t settlement, however, merely ratified in 1903 the final stage in the
conversion of both countries to Parnell's policy of State-aided land
purchase. Tentative beginnings were made with it under the Government
which was in power from 1886 to 1892; but the main characteristic of
this period was a fierce revival of the land war. It was virulent in
Wexford, and in 1888 Redmond shared the experience which few Irish
members escaped or desired to escape; he was sentenced to imprisonment
on a charge of intimidation for a speech condemning some evictions. He
and his brother met in Wexford jail, and both used to describe with glee
their mutual salutation: "Good heavens, what a ruffian you look!"
Cropped hair and convict clothes were part of Mr. Balfour's resolute
government.

Yet in those days Ireland was winning, and winning fast. Mr. Gladstone's
personal ascendancy, never stronger than in the wonderful effort of his
old age, asserted itself more and more. Public sympathy in Great Britain
was turning against the wholesale evictions, the knocking down of
peasants' houses by police and military with battering-rams. The Tory
party sought for a new political weapon, and one day _The Times_ came
out with the facsimile of what purported to be a letter in Parnell's
hand. This document implied at least condonation of the Phoenix Park
murders.

Other letters equally incriminating were published. Parnell denied the
authorship, his denial was not accepted; fierce controversy ended in the
establishment of one of the strangest Commissions of Enquiry ever set
up--a semi-judicial tribunal of judges. Its proceedings created the
acutest public interest, drawn out over long months, up to the day when
Sir Charles Russell had before him in the witness-box the original
vendor of the letters--one Pigott. Pigott's collapse, confession of
forgery, flight and suicide, followed with appalling swiftness: and the
result was to generate through England a very strong sympathy for the
man against whom, and against whose followers, such desperate calumnies
had been uttered and exploited. Parnell's prestige was no longer
confined to his own countrymen: and the sense of all Home Rulers was
that they fought a winning battle, under two allied leaders of
extraordinary personal gifts.

Then, as soon as it was clear that the attack of the Pigott letters had
recoiled on those who launched it, came the indication of a fresh
menace. Proceedings for divorce were taken