The Irish standard., 1898-12-10
LlEE OF PARNELL
Continued from pnge IL

Continued from Page H.
'fhis prospect is ominous and most
alarming"
There is an irreconcllable clash of
views mere. But strange, also, that the
proposed reduction of the Irish members
TO 50 IN the home rule bill of 1898 should
also have been declared alarming" by
Mr.. Redmond.
We shall not delay, however over the
questions raised by Mr.. O'Brien frankly,
unimpartial, incomplete and withal dam
aging account Of the later incidents of
a great but marred career. Its ncom-
pleteness, even in regard to vital mat.
tiers of common knowledge, is sometin IS
marvellous. The historian who chroni-
Giles the events of Mr.. Parnelrs fall, and
omlts the announcement of the Irish
hierarchy is careless indeed The
plunge from the history of the years
1877 to 1889 into the dismal story of
1S9O-91 cannot be made even by Mr..
OBrien anything but chilling and de-
pressing. We pass from nation making
and the company of statesmen into the
battle of faction and the pleasant rec
objections of Mr.. Barry O'Brien 1t is
literary descent and it is symptomalic
of a great tragedy and great fall. Mr..
OBrien concludes his history with an
appreciation obtained from Mr.. Glad
stone in 1897. 1t is the only graphic
summing up of Parncl in the book.
'Parnell was the most remarkable
man | ever met" said Mr.. Gladstone.
81 Go not say the ablest man; say the
most remarkable and the most Interest,"
ing. He was an intellectual phenome-
non. He was unlike anyone I had eyer
met. He did things and he said things
unlike other men. 1t was an Intellectual
treat to do business with Parnell AZ!
! had Parnell lived, had there been no di-
vorce proceedings, do soemnly believe
there would be a parliament in Ireland
/ now! Oh, it was a terrible tragedy.
There ought to have been DEATH but
there would have been a resurrection
| l do not say that the private qucs, ion
ought to have affected the public move
ment. What l say is, it did affect it,
and, having affected it, Parnell was
bound to go. l think Parnell acted bad
ly. l think he ought to have gone right
away. He would have come back; moth
ing could have prevented him; he would
In 4,
WAS a most extraordinary man. Was he
callous to everything? l never could
tell how much he felt, or how much lie
did not feel. He was generally immova-
characteristic. A marvellous man, Il ter
rible fall"
The issues involved in that fall are
not quite SO simple as they appeared to
many on both sides OF the controversy
in 1890 and 1891. Barry O'Bren does
not determine them. No one could hut
Mr.. Parnell himself; and for all the
purposes of authentic biography the
oracle is dumb. and does not speak in
these volumes except as he spoke in the
whirlwind Of personal combat. Parncll
was a great man, and an lncomparably
great man; but in the measure of his
greatness was his responsibility. Did
he fulfill it? The future will answer
We lay down the volumes with sense Of
disappointment; they will not satisfy
expectations. But no book about the
life OF Parnell and the uprising of Ire
land that found him at it's head, could
fail to be interesting. Perhaps the au-
thor made the best use Of his materials;
but it is clear he has not written the
final word on great subject. One fault
we must charge to him--a certain care
lessness regarding names and facts
which make his book unreliable in de-
tail. Who was Norris Brooke? and
where In Dublin is tho "Knightsbrid.se
Termnus?"