Seducing the Irish

The Irish problem has been a major one in British politics since the first Home Rule Bill of 1886 was rejected. In 1893 the Liberal government of Gladstone presented its second Home Rule Bill, which allowed Ireland to have a local parliament. This was not an attractive proposal to the Irish Unionists at all. Their newspaper United Ireland portrays the ship `Erin', seduced by the celestial sounds of Gladstone and his Sirens, heading for the rocks. The second Home Rule Bill ran aground the House of Lords, and Gladstone's second government did not survive 1893.