I reported my retirement in what, at this distance of time, seems to me a philosophic mood; at any rate it was neither dispirited or despondent:—
"Melbourne, May 16, 1859."My dear O'Hagan,—Since my recovery from death's door in September last I have been meditating a letter to you. But during the sitting of Parliament the charge of a heavy department, and the late hours in the House, deprived me of all leisure. Now, however, I have abundance, for Parliament is up, and I have resigned my office. I will not trouble you with local politics at the distance of half the world's circumference, but I may predict that some day I will return to office; and meantime the only sacrifice is that of income—I certainly have not lost character or influence.
"I confidently hope to go home for a year in about three years, and then to return and be content with Australia for the remainder of my life. There are half a dozen friends in Ireland I long to see again, but the sky and soil here suit me far better. I grow my own peaches, figs, grapes, and walnuts, in addition to all the home fruits, and have become a great horticulturalist dividing my time between politics and the pruning knife."
The General Election proved fatal to the Government, several ministers lost their seats, and their supporters were reduced to a handful. One of the earliest questions to be dealt with when the House assembled was my resignation. I stated the grounds of it, and justified the policy I had pursued. Mr. O'Shanassy in reply made a suggestion which did him fatal injury in many generous minds. He told the story of my proposed resignation at an earlier period on the Governor's speech, and said he had no doubt, from the tone of the Dublin Nation on the same events, that what I objected to was not the ridiculous combination of Cabinet and Corporation, but sympathy with the sufferers in India, whose sufferings he had seen minimised if not mocked at in the Dublin Nation. I had as little control of the Nation as of the Times, and this was regarded as a felon stroke by one Catholic against another in a community so ready to
