From that evening on which, in the valley of Bethulia, He nerved the arm of the Jewish girl to smite the drunken tyrant in his tent, down to this day, in which He has blessed the insurgent chivalry of the Belgian priest, His Almighty hand hath ever been stretched forth from His throne of light, to consecrate the flag of freedom, to bless the patriot's sword! Be it in the defense, or be it in the assertion of a people's liberty, I hail the sword as a sacred weapon; and if, my lord, it has sometimes taken the shape of the serpent and reddened the shroud of the oppressor with too deep a dye, like the anointed rod of the high priest, it has at other times, and as often, blossomed into celestial flowers to deck the freeman's brow.

Abhor the sword-stigmatize the sword? No, my lord, for, in the passes of the Tyrol, it cut to pieces the banner of the Bavarian, and, through those cragged passes, struck a path to fame for the peasant insurrectionist of Insprück! Abhor the sword-stigmatize the sword? No, my lord, for at its blow, a giant nation started from the waters of the Atlantic, and by its redeeming magic, and in the quivering of its crimson light, the crippled colony sprang into the attitude of a proud Republic-prosperous, limitless, and invincible! Abhor the sword-stigmatize the sword? No, my lord, for it swept the Dutch marauders out of the fine old towns of Belgium, scourged them back to their own phlegmatic swamps, and knocked their flag and scep

ter, their laws and bayonets, into the sluggish waters of the Scheldt.

My lord, I learned that it was the right of a nation to govern herself, not in this hall, but upon the ramparts of Antwerp. This, the first article of a nation's creed, I learned upon those ramparts, where freedom was justly estimated, and the possession of the precious gift was purchased by the effusion of generous blood. My lord, I honor the Belgians, I admire the Belgians, I love the Belgians, for their enthusiasm, their courage, their success, and I, for one, will not stigmatize, for I do not abhor, the means by which they obtained a citizen king, a chamber of deputies.'

1 Here the speaker was interrupted and not being permitted t proceed, he and his friends left the hall and never entered it again.

A. M. SULLIVAN

ON THE ZULU WAR'

(1879)

Born in 1830, died in 1884; became Editor and Proprietor of the Dublin Nation, 1846; opposed the Fenian Movement; ordered to be assassinated, but the order never executed; imprisoned, 1868; elected to Parliament as a Home Ruler, 1874; reelected, 1880, but owing to ill health resigned, 1881; buried in the "O'Connell Circle" in Glasnevin Cemetery.

We find ourselves once again sitting in Committee of the Whole House to vote a war subsidy. The present occupants of the Treasury Bench are determined that so long as they retain their places the Temple of Janus shall not be closed. In the reading-room of this House, a couple of

From a speech in the House of Commons, February 27, 1879. By permission of Mr. T. D. Sullivan, brother of A. M. Sullivan. The circumstances in which this speech was delivered were described at the time as follows, by the Parliamentary correspondent of the Liverpool Journal: "But the debate was not to be wholly and uninterruptedly dreary, for near the end of it there came a speech from Mr. Sullivan, the member for Louth, which drove away all dulness for the time, and lighted up the debate as a lightning flash illuminates the sky on a murky night. The speech was short, but the effect must have been startling. These people had been dro⚫ ning for several hours about mere money matters. Meanwhile Mr. Sullivan sat in his place on the second bench from the floor below the gangway. At last, when Sir Stafford had in his dryest style delivered his winding-up speech, Sullivan's patience gave out, and up he sprang, and, kicking all precedent aside, and knocking old use and wont head over heels, he stormed into the debate like a tornado."

years ago, her majesty's ministers were kind enough to send up for the convenience of members and to hang on the walls maps of our latest acquisitions and our "seats of war." We had maps of the Transvaal and of Cyprus and the harbors of Famagousta, Limasol, and all the rest of it. Then came "the seat of war" in Afghanistan, which covered all that remained of the wall, and the other day, when the clerks of the Intelligence Department came to fix up our newest "seat of war," it was discovered that we had on hand so many "seats of war" that there was no room on the wall for more.

If this is to go on, where is it to end? I will tell you that it will not end so long as her majesty's government can have money voted in this House on the excuse that because we are involved in war, money must be voted to carry it on. It is always too late or too soon to protest. For my part, I take my stand against what seems to have become a system of plunging us without our knowledge or concurrence into wars from which our consciences revolt, and then, because the butcher's bill is incurred, telling us government must needs have the money-that it would be "unpatriotic" to refuse it.

I know there are honorable members round about me who will say: "We are as much opposed to this Zulu war as any man can be. We believe it to be an unjust war, but will vote for the money because the country is now engaged in the struggle."

I can quite recognize that

as a ground which some members of this House may take up; far be it from me to quarrel with them; but, for myself, I say my conscience recoils from having act, hand, or part in voting a sixpence for this war. I challenge any man in or out of this House to defend it on the principles of public equity, if he will only suppose that it is Russia that is waging the war, and not England. I say no man in this House will dare to apply to such a war the principles which you apply elsewhere. If this dusky chief, spear in hand, set forth to defend his home against the Frank, the Russian, or the German, English pens would trace his record of glory, and English poets would sing his fame. We have had sympathetically dramatized for us the story of Pizarro, when men-savages perhaps, but patriots all the same-withstood the civilizing tyrant that came upon their shores. And when we stand in Pizarro's place in South Africa to-day, is no voice to be raised in England better worthy of being heard than mine to say, as I say now, This is an iniquitous and a wicked war; it is against all my convictions of right and wrong?"

And at what an hour do we find ourselves so far gone in this onward march of aggression, this lust of territory, this greed of annexation? It is at the very moment that you have been contesting the right of a Christian power to redress Christian wrongs in the east of Europe. You call Russia an aggressive power, and treat us to homilies on the iniquity of her pushing