xxii LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL 279 



Mr. Sydney Buxton who, as Member for 

 Poplar, was naturally much interested in the 

 matter, was away for his holiday, but his con- 

 stituents telegraphed to him to return. The 

 following letter from Mrs. Buxton indicates the 

 trouble he and Mrs. Buxton had in their return 

 journey : 



Westport, 23rd August 1889. 



Dearest Father. . . . Sydney and I have been 

 having a very nice time here ; but now to our very great 

 disgust, we have been telegraphed for home to London. 

 There are some strikes going on in the East End, and 

 Sydney has a good deal of influence with the men, as he 

 has helped in arbitrations before, so when they tele- 

 graphed begging him to go back, he thought we ought. 

 I think he is quite right, but it is a great nuisance. I 

 felt inclined to stamp and swear when the telegram 

 came. We have to be back on Saturday morning, for 

 the great meeting in the afternoon — and to do it, we had 

 yesterday to drive 43 miles, with one broken-kneed 

 horse all the way ! It certainly was what our carman 

 called a " long, slow, thravel " : but there wasn't any 

 other animal to be had. We were staying at a most 

 delicious place called Renvyle, on the Galway coast. It 

 is a very pretty quaint old house, slated all over outside, 

 and panelled with oak inside, standing in the midst of 

 lovely scenery, and with very good shooting — of a rough 

 sort — all round. It belongs to a Mrs. Blake, a distressed 

 Irish landlady, who, not being able to get her rents, very 

 pluckily turned her house into an hotel, and so makes her 

 living. It is altogether most comfortable, though Mrs. 

 Blake, herself, might become a nuisance in time. Yester- 

 day she discovered from Syd's telegram that he was an 

 M.P., so all the while we were packing, she kept dashing 

 into our room with new arguments about the Agitation — 

 nourishing the bill she was making out for us in one hand, 

 and a report of her evidence before the Parnell Com- 

 mission in the other. But she was very hospitable and 

 nice to us, in spite of our telling her we were Parnellites. 

 I always say I am a Parnellite in this country, as I 

 don't choose to let Sydney fight the landlord class all by 



