MR GLADSTONE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2097, 3 May 1894, Page 18

MR GLADSTONE.

Mr Gladstone recently received a letter from his constituents in Midlothian in which he was requested to represent the borough in the House of Commons. He wrote in reply declaring that his chief desire will be to follow the wishes of the constituents he represents. " There will naturally be a change in my attendance in Parliament. I cannot yet judge how far my sight and hearing will disable my performing parliamentary duties. As to the merits or demerits of my career, certainly I have been chargeable with many errors of judgment, but I hope I have at least been governed by uprightness of intention and a desire to learn." He then reviews his public life of 60 years, dating ,from Lord Derby's Reform Act, which he describes as the political birth of Scotland and the beginning of a duty which he had solemnly recognised. Mr Gladstone says his career has been a history of political, economical, social, moral, and intellectual emancipation. In all the numberless causes that had been brought forward in this time Scotland has battled for the right. "I am deeply convinced," he adds, " that until the just demands of Ireland are satisfied, as the House of Commons tried to satisfy them, neither the legislative wants of any portion of the United Kingdom will be adequately met, nor will the Empire attain its maximum power, nor its honour be effectively cleared of the deepest historic stain ever attached to it."