July, 1885, is the most conspicuous example.]

[Footnote 4: At Easter, 1885, I met a number of leading Ulster Liberals
in Belfast, told them that Home Rule was certainly coming, and urged
them to prepare some plan under which any special interests they
conceived the Protestant part of Ulster to have, would be effectually
safe-guarded. They were startled, and at first discomposed, but
presently told me I was mistaken; to which I could only reply that time
would show, and perhaps sooner then even English Liberals expected.]

[Footnote 5: My recollection of a conversation with a distinguished
public man in July, 1882, enables me to say that this fact had impressed
itself upon us as early as that year. He doubted the fact, but admitted
that, if true, it was momentous. The passing of the Franchise Bill made
it, in our view, more momentous than ever.]

[Footnote 6: Some thought that its functions should be very limited,
while large powers were granted to county boards or provincial councils.
But most had, I think, already perceived that the grant of a merely
local self-government, while retaining an irresponsible central
bureaucracy, would do more harm than good. It seemed at first sight a
safer experiment than the creation of a central legislative body. But,
like many middle courses, it combined the demerits and wanted the merits
of each of the extreme courses. It would not make the country tranquil,
as firm and long-continued repression might possibly do. Neither would
it satisfy the people's demands, and divert them from struggles against
England to disputes and discussions among themselves, as the gift of
genuine self-government might do.]

[Footnote 7: Some of us had tried to do so. I prepared such a scheme in