politics it is not necessary to press the case against "Ulster" any
farther than that. Even majorities have their rights. If a plurality of
nine to two is not sufficient to determine policy and conduct business
in a modern nation, then there is no other choice except anarchy, or
rather an insane atomism. Not merely every party, but every household
and, in last resort, every individual will end as a Provisional
Government. Separatism of this type is a very ecstasy of nonsense, and
none of my readers will think so cheaply of his own intelligence as to
stay to discuss it. It is in other terms that we must handle the problem
of "Ulster."

The existence in certain nooks and corners of Ireland of a democratic
vote hostile to Home Rule is, let us confess, a conundrum. But it is a
conundrum of psychology rather than of politics. It may seem rude to say
so, but Orangeism consists mainly of a settled hallucination and an
annual brainstorm. No one who has not been present at a Twelfth of July
procession can realise how completely all its manifestations belong to
the life of hysteria and not to that of reason. M. Paul-Dubois, whom we
may summon out of a cloud of witnesses, writes of them as "demagogic
orgies with a mixed inspiration of Freemasonry and the Salvation Army."
The Twelfth of July is, or rather was, for its fine furies are now much
abated, a savage carnival comparable only to the corroborees of certain
primitive tribes.

"A monster procession," continues M. Paul-Dubois, "marches through
Belfast, as through every town and village of Orange Ulster, ending
up with a vast meeting at which the glories of William of Orange
and the reverses of James II. are celebrated in song.... Each
'lodge' sends its delegation to the procession with banners and
drums. On the flags are various devices: 'Diamond Heroes,' 'True