Are you still determined to stand out ?" On the other hand, when so much of the full demand was conceded, were Nationalists insistent, he asked, on demanding what they had never asked in the discussions upon any Home Rule Bill?
Nationalist leaders had now the chance of leading a combination of all sane elements in the landowning and land-cultivating classes.

No Irish leader had ever before been able to present such an appeal to Unionist opinion as would come from the man who represented a Convention Party.
It was a speech which Redmond, if present, must have replied to, and could not have replied to without indicating profound sympathy--for he was in agreement with its main lines; and his expression of opinion upon it must have influenced strongly the views of the rank and file at the moment when they were most open to suggestion.
In his absence, men's minds were greatly affected by the fear that if we adopted these proposals, our decision would be exposed to attack from a combination of three forces--Sinn Fein, which would at least officially condemn anything less than complete separation, and would furiously assail a proposal that denied full taxing powers; the Roman Catholic Church, which would take its lead from Bishop O'Donnell, who set out in an able memorandum the reasons why Ireland must have full control of taxation; and finally, the powerful newspaper whose proprietor, Mr.
Murphy, at once gave signs of his hostility by putting on the paper an amendment to Lord Midleton's resolution which amounted to a direct negative.
The reassembly of the Convention was fixed for Wednesday, January 2nd.
Redmond came to Dublin on the Monday.

He told me that he was inclined to move that while we thanked Lord Midleton for his substantial contribution towards our purpose, we could not accept his proposal, unless it opened the way to a settlement.

What he meant by this was not merely that if Ulster agreed, we should accept; for that would certainly open the way.

But he had also in his mind the possibility of a guarantee from Government that an arrangement come to, as this might be, by four-fifths of the Convention, and repudiated only by the pledge-bound Ulster block, would be regarded as substantial agreement, and taken as a basis for legislation.