The Drama of Three Hundred and Sixty Five Days/"Why Isn't the House Cheering"
"WHY ISN'T THE HOUSE CHEERING?"
Then came our Prime Minister's passionate,
fiery, yet dignified and even exalted denunciation
of the proposal of Germany that we should
trade with her in our neutrality by committing
treachery to France and Belgium—("To accept
your infamous offer would be to cover the
glorious name of England with undying shame");
then the announcement of the ultimatum sent
by Great Britain to Germany demanding an
assurance that the neutrality of Belgium should
be respected; and finally that speech of John
Redmond's, which, spoken on the very top of the
crisis that had threatened to bring a fratricidal
war into Ireland, has been, perhaps, the most
thrilling and dramatic utterance yet produced by
the war." I tell the Government they may
take every British soldier out of Ireland to meet
the enemy of the Empire. Ireland's sons will
take care of Ireland. The Catholics of the South
will stand shoulder to shoulder with their Protestant
fellow-countrymen of the North to fight the
common foe."
It was another appeal to the gentleman in the British nation, and in one moment it swept the bitter waters of the Home Rule crisis out of all sight and memory. I have heard a Cabinet Minister say that, as he listened to Redmond's speech, he was surprised at the silence with which it was received. "Why isn't the House cheering?" he had asked himself. But all at once he had felt his eyes swimming and his throat tightening, and then he had understood.