It was a speech which Redmond, if present, must have replied to, and could not have replied to without indicating profound sympathy—­for he was in agreement with its main lines; and his expression of opinion upon it must have influenced strongly the views of the rank and file at the moment when they were most open to suggestion.

In his absence, men’s minds were greatly affected by the fear that if we adopted these proposals, our decision would be exposed to attack from a combination of three forces—­Sinn Fein, which would at least officially condemn anything less than complete separation, and would furiously assail a proposal that denied full taxing powers; the Roman Catholic Church, which would take its lead from Bishop O’Donnell, who set out in an able memorandum the reasons why Ireland must have full control of taxation; and finally, the powerful newspaper whose proprietor, Mr. Murphy, at once gave signs of his hostility by putting on the paper an amendment to Lord Midleton’s resolution which amounted to a direct negative.

The reassembly of the Convention was fixed for Wednesday, January 2nd.  Redmond came to Dublin on the Monday.  He told me that he was inclined to move that while we thanked Lord Midleton for his substantial contribution towards our purpose, we could not accept his proposal, unless it opened the way to a settlement.  What he meant by this was not merely that if Ulster agreed, we should accept; for that would certainly open the way.  But he had also in his mind the possibility of a guarantee from Government that an arrangement come to, as this might be, by four-fifths of the Convention, and repudiated only by the pledge-bound Ulster block, would be regarded as substantial agreement, and taken as a basis for legislation.  In that case, also, the way would be open; but he had no written assurance of such an understanding, though I gathered that he was urging the Government to give it.  We were, however, told on good authority in these days that if the Southern Unionists’ proposal was accepted by the Nationalists and other elements outside of Ulster, the Prime Minister would use his whole influence with his colleagues to secure acceptance of the compact and immediate legislation upon it.  This would mean, we were also assured, that the whole thing would be done before Easter.

On January 2nd the resumed debate for the first time brought the Convention face to face with concrete proposals for a settlement.  In tone and in substance it would have done credit to any Parliament that ever sat.  I shall not try to summarize the arguments, but simply to note certain outstanding facts.

Lord Midleton modified his original proposal that collection of customs should be an Imperial service throughout.  He agreed that collection might be done by the Irish Civil Service.  Moreover, he admitted that Ireland must have full means of checking the account for these taxes, great part of which must necessarily be collected at English ports, since tea, tobacco and the other dutiable articles were seldom shipped direct to Ireland.