When a railway strike was threatened, the soldiers had been called out and had come without a murmur.

Was the Army to be used against all movements except those under the patronage of the Tory party?
If so, he would tell his four hundred thousand railway men to equip themselves to defend their own interests.
These speeches set people thinking very gravely, but their effect was to increase the confidence of Home Rulers--the more so as Sir Edward Grey, in one of his rare moments of emphasis, declared his determination to go as far as either speaker if the case which they foreshadowed should arise.

But new occurrences disquieted the public; the bungling which had characterized dealings with the officers at the Curragh was not ended there.

General Gough received a document from Colonel Seely, Secretary of State for War, countersigned by Sir John French and Sir Spencer Ewart, the military heads of the War Office; and this document was in part disavowed by the Cabinet.

The two Generals resigned and Colonel Seely followed their example.