But this attitude of self-abnegation was pushed very far by him, and perhaps too far.  In his early utterances he deprecated all official recognition of sections.  Yet from the moment when committees came to be appointed this recognition was claimed; and from the first the Ulster group maintained a compact organization.  They had their own chairman, Mr. Barrie, and their secretary; they secured a committee-room for their own purposes; they voted solidly as one man.  All this, though we did not know it at first, was dictated by the conditions of their attendance.  They were pledged to act simply as delegates, who must submit every question of importance to an Advisory Committee in Belfast—­behind which again was the Ulster Unionist Council.  They had therefore no freedom of action and were of necessity extremely guarded in speech.

The Southern Unionists, including the representatives of the Irish peers, were also organized as a group; but they came to the Convention with much fuller powers.  They felt themselves bound to consider, and in certain conditions to consult, those whom they represented; but they were free to originate suggestions, and individually each man expressed his own view.  But they too had their meeting-place and their frequent consultations.

The handful of Labour men also met and discussed action, though they were not organized as a group and did not feel pledged to a joint course.  Each, according to his own lights, represented the interests of Labour.  Still, they met.

The only group which had no common centre of reunion was that of the Nationalists—­a majority of the whole assembly.  This included the representatives of the Irish party and the County and Urban Councillors, all of whom had been returned as its supporters.  It included also the four representatives of the hierarchy, every one of whom had been either actually or potentially a part of Nationalist Conventions, and of whom three had been most prominent supporters of the general organization.

But a difficulty existed in the presence of other personages who were in general support of us, but who outside the Convention belonged to a different category.  Lord Dunraven was a Home Ruler, but had been no supporter of the Irish party.  Lord MacDonnell stood much nearer to us, but was a power in his own right and had never been a party politician.  Mr. Lysaght had voted against us in Clare.  Mr. Russell had very often attacked the party on aspects of its general action.  Above all, there was Mr. W.M.  Murphy, who, like Mr. Healy, had been at one time a member of the Irish party, and whose paper had for long been in nominal support of its purposes, but who had throughout recent years done more than all forces together to discredit and weaken its influence.