through a Parliamentary interregnum during which it was ruled by a House of Commons that had exhausted its mandate, and by its own act had ceased to represent the bulk of the enfranchised classes. It lacked authority to legislate, and was too spiritless to intrigue. All that could be done by its leaders was to prepare the ground for the General Election; in other words, they began to seek for a policy with which they could go to the country. Many Cabinet meetings were held in January, but with no very obvious result. Ministers seemed unable to hit on a programme, and when Lord Stanley and Mr. Gathorne Hardy addressed a great political meeting at Bristol on the 22nd, their chief object appeared to be to apologise for the Reform Act. It had been demanded in a manner that it would have been dangerous to refuse, and the “innovating impulse” which it might create would soon spend itself. Such, at least, was Lord Stanley’s view. The Liberals, on the other hand, had been openly fishing for a policy. Some, like Mr. Lowe, Mr. Stansfeld, and Mr. Forster, pressed for radical measures of educational reform. “We must educate our masters,” said Mr. Lowe, and so he now demanded national compulsory unsectarian education. A few rising young men, like Mr. Fawcett, gave prominence to Land Law Reform, the creation of peasant-proprietorship, abolition of primogeniture, and the like. Mr. Bright, however, like most thinking men at the time, contended that the Irish Question must hold the first place in the Liberal programme of the future. The recent activity of the Fenians, and the discovery that the Irish patriots had found in America a new fulcrum for their agitation, convinced Englishmen that a new departure must be taken in Irish policy. Unless England could dictate a Conspiracy Bill to the United States, the American-Irish could keep Ireland in revolutionary restlessness so long as Irishmen despaired of getting grievances redressed by the Imperial Parliament. But what should be done for Ireland? Some said the Land Question must be settled; others that concessions to the priesthood in the matter of education would suffice; others, like Lord Stanley, thought the Irish case was hopeless, and they talked of the impossibility of conceding anything to noise and menace.