and after all the servile sycophancy they had given to the Liberals, neither Mr Redmond nor those true-blue Liberals, Mr Dillon and Mr O’Connor, had ever sought to extract from Mr Asquith an irrefragable statement of his intentions regarding the Irish Question, or whether he and his Government intended to make it a prime plank in the Liberal platform at the polls.  The rejection of the Budget by the Lords was made the real issue before the electors, and little was heard of Home Rule, either on the platform or in the Press.  True, Mr Asquith made a vague and non-committal reference to it at the Albert Hall on the eve of the election, but the Liberal candidates, with extraordinary unanimity, fought shy of it in every constituency, except where there was a considerable Irish vote to be played up to, and one of the Liberal Party Whips even went so far as to declare there was no Home Rule engagement at all.  Far different was it in other days, when Parnell was in power.  He would have pinned the Party to whom he was giving his support down to a written compact, which could not be broken without dishonour, and he would leave nothing to the mere emergencies and expediencies of politics, which are only the gambler’s dice in a devil’s game.

But the men of lesser calibre who had now the destiny of a nation in their hands “trusted” in the good faith of the Liberals and in return asked the country to “trust” them.  There never was such a puckish game played in history.  Criticism was stifled and the people were told, and no doubt in their innocence believed it, that Home Rule was already as good as carried and that the dream of all the years was come true.  Mr Dillon was audaciously flying the flag of “Boer Home Rule as a minimum,” although he had not a scrap of authority or a line of sanction for his pronouncements.

It seemed as if every friend of Mr O’Brien was to go under in the campaign of opposition that was being elaborately carried out against them.  Our constituencies were swarming with paid organisers and men and money galore were pouring in from outside, so that our downfall and defeat should be made an absolute certainty.

It was in this crisis that the generous spirit of Mr O’Brien impelled him to come to our assistance.  For my own part I never had a doubt that when the hour struck the champion of so many noble causes would be found once again stoutly defending the men who had staked all for the sake of principle, but who, without his aid, must be mercilessly thrown to the wolves.  We were in a most benighted state, without any trace of organisation of our own (except that I had the Land and Labour Association unflinchingly on my side), without any newspaper to report our speeches, and with only the bravest of the brave to come upon our platforms and say a good word for us.  The outlook was as bleak as it well could be, when suddenly, towards the end of December 1909, the joyous news reached us that “the hero of a hundred fights” was about to throw himself into the breach on our behalf.  Our enemies laughed the rumour to scorn, but we knew better and we bided in patience the coming of our man.