Above all, the Ashe incident emphasized the presence in Ireland of a great force over which Redmond had no control and which had no representative in the Convention.

How, men asked, even if a bargain could be made with Constitutional Nationalists, should that covenant be carried into effect?
III The Cork visit marks the close of the first stage in the history of the Convention.

At the opening of our session there it was decided to appoint a Grand Committee of twenty, whose task should be, "if possible, to prepare a scheme for submission to the Convention, which would meet the views and difficulties expressed by the different speeches during the course of the debate." The Convention itself, after its deliberations of that week, would adjourn until the Committee was in a position to report.

This second stage, purely of committee work, was to last much longer than anyone anticipated: the Convention did not reassemble till the week before Christmas.

If that length of adjournment had been foreseen, the Committee would never have been appointed.
Mr.Lysaght in his first address to the Convention had pressed upon us the view that Sinn Fein could be won.