The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1910-10-29
payment of members of parliament
May Succeed Balfour.

payment of members of parliament
May Succeed Balfour.
Since Mr.. Balfour's health begaH to
fail there are two whose names are
mentioned as his possible successor.
One is Austin Chamberlain; the other
is F. e. Smith, a brilliant young law
yer and orator, who sprang rapidly
into eminence during the last par
lament In letter during the week
he comes out bluntly in favor of pay
ment of members of parliament as
the only alternative "to the intoler-
able system which the Osbourne judg-
ment has ended This has made old
Tories sit up and take notice and has
created a weeks angry and heated
discussion in the organs of the Un-
ionist party. Behind all these sources
of disunion in both great parties
looms up the old one of the Confer
ence. The laborites were opposed to
lit from the outset. The Radicals are
impatient of delay in their campaign
against the Lords. The younger Tor
les clamor for vigorous and imme-
diate agitation for tariff reform and
openly blame Balfour for his dilatori-
ness. The outlook, in a word, is so
complex and puzzling that anything
may happen.
Carnegie In Ireland.
1t will scarcely be of supreme in
terest to the American reader to know
that we have had in Ireland visit
from Mr.. Andrew Carnegie, and that
he has received the freedom of the
city of Belfast. It will certainly not
surprise the reader to know that Mr..
Cesnegie made a speech in which he
discoursed on free libraries, education,
and the evils of war. Still he had
some things to say that he could not
have said in other places. He was
proud of Belfast. He was told that
much of the city's progress was due
to it's Scotch element. He had that
Ooy 0OOAA CAO IoA soCoI AOpO ldCtO1y, dllu
the largest ship-building yards in the
world. ..
But, had his aristocratic friends
wished they could have shown him
some of the worst sweating shops in
Christendom. The exposure of these
within the last month reveals a con-
dition of affairs that cries to heaven
for vengeance, and what Mr.. Devlin,
the only Nationalist member that Bel
before parliament as soon as it re-
opens.
Reading between the lines of his
speech, I think I can also see an at
tempt to answer some opinions ex-
pressed in America to the effect that
his libraries are not an unmixed bless
ing He said he did not know Sir Wal
ter Scott. Nor was he alarmed at the
extent to which the frequenters of pub
lie libraries avail of the works of fic-
ton on the shelves. He thinks that
fiction cultivates the taste for reading,
and that as people become acquainted
with novels they take in time to
more serious literature. The public
library is, therefore, good thing,
thinks Mr.. Carnegie, even if the de-
mand for fiction goes up to ninety or
ninety-f1ve per cent.
AS I read, 1 wished l could ask
Mr.. Carnegie three questions: How
many modern novelists are like Sir
Walter Scott? How many Irish OF
| American boys have minds that will
run in the same groove as did that
of Mr.. Carnegie? What about the
opinion Of Thackery, himself no
mean writer of fiction, that the boy
who surfeits on the sweets of fiction
destroys his tastes for wholesome
food? Mr.. Carnegie declared that he
is democrat from the top of his head
to the sole of his feet. Trust the peo-
pie, he said. The advice was probably
not very welcome to his select audi
ence in Belfast. Their spirit of demo.
cracy was shown in the fact that not
fact that not single Catholic or
nationalist was invited to take part
in the ceremony.
| Last winter, When Ralph Parlette,
one of the standard humorous phil