He was, I believe, the real author of a phrase which was sometimes attributed to me, that the Liberal Unionists were "the mules of politics: without pride of ancestry, or hope of posterity."

H. H. Asquith, Memories and Reflections, vol. 1 (London: Cassell & Co., 1928), ch. 16, p. 123. But see Joseph McCabe, Life and Letters of George Jacob Holyoake, vol. 2 (London: Watts & Co., 1908), p. 202: "She [Mme. Venturi] gladly repeats to Holyoake a mayor of Dublin's description of the Liberal Unionists as "the mules of politics: with neither pride of ancestry nor hope of posterity"—really, a quotation from Lloyd Garrison."