As he gets nearer to his subject, he has definite statistical reports made for him by 'Welby and Hamilton on the figures' (p.

306), has 'stiff conclaves about finance and land' (p.

298), and nearly comes to a final split with Parnell on the question whether the Irish contribution to Imperial taxation shall be a fifteenth or a twentieth.
Time and persons are important factors in his calculation.

If Lord Salisbury will consent to introduce some measure of Irish self-government, the problem will be fundamentally altered, and the same will happen if the general election produces a Liberal majority independent of both Irish and Conservatives; and Mr.Morley describes as underlying all his calculations 'the irresistible attraction for him of all the grand and eternal commonplaces of liberty and self-government' (p.

260).
It is not likely that Mr.Morley's narrative touches on more than a fraction of the questions which must have been in Gladstone's mind during these months of incessant thought.