passionate loyalty to the Crown; he watched with disgust the way in
which her defences were being sapped by the Liberal Party in England;
and the thought that such a people were perhaps on the eve of being
driven into subjection to the men whose character he had had so much
opportunity to gauge in the days of the Land League filled him with
indignation.

If, therefore, he could be of service in helping to avert so great a
wrong Sir Edward Carson came to the conclusion that it would be shirking
a call of duty were he to decline the leadership that had been offered
him. Realising to the full all that it meant for himself--inevitable
sacrifice of income, of ease, of chances of promotion, a burden of
responsibility, a probability of danger--he gave his consent; and the
day he gave it--the 21st of February, 1910--should be marked for all
time as a red-letter day in the Ulster calendar.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] _Lord Randolph Churchill_, by the Right Hon. W.S. Churchill, vol.
ii, p. 62.

[10] _The Times_, June 16th, 1892.

[11] He expressed this conviction to the author in 1911.




CHAPTER IV