concealed from view as in the previous year. The Liberals, indeed,
maintained the same tactical reserve on the subject, alike in their
writings and their speeches. The Liberal Press of the period may be
searched in vain for any clear indication that the electors were about
to be asked to decide once more this momentous constitutional question.
Such mention of it as was occasionally to be found in ministerial
speeches seemed designed to convey the idea that, while the door leading
to Home Rule was still formally open, there was no immediate prospect of
its being brought into use. The Prime Minister in particular did
everything in his power to direct the attention of the country to the
same issues as in the preceding January, among which Ireland had had no
place. In presenting the Government's case at Hull on the 25th of
November, he reminded the country that in the January elections the veto
of the Peers was "the dominant issue"; in the intervening months the
Government, he said, had brought forward proposals for dealing with the
veto, and had given the Lords an opportunity to make proposals of their
own; a defeat of the Liberals in the coming elections would bring in
"Protection disguised as Tariff Reform"; but he (Mr. Asquith) preferred
to concentrate his criticism on Lord Lansdowne's "crude and complex
scheme" for Second Chamber reform; he made a passing mention of
"self-government for Ireland" as a policy that would have the sympathy
of the Dominions, but added that "the immediate task was to secure fair
play for Liberal legislation and popular government." And in his
election address Mr. Asquith declared that "the appeal to the country
was almost narrowed to a single issue, and on its determination hung the
whole future of democratic Government."

This zeal for "popular," or "democratic" government was, however, not
inconsistent apparently with a determination to avoid at all hazards
consulting the will of the people, before doing what the people had