ith the language of the government of Sir Robert Peel;
and held up to admiration the Whig policy of 1833, certainly coercive,
but with remedial measures--a measure for the abolition of church cess,
introduced ten days before the Coercion Bill, and a promise of municipal
reform made simultaneously with the proclamation of martial law. This
was real statesmanship and touching the root of the evil. Whereas
'Sir Robert Peel had only consented to passing the Municipal Bill in a
crippled state, and only now (in 1846) promised, that the corporations
of Ireland should be placed on the same footing as the corporations of
England.' Who could be surprised that such a policy-should end in famine
and pestilence?

The followers of Mr. O'Connell again succeeded in adjourning the debate
until Monday the 6th. On that day Sir Robert Peel made 'an earnest
appeal' to extricate himself from the almost perilous position in which
he found his administration suddenly involved. In case the division on
the first reading of the Irish Bill should not take place that night, he
endeavoured to prevail on those members who had notices on the paper
for the following night (Tuesday the 7th), the last night before the
holidays, to relinquish their right and to permit the Irish debate
to proceed and conclude. 'He had no wish to interfere with the due
discussion of the measure; but he believed that the Irish members, if
they permitted the House to proceed with the Corn Bill, by concluding
the discussion on the Irish Bill, would be rendering an essential
service to their country.'

But this earnest appeal only influenced still more the fiery resolves
of Mr. Smith O'Brien and his friends. They threw the responsibility for
delay of the Corn Bill on the government. The inconvenience which
the country suffered was occasioned by the minister, not by the Irish
members. He ought, on Friday last, to have adjourned the discussion on
the Coercion Bill until after Easter. He and other members who were
on the paper for to-morrow would willingly relinquish their right of
priority in favour of the Corn Bill, or of any measure of a remedial
kind, but not in favour of a Coercion Bill. He did not wish to have any
concealment with the minister as to the course which the Irish members
would pursue. It was their bounden duty to take care that _pari passu_
with the discussion of the Coercion Bill there should be discussions
as to the misgovernment of Ireland; and that, in the