[Illustration: THE QUEEN IN HER STATE ROBES (1887).
(_From the Photograph by Walery, Regent Street._)]
(_From a Photograph by Elliott and Fry._)]
bring him in £6,000,000 of fresh revenue. By adding two shillings a gallon to the duty on spirits, and a shilling a barrel to the duty on beer, he expected to obtain £1,650,000. But this still left him with a deficit of £15,000,000 to meet. He took £4,600,000 from the Sinking Fund to meet it--leaving a balance of £3,000,000 to be paid out of the annual revenue. The landed gentry attacked the Budget because it levelled up the succession duties on land till they were equal to those on personal property. The liquor trade attacked the changes in the duties on spirits and beer--so that an excellent opportunity had arisen for the Tory-Parnellite coalition to deal a fatal blow at the Government on another issue than that of continuing Coercion. Mr. Childers finding that only £9,000,000 of the Vote of Credit (£11,000,000) would be needed, offered to halve the increase on the spirit duty, and limit the increased beer duty to a year--but without avail. Sir M. Hicks-Beach moved an amendment which united all the forces of the Opposition and the Parnellites, and defeated the Ministry on the 8th of June, by a vote of 264 to 252. Lord Randolph Churchill’s[210] speech at Bow on the 3rd of June, was taken as a good guarantee that the Irish Party need not fear a Coercion Bill from the Tories if they got into office. “But,” writes Mr. T. P. O’Connor, “even with so strong an assumption the cautious and realistic leader of the Irish Party was not satisfied; and the Irish Members did not go into the Lobby to vote against a Liberal Ministry about to propose coercion until there was an assurance, definite, distinct, unmistakable, that there would be no coercion from their successors.” The scene when the numbers were announced will never be forgotten by those who were present. When it was known that the Government was defeated, the pent-up excitement of the House found vent in a terrific uproar. “Lord Randolph Churchill,” writes Mr. Lucy, “leapt on to the bench, and, waving his hat madly above his head, uproariously cheered. Mr. Healy followed his example, and presently all the Irish members, and nearly all the Conservatives below the gangway, were standing on the benches waving hats and pocket-handkerchiefs and raising a deafening cheer. This was renewed when the figures were read out by Mr. Winn, and again when they were proclaimed from the Chair. From the Irish camp rose cries of ‘Buckshot! Buckshot!’ and ‘Coercion!’ These had no relevancy to the Budget Scheme; but they showed that the Irish members had not forgotten Mr. Forster, and that this was their hour of victory rather than the triumph of the Tories. Lord Randolph Churchill threatened to go mad with joy. He wrung the hand of the impassive Rowland Winn, who regarded him with a kindly curious smile, as if he were some wild animal. Mr. Gladstone had resumed his letter,[211] and went on calmly writing whilst the clerk at the table proceeded to run through the Orders of the Day as if nothing particular had happened. But the House was in no mood for business. Cries for the adjournment filled the House, and Mr. Gladstone, still holding his letter in one hand and the pen in the other, moved the adjournment, and the crowd surged through the doorway, the Conservatives still tumultuously cheering.”[212]