Evening Memories

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XLVIII, Issue 44, 8 November 1923, Page 7

Evening Memories

(By William O'Brien.)

CHAPTER (Continued.) A still worse stroke of fate was to follow. 'Even after the Divorce Court proceedings there need never have been a. Split. The agonies of a ten years' Split were incurred by Irishmen, rather than dismiss Gladstone ,to his political grave when he declared that "the continuance of Mr.* Parnell at the present moment in, the "leadership of the Irish Party . . . would render my retention - of the Leadership of the Liberal Party, based as it has been mainly upon the prosecution of the Irish Cause, almost a • nullity." The astounding revelation is now made to Us' that these words were, on second thoughts/ struck out of his draft letter by Gladstone himself, and were only restored for reasons having no relation to any morals better • than electioneering morals on the insistence of an Englishman whose fidelity to the Irish Cause was trusted even more than Gladstone's own by Ireland, and indeed to theend by Parnell. Of all men, the fatal stab came from Brutus! The words which exacted from Ireland the cruellest sacrifice in all her pitiful history, and .wrecked her," hopes for a generation, would never have seen the light' if Gladstone's own judgment had not been over-ridden by Mr.' John Morley, of all faithless human kind.* However,. there were still a spring, a summer, and an autumn before us during which our hopes were at their highest. ; Shea might, as Parnell anticipated, flinch from the 'ordeal, or he might leave the court a man too deeply disgraced to be worth further public notice. The one-contingency which no imagination could conceive was a quarrel between Gladstone and Parnell which would split a united Irish race asunder, and a quarrel which, as we now know from the man who precipitated it, need never have occurred. * And now to gratify children, old and young, with a happy ending of the present book 'in the old-fashioned way. It is not really an end; there were still twenty-five years of toil and trouble to be endured by my wife ami myself, before we could reach a home of peace; but, for the '"happy" part of the description, it is as ineffably true as anything can ever be that, is written of a world where "man never is, but always to be, blest." An indefinable influence had come into my life during my Galway imprisonment of 1889. Some communications had reached' the Governor from a lady in Paris which he strained his duty so far as to put into my hands. There was some subtle spell about these little messages, written though they were in a strange tongue, which the Governor's all *ln his liecollections (Macmillan, 1917) Viscount Mor- ' ley makes his extraordinary confession (which was withheld in his Life of Gladstone) in these ,words: "At 8 to dinner in Stratton Street. I sat next to Granville, and next to him was Mr. G. We- were all gay enough, and as unlike as possible to a marooned crew. Towards the end of the feast, Mr. G. handed to me, at the back of Granville's chair, the draft of the famous letter; in ; ' an unsealed envelope. While he read the Queen's speech to the rest, I perused and re-perused the letter Granville also -read it. I said to Mr. G. across Granville, ' But you have not put in the very thing that would be most likely of all things to move him.' Harcourt again regretted that it was addressed to me and not to P., and agreed with me that it ought to be strengthened as .I had indicated if it was meant really to affect P.'s mind. •" Mr. G. rose, went to the writing table, and with me standing by, wrote, on a sheet of Arnold M.'s grey paper, the important insertion. I marked then and put undev his eyes the' point at which the insertion was to be made and put the whole into my pocket. Nobody else but H. was consulted about it'or saw ■it." Had the Irish Party been made aware ,of the facts now divulged by Lord Morley, the scenes* in Committee Room 15 would' never have taken place: Ireland's reputation for chastity stood in no need of defence. The hypocrisy of 'the Liberal politicians can only be measured fegife reflecting i what would have been their own action, " if fine* ' proposal were one to cashier Nelson,,. on the eve of the •'" Battle of 'Trafalgar, because Lady Hamilton's husband had ■ called at the Admiralty to makeHiis complaint. : :

but paternal love of his prisoner invested with a romantic interest. His instinct was a swifter one than his prisoner's own. I at first regarded them as of no deeper moment than the messages of the many noble-hearted women, Irish and foreign, whom a fight for freedom always charms to the side of the hard-set swordsman. They were such slight things, and yet of such incomparable womanliness — sometimes a verse or two from Racine or Browning, unforgettable as the "eagle's feather" of the Memorabilia, sometimes a pressed flower with its own perfumed meaning, or again a box of French chocolates, whereof by a woman's instinct, the dainty ornamentation of the box was even sweeter than the sweets. By degrees I came to learn, although in the vaguest way, that my correspondent was a Russian lady, Madame Raft'alovich, who hospitably extracted from me a promise to pay her a visit whenever I might find myself in Paris. Still the Governor's romantio insight rather amused than impressed me, and the messages from Paris were largely jostled out of my mind by hundreds of similar kindnesses, and by the innumerable prosaic anxieties that awaited me the moment the gaol gate was crossed. A month or two afterwards I was in Paris, on my way to the Riviera, where a villa had been placed at my disposal by Madame Venturi, an Anglo-Italian lady who sat out the Parnell Commission Court from its first day to its last, with the unwearied and unrewarded fidelity of which women only have the gift. Dr. Kenny and Tom Gill, who were in Paris with me, were as keenly interested as had been the Governor of Galway Gaol in my mysterious correspondent, and insisted on accompanying me on what I supposed would be the formality of making my promised call. The address brought us to a vast detached mansion in the Avenue du Trocadero, the doorway crowned by a far-spreading marquise, and the carriage approach barred by massive iron railings. Appearances were daunting, and my own spirits were not raised when as we rang a great bell tolled twice overhead, and two statuesque valets appeared on the perron, promptly as genii of the Arabian Nights at the clapping of hands. I am afraid it was with a certain selfish relief I learned that Madame was not at home, though we were informed she was expected back at any moment. I left my card with the sense of duty cheaply done. My own decision would have been- without hesitation to write a civil letter of excuse, and leave the matter there, an excellent pretext having just presented itself in a telegram urging me to give up my trip to the South, and return to Tipperary without delay to deal with an urgent crisis that had arisen suddenly there. • Joe Kenny's curiosity was now, however, rising to fever heat; he urged the rudeness of returning charming kindness by an empty pTetence of a call, and there would still be time to catch the night mail from the Gare du Nord. Mrs. Kenny and he ultimately prevailed on me to call back before quitting Paris. But for their happy insistence, I should most certainly never have returned to the Avenue du Trocadero, and should have missed the one overwhelming personal happiness of my lifetime. (To be continued.)