expressly permitted to make alterations.

Clause 5 is an exposition, so to speak, of the consequence which would
seem to flow from the fact of the Queen being a constitutional part of
the Legislature. It states that the royal prerogatives with respect to
the summoning, prorogation, and dissolution of the Irish legislative
body are to be the same as the royal prerogatives in relation to the
Imperial Parliament. The next clause (6) is comparatively immaterial;
it merely provides that the duration of the Irish legislative body is to
be quinquennial. As it deals with a matter of detail, it perhaps would
have more aptly found a place in a subsequent part of the Bill. Clause 7
passes from the legislative to the executive authority; it declares:--

(1.) The executive government of Ireland shall continue vested in Her
Majesty, and shall be carried on by the Lord Lieutenant on behalf of Her
Majesty with the aid of such officers and such council as to Her Majesty
may from time to time seem fit.

(2.) Subject to any instructions which may from time to time be given by
Her Majesty, the Lord Lieutenant shall give or withhold the assent of
Her Majesty to bills passed by the Irish legislative body, and shall
exercise the prerogatives of Her Majesty in respect of the summoning,
proroguing, and dissolving of the Irish legislative body, and any
prerogatives the exercise of which may be delegated to him by Her
Majesty.

Bearing in mind what has been said in the preliminary observations in
respect of the relation between the executive and the legislative
authority, it will be at once understood how much this clause implies,
according to constitutional maxims, of the dependence on the one hand of
the Irish executive in respect of imperial matters, and of its
independence in respect of local matters. The clause is practically
co-ordinate and correlative with the clause conferring complete local
powers on the Irish Legislature, while it preserves all imperial powers
to the Imperial Legislature. The governor is an imperial officer, and
will be bound to watch over imperial interests with a jealous scrutiny,
and to veto any bill which may be injurious to those interests. On the
other hand, as respects all local matters, he will act on and be guided
by the advice of the Irish executive council. The system is, as has been
shown above, self-acting. The governor, for local purposes, must have a
council which is in harmony with the legislative bo