoidably absent from their places. It is an awful nuisance
breaking in upon a man's holiday; but it is a difficulty that has to
be faced, and as there seems a popular inclination to look to me to
settle it, I suppose there is nothing to be done but to grapple with
it.
One additional drawback from a quite unexpected source makes itself
known by correspondence with my colleagues. They are all in a dreadful
state of fussy alarm. My uncle the Markiss begs me to be careful.
"Firmness without Rashness" is an excellent copy-head, which W. H.
SMITH sends me in fine round-hand from the distant Mediterranean. I
wish they'd all mind their own affairs. In the intervals of my other
occupations I can answer for Ireland, and if any awkwardness arises, I
can put up KING-HARMAN to answer for me. So, dear TOBY, don't you
have any anxiety on my account. Some half-hour after dinner, with the
contemplative toothpick at hand, and my heels on the table, I will, if
the subject occurs to me, settle the Irish Question.
Yours faithfully,