DEATH OF MR. PARNELL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8693, 9 October 1891, Page 5

DEATH OF MR. PARNELL.

REPORTED SUICIDE.

SENSATION IN IRELAND.

MANY MOVED TO TEARS.

THE POLITICAL EFFECT OF lIIS

DEATH.

CONTRADICTORY STATEMENTS. Prttt Auociation.—Me-ctric Telcjraph—Copyright. London, October 7. Me. C. S. Parnell, M.P., is dead, aged 45. He caught a chill while in bed on Friday, and developed acute rheumatism. He was unconscious for several hours, and died at midnight yesterday in intense agony. He was staying at Brighton. • Later. Mrs. Parnell's solicitors have received an unsigned telegram stating that Mr. Parnell committed suicide. Mr. Justin Macarthy said to an interviewer that he was inexpressibly grieved and shocked at Mr. Parnell's sudden death, though it would bring peace and heal the breach.between the two sections of the Irish party. They would now join forces again, and place the cause of Home Rule bpyond danger. The Parnellites are holding a conference in Dublin. Mr. ' Parnell's last appearance in public was on Sunday week. 1 He left Ireland on Thursday suffering from a- chill, which developed . into rheumatism, and died unconscious, in the presence of his wife only. There was immense excitement in Dublin when the news became known. Business was stopped for a time, and many persons were moved to tears. The National Federation, which was sitting in Dublin, has adjourned. A prominent Parnellite declares that the death of the leader, so far from healing, will widen the breach in the Irish Party. A CHARACTER SKETCH. ' The following interesting character sketch of Mr. Parnell, written by Mr. W. T. Stead, appeared in the Review of Reviews for February, 1890. Little could Mr. Stead have dreamt when he wrote his highly sympathetic sketch of " the uncrowned King of Ireland" that before the end of 1891 Mr. Parnell would be under a social ban, the deposed leader of the Irish party, reviled by his former colleagues, and, last of all, dead. Some thirty years ago a small boy, with curious brown eyes ana fair hair, might have been observed on the coping of the roof of a stately mansion-house in Ireland. He was all alone, and was apparently too intent upon what he was doing to spare a thought for the perils of his position. He had with him on the roof an iron pot, one of those usually employed for boiling potatoes, but he had converted into an improvised brazier, in which ho was melting lead. It was little Charlie Parnell, who, having heard that the best way of making spherical bullets was to drop molten lead from a great ' height, had mounted the roof of Avondale. dragging an improvised smelting-pot full of burning coals uptwo high laddersandacrosstheslopingroof. What success the boy had in casting bullets tradition sayeth not, nor does it much matter. The marvellous thine: was that the boy came down in safety. The incident was typical of Mr. Parnell's subsequent career. The boy was father of the man. The cool daring which led the lad to drag his blazing brazier to the copestone of topmost roof of Avondale without making any fuss or phrase, the originality and resource with which he carricd out his experiment, the calm security with which lie achieved his purpose, and tho safety with which he descended to earth, are all typical of . the Irish leader, who this month is the most conspicuous figure 111 the political arena. THE PARADOX CALLED PARNELL. Mr. Parnell is an incarnate paradox. He is, to begin with, a Protestant, and yet he is the chosen chief of the most passionately Catholic population in the world. Although the uncrowned king of Ireland, he is of English and American descent. He is a landlord, but he has led the tenants to a victory without parallel in our history. He is obeyed as no one has ever been obeyed before by an Irish party, but he began his career by a mutiny against the authority of his leader. His name lias been the symbol of a revolutionary movement, against which all the resources of civilisation were invoked in vain, but he is at the same time the mainstay of conservatism among his owu people. ' He is the Parliamentary chief of the most voluble and eloquent of English-speaking nationalities. But when he mane his debut as a Parliamentary candidate, lie stuck and could not get through even the .-'perfunctory maiden speech of a political debutant, and down to tnis day he has never made a single speech that could by any stretch of charity be described as an eloquent oration. Imagine everything that the stage Irishman is supposed to be, and you have everything Mr. Parnell' is not. He is neither a conspirator nor a demagogue. He has neither fire nor fury nor passion, nor any of the splendid vices or tho showy virtues of his countryman. In the midst of a loquacious and nervously restless generation, Mr. Parnell has achieved his unique success chiefly by the possession of a unique capacity of holding his tongue. AN ANGLO-AMERICAN IRISHMAN. Mr. Piiruoil is a typo of the amalgamation of races that is going on under the rooftree of our English speech. His forebears crossed over to Ireland after the Commonwealth from Congleton, in Cheshire; one of the most distinguished of his predecessors, who held high office in an English Cabinet, died as Baron Congleton in 1842. His mother is an American, the daughter of tho first Admiral in the American navy. He was educated as ft small boy in a Nonconformist dame : school in Somersetshire._ He matritricnlated in Cambridge University. He has been the acknowledged' leader of tho Irish race all over the world ever since 1879 but the type of his political genius is more akin to that of tho Scotch than to that of any other nationality under the British flag. A CHIP OF THE OLD BLOCK. When Mr. Parnell's grandfather _ w,\s newly married, his honeymoon was interrupted by a summons to take the seas against the English. As he bade his bride farewell, he asked, " What present shall I' bring you when I come back ?" " Bring me a British frigate !" was her reply; for she, too, was of the sturdy English breed which has ever been the boldest and deadliest foe of the British Government when it is false to the true principles of English liberty. " Bring you - one British frigate?" said Charles Stewart; " you shall have two, and I shall weat my wedding uniform in battle." He was as good as his word, and his capturo of the Cyano and the Levant is one of the most brilliant episodes in the naval annals of America. A remark attributed to him after the battle was over, when the British captains, as prisoners of war, were disputing in his cabin as to who was to blame for the loss of tlie fight, might almost be uttered_ by his grandson as he listens to the recriminations of Liberals and Tories about the coming triumph of Homo Rule. " Gentlemen," said he, " there is no use getting warm about it; it would have been just the same whatever you might have done. If you doubt that, I will put you all on board again and you can try it over." The last promise, however, Mr. Parnell would never have made. He is too cautious to risk tho chances of a battlo that is already gained. But it was natural that a man "with such ancestors • should approaoh the struggle with the British Government iu a spirit that could easily be mistaken for intense hatred of Englaud and the English. WITH THE HEAD OF AN ENGINEER. Hatred of that sentimental kind is not Mr. Parnell's foible. He is not sentimentalist enough to hate England. His mind is essentially that of a civil engineer. He has always had a great turn for mechanics, and one of. the amusements of his youth was to endeavour to solve the problem of perpetual motion. He l has always been interested in chemicals and natural philosophy, and durring part of the sittings of the Commission he appeared with his arm in a sling owing to some accident in a laboratory. Rumour said at the time that he had been testing some of the ores of Avondale for gold, arid the nitric aoid had burnt his hand. The habit of . mind which he brought to politics was the sumo as that which Sir John Parnell addressed himself to tho making of canals in Ireland. When an ' engineer is making a cutting he docs not swear even at a quagmire, and Mr. Parnoll is too intent upon his end to waste force in unnecessary emotion. No man has caused more stormy ebullitions of passion, but excepting on one or two. memorable occasions, he has been as cool as a cucumber, a3 collected us a judge. His first recorded utterance - in the House of Commons .was characteristic. It was

made in the first great , struggles by which the Home Rulers ! compelled' the hostile parties to admit their right, to recognition. In reply to fierce objurgations from both sides of the , House Mr. Parnell said that " they had deliberately adopted this course, and they .'would stick to it. Deliberation in selecting the means ; to be employed and resolution as immovable .as adamant when they were adopted—these have distinguished Mr. Pariiell's policy. from the first to the last.- > :-J i ' ■ ; v AN IRISH ATHANASIUS. There are few men of whom the English would be prouder if he had been on the other side. He at least has shown his ability to stand alone.- Time and again, in the early days, when Mr, Biggar and Major O'Gorman acted as "tellers, Mr. Parnell walked alone into the 'lobby against a House raging with impotent indignation.' . Athanasius contra mundum is always a heroic figure, which, however, is better appreciated by the world when Athanasius is at a little distance. When the. fight is on there is no one so unpopular. Popular or unpopular it did not matter to Mr. Parnoll. He had a lone row to hoe, and he went on • with' his work, " rain or shine." : ,• '• . HOW HE LEARNT TOE RULES OF THE HOUSE. This devotion to his end, not. the devotion of a fanatic who is sustained by the glow of passionate enthusiasm, but the practical, business-like determination of an engineer who has a certain amount of tunnelling to do, has been one great secret of his power. He blundered often when lie entered Parliament owing to his iuacquaintauce with the forms of the House. " How are you to learn the rules of the House?" said a young and impatient follower. . "By. breaking them,' was the laconic but sufficient answer. This is the way in whioh Mr. Parnell learned his lesson. SLOW AND STEADY WINS THE RACE. Mr. Parnell resembles Lord Hartington and Mr. Balfour in being constitutionally indisposed to very active exertion. "The ingrained laziness of his disposition," so his impatient followers call it; but there are times when slow and steady wins the race. But Mr. Parnell is no longer the man he was. Mr. Biggar stood the storm and stress of that trying time better than his younger ally. Mr. Parnell, when a boy at school, was laid up with typhoid fever, and he has never quite been in robust health ever since. Three years ago be broke down utterly. Since then he has taken it easytoo easy, some thinkfor he has hardly kept himself in evidence either in Parliament or in Ireland. But- he worked hard at the Commission in getting up his case, and he has kept his seat in the saddle as firmly as ever both in the House and out of it. His will there is none to dispute. His authority is as supreme as in the old days when he only got rest when he was sent to caol. Kilmainham, with its horribly dark dungeon walk, was not exactly the best sanatorium for a politician. knocked up by the incessant labours of the Land League, out it was better than nothing, and in other ways his imprisonment did him good. Mr. Parnell, in his relations with his fellow-men, is : kind-hearted and sympathetic. His prison experiences have made him very genial with all who have suffered for the Irish cause. It is a thousand pities that all the occupants of the Front Opposition . Bench ,• could not be passed through the same experience. He is cautious, and never did he say a truer word that when he said he never was a conspirator. His experience of Irish conspirators did not tempt him to risk his life and liberty in their hands. ...

HIS CHARACTERISTICS AS LEADER. As a leader he was not an originator. Mr. Biggar invented Obstruction before Mr. Parnell adopted it. It was Ronayne who first put him up to the idea of. making the Irish force a power in English politics. There is nothing original in the adoption of the method of the importunate widow in Parliamentary politics. But while " Mr. Parnell initiated nothing, he bettered all his instructions, and improved upon, all; his masters. Mr. Parnell's, character is ■ often misunderstood, even by those' who stand nearest to him. Nothing, for instance, is more common than to hear him spoken' of as a rigid disciplinarian—a kind of Irish Tzar. In reality, he allows his followers to go as they please to an extent that often lands him in considerable difficulties. It is an open secret that the Plan of Campaign would never have been proclaimed if Mr, Parnell had had his own way. His constitutional lethargy, reinforced at that time .by acute illness, enabled his followers to force his hand. In Parliament he effaces himself to an extent that few realise. But in one respect only is the popular conception well founded. When Mr. Parnell speaks he is obeyed. But he speaks very seldom, and always to some purpose. The atmosphere of reserve in which lie shrouds himself is natural to him. ' He is an aristocrat born and bred, and if he were, like his predecessor, to become a peer of the realm, ho would find himself much more at home in the House of Lords than with the rough and rude democracy, AN ESSENTIALLY CONSERVATIVE FORCE. . English people are only beginning to understand that Mr. Parnell is the great conservative force in Ireland. He is a landlord and an Englishman. Ho has 110 consuming passion for the extirpation of landlordism. It was no doubt only in joke that he told Michael Davitt that the first necessity for maintaining order in a Home-Ruled Ireland would be to clap him (Davitt) into gaol. But the joke covered a truth. Ddvitt is . a Celt. Landlordism is to him the devil incarnate. Mr. Parnell has always been for making compromises with the evil thing. Davitt has been hot for cutting it up root, and branch. Mr. Davitt is the Revolution. Mr. Parnell is the Counter-Revolution in Ireland. If Mr. Parnell were in office at the head of a majority in a College Green Parliament tomorrow, he would soon bo compelled to govern Ireland by the aid of the Orangemen of the North and the support of the Viceroy. HIS SERVICES TO THE EMPIRE. From an Imperial point of view, Mr. Parnell is about the most valuable man in politics. He is the man who has forced federation within the pale of practical politics, and while securing the adoption of Home Rule by the Liberal party has gone distinctly ahead of the Liberal leaders in his adhesion to the principle of a federalised' Empire. Mr. Rhodes, who is probably the most thoroughgoing Imperialist in the. English-speaking world, would never have lavished on the Parnellite cause his magnificent donation of £10,000, had he not seen that Home Rule under Mr. Parnell made for the consolidation, not for the disintegration, of the Empire. MR. PARNELL AS A MAN. Personally Mr. Parnell is regarded with such kindly feelings as are compatible with respect and awe. Ho is not a socixibte creature. He has never been known to drink to excess. He never haunts theatres or concert halls. No one has ever heard him swear, wherein he differs from some of his followers, who swear like troopers. I have always found him perfectly truthful and straightforward.* I put the question recently to two Irishmen, both of whom had known him intimately for years. One was an enemy, the other a friend. ' Said the friend : " I think Mr. Parnell •is a truthful man, and I have nevor known him act dishonourably to any !of his colleagues or friends." His enemy said: " Air. Purnell is the most supremo liar the world ever saw." So widely do the opinions of men differ according < to their standpoint. There is the same wide difference of opinion upon the charge that has just been brought against! him by his quondam friend, Captain O'Shea. It is well, however, to remember Bismarck's saying, that he was always disbelieved because no always spoke the truth. Mr. Parnell's conduct may be misjudged because of hie innocence. Certain it is that when the tongue 01 scandal was busy with his name three or four years ago, the very man who now brings the accusation against him was then completely satisfied that the current scandal had no foundation in fact. If that were the ease down to the spring of 1886, when Captain O'Shea and Mr. Parnell had a political difference, the intimacy can hardly have changed , its character because Captain O'Shea changed his politics. If, however, it should turn out that Mrs. O'Shea, having contracted an uuhappy marriage, had unfortunately justified the action of her husband, then Mr. Purnell'a course may be predicted Avith some confidence. -As a truthful man, lie will not deny, on oath accusations that the Court may declare to be true, and as an honourable man, if the decree is pronounced he will —-[At this interesting point there is a blank, owing to some lines of type having dropped out. Mr. Stead, however, no doubt had written that Mr. Parnell would marry the lady, and this is what he did.] AT HOME. On his estate, in VVicklow, whero Mr. Parnell has an extensive-quarry, and employs 250 men, he is very popular. I remember when I was at Lord.Fitzwilliam's beautiful seat close by, I was shown with almost reverential respect, the place where Mr. Parnell in his youth used to play cricket. Those who knew him in the privacy .of hia home are much attached to him. No one can be more unnssumiug and simple in his manners. He reads a good ' deal, especially about mechanics, biography, and history. Imaginative literature is not his strong point, nor could he ever make much headway with poetry. Once, and once only, has he been known to quote poetry in a speech. It was not of a nature to encourage him to repeat the experiment. Working up towards his peroration, he declared that they would never rest until they had made their country realise the poet's dream,', First flower of the earth, first jewel of the sea! "Gem, gem!" said a friend at his elbow. " Oh, yes," replied Mr, Purnell, "but jewel is a better word 1" . . .