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a very old man of a very old family and a decidedly active, public-spirited, hardworking old man none the less. Ancestry, in making of him a fine gentleman, has not deprived his country of a most efficient citizen.
Then there is the Earl Curzon of Kedleston, son of the fourth Baron Scarsdale, who entered the House of Commons, made a name for himself, became Viceroy of India and took his seat in the House of Lords on merit alone before the death of his father of whom he was the heir. That father was himself a remarkable man -- Clergyman in the Church of England, Judge of the County Court, large landed proprietor, a universally loved and respected person. Ho died in March of this year, considerably over eighty years of ago.
It's a great breed, the British Nobility. A noble history it has, too. Americans should remember that it was the Barons who wrested the Magna Charta from King John; the great Whif Nobles who destroyed the Stuart tyranny and brought over the Houses of Orange and Brunswick-Luneburg.
Ireland has always been a mighty factor in American Anglophobia. At present the Irish irreconcilables and the Germans are doing all they can to heighten the diseases. They have created a vast amount of maudlin sympathy for the leaders of the latest Sinn Fein outbreak so promptly and properly executed by the British government. Their success in this regard argues little for American possession of the judicial temperament.
Now, the Irish question, like all other questions, is two sided. England has not always been on the right side. On the other hand, she has not always been in the wrong although she would suppose so who judged from the sentiment largely expressed in this country.
One who would correctly inform himself of Irish affairs should read the authorities on both sides and strike the middle ground. To anyone pressed for time, I would recommend a perusal of Professor Patrick W. Royce's very fair and very lucid history. Professor Royce was both Irish and Catholic: but under no circumstances does he lose the judicial, impartial attitude, at no time does he give way to passion; always does he recognize the relativity of facts and circumstances, never does he fail to judge in the light of the spirit of the times. It would be well were the perfervid, harbrained Irish enthusiasts of the present generation to acquire a modicum of his calm and unruffled composure. More weight, at least, would attach to them.
Ireland has, in the past, been terribly misgoverned; but very probably not more so than the average subject race of bygone times and certainly not one whit more cruelly than the Prussian Poles and Danes are ruled today by Casement's dear friend, Germany. On the other hand, within the last two or three generations, England has been doing all in her power to better conditions in Ireland--and has succeeded wonderfully well. Manufacturing and commerce is being encouraged and the fertile soil of the country is being opened to the small cultivator by the wholesale parceling of great estates. The result has been
