What remained then, if Ulster would not accept the offer? Nothing but
"to proceed calmly with the Bill." Threats of civil war he discounted.
Disturbances there would probably be; but when the first Home Rule Bill
was defeated, there were weeks of the most terrible riots in Belfast.
The House could not afford to be deterred from any course by threats of
violence; and he was confident that the Bill would pass into law and
profoundly confident it would never be revoked.

He gave his reasons for that confidence in a passage almost
autobiographical in character--if only because it made the House realize
how completely this man's whole adult life had been devoted to this one
long service, and how far the labours of our party had achieved their
purpose.

"In a sense I may say I have lived my whole life within these walls. I
came in here little more than a boy, and I have grown old in the House
of Commons, and in the long space of years which have passed since then
I have witnessed the most extraordinary transformation of the whole
public life of this country, and I have witnessed an almost miraculous
change in the position and the prospects of the Irish National Cause.
When I came to this House, Irish Nationalist members, in a sense, were
almost outcasts. Both the great British parties--there was no Labour
party then--divided on everything else, were united in hostility to the
national movement and the national ideal. Home Rule seemed hopelessly
out of the range of practical politics. There were only a handful of men
in this whole House of Commons besides us who were in favour of any
measure of Home Rule for Ireland. Outside, the public opinion of this
country was ignorant, and it was actively hostile, and we found it
impossible to gain the ear of the democracy of England for the voice of
Ireland. All that has vanished into thin air. All that has radically