In any event Ulster will be left out of any settlement. One doubts if the Sinn Feiners would be prepared to conquer it by force if they could; they would be more likely to coerce it into union by a commercial boycott, which might be made very effective. Everyone knows that Ulster's acceptance of the Government bill makes the position worse than ever. The Friends who recently sent a deputation to Ireland came back with the conviction that Ulster's point of view rendered any simple solution impossible of realization and Sir Edward Carson by agreeing to the Government proposals has made Mr. Lloyd George unable to go readily and cheerfully any further on the road to Dominion Home Rule.
Yet if the Catholic Church likes to move at this juncture we shall have peace in Ireland. It is still omnipotent despite the indifference of the younger revolutionaries, There is, though, no sign of it, since one clerical voice means: lit-ne. The Cabinet on its part is not pushing things. It knows how far it is prepared to go and it is not going any further under pressure. Its optimism seems to grow daily and indeed it would appear that the policy of perpetual harassing is slowly meeting with its reward. The crimes are for the moment fewer though at any minute there may be a sudden outbreak. Outside Treland the determination of the British public to crush outrages seems to be regarded as a warning. Yet none the less we would sincerely like to settle the whole affair on any reasonable lines. The difficulty is to find the reasonable reonle. But we do not despair. And perhaps the settlement may come sooner than many imagine.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.