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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Ireland as It Is + And as It Would be Under Home Rule + +Author: Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.) + +Release Date: August 17, 2009 [EBook #29710] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IRELAND AS IT IS *** + + + + +Produced by Jeannie Howse, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<div class="tr"> +<p class="cen" style="font-weight: bold;">Transcriber's Note:</p> +<br /> +<p class="noin">The original book for this e-text is full of inconsistent + hyphenation, punctuation and capitalization, which has been preserved. + This e-text contains Irish dialect, with unusual spelling.</p> +<p class="noin" style="text-align: left;">Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. +For a complete list, please see the <span style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="#TN">end of this document</a>.</span></p> +<p class="noin">Click on the <a href="#map">Map</a> to see a larger version.</p> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<h1>IRELAND AS IT IS</h1> +<h3>AND AS IT WOULD BE</h3> +<h2>UNDER HOME RULE.</h2> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3 style="margin-bottom: 3px;">SIXTY-TWO LETTERS</h3> +<h5 style="margin-top: 3px; margin-bottom: 3px;">WRITTEN BY THE</h5> +<h3 style="margin-top: 3px; margin-bottom: 3px;">SPECIAL COMMISSIONER</h3> +<h5 style="margin-top: 3px; margin-bottom: 3px;">OF THE</h5> +<h4 style="margin-top: 3px; margin-bottom: 3px;">BIRMINGHAM DAILY GAZETTE,</h4> +<h5><span class="sc">Between March and August, 1893.</span></h5> + +<br /> + +<h4><i>With Map of Ireland showing the places visited.</i></h4> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h5>BIRMINGHAM:<br /> +BIRMINGHAM DAILY GAZETTE COMPANY, LIMITED, HIGH STREET.<br /> +<br /> +LONDON:<br /> +47, FLEET STREET, E.C.</h5> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h4>PRINTED BY<br /> +THE BIRMINGHAM GAZETTE CO., LTD.,<br /> +52 AND 53, HIGH STREET,<br /> +BIRMINGHAM.</h4> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[iii]</a></span><br /> + +<div class="img"> +<img border="0" src="images/deco1.png" width="65%" alt="Decoration" /> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h2>SPECIAL COMMISSIONER'S PREFACE.</h2> +<br /> + +<p>Irish Loyalists will not soon forget the early part of 1893. Arriving +in Dublin in March, it at once became evident that the industrial +community regarded Home Rule, not with the academical indifference +attributed to the bulk of the English electorate, but with absolute +dismay; not as a possibility which might be pleasantly discussed +between friends, but as a wholly unnecessary measure, darkly +iniquitous, threatening the total destruction of all they held dear. +English lukewarmness was hotly resented, but the certainty that +England must herself receive a dangerous if not a mortal wound, was +scant comfort to men who felt themselves on the eve of a hopeless +struggle for political, nay, even for material existence. This was +before the vast demonstrations of Belfast and Dublin, before the +memorable function in the Albert Hall, London, before the hundreds of +speakers sent forth by the Irish Unionist Alliance had visited +England, spreading the light of accurate knowledge, returning to +Ireland with tidings of comfort and joy. The change in public feeling +was instant and remarkable. Although from day to day the passage of +the Bill through the Commons became more and more a certainty, the +Irish Unionists completely discarded their fears, resuming their +normal condition of trust and confidence. Mr. H.L. Barnardo, J.P., of +Dublin, aptly expressed the universal feeling when he said:—</p> + +<p>"We have been to England, and we know three things,—that the Bill<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[iv]</a></span> +will pass the Commons, that the Lords will throw it out, and that the +English people don't care if they do."</p> + +<p>This accounted for the renewed serenity of the well-doing classes, +whose air and attitude were those of men thankful for having narrowly +escaped a great danger. The rebound was easily observable in cities +like Dublin and Belfast, where also was abundantly evident the placid +resignation of the Separatist forces, whose discontent with the actual +Bill and profound distrust of its framer, superadded to an +ever-increasing qualmishness inevitably arising from acquaintance with +the prospective statesmen of an Irish Legislature, caused them to look +forward to the action of the Lords with ill-disguised complacency. In +regions more remote the scattered Loyalists lacked the consolation +arising from numbers and propinquity to England, and accordingly their +tremors continued, and, in a smaller degree, continue still. To them +the Bill is a matter of life and death; and while their industry is +crippled, their mental peace is destroyed by the ever-present torture +of suspense.</p> + +<p>As to the merits of the case for Home Rule, I would earnestly ask +fair-minded opponents to remember that during my wanderings I met with +numbers of intelligent and honourable men, both Scots and English, who +having come to Ireland as earnest, nay, even by their own confession, +as bigoted Gladstonians, had changed their opinions on personal +acquaintance with the facts, and strove with all the energy of +conscientious men who had unwittingly led others astray, to repair, so +far as in them lay, the results of their former political action. And +it should be especially noted that of all those I so met who had +arrived in Ireland as Home Rulers, not one <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</a></span>retained his original +faith. A very slight process of inductive reasoning will develop the +suggestiveness of this incontestible fact.</p> + +<p>Readers will hardly require to be reminded that the letters were +written, not in studious retirement with ample time at command, but +for a Daily Paper, at the rate of nearly eight newspaper columns a +week, in the intervals of travel and inquiry, often under grave +difficulties and with one eye on the inexorable clock. The precepts of +the Master were of necessity ignored:—</p> + +<div class="block2"><p class="noin"><i>Sæpe stylum vertas, iterum quæ digna legi sint Scripturus; +neque, te ut miretur turba labores Contentus paucis lectoribus.</i></p></div> + +<p>But before committing them to paper, the facts were sifted with +scrupulous care, and where personal investigation was impracticable, +nothing was adduced except upon evidence of weight and authority +sufficient to prove anything. And as during a six months' hue and cry +of the Nationalist press of Ireland, aided and abetted by some English +prints, no single statement was in any degree shaken, the letters have +re-appeared precisely as at first.</p> + +<p class="right"><span style="padding-right: 5%;">R.J.B.,</span><br /> +Special Commissioner of the <i>Birmingham Daily Gazette</i>.</p> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[vi]</a></span><br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<div class="img"> +<img border="0" src="images/deco2.png" width="20%" alt="Decoration" /> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span><br /> + +<div class="img"> +<img border="0" src="images/deco3.png" width="65%" alt="Decoration" /> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3>EDITOR'S REVIEW.</h3> +<br /> + +<p>The <i>Birmingham Daily Gazette</i> of August 18, 1893, thus summed up the +labours of its Special Commissioner:—We publish to-day the last of +our Special Commissioner's letters on "Ireland As It Is." His task has +been an arduous one, and not without a strong element of personal +danger. That he has been kept under the close observation of the Irish +police; that they have frequently given him timely warning of personal +danger; that he has dared to go to places in County Clare when the +police warned him to refrain, and his native car-driver refused to +venture, are facts which he has modestly abstained from bringing into +the prominence they deserved. We must necessarily speak of the merits +of his labour with a certain measure of reserve, but the many letters +which lie before us are at least a gratifying proof that his work has +been appreciated, and that it has cast new lights upon the Irish +problem. To the simple direction, "State nothing that you cannot stand +by," he has been faithful even beyond our most sanguine hopes. A +stranger in a strange land seeking information wherever it can be +found, and compelled on many occasions to accept the statements made +to him, may easily be led into error. It is to the credit of our +Commissioner that he has withheld some of the most sensational stories +retailed to him, because he had not an opportunity of verifying them +in detail. The notorious Father Humphreys, of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>Tipperary, will not +soon forget his experience of giving the lie to the <i>Gazette</i>; neither +will those who organised an "indignation" meeting at Tuam be likely to +congratulate themselves upon having stung our Commissioner into +retaliation. It may be recalled as an illustration of the desperate +efforts made to discredit him that after he had attended a Nationalist +meeting at Dundalk he was denounced as a "liar" and a "pimp" because +he had stated that he was invited to address the score of persons who +had "met in their thousands" to shake the foundations of the British +Empire. His assailants fiercely declared that he was not invited to +speak; he was only informed that he might address the meeting if he +desired to do so!</p> + +<p>Our Commissioner has travelled about four thousand miles since he +started last March. He has taken no lop-sided view of Ireland. The +prosperous North has been contrasted with the stagnant South, and the +causes of their difference have been explained. The splendid work of +industrial development inaugurated in the poverty-stricken West by +that greatest of all Irish Secretaries, Mr. Balfour, has been compared +with the mischievous encouragements of idleness, the lavish +professions of sentimental sympathy, and the dogged refusals of +substantial help since the present Government took office. Above all, +our Commissioner has provided conclusive evidence that Irish +Nationalism is a mere delusive sham—a paltry euphemism for the +predatory passion which a succession of professional agitators have +aroused in the hearts of the people. If the Land Question could be +settled, there would be an end of the clamour for independence and of +the insensate shrieking against British rule. With a definite stake in +the country the peasantry upon whom the Nationalist agitation mainly +relies would cease to place their faith in the impecunious and +blatant <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span>scoundrelism which fattens upon the discord and misery which +it provokes in the name of Patriotism. Our Commissioner believes that +the priests, who have an even stronger hold upon the people than the +politicians, would find their power weakened if it were possible to +greatly extend the system of peasant proprietary which it was the +purpose of the Land Purchase of 1891 to foster. Land hunger lies at +the root of Irish disaffection, and the Romish hierarchy have found in +the deep-rooted prejudices and the ignorant superstitions of the +people a foundation upon which they have reared an appalling +superstructure of social and spiritual tyranny. Politicians have +taught the peasantry to believe that they have been robbed of the land +which is their only means of subsistence in a country that is +destitute of mineral wealth, that lacks capital, and is overshadowed +by the enormous commercial energy of Great Britain. The priests have +adopted the theses of politicians, and have brought the terrors of +their sacred calling into play in order to make themselves the masters +of the people.</p> + +<p>Home Rule would be the signal for a ghastly civil war, ruinous to +Ireland, and fatal to that spirit of religious toleration by which the +Roman Catholics and the Protestants have obtained equal rights of +citizenship under the rule of the Queen and the Imperial Parliament. +The cultured Roman Catholics of England and Ireland look with pain and +regret at the insensate bigotry and domineering intolerance which made +the exposures in County Meath possible. They see in these wild claims +of absolutism in the domain of temporal as well as spiritual affairs, +a grave danger to all pure religion. They perceive that the revival of +the old sectarian passions in Ireland cannot fail to react on Great +Britain, and even if the Keltic priesthood triumphed over the Ulster +Protestants their victory would be a fatal one to all who hold by <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span>the +Roman Catholic faith in England. Home Rule would bring misery and +disaster in its train, and even the Parnellite section of the Irish +people, who have shaken off clerical domination, tremble at the +prospect of it while nine-tenths of their co-religionists are +destitute of personal freedom. We must find the solution of Ireland's +disaffection in another way, and mainly by a bold handling of the +agrarian question, which lies at the root of all. The task before the +Unionist party is not a light one. They must crush the Nationalist +conspiracy, and uproot the fantastic hopes which unscrupulous men have +implanted in the minds of an ignorant and credulous people. They must +extend the noble system of practical aid to Ireland so successfully +inaugurated by Mr. Balfour in his light railway, fishery, and +agricultural development schemes. And they must mitigate the friction +between owners and occupiers of the soil by making it easy and +profitable for tenants and landlords alike to avail themselves of +British credit in terminating a relationship which has been fraught +with occasions of bitter hostility and mistrust. Under such a policy +we can see bright prospects of a happy future for the sister island, +but under the policy of Home Rule we see only the lowering clouds of +civil war and the dark shadows of reawakened religious animosity.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="toc" id="toc"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span><br /> + +<div class="img"> +<img border="0" src="images/deco4.png" width="65%" alt="Decoration" /> +</div> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3>CONTENTS.</h3> +<br /> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="85%" summary="Table of Contents"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="60%" style="font-size: 80%;"> </td> + <td class="tdr2" width="32%"> </td> + <td class="tdr" width="8%" style="font-size: 80%;">PAGE</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_1_THE_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL">No. 1.—The Spirit of the Capital</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dublin, March 28th</td> + <td class="tdr">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_2_PANIC_AND_DISASTER">No. 2.—Panic and Disaster</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dublin, March 30th</td> + <td class="tdr">7</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_3_ULSTERS_PREPARATIONS_FOR_WAR">No. 3.—Ulster's Preparations for War</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Belfast, April 1st</td> + <td class="tdr">13</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_4_MR_BALFOURS_WELCOME">No. 4.—Mr. Balfour's Welcome</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Belfast, April 4th</td> + <td class="tdr">20</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_5_HAS_Mr_MORLEY_LIED">No. 5.—Has Mr. Morley Lied?</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Ballymena, April 6th</td> + <td class="tdr">27</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_6_THE_EXODUS_OF_INDUSTRY">No. 6.—The Exodus of Industry</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dublin, April 8th</td> + <td class="tdr">34</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"> <a href="#MR_BALFOUR_IN_DUBLIN">Mr. Balfour in Dublin</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dublin, April 8th</td> + <td class="tdr">40</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_7_BAD_FOR_ENGLAND_RUINOUS_TO_IRELAND">No. 7.—Bad for England, Ruinous to Ireland</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Limerick, April 11th</td> + <td class="tdr">43</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_8_TERRORISM_AT_TIPPERARY">No. 8.—Terrorism at Tipperary</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Tipperary, April 12th</td> + <td class="tdr">48</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_9_TYRANNY_AND_TERRORISM">No. 9.—Tyranny and Terrorism</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Oolagh, Co. Tipperary, April 15th</td> + <td class="tdr">54</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_10_DEFYING_THE_LAND_LEAGUE">No. 10.—Defying the Land League</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Cork, April 20th</td> + <td class="tdr">61</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_11_THE_CRY_FOR_PEACE_AND_QUIETNESS">No. 11.—The Cry for Peace and Quietness</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Tralee, Co. Kerry, April 20th</td> + <td class="tdr">67</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_12_ENGLISH_IGNORANCE_AND_IRISH_PERVERSITY">No. 12.—English Ignorance and Irish Perversity</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Limerick, April 22nd</td> + <td class="tdr">75</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_13_THE_CURSE_OF_COUNTY_CLARE">No. 13.—The Curse Of County Clare</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Rathkeale, Co. Limerick, April 24th</td> + <td class="tdr">81</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_14_LAWLESSNESS_AND_LAZINESS">No. 14.—Lawlessness and Laziness</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Killaloe, Co. Clare, April 27th</td> + <td class="tdr">89</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_15_THE_PERIL_TO_ENGLISH_TRADE">No. 15.—The Peril to English Trade</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Ennis, Co. Clare, April 29th</td> + <td class="tdr">96</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_16_CIVIL_WAR_IN_COUNTY_CLARE">No. 16.—Civil War in County Clare</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Bodyke, Co. Clare, May 2nd</td> + <td class="tdr">102</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_17_RENT_AT_THE_ROOT_OF_NATIONALISM">No. 17.—Rent at the Root of Nationalism</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Bodyke, Co. Clare, May 2nd</td> + <td class="tdr">109</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_18_HARD_FACTS_FOR_ENGLISH_READERS">No. 18.—Hard Facts for English Readers</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Gort, Co. Galway, May 6th</td> + <td class="tdr">116</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_19_INDOLENCE_AND_IMPROVIDENCE">No. 19.—Indolence and Improvidence</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Athenry, Co. Galway, May 6th</td> + <td class="tdr">123</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_20_RELIGION_AT_THE_BOTTOM_OF_THE_IRISH_QUESTION">No. 20.—Religion at the Bottom of the Irish Question</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Tuam, Co. Galway, May 9th</td> + <td class="tdr">128</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_21_MR_BALFOURS_FISHERIES">No. 21.—Mr. Balfour's Fisheries</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Galway Town, May 13th</td> + <td class="tdr">135</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_22_THE_LAND_LEAGUES_REIGN_AT_LOUGHREA">No. 22.—The Land League's Reign at Loughrea</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Loughrea, May 16th</td> + <td class="tdr">142</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_23_THE_REIGN_OF_INDOLENCE">No. 23.—The Reign of Indolence</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Salthill, May 18th</td> + <td class="tdr">149</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_24_THE_ARAN_ISLANDS">No. 24.—The Aran Islands</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Galway, May 20th</td> + <td class="tdr">156</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_25_THE_PRIESTS_AND_OUTRAGE_THEY_NEVER_CONDEMNED_IT">No. 25.—The Priests and Outrage</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Moycullen, Connemara, May 23rd</td> + <td class="tdr">163</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_26_THE_CONNEMARA_RAILWAY">No. 26.—The Connemara Railway</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Oughterard, Connemara, May 23rd</td> + <td class="tdr">169</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_27_CULTIVATING_IRISH_INDUSTRY">No. 27.—Cultivating Irish Industry</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Athenry, May 27th</td> + <td class="tdr">177</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_28_COULD_WE_RECONQUER_IRELAND">No. 28.—Could we Reconquer Ireland?</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Barna, Co. Galway, May 30th</td> + <td class="tdr">184<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_29_WHAT_RACK-RENT_MEANS">No. 29.—What Rack-Rent Means</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Mullingar, Co. Westmeath, June 1st</td> + <td class="tdr">190</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_30_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS">No. 30.—The "Union of Hearts"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Athlone, June 3rd</td> + <td class="tdr">197</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_31_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS">No. 31.—The "Union of Hearts"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Westport, June 6th</td> + <td class="tdr">203</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_32_HOME_RULE_AND_IRISH_IMMIGRATION">No. 32.—Home Rule and Irish Immigration</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Castlebar, June 8th</td> + <td class="tdr">209</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_33_TUAMS_INDIGNATION_MEETING">No. 33.—Tuam's Indignation Meeting</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Ballina, June 10th</td> + <td class="tdr">217</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_34_WHY_IRELAND_DOES_NOT_PROSPER">No. 34.—Why Ireland does not Prosper</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Oughewall, June 10th</td> + <td class="tdr">223</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_35_IN_A_CONGESTED_DISTRICT">No. 35.—In a Congested District</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Newport, Co. Mayo, June 15th</td> + <td class="tdr">230</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_36_IRISH_IMPROVIDENCE_THE_STUMBLING_BLOCK">No. 36.—Irish Improvidence the Stumbling Block</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Mulranney, Co. Mayo, June 17th</td> + <td class="tdr">237</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_37_ON_ACHIL_ISLAND">No. 37.—On Achil Island</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Achil Sound, June 20th</td> + <td class="tdr">244</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_38_THE_ACHIL_ISLANDERS">No. 38.—The Achil Islanders</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dugort, Achil Island, June 22nd</td> + <td class="tdr">251</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_39_IRISH_UNFITNESS_FOR_SELF-GOVERNMENT">No. 39.—Irish Unfitness for Self-Government</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Castlereagh, June 24th</td> + <td class="tdr">259</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_40_OBJECT_LESSONS_IN_IRISH_SELF-GOVERNMENT">No. 40.—Object Lessons in Irish Self-Government</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Roscommon, June 27th</td> + <td class="tdr">265</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_41_THE_CHANGED_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL">No. 41.—The Changed Spirit of the Capital</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dublin, June 29th</td> + <td class="tdr">271</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_42_AT_A_NATIONALIST_MEETING">No. 42.—At a Nationalist Meeting</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Dundalk, July 1st</td> + <td class="tdr">279</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_43_IN_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH">No. 43.—In the Prosperous North</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Newry, July 4th</td> + <td class="tdr">285</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_44_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH">No. 44.—The Prosperous North</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Armagh, July 6th</td> + <td class="tdr">291</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_45_A_PICTURE_OF_ROMISH_TOLERATION">No. 45.—A Picture of Romish "Toleration"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Monaghan, July 8th</td> + <td class="tdr">298</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_46_A_BIT_OF_FOREIGN_OPINION">No. 46.—A Bit of Foreign Opinion</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Enniskillen, July 11th</td> + <td class="tdr">304</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_47_THE_LOYALISTS_AND_THE_LAWLESS">No. 47.—The Loyalists and the Lawless</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Clones, July 13th</td> + <td class="tdr">310</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_48_A_SEARCH_FOR_ORANGE_ROWDYISM">No. 48.—A Search for "Orange Rowdyism"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Belfast, July 15th</td> + <td class="tdr">317</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_49_THE_CONSTITUTION_OF_THE_ORANGE_LODGES">No. 49.—The Constitution of the Orange Lodges</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Portadown, July 18th</td> + <td class="tdr">324</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_50_THE_HOLLOWNESS_OF_HOME_RULE">No. 50.—The Hollowness of Home Rule</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Warrenpoint, July 20th</td> + <td class="tdr">331</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_51_THE_IRISH_PRESS_ON_FINALITY">No. 51.—The Irish Press on "Finality"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Strabane, July 22nd</td> + <td class="tdr">337</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_52_HOW_THE_PRIESTS_CONTROL_THE_PEOPLE">No. 52.—How the Priests Control the People</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Raphoe, Co. Donegal, July 25th</td> + <td class="tdr">345</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_53_WHAT_THEY_THINK_IN_COUNTY_DONEGAL">No. 53.—What they think in County Donegal</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Stranorlar, Co. Donegal, July 27th</td> + <td class="tdr">351</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_54_A_SAMPLE_OF_IRISH_LOYALTY">No. 54.—A Sample of Irish "Loyalty"</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Killygordon, July 29th</td> + <td class="tdr">358</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_55_A_TRULY_PATRIOTIC_PRIEST">No. 55.—A Truly Patriotic Priest</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Donegal, August 1st</td> + <td class="tdr">365</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_56_DO-NOTHING_DONEGAL">No. 56.—Do-Nothing Donegal</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Donegal, August 3rd</td> + <td class="tdr">371</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_57_BAREFOOTED_AND_DILATORY">No. 57.—Barefooted and Dilatory</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Ballyshannon, August 5th</td> + <td class="tdr">378</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_58_THE_TRUTH_ABOUT_BUNDORAN">No. 58.—The Truth about Bundoran</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Sligo, August 8th</td> + <td class="tdr">383</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_59_IRISH_NATIONALISM_IS_NOT_PATRIOTISM">No. 59.—Irish Nationalism is not Patriotism</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Birmingham, August 11th</td> + <td class="tdr">390</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_60_LAND_HUNGER_ITS_CAUSE_EFFECT_AND_REMEDY">No. 60.—Land Hunger: its Cause, Effect, and Remedy</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Birmingham, August 14th</td> + <td class="tdr">396</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_61_CLERICAL_DOMINATION_AND_ITS_CONSEQUENCES">No. 61.—Clerical Domination and its Consequences</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Birmingham, August 16th</td> + <td class="tdr">403</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl"><a href="#No_62_CIVIL_WAR_A_CERTAINTY_OF_HOME_RULE">No. 62.—Civil War a certainty of Home Rule</a></td> + <td class="tdr2">Birmingham, August 18th</td> + <td class="tdr">409</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<br /> + +<p class="cen">[For a <a href="#GENERAL_INDEX">General Index</a> the reader is referred to the end of the volume.]</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> + +<h2>IRELAND AS IT IS</h2> + +<h3>AND AS IT WOULD BE</h3> + +<h2>UNDER HOME RULE.</h2> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_1_THE_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL" id="No_1_THE_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span><br /> + +<h2>IRELAND AS IT IS</h2> + +<h3>AND AS IT WOULD BE</h3> + +<h2>UNDER HOME RULE.</h2> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 1.—THE SPIRIT OF THE CAPITAL.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterb.png" alt="B" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />y the Spirit of the Capital I do not mean, as an Irishman would tell +you, Jameson's whiskey, nor yet the vivifying soul of Guinness's +double stout, but the mental posture of the dwellers in Dublin with +reference to Home Rule. There can be no doubt of the interest +prevailing in the Irish metropolis. The people are wrought into a +fever-heat of expectancy and intense nervous excitement. Home Rule is +the only topic of conversation. In hotels, on the steamers, in railway +carriages, on tramcars, in the market-place, on the steps of the +temples, at the corners of the streets, in the music halls, the +wondering stranger hears of Home Rule, Home Rule, Home Rule, first, +last, midst, and without end.</p> + +<p>Obviously so much discussion shows difference of opinion, divergency +of conception, conflicting interests. It is borne in upon you that the +Irish people are far from agreed as to what Home Rule means, and that +every individual has his own pet notion, the various theories +differing as widely as the education and social position of their +proposers. But the most striking feature in the attitude of Dublin is +undoubtedly the intense, the deep-rooted, the perfervid hatred of the +bill shown by the better sort of people, the nervous anxiety of the +law-abiding classes, the undisguised alarm of everybody who has +anything to lose, whether commercial men, private traders, +manufacturers, or the representatives of learning and culture. The +mere shadow of Home Rule has already seriously affected stocks and +securities, has brought about withdrawal of capital, and is sending +both English and Irish commercial travellers home empty-handed. Sir +Howard Grubb, maker of the great telescope of the Lick Observatory, +America, an Irishman whose scientific and commercial successes are a +glory to his country, and whose titular honours have been won by sheer +force of merit, declares that the passing of the Home Rule Bill will +be the signal heralding his departure to England, with plant and +working staff, and that he has been preparing for this since 1886. One +of the largest booksellers in the city tells me that, acting in +conjunction with others of the trade, during the last six weeks no +orders have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>been given to English travellers, adding—and thoughtful +people should find this highly suggestive—"The Dublin Unionists are +the people who have the money and the education. The people who have +money to spend are becoming excessively careful. They know not what +may be in store, but they fear that if Home Rule becomes law they will +be ruined, and more than ninety-five per cent. of my customers are +Unionists."</p> + +<p>Further inquiry confirmed the statement that the book-buying community +are practically Unionists to a man. The same figures hold good among +the Irish Quakers. Ninety-five per cent. is the proportion given to me +by an eminent Friend, no stranger to Birmingham, intimately known to +Alderman White and three generations of the Cadbury family. He said, +"Irish Quakers are Unionists, because they are on the spot, because +they understand the subject, because they know what will follow, +because they share the dangers of the threatened revolution. What may +be the proportion of Home Rulers among the English Friends I do not +know, but probably the Gladstonians have a majority, for precisely +opposite reasons to those I have stated, that is,—they are not on the +spot, do not understand the matter, are unable to see what will take +place, and regard themselves as safe, whatever happens." The Irish +Quakers have issued a manifesto which should weigh with their English +brethren and with the country at large. The Quakers know their way +about. Their piety has not blunted their perceptive faculties, has not +taken the edge off their keenness. Their reputation for shrewdness is +equal to their reputation for integrity, which is saying a good deal. +With them the innocence of the dove is happily combined with +considerable wisdom of the serpent. And at least ninety-five per cent. +of the Irish Quakers are earnest Unionists.</p> + +<p>But although the deep concern of the respectable classes of the Irish +capital is calculated to fill the wandering Englishman with grave +uneasiness, it is not all tragedy. The Dubliners must have their fun, +and, like the Parisians, will sport with matters of heaviest import. +The poorer classes treat the universal subject lightly, as beseems men +who have nothing to lose and everything to gain. The prevailing trait +in their mental attitude is incredulousness. You cannot make them +believe that the bill will pass. "We'll get Home Rule when a pair o' +white wings sprouts out o' me shoulders an' I fly away like a +blackbird," said an old market woman with great emphasis; and a Dublin +jackeen, piloting an American over the city, said: "This, Sorr, is +College Green, an' that, Sorr, is Thrinity College, an' that +Sorr,"—here he pointed to the grand pile opposite the College—"that +Sorr, is the grate buildin' in which the Irish Parliament is <i>not</i> +going to meet!" At one of the music halls an old woman (Ireland) is +represented as buying a coffin for a deceased son named "Home Rule" +Bill, when the following conversation occurs:—</p> + +<p>"Is it an oak or an elm coffin ye want?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>"Ah, thin, just a chape deal coffin, shure—wid a few archangels on +the lid."</p> + +<p>"Will ye want any trimmings?"</p> + +<p>"Arrah, what d'ye mane by trimmin's?"</p> + +<p>"Trimmings for the coffin."</p> + +<p>"Bad luck to yer trimmin's. What would I want wid them? Sure 'twas +'trimmin's' that kilt him!"</p> + +<p>It is hoped that Saxon readers will see this subtle joke when I +explain that "delirium" should come before "trimmin's."</p> + +<p>Underneath the incredulity of the lower classes—and be it observed +that their incredulity is obviously based on an instinctive feeling +that the claims and arguments of their own party are alike +preposterous—underneath this vein of unbelief is a vein of +extraordinary credulity. Poverty is to be at once and for ever +abolished. "The millions an' millions that John Bull dhrags out iv us, +to kape up his grandeur, an' to pay soldiers to grind us down, we'll +put into our own pockets, av you plaze," was the answer vouchsafed to +an inquiry as to what advantages were expected from the passing of the +Home Rule Bill. The speaker was a political barber. Another of the +craft said, in answer to the same query, "Well, Sorr, I think we have +a right to our indipindence. Sure, we'd be as sthrong as Switzerland +or Belgium." A small farmer from the outlying district thought that +rents would be lowered, that money would be advanced to struggling +tenants, that great public works would be instituted, and plainly +intimated that all these good things and many more had been roundly +promised by the Home Rule leaders, and that he, for one, fully +believed that all would duly come to pass, once the Bill were carried, +which happy event he never expected to see. Every man was to be a kind +of king in his own country, evictions were to be utterly unknown; the +peasantry were to live rent free, under a visionary scheme of which he +had all the absurd particulars; the old sporting maxim reminding +farmers that landlord shooting begins on January 1st and ends on +December 31st was to become obsolete by reason of a complete +extinction of the species—only an odd one being occasionally dug out +of the bogs along with trunks of bog-oak and skeletons of the great +Irish elk; while the family pig, which, having for ages occupied a +responsible position in the matter of "Rint," is understood to be an +inveterate landlord-hater, will be released from his delicate +situation, will be relieved from his harassing anxieties, will no +longer be sacrificed to the exigencies of the occasion; but, on the +contrary, will peacefully expire of old age, surrounded by every +tribute of respect. The dirtiest of the Dubliners hold opinions as to +the marvellous results of Home Rule more adapted to their own +positions and pursuits, but apparently on the same plane, no whit +higher in the scale of intelligence. They regard the English as their +natural enemies, and the lower you go the more truculent they become. +One and all they hold the belief, industriously instilled by +agitators, that the poverty of Ireland is due to the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>aggrandisement +of England, that the bulk of Irish taxation flows into English +coffers, and is used for English purposes to the exclusion of Ireland, +and this they have swallowed and insist upon, in defiance of common +reason and the evidence of their senses. The instinct of patriotism is +not <i>en évidence</i>. The dominant passion is cupidity, and nothing +higher; sheer greed of gain, lust of possession, and nothing nobler. +Selfishness and the hope of plunder are the actuating impulses at the +poll; crass ignorance and bitter prejudice the mental disposition of +the lower class of voters. Four hours' slumming convinced me of this, +and must convince anyone. "We'll bate the English into the say," said +a resident in the sweet region yclept Summer Hill. "Whin we get the +police in our hands an' an army of our own, we'd sweep them out o' the +counthry av we only held cabbage-shtalks. Ireland for the Irish, an' +to hell wid John Bull! Thim's my sintiments." And those are the +"sintiments" of his class. I have spent days among the Irish Home +Rulers without having once heard of the Union of Hearts. The phrase +serves well enough to tickle the simple souls of the long-eared but +short-headed fraternity of pseudo-philosophical-philanthropists across +the water, but it has no currency in Ireland.</p> + +<p>Like the country folks the city slummers believe that unheard-of +advantages would follow the great Bill, and, unconsciously parodying +Sancho Panza, say in effect, "Now blessings light on him who first +invented Home Rule! it covers a man all over, thoughts and all, like a +cloak; it is meat for the hungry, drink for the thirsty, heat for the +cold, and cold for the hot." The bare thought of the coming Paradise +illuminates their dirty visages. Like the lunatic, the lover, and the +poet, they are of imagination all compact, and, unlike the character +mentioned by the Bard, they "can hold a fire in their hands, By +thinking on the frosty Caucasus, And cloy the hungry edge of appetite +By bare imagination of a feast; And wallow naked in December snow By +thinking on fantastic summer's heat."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, they lounge about in idleness, hugging their misery, +discussing the "bating" of the Unionist party, or, as I saw them +yesterday evening, listening to the crooning of an ancient female +gutter-snipe, a dun-coloured heap of decrepit wretchedness, chanting +the great future of the Irish Parliament in a picturesque and +extraordinary doggerel anent the "larned reprisintatives of the Oirish +na-a-tion. Promiscu-o-ous they shtand in em-u-la-a-tion." The small +shopkeepers, once ardent Nationalists, seem to be changing their +minds. One of them confided to me the fact that he and his fellows, +brought actually face to face with the possibility that the end of +their aspirations and agitations would be attained, were beginning to +ask whether, after all, taxation would be remitted, whether indeed the +rates would not be heavier, and whether the moneyed people would +remain in the country at all. Hearing on all sides these and similar +confessions, accompanied by urgent admonitions of secrecy, you begin +to ask whether the past conduct <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>of these enlightened voters had any +more substantial basis than a cantankerous and unreasonable +discontent, superadded to an Irishman's natural love of fighting. The +leaders of the Separatist party have made the most frantic efforts to +win over the police, but apparently without much success. The Dublin +constabulary, a body of 1,300 men, is totally separate and distinct +from the Royal Irish Constabulary, but I have reason to believe that +the feeling of both forces is averse to Home Rule. Said a sergeant +yesterday, "John Bull may have faults, but," and here he winked +expressively, "but—he pays!" Then he went on—"I am a Westmeath man, +a Roman Catholic, an' as good an Irishman as any of thim; an' I'd like +Home Rule if it was local self-government, what they call the gas an' +wather management, or the like of that. But although I've the highest +respect for my counthry, an' for my counthrymen, I'd like to feel that +my pay was in better hands, and—what is of more importance—my +pension, afther 30 years' service."</p> + +<p>Here was a complete lack of confidence, but my friend had more to say. +He referred to the provisions of the bill, spoke of the six years' +arrangement, and on this point exhibited great native shrewdness. "How +do we know we'll be employed for six years, once the Irish leaders get +matters in their own hands? They may promise fairly enough, but they +would be subject to several influences which might prevint thim kaping +their promise. First of all, when they had the power, they would +naturally like to manage things their own way—an' not to be +altogether bound down so hard an' fast by their engagement with the +English Parliament. Then, although they profess such friendship, they +don't altogether like us. We may tell them we are Nationalists, an' +that we're runnin' over with patriotism; but they'll tell us that we +stood by at evictions, an' that we fired on the people at +Mitchelstown. But the greatest thing of all is this—all their +counthry friends, all the terrorisers, the men that mutilated the +cattle, the village ruffians that for years have been doin' their +work, an' actin' as their spies—all these will have to be provided +for. The same with our officers, but their case is still worse. They +have had to pass a regular military examination, which means an +expensive education. They will get the go-by an' the dirty kick-out, +in order that the friends of the ruling party, who have been so long +in the desert, may be furnished with posts. 'Tis human nature, Sorr." +Wherefore, the constabulary, it would seem, may be trusted to take +care of themselves, but the situation is suggestive of serious +complications, once the bill were passed. A full private this morning +told me that without the security of the British Exchequer the force +would not hold together for four-and-twenty hours, a statement which, +whatever be its value, is at least an indication of the amount of +trust which some of the Irish people, and those not the worst +informed, are disposed to place in the distinguished assembly which, +according to the authority hereinbefore-mentioned is <i>not</i> to meet on +College Green.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>A never-ending complaint which follows you everywhere is the +supineness of the English electorate. Men whose interests are +seriously threatened, such as the better class of shopkeepers, are +unable to understand the comparative calmness of the British public at +large. Passionately they ask why England leaves them to their fate, +and strongly they urge that prompt and decided action should be taken, +if not for the sake of Ireland, then in the interests of England +herself. Disruption, pure and simple, the breaking up of the Empire, +with panic and general ruin, are in their opinion the sure and certain +concomitants of the bill now before the House. They declare that +Englishmen as a whole, whether Gladstonians or Unionists, fail to +realise the gravity of the situation, and they lose no opportunity of +saying whenever they hear an English accent, "<span class="sc">We don't want it, we +don't want it!</span>" Not always do they trouble to say what is the +thing they so emphatically reject. "Pardon me, Sir, but are you +English?" Receiving an affirmative the rejoinder comes at once, and +forcefully, "We don't want it, we don't want it! Tell the English +people that if they knew all they would not entertain the idea for a +moment." The phrase meets you everywhere, is roared at you in chorus +in commercial rooms, haunts you in your sleep, and, if they would own +it, must be painfully suggestive to Gladstonian visitors. But there +are none so blind as those who will not see, none so deaf as those who +will not hear. It is impossible to withhold sympathy with the +indignation and mental anxiety of these industrious men, who have made +Dublin what she is, and whose only notion of happiness is the +fulfilment of duty, their sole means of acquiring wealth or +middleclass comfort, hard and honest work. That the backbone of the +city should stand with their fortunes subject to the will of a few +unscrupulous agitators is indeed, as they say, an inscrutable +dispensation of Providence.</p> + +<p>Help, however, is at hand. As Hercules hangs backward in their need +they have determined to help themselves. During the Easter recess both +Ireland and England will be made to ring with denunciations of Home +Rule, denunciations uttered for the most part by Irishmen. Orators +will go forth throughout the length and breadth of both islands, with +the object of laying the truth of the matter before the +people—demonstrating the dire results which the most intelligent +almost unanimously predict. There will be no lack of funds—Catholics +and Protestants are subscribing, among the former the grandson of +Daniel O'Connell, the great Liberator of Ireland. Money is literally +pouring into the offices of the Irish Unionist Alliance. Little Roman +Catholic Tralee, in the heart of Kerry, one of the most disturbed +districts, has sent several hundreds. In three weeks the subscriptions +have reached £20,000. That ought to be enough to enable Irish +Unionists not, as one said to me, "to enlighten the English people. We +do not presume to so much. But we will try to let some of the Darkness +out."</p> + +<p class="date">Dublin, March 28th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_2_PANIC_AND_DISASTER" id="No_2_PANIC_AND_DISASTER"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 2.—PANIC AND DISASTER.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he situation is becoming hourly more serious. The over-excited +condition of men's minds is rapidly ripening into a panic. The +impending Second Reading is driving the respectable population of +Ireland into absolute despair. The capital is inundated by men from +all parts of the kingdom anxious to know the worst, running hither and +thither, asking whether, even at the eleventh hour, anything may be +done to avert the dreaded calamity. An eminent solicitor assures me +that during the last four-and-twenty hours a striking change of +opinion has taken place. Red-hot Home Rulers when confronted with the +looming actuality are on all sides abandoning their loudly proclaimed +political opinions. My friend's business—he is, or has been, an +ardent Home Ruler—is chiefly connected with land conveyancing, and he +declares that his office is besieged by people anxious to "withdraw +their charges" on land and house property, that is, to recall their +money advanced on mortgage, however profitable the investment, however +apparently solid the security. He instanced the case of an estate in +Cavan, bearing three mortgages of respectively £1,000, £3,000, and +£4,000, and leaving to the borrower a clear income of £1,700 a year +after all claims were paid. The three lenders are strenuously +endeavouring to realise, the thousand-pounder being prostrate with +affright, but although the investments under normal conditions would +fetch a good premium, not a penny can be raised in any direction. The +lenders are Home Rulers, and eighty per cent. of the population of +Cavan are Roman Catholic.</p> + +<p>The same story is heard everywhere, with "damnable iteration." The +cause of charity is suffering severely. The building of additions to +the Rotunda Hospital and the Hospital for Consumptives, at a cost of +twenty thousand pounds, has been definitely abandoned, although +three-quarters of the money has been raised. The building trade is at +a complete standstill. On every hand contracts are thrown up, great +works are put aside. Mr. Kane, High Sheriff of Kildare, declines to +proceed with the building of his new mansion, which was to cost many +thousand pounds. Mr. John Jameson, the eminent distiller, who also +contemplated the construction of a palatial residence, which would +take years to build, has dropped the idea. The project for the +formation of a great Donegal Oyster-bed Company, which long bade fair +to prosper, and to confer a boon on the starving peasantry of the +coast, has been cast to the winds. Among the shoals of similar +occurrences which confront you at every turn, some contain an element +almost of humour. A Dublin architect tells a quaint story of this +kind. It may not be generally known in England that the Roman +Catholics of Ireland can borrow money from John Bull for the erection +of "glebe-houses," at 4 per cent., repayable in 49 years. In a certain +recent case the priest thought the builder's estimate <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>too high, and, +without absolutely declining the contract, intimated that he would +"wait a while." Said the architect, "Better make up your mind before +June, or you may have the Irish Legislature to deal with." This +argument acted like magic. The good Father instantly saw its cogency, +and, like every other patriotic Nationalist whose personal interest is +involved, preferred to place himself in English hands rather than in +those of his own countrymen, and incontinently accepted the contract, +begging the architect to proceed with all haste.</p> + +<p>A run on the Post Office Savings Bank threatens to clear out every +penny of Irish money, and why? Because it has dawned on the small +hoarders, the thrifty and industrious members of the lower classes, +that the Post Office is to be transferred to the Irish Legislature. A +friend tells me that yesterday his Catholic cook begged for an +interview. She had money in the Post Office Savings Bank, and +thereanent required advice, asking if it would be safe till to-morrow! +Following up this hint, pregnant with meaning, though delivered in +jest, I found that the feeling of insecurity is spreading like wild +fire, to the intense indignation of those patriots who have no +savings, and who are alive to the fact that under the provisions of +the proposed Act the four millions supposed to be lying in the Post +Office Savings Bank would constitute the entire working capital, as +distinguished from current income, of the College Green Legislature. +The master of a small sub-office told me that the withdrawals at his +little place amounted to £200 per week, rising latterly to £70 per +day, and that it was necessary to get money from London to meet the +demands. Concurrently with this I learn that the Dublin Savings Bank, +an institution managed by merchants of the city, for the encouragement +of thrift, is receiving the money so withdrawn, and this confidence is +explained by the well-known fact that the directors have publicly +declared that on the passing of the Home Rule Bill they will pay 20s. +in the pound and close the bank, in addition to which significant +ultimatum they have, in writing, declared to Mr. Gladstone, that this +course of action is due to the fact that they repudiate the security +of the proposed Irish Legislature. To put the thing in a nutshell it +may be said that not a single Irishman in or out of the country is +willing to trust the Irish Legislature with a single penny of his own +money.</p> + +<p>A curious feature of the Nationalist character is the profound +contempt expressed for Nationalist M.P.'s. Englishmen are accustomed +to speak of their own members, representing their own opinions, with +respect. Not so in Dublin. A rabid Nationalist said to me, "I am an +Irishman to the backbone. I am a Home Ruler out-and-out. But do you +think I'd trust my property with either of the two Tims? Do you think +such men as Tim Harrington and Tim Healy are fit to be trusted with +the spending of 2½ millions of money per annum? They have their +job, and they work well at their job, and the Irish people have backed +them up out of pure <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>divilment. 'Tis mighty fine to take a rise out of +John Bull, to harass him, to worry him, to badger him out of his seven +sinses. The half of the voters never were serious, or voted as they +were told by men who expatiated on the wrongs which have been dinned +into them from infancy. But to trust these orators with their money! +Bedad, we're not all out such omadhauns (idiots) as that! Paddy is not +altogether such a fool as he looks."</p> + +<p>Although public feeling has suddenly deepened in intensity, the change +has been for some time in progress. I am enabled to state on +irrefragable authority, that Lord Houghton's sudden departure from +Dublin on Sunday week was entirely due to his alarm at the shifting +aspect of affairs, which rendered instant conference with Mr. +Gladstone a matter of urgent necessity. And it should be especially +noted that this change is most apparent not in the Protestant North, +not among the irreconcilable black and heretic Ulsterites, but in +Nationalist Dublin, in the Roman Catholic south—not simply among the +moneyed classes and well-to-do shopkeepers of Dublin, but among the +industrious poor, and the small farmers of the region round about. The +opinions and feelings of the better classes have ever been dead +against the Bill, and the best portion of the poorer people are +assuredly moving in the same direction. That such is the simple fact +is undeniable. It is thrust upon you whether you will or no. You are +compelled to believe it, whatever your political creed. It manifests +itself in a variety of ways. Mr. Love, of Kildare, a landed +proprietor, now in Dublin, says that on Sunday last Dr. Gowing, parish +priest of Kill, denounced Home Rule from the altar, and advised the +people to have none of it.</p> + +<p>The Dubliners are beginning to publicly ridicule their Nationalist +members. A bog-oak carving represents a typical Irishman driving a +"conthrairy pig," which is supposed to stand for Tim Harrington. The +interesting animal is deviating from the right way, gazing fixedly at a +milestone which bears the legend, "IX. miles to College Green." His +master gives him a cut of the whip and a jerk of the rope, and thus +addresses the wayward Tim, "Arrah, don't be wastin' yer larnin', radin' +milestones. Ye're not goin' to Dublin—ye're goin' to BRAY!" A +Phœnix Park orator who sang amusing songs finished his appeal for +coppers thus, "Sure, Home Rule is a splindid thing—an iligant thing +intirely, an' a blind man could see the goodness iv it wid his two +eyes. Didn't ye all know Tim Harrington whin he hadn't the price iv his +breakfast? Didn't ye know him whin he would dhrop on his two +marrowbones and thank God for the price of a shmell of calamity-wather" +(whiskey). "An' now look at him! D'ye mind the iligant property he has +outside Dublin? An ye'll all get the like o' that, every bosthoon among +yez, av ye get Home Rule. But yez must sind <i>me</i> to Parlimint. Sure I +have ivery quollification. Wasn't I born among yez? Wasn't I rared +among yez? Don't I know what yez wants? An' didn't I go many a day +widout a male? Aye, that I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>did, an' could do it again! Sind <i>me</i> to +Parlimint, till I get within whisperin' distance of Misther +Gladstone—within whisperin' distance, d'ye mind me? Ye'll all get +lashins of dhrink, an' free quarthers at the Castle. An' all ye have to +do is to pay me, an' pay me well." Here the speaker laid his finger +along his nose and broke into a comic song having reference to "the +broad Atlantic," which he chanted in a brogue almost as broad as the +Atlantic itself.</p> + +<p>The better class of vacillating Nationalists are ready to give a +plausible reason for the faith that is in them. You cannot catch an +Irish Home Ruler napping, nor will he admit that he was ever wrong. He +will talk to the average Englishman about Irish rights and Irish +wrongs, Irish virtues and Irish abstinence from crime with a reckless +disregard for truth that can only be born of a firm belief that Irish +newspapers are never read outside Ireland, and will then walk off and +plume himself on the assumption that because he met no point-blank +contradiction he has duped his victim into believing the most absurd +mass of wild misinformation that was ever crammed down the throats of +the most gullible of his rustic countrymen. It must be admitted that +they are shrewd critics of the Bill, of which every individual +citizen, whatever his conviction, has an annotated copy in his +tail-pocket. The Dublin change of front is ascribed to the "insulting +manner in which the Bill is drafted." The Nationalists, one and all, +roundly declare, in terms which admit of no qualification, that the +present bill means no less than separation, and while admitting that +this is their dearest aspiration, declare that England will only have +herself to thank. They complain that the word "Parliament" is never +used in the Bill when referring to the Irish Legislature, but console +themselves with the reflection that the supremacy of Parliament proper +is only mentioned in the preamble, which they rejoice to believe is +not part of the bill, and therefore is not binding in law. The +Treasury clauses they declare to have been drawn by a deadly enemy of +Ireland, but here again they find salvation in the alleged +inconsistency of the various provisions of the bill.</p> + +<p>They accept with exceeding great joy the provision which will enable +them to deprive of their property, rights, and privileges all existing +Corporations whether incorporated under Royal Charter or otherwise, +pointing out that this means ownership and control of the Bank of +Ireland, Trinity College, and all the churches and cathedrals, which +hereafter are to be wrested from Protestant hands and devoted to the +propagandism of the Roman Catholic faith; and that the Bill confers +these powers is, they say, made clearly evident by the clause that +places these matters in the hands of an executive "directed by Irish +Act." By virtue of his position they have already nominated Archbishop +Walsh on this executive, with other ecclesiastics of like kidney. This +they admit is a good mouthful, but they scornfully assert that while +Mr. Gladstone has left them income-tax to pay, he has also loaded them +with the Post Office, a Greek gift, which under the best English +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>management is worked at a loss of fifty thousand pounds a year! The +two Home Rulers who in my hearing so ruthlessly dissected the Bill +made merry over the clause which excludes the Irish Government from +all control of the "foreign mails or submarine telegraphs or +through-lines in connection therewith," pouring on the unhappy +sentence whole cataracts of ridicule. "We have the thing in our hands, +and we are not to control its working," said they. "The cable between +England and America passes through Ireland, will be worked by our +servants, by people who will look to us as their paymasters, and we +are to have no control!" The preposterous absurdity of the notion +tickled the entire company. "But if England does not please us, can we +not cut the cable? Can we not order our own paid servants to cease +transmitting messages, or to transmit only such as have survived the +inspection of the accredited officials of the Irish people?" It was +thought that this was reasonable and a possible, nay a probable +conjuncture, and might be used as a weapon to damage English trade. +"Let them go round or lay another cable," said one patriot.</p> + +<p>This sort of discussion, more or less reasonable, is everywhere heard, +and should be of some value in indicating the use Irishmen expect to +make of the Act. Not a single friendly syllable, not a word of +amicable fellowship with England, not a scintilla of gratitude for +favours past or to come, nothing but undisguised animosity, and a +fixed resolution to make every clause of the Act a battlefield. I +speak that I do know and testify that I have seen. My personal +relations with the Irish people have been and continue to be of the +most gratifying kind. In the homes of the highest, in the great +manufactories, even in the lowest slums I have seen much that is +attractive in the Irish character—much that excites warm interest, +and is calculated to attach you to the people. I have conversed with +scores of Home Rulers of all shades, and to the query as to whether +ultimate separation is hoped for, I have received an invariable +affirmative. True it is that the answer varied in terms from the blunt +"Yes" of the uncompromising man to the more or less veiled assent of +the more cautious, but the result was in substance ever the same. Talk +about the Union of Hearts, the pacification of Ireland, the brotherly +love that is to ensue, and the Unionists turn away with undissembled +impatience, the Home Rulers with a chuckle and a sneer. As well tell +reasonable Irishmen that the world is flat, or that a straight line +between two given points is the longest, or that the sun moves round +the moon, or any other inane absurdity contrary to the evidence of +science and their senses. The English Gladstonians who babble about +brotherly love and conciliation should move about Dublin in disguise. +Disguise would in their case be necessary to get at the truth, for +Paddy is a shrewd trickster, and delights in humbugging this species +of visitor, whom he calls "the slobbering Saxon." Then if they would +return and still vote for Home Rule they are no less than traitors to +their country and enemies to their fellow-country men.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>The weather is very fine, and the fashionable resorts are fairly well +frequented, but trade daily grows worse. Wholesale houses, says a high +authority, are "not dull, but stone dead." The pious Irish fast and +pray during the week, and the great Roman Catholic Retreat at Milltown +is crowded to the limits of its accommodation. The ladies wear a kind +of half-mourning, a stylish sort of reminder of original sin. +Sackcloth and ashes in Catholic Dublin consist of fetching brown, +grey, or tan costumes, set off with huge bunches of fragrant violets, +tied with a bow the exact shade of the flower, or a dull shade of +purple, a sort of Lenten lugubriousness particularly becoming to +blonde penitents. The ladies are indefatigable in their efforts +against Home Rule, and one distinguished canvasser for signatures to +the Roman Catholic petition has been warned by the police, as she +values her life, to leave Dublin for a time. The ruffian class, +needless to say, has undergone no change, but still demands the bill, +and this delicate lady, for years foremost in every good and +charitable work, is driven from her home by threatening letters—that +accursed resort to anonymous intimidation which so discredits the +Irish claim to superior courage and chivalry. The Catholics of Dublin +are signing numerously, but the number of signatories by no means +represents the opponents of the Bill.</p> + +<p>Englishmen cannot be brought to realise for one moment the system of +terrorism and intimidation which prevails even in the very heart of +the capital. Parnellite spies are everywhere and know everything, and +woe to the helpless man who dares to have a mind of his own. And not +only are the poor coerced and deprived of the liberty of the subject, +but the wealthiest manufacturers—men whose firms are of the greatest +magnitude—will caution you against using their names in connection +with anything that could give a clue to their real sentiments. This +difficulty arises everywhere and information can only be extracted +after a promise that its source shall never be disclosed. The priests +are credited with unheard-of influence among the poor. "At the present +moment the ruffians are held in leash. The order has gone forth that +pending the Home Rule debate they are to 'be good.' But if I sign that +petition, although here in Dublin, the thing would be known at Tralee, +200 miles away, before I reached home—and a hundred to one that the +first blackguard that passed would put a match in my thatch, would +burn my stacks, would hough or mutilate my cattle." The speaker was a +Roman Catholic farmer from Kerry. Mr. Morley, in stating that the +prosecution of the Rev. Robert Eager had ceased and determined, was +utterly wrong. The rector's cousin, Mr. W.J. Eager, also of Tralee, +told me that threatening letters with coffins and cross-bones were +still pouring in in profusion. Mr. Eager was calmly requested to give +up land which he had held for 15 years to a man who had previously +rented it, and as the good parson failed to see the force of this +argument he is threatened with a violent death. In England such a +thing could only happen in a pantomime, but some of the Irish think it +the quintessence of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>reasonable action. These are the class that +support the Bill; these are the men Mr. Gladstone and his +conglomeration of cranks and faddists hope to satisfy. A brilliant +kind of prospect for poor John Bull.</p> + +<p>Mr. John Morley should accompany me in my peregrinations among the +intelligent voters who have placed him and his great chief in power, +along with the galaxy of minor stars which rise with the Grand Man's +rising and set at his setting. "The British Government won't allow us +to work the gold mines in the Wicklow mountains. Whin we get the Bill +every man can take a shpade, an' begorra! can dig what he wants." "The +Phaynix Park is all cramfull o' coal that the Castle folks won't allow +us to dig, bad scran to them. Whin we get the Bill wu'll sink thim +mines an' send the Castle to Blazes." But the quaintest, the funniest, +the most sweetly ingenuous of the lot was the reason given by a +gentleman of patriarchal age and powerful odour, whom I encountered in +Hamilton's Lane. He said, "Ye see, Sorr, this is the way iv it. 'Tis +the Americans we'll look to, by raison that they're mostly our own +folks. They're powerful big invintors, but bedad, they haven't the +wather power to work the invintions. Now <i>we</i> have the wather power, +an' the invintions 'll be brought over here to be worked. An' that'll +give the poor folks imploymint."</p> + +<p>The poor man's ignorance was doubtless dense, his credulity amusing, +his childlike simplicity interesting. But the darkness of his +ignorance was no blacker, the extent of his credulity no more amazing, +than the ignorance and credulity of English Gladstonian speakers, who, +with a Primitive Methodist accent and a Salvation Army voice, +proclaim, with a Bible twang, their conviction that Home Rule means +the friendship of Ireland.</p> + +<p class="date">Dublin, March 30th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_3_ULSTERS_PREPARATIONS_FOR_WAR" id="No_3_ULSTERS_PREPARATIONS_FOR_WAR"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 3.—ULSTER'S PREPARATIONS FOR WAR.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letteru.png" alt="U" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />lster will fight, and fight to the death. The people have taken a +resolution—deep, stern, and irrevocable. Outwardly they do not seem +so troubled as the Dubliners. They are quiet in their movements, +moderate in their speech. They show no kind of alarm, for they know +their own strength, and are fully prepared for the worst. They speak +and act like men whose minds are made up, who will use every +Constitutional means of maintaining their freedom, and, these failing, +will take the matter in their own strong hands. Meanwhile they +preserve external calm, and systematically make their arrangements. If +ever they went through a talking stage, that is now over. They have +passed the time of discussion, and are preparing for action. If <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>ever +they showed heat, that period also is past. They have reached the cold +stage, in which men act on ascertained principles and not in the +frenzy of passion. There is nothing hysterical about the Belfast men. +They are by no means the kind of people who run hither and thither +wringing their hands. Neither are they men who will sit down under +oppression. And oppression is what they expect from a Dublin +Government. Mr. Gladstone and his tribe may pooh-pooh this notion, but +the feeling in Ulster is strong and immovable. The tens of thousands +of Protestants thickly scattered over other provinces feel more +strongly still; as well they may, for they have not the numbers, the +organisation, the unity which is strength, that characterise the +province of Ulster. They hold that Home Rule is at the bottom a +religious movement, that by circuitous methods, and subterranean +strategy, the religious re-conquest of the island is sought; that the +ignorant peasantry, composing the large majority of the electorate, +are entirely in the hands of the priests, and that these black swarms +of Papists have a congenital hatred of England, which must bring about +separation. These are the opinions of thousands of eminent men whose +ability is beyond argument, who have lived all their lives on the +spot, who from childhood have had innumerable facilities for knowing +the truth, whose interests are bound up with the prosperity of +Ireland, and who, on every ground, are admittedly the best judges. +Said Mr. Albert Quill, the Dublin barrister:—</p> + +<p>"Mr. Gladstone, who in eighty-four years has spent a week in Ireland, +puts aside Sir Edward Harland, who has built a fleet of great ships in +an Irish port, and sneers at the opinion of the Belfast deputation who +have lived all their lives in Ireland." A Roman Catholic Unionist, an +eminent physician, said to me:—</p> + +<p>"I fear that Catholicism would ultimately lose by the change, although +at first it would undoubtedly obtain a strong ascendant. The bulk of +the Irish Catholics have a deep animosity to the English people, whom +they regard as heretics, and the Protestants of Ireland would in +self-defence be compelled to band themselves together, for underneath +the specious surface of the Home Rule movement are the teeth and claws +of the tiger. Persecution would follow separation, which is inevitable +if the present bill be carried. A Dublin Parliament would make a +Protestant's life a burden. This would react in time, and Catholicism +would suffer in the long run. And for this reason, amongst others, I +am against Home Rule."</p> + +<p>But what are the Belfast men doing? <i>Imprimis</i> they are working in +what may be called the regular English methods. Unionist clubs are +springing up in all directions. The Earl of Ranfurly opened three in +one evening, and others spring up almost every day. The Ulster +Anti-Repeal and Loyalist Association will during the month of April +hold over three hundred meetings in England, all manned by competent +speakers. The Irish Unionist Association and the Conservative +Association are likewise doing excellent work, which <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>is patent to +everybody. But other associations which do not need public offices are +flourishing like green bay trees, and their work is eminently +suggestive. By virtue of an all-powerful introduction, I yesterday +visited what may be called the Ulster war department, and there saw +regular preparation for an open campaign, the preliminaries for which +are under eminently able superintendence. The tables are covered with +documents connected with the sale and purchase of rifles and munitions +of war. One of them sets forth the particulars of a German offer of +245,000 Mauser rifles, the arm last discarded by the Prussian +Government, with 50,000,000 cartridges. As the first 150,000 Mausers +were manufactured by the National Arms and Ammunition Company, +Sparkbrook, Birmingham, it may be interesting to record that the +quoted price was 16s. each, the cartridges being thrown in for +nothing. Another offer referred to 149,000 stand of arms, with +30,000,000 cartridges. A third document, the aspect of which to a +native of Brum was like rivers of water in a thirsty land, was said to +have been summarily set aside by reason of the comparative antiquity +of the excellent weapon offered, notwithstanding the tempting lowness +of the quoted price.</p> + +<p>A novel and unexpected accession of information was the revelation of +a deep and sincere sympathy among the working men of England, who, +with gentlemen of position and rifle volunteers by hundreds and +thousands, are offering their services in the field, should civil war +ensue. The letters were shown to me, all carefully filed, and +sufficient liberty was permitted to enable me to be satisfied as to +the tenour of their contents. Among the more important was a short +note from a distinguished personage, offering a contribution of £500, +with his guarantee of a force of two hundred men. This also was from +England, a fact which the scoffers at Ulster will do well to read, +mark, learn, and inwardly digest. The guarantee fund for the first +campaign now amounts to nearly a million and a half, which the best +financial authority of Belfast tells me is "as good as the Bank of +England." What the Dublin police-sergeant said of John Bull may also +be said of the Ulsterman—"He may have faults, but—he Pays!" Funds +for current purposes are readily forthcoming, £50,000 being already in +hand, while promises of a whole year's income seem thick as autumnal +leaves in Vallombrosa. No means is left untried, no stone is left +unturned to render abortive what the dry and caustic Northerners call +the Home Ruin Bill, or the Bill for the <i>Bitter</i> Government of +Ireland.</p> + +<p>Moving hourly among people accurately and minutely acquainted with the +local position, you cannot fail to be struck by the marvellous +unanimity with which all Irish Unionists predict the exact result of +such a bill as constitutes the present bone of contention, and their +precise agreement as to concerted action should the crisis arise. They +ridicule the English notion that they intend to take the field at +once. Nothing of the kind. They will await <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>the imposition of taxes by +a Dublin Parliament, and will steadfastly refuse to pay. The money +must then be collected by force of arms, that is, by the Royal Irish +Constabulary, who will be met by men who under their very noses are +now becoming expert in battalion drill, having mastered company drill, +with manual and firing exercise; and whose numbers—I love to be +particular—amount to the respectable total of one hundred and +sixty-four thousand six hundred and fourteen, all duly enrolled and +pledged to act together anywhere and at any time, most of them already +well armed, and the remainder about to be furnished with splendid and +effective weapons, which before this appears in print will have been +landed from a specially chartered steamer, and instantly distributed +from a spot I am forbidden to indicate, by an organisation specially +created for the purpose.</p> + +<p>All these particulars—and more—were furnished by gentlemen of high +position and unimpeachable integrity, whose statements, of themselves +sufficient, were abundantly confirmed by the exhibition under +restrictive pledges, of undeniable documentary proofs, with partial +but satisfactory glimpses of the work actually in hand. No vapouring +here, no breathless haste, not a suspicion of excitement. Nothing but +a cold, emotionless, methodical, business-like precision, a +well-considered series of commercial transactions, conducted by men +specially acquainted with the articles required and regularly trained +to office routine. English Home Rulers, unable to see a yard in front +of them, whose training and instincts are of the goody-goody, milk and +water type,—the lily-livered weaklings, who measure the courage of +others by their own,—may be excused their inability to conceive the +situation. They cannot understand the dour, unyielding spirit of the +Ulsterman in a matter which affects his property, his religion, his +freedom. A party backboneless as the Globerigina ooze, and, like that +sub-Atlantic production, only held together by its own sliminess, must +ever fail to realise the grit which means resistance, sacrifice, +endurance; cannot grasp the outlines of the Ulster character and +spirit, which resemble those which actuated the Scottish Covenanters, +the Puritan army of Cromwell, or even—and this illustration should be +especially grateful to Gladstonians—the Dutch Boers of the Transvaal.</p> + +<p>But although the surface is placid the depths are turbulent. If Dublin +is simmering, Belfast is boiling. The breed is different. The +Northerner is not demonstrative, is slow to anger, but being moved is +not easily appeased. The typical Irishman, with his cutaway coat, his +pipe stuck in his conical caubeen, his "sprig of shillelagh," or +bludgeon the Donnybrook Fair hero who "shpinds half a-crown, Mates wid +a frind An' (for love) knocks him down" is totally unknown in these +regions. The men who by their ability and industry have lifted Ireland +out of the slough, given her prosperity and comparative affluence, +marched hand in hand with the English people, have only seen, with +wonder, the rollicking Kelt, devoid of care, forethought, and +responsibility, during their trips <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>to the South and West—or wherever +Home Rulers most do congregate. Strange it is, but perfectly true, +that in most cases an Irishman's politics may be determined by outward +and visible signs, so plain that he who runs may read. In Dundalk, +which should be a thriving port, you see in and around the town long +rows of low thatch-covered cabins, with putrid dunghills +"convaynient," dirty, half-fed, barefooted children, and—magnificent +Catholic churches. Home Rule rules the roost. As you move northwards, +the symptoms of poverty gradually disappear. Scarva, the annual +meeting ground of 5,000 to 10,000 Orangemen, who on July 13, the day +after the anniversary of the battle of the Boyne, fight the battle +o'er again, with a King William and a King James, mounted respectively +on their regulation white and bay chargers—Scarva is neat, clean and +civilised. Bessbrook, the Quaker colony, is, as might be expected, a +model community. Lurgan is well built, smart, trim, and delightful, a +wealthy manufacturing place with the general aspect of Leamington. As +the train steamed into the station an American traveller took a +general survey of the district, and said to the general company—</p> + +<p>"I reckon this is a Unionist place."</p> + +<p>A fierce-looking man from Dundalk admitted the soft impeachment.</p> + +<p>"Thought so. Can spot a Home Rule town far off as I can see it. Mud +huts, whitewashed cabins with no upstairs, muck-heaps, and bad fences. +Can spot a Home Ruler as far as I can see him. Darned if I couldn't +track him by scent, like a foxhound. That's the rank and file—very +rank, I should say, most of them. And old J. Bull concludes to let the +dunghill folks, powerful lazy beggars they seem, come top-sawyer over +the fellows that built a place like this, eh?"</p> + +<p>The Newry man, taking off his hat, revealing a head of hair like a +disorderly halo, took from the lining a little paper which called upon +the Irish peasantry to remember their wrongs, referred to the time +when Englishmen could murder Irishmen with impunity, stated that the +thing had often been done, and called upon every male from fifteen to +fifty to enrol himself in the Irish Independent Army—referring to the +Protestants as "a cruel and bloody minority." The Yankee returned the +bill contemptuously.</p> + +<p>"You think this a question of counting noses. Now, I'm a sympathiser +of Home Rule, but if I was J.B. it would be different. I'm hanged if I +would not stick to my clean, clever, faithful friends, though they +were outnumbered by twenty to one. An' I'm a Republican, mind ye that. +Ye might ask me to put the muck-heap men at the head of affairs—ye +might ask till doomsday, but ye'd never get it. An' any man's a fool +that would do it."</p> + +<p>A placard announcing the formation of an Irish Army of Independence, +and calling on the people to enrol themselves, has been extensively +circulated, and it is said that the Roman Catholics, like the +Protestants, are industriously drilling, north, south, east <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>and west. +I am careful to use the term Protestants, as the force available is +drawn from the general body of Nonconformists. Orangemen are members +of the Church of Ireland, and have always been regarded as +Conservative. On the contrary, Presbyterians and Methodists are +considered to be advanced Liberals, and herein lies a popular English +fallacy—Gladstonians often refer to the Orange agitation against the +disestablishment of the Irish Church, which they would fain compare +with the present opposition to Home Rule, forgetting or ignoring the +fact that the strength of Ulster resides in the Nonconformist bodies, +and that these were all in favour of disestablishment, leaving the +Orangemen in a hopeless minority. Now, however, the Nonconformists +have joined their forces with those of the Orange bodies, which +creates a very different aspect of affairs. The English Home Rulers +say the opposition will end in smoke. It is said that the most insane +are sometimes wiser than they dream, just as liars sometimes speak +truth by accident. The movement will end in smoke, but it will be the +smoke of battle. Every man who supports the Home Rule Bill incurs the +stigma of blood-guiltiness. The bill that succeeds Home Rule will be +the Butchers' Bill. No doubt Mr. Gladstone will explain away the +"painful occurrences which we all deplore," and will endeavour to +transfer the blame to other shoulders. His talent for explanation is +unapproachable, but unhappily he cannot explain the slain to life +again.</p> + +<p>In a former letter I pointed out how cleverly the Nationalists dissect +the bill, how they point out that its proposals are insulting to +Ireland, how they prove that its provisions are inconsistent and +unworkable, how they propose to discount the trumpery restrictions and +the gimcrack "safeguards" of the proposed measure, how in short, they +tear the bill to rags, laugh its powers to scorn, and hold its authors +in high derision. The Belfast men do not discuss the bill, do not +examine it clause by clause, do not quibble over the purport of this +or the probable effect of that, do not ask how the customs are to be +collected, or who is to pay for this, that, or the other. They descend +to no details, enter into no particulars, point out no minor +fallacies, argue no questions of the ultimate effect of any one +section of the bill. They reject the measure as a whole. The principle +is bad, radically rotten, and cannot be amended. With the Home Rulers +they agree that the bill means Separation, and therefore they put it +away <i>en bloc</i>. They will have no part with the unclean thing, but +cast it to the winds, bundle it out neck and crop, kick it downstairs, +treat it with immeasurable contempt. They are well versed in the broad +principles of Constitutional law, as it at present exists; will tell +you that the Irish Constabulary is the only force that can be brought +against them for the collection of the taxes, which they will +absolutely refuse; declare that the military can only be used against +them for this purpose by Act of Parliament; cite the preamble of the +Army Bill, which shows that there is no standing army, but only a +force renewed in its functions <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>from year to year; show that the +monarch has ceased to be generalissimo of the British troops since +such a year, refer to the sad case of Charles I., who would fain have +collected Ship-money from a certain John Hampden, and endeavoured to +use the English army for this laudable purpose, meeting a fate at once +horrible and instructive. Then comes the application. Similar causes, +say they, will bring about similar effects, and if the quality and +temper of the people be considered their arguments seem reasonable.</p> + +<p>The Irish army of Independence is already a subject of mockery. "Ten +of our men would make a hundred of them run like hares. On the 27th +ult. a party of Orangemen were fired upon near Stewartstown, and +although unarmed they stormed the hill whence came the shots, while +the heroic riflemen who had fired 14 bullets, luckily without effect, +showed that if too cowardly to fight, they were not too lazy to run." +This occurrence, of which I had the description from authority, would +have excited some attention in England, but here it is lightly passed +over as nothing exceptional. "We are holding back our men. The other +party are egging us on to outbreak, in the hope that our cause will be +discredited, and that Lord Salisbury's visit in May might be +hindered." There is a mutual repugnance between the two peoples, but +the character of the repulsion is different. The Roman Catholics +manifest an unmistakable hatred—the term is no whit too strong—a +hatred of the social and intellectual superiority of their +fellow-countrymen, who in turn look upon the Catholics (as a whole) +with mistrust, mingled with contempt. As well ask Brother Jonathan to +submit to the rule of the negro, as well ask the London trader to put +his interests in the hands of a Seven Dials' syndicate, as well ask +Mr. Gladstone and his followers to listen to reason or to talk common +sense, as to expect the powerful and influential Protestants of +Belfast and Ulster generally to entrust their future to a Legislature +elected by the most illiterate electorate in the three kingdoms, and +under the thumb of the priests—who wield a despotic power which +people in England cannot be made to understand. A short time ago the +Dublin Freemasons held a bazaar in aid of a charity whose object was +the complete care of orphan children. The Catholic Archbishop +immediately fulminated a decree that whosoever patronised the show +would incur the terrors of the church, which means that they would +perish everlastingly. Some poor folks, servant girls and porters and +the like, who were sent by their mistresses or called by their honest +avocations, dared to enter the accursed precincts, and emerging alive, +rushed to confession, that the leprosy of Masonic charity might be +washed from their souls by absolution.</p> + +<p>Absolution was refused. The wretched outcasts were referred to the +Bishop, who in this dire emergency had sole power to unlock the gates +of heaven. Do English people know what an Irish Catholic feels when +refused absolution? I trow not, and that therefore they cannot justly +estimate the power of the priests. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>Another illustration. A friend of +mine made some purchases and sent a man for them, one of five hundred +Catholics in his employ. The poor fellow halted two hundred yards from +the contaminating circle, and by the aid of a policeman, got the +parcel brought to him—without risking his immortal soul.</p> + +<p>The bazaar realised twenty-two thousand pounds.</p> + +<p>The Ireland of the harp and vesper bell, free from the dominion of +England, having the prestige of an independent Catholic State, the +Ireland of excommunication by bell, book, and candle, the Ireland of +the priest and Pope—that, and no other, according to Ulstermen, is +the ultimate end of Home Rule. They will have none of it, their +determination is announced, and they will stand by what they say. From +what I have seen and heard I am convinced that Ulster means business, +and also has the power to win. The Irish Unionists are worthy +co-partners in the great fight, and Englishmen should stand with them +shoulder to shoulder. But with or without English aid, Ulster may be +trusted to hold its own.</p> + +<p class="date">Belfast, April 1st.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_4_MR_BALFOURS_WELCOME" id="No_4_MR_BALFOURS_WELCOME"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 4.—MR. BALFOUR'S WELCOME.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />rriving in the northern capital from Dublin you are apt to experience +a kind of chill, akin to that felt by the boy of easy-going parents +who, visiting the house of a staid and sober uncle, said to his little +cousins, "At home we can fight with pillows, and let off crackers in +the kitchen, and ride on the poker and tongs across the dining-room +tables, and shy oranges at the chimney ornaments, and cut the sofas +and pull out the stuffing, but here we get no fun at all!" The +effervescence of the sunny south is conspicuous by its absence, and be +it observed that the political south and the geographical south of +Ireland are entirely different, the Ulstermen invariably using the +term to denote an imaginary line across the country just above +Dundalk. The mention of this town reminds me of a Cork commercial +traveller's description of the Dundalk festivities in connection with +the visit of our famous citizen, Mr. Egan, on the occasion of his +release—"There was a murtherin' big crowd o' the greatest ruffians ye +ever clapped your two eyes on. Some o' them had long sticks with a +lump o' tow on the end, steeped in petroleum or something equally +inflammable, an' whin they got the word to march—the hero was in a +brake—they lit up and walked away in procession without looking at +him at all, or taking any notice of him, which was moighty strange, I +thought. They went on an' on, a lot o' rapscallions ye wouldn't like +to meet in a lonely lane, and whin the brake stopped, for some reason +or other, the whole o' them were unconscious of it, an' marched on +without the grate man, leaving him an' his brake alone. I had the +curiosity to go to the meetin'. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>There were two factions in the town, +an' only one of them was riprisinted, the others stood aloof. They are +at daggers drawn, flyin' at each other's throat, although Catholics +and Home Rulers, an' this meetin' was the funniest thing at all! The +chairman was a common fellow that made money some way, an' ye may say +he liked to hear himself spake. An' be the powdhers o' war, he had the +convaniences for speech-makin', for he had a jaw like a bulldog, an' a +mouth on him ye couldn't span with your two hands." Further +description proceeded in the same strain, and even allowing for the +exuberancies of my friend's southern imagination, and his wide command +of figurative language, this account of the kind of people who +constitute ninety-nine hundredths of Mr. Gladstone's allies should +give Home Rulers pause.</p> + +<p>There is no lack of enthusiasm here, but the people mind their work, +and do not bubble over every five minutes. They certainly showed +warmth on Monday morning, and never was popular ruler, victorious +general, or famous statesman welcomed with more spontaneous burst of +popular acclaim. York Street was literally full of all classes of +people, save and except the typical Irish poor. Of the tens of +thousands who filled Royal Avenue, Donegal Place, and the broad road +to the North Counties Railway, I saw none poorly clad. All were well +dressed, orderly, respectable, and wonderfully good-humoured, besides +being the tallest and best-grown people I have ever seen in a fairly +extensive European experience. I was admitted to the station with a +little knot, comprising the Marquess of Ormonde, Lord Londonderry, the +gigantic Dr. Kane, head of the Ulster Orangemen, and Colonel +Saunderson, full as ever of fun and fight. It was at first intended to +keep the people outside, and a strong detachment of police guarded the +great gates, but in vain. They were swept away by mere pressure, and +the people occupied the place to the number of many thousands, mostly +wearing primroses. As the train steamed in there was a tremendous rush +and cheering—genuine British cheering, such as that with which +Birmingham used on great occasions to greet John Bright—rendering +almost inaudible the numerous explosions of fog-signals which perhaps +by way of salute had been placed at the entrance to the station. There +was a mocking shout of "Dynamite," followed by a roar of laughter, and +despite the frantic efforts of the railway men, who humanely struggled +to avoid the seemingly impending sacrifices <i>à la</i> Juggernaut, the +more active members of the crowd storming the train, instantly sprang +aloft and manned the tops of the carriages with a solid mass of +vociferating humanity. Soon Mr. Balfour's face appeared, and a moment +after he was standing amidst the throng, swayed hither and thither by +loyalists who shook his hands, patted him on the back, deafened him +with their cheers. Out came the horses, dashing through the people, +snorting and plunging like so many Gladstonians, but happily injuring +no one. In went the men, Mr. Balfour laughing merrily, and looking +uncommonly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>fit, lifting his soft brown hat in mute recognition of the +magnificent welcome accorded by men who are perhaps among the most +competent judges of his merit as a benefactor of Ireland. Away went +the carriage, amid tumultuous shouting of "No Home Rule," and "God +save the Queen." This went on for miles, from the Northern Counties' +Terminus to Victoria Street, when Lord Londonderry signalled to +quicken the pace, and after a short speech at the Albert Memorial, the +<i>cortége</i> disappeared over the bridge, and I returned to meet the +English working men who arrived an hour later. Splendid it was to hear +the six hundred miners from Newcastle-on-Tyne shouting "Old Ireland +for ever!" while the generous Irishmen responded with "Rule Britannia" +and cheers for Old England. Cheers for Belfast and Newcastle +alternated with such stentorian vigour, each side shouting for the +other, that you might have been excused for imagining that the Union +of Hearts was an accomplished fact, and that brotherly love had begun +and must ever continue. Said a miner, "We're all surprised to see that +the people here are just like Englishmen. An' I'm blest if they aren't +more loyal than the English themselves."</p> + +<p>From Monday morning the city has been resounding with beat of drum and +the shrill sounds of the fife. The houses are swathed in bunting, and +the public buildings were already covered with banners when I arrived +on Friday last. This, however is not characteristic Belfast form. The +Belfasters <i>can</i> rejoice, and whatever they do, is thoroughly done, +but work is their vocation, as befits their grave and sober mood. They +are great at figures, and by them they try to show that they, and not +the Dubliners, should be first considered. They are practical, and +although not without sentiment, avoid all useless manifestation of +mere feeling. They are mainly utilitarian, and prefer mathematical +proof, on which they themselves propose to rely, in proving their +case. Here is an instance. A Belfast accountant, who is also a public +officer, has collected a number of comparative figures on which he +bases the claims of Belfast to prior consideration. The figures are +certainly exact, and are submitted as evidence of the superior +business management, and larger, keener capacity of Protestant Belfast +as compared with those of Catholic Dublin. Beginning with the +functions of the Dublin Lord Mayor, secretary, and so forth, which +cost £4,967 a year, it is shown that the same work in Belfast—which +is rather larger than Dublin—costs only £176. Let us tabulate a few +representative cases:—</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="3" width="60%" summary="comparison salaries"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="80%"> </td> + <td class="tdr" width="10%">Dublin.</td> + <td class="tdr" width="10%">Belfast.</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Mayor, &c. </td> + <td class="tdr">£4,967</td> + <td class="tdr">£176</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Town Clerk, secretaries of committees, law agents</td> + <td class="tdr">5,659</td> + <td class="tdr">2,752</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Treasurer, accountants, stock registrar</td> + <td class="tdr">3,402</td> + <td class="tdr">2,168</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Fire Brigade, salaries and lighting</td> + <td class="tdr">3,616</td> + <td class="tdr">1,247</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Coroners, sanitary officials</td> + <td class="tdr">3,530</td> + <td class="tdr">1,310</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Wages of sanitary staff</td> + <td class="tdr">2,233</td> + <td class="tdr">1,130</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Surveyors (borough & waterworks) and Secretaries</td> + <td class="tdr">6,070</td> + <td class="tdr">4,472</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" style="padding-bottom: .25em;">Clerks of Peace and Revision Officers</td> + <td class="tdr" style="padding-bottom: .25em;">2,451</td> + <td class="tdr" style="padding-bottom: .25em;">1,552</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" style="padding-left: 35%; padding-top: .25em;">Totals</td> + <td class="tdr" style="border-top: solid 1pt black; padding-top: .25em;">£31,928</td> + <td class="tdr" style="border-top: solid 1pt black; padding-top: .25em;">£14,807</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>This discrepancy is everywhere observable. The Dublin Gas +Management costs £14,850 against £8,060 in Belfast, with the +result that the Ulster City Gasworks yielded in 1891 a profit of +£27,105, charging 2s. 9d., while the Dubliners charge 3s. 6d. and +make no profit at all. The Belfast markets yield a profit of about +£3,500, while on the Dublin markets and abattoir there was a +deficit of £3,012 to be made good by the ratepayers. Dublin, with +property amounting to £20,000 a year and old-established Royal +bounties, owes nearly twice as much as Belfast, which latter city +spends more on what may be called the advance of civilisation. +In 1892 Belfast spent £8,000 on a public park—Government +providing for this matter in Dublin—£5,686 on public libraries, +and £4,100 on baths and workhouses, against £1,217 and £1,627 +for like purposes in Dublin. "Therefore," say the Belfast men, +"we will not have our affairs managed by these incompetent men, +who, besides their demonstrated incapacity to deal with finance, are +dependent for their position on the illiterates of the agricultural +districts, who are to a man under the thumb of the priests, and who, +moreover, have shown that their rapacity is equal to their lack of +integrity, and whose leading doctrine is the repudiation of lawful +contracts," a point on which commercial Ulster is excessively severe. +One thing is certain—Ulster will never pay taxes levied by an Irish +Legislature in which Ulster would be utterly swamped. All classes +are of this opinion, from the Earl of Ranfurly, who during a long +interview repeatedly expressed his conviction that the passing of +any Home Rule Bill would be fraught with most lamentable results, +to the humble trimmer of a suburban hedge who, having admitted +that he was from the county Roscommon, and (therefore) a Catholic +Home Ruler, claimed to know the Ulster temper in virtue of 28 +years' residence in or near Belfast, and said—</p> + +<p>"What they say they mane, an' the divil himself wouldn't tur-r-n thim. +Ah, but they're a har-r-d-timpered breed, ivery mother's son o' them. +Ye can comether (gammon) a Roscommon man, but a Bilfast man, +whillaloo!" He stopped in sheer despair of finding words to express +the futility of attempting to take in a Belfast man. "An' whin ye ax +thim for taxes, an' they say they won't pay—ye might jist as well +whistle jigs to a milestone! 'Tis thrue what I tell ye."</p> + +<p>As for to-day, the magnificence of the pageant beggars description. +Whether regarded from a scenic point of view or with respect to +numbers and enthusiasm, never since Belfast was Belfast has the city +looked upon a sight approaching it. From early morning brass bands and +fife bands commenced to enter the city from every point of the +compass, and wherever you turned the air resounded with the inspiring +rattle of the drum. Monday's display of bunting was sufficiently +lavish to suggest the impossibility of exhibiting any more, but the +Belfasters accomplished the feat, and the bright sunshine on the +brilliant colours of the myriad banners was strongly reminiscent of +Paris <i>en fête</i> under the Empire. The Belfast streets <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>are long, +straight, and wide, and mostly intersect at right angles. Much of the +concourse was thus visible from any moderate coign of vantage, and +from the Grand Stand in Donegal Place the sight was truly wonderful. +The vast space, right, left, and front, was from 10 o'clock closely +packed with a mighty multitude that no man could number, and +locomotion became every moment so painful as to threaten total +stagnation. The crowd was eminently respectable and perfectly orderly, +and submitted to the passage of innumerable musical organisations with +charming good humour. Never have I seen or heard of such an assemblage +of bands, all uniformed, all preceded by gorgeous banners bearing all +kinds of loyal and party mottoes, all marching in splendid military +fashion, and of themselves numerous enough to furnish a very +considerable demonstration. Many of the tunes were of a decidedly +martial character, and strange to English ears, such as the "Boyne +Water," the "Orange Lily" and the "Protestant Boys," the last being a +version of the "Lillibulero" so often mentioned by Scott. All these +tunes, more or less distasteful to Nationalists, were interspersed +with others less debatable, such as "Rule Britannia," "The Old Folks +at Home," "The Last Rose of Summer," "God Save the Queen," and "See +the Conquering Hero comes," which last generally accompanied the +portrait of Orange William, the "Glorious, Pious, and Immortal," +mounted on his famous white charger, which noble animal is depicted in +the attitude erroneously believed to be peculiar to that of Bonaparte +when crossing the Alps. The Earl of Beaconsfield was also to the fore +with primroses galore; indeed, the favourite flower was invariably +worn by the ladies, who were greatly in evidence. "Our God, our +Country, and our Empire" was the motto over Mr. Balfour, with a huge +"Welcome" in white on scarlet ground, the whole surrounded by immense +Union Jacks. The familiar red, white, and blue bore the brunt of the +decorative responsibilities, although here and there the green flag of +Ireland hung cheek by jowl with the English standard, emphasising the +friendliness of the present Union. As time went on the crowd became +more and more dense, and a breathless pressman, who reached his post +at twelve o'clock, stated that the seething myriads of Donegal Place +and the adjacent streets were "hardly a circumstance" to what he had +seen in the York Road, where the people awaited the hero of the hour. +Things were getting serious at 12.15, and then it was that the active +members of the crowd swarmed on the railings, balancing themselves in +most uncomfortable situations, and maintaining their spiky seats with +a tenacious martyrdom which spoke volumes for the determination of the +Ulster character.</p> + +<p>On and ever on went the bands in seemingly endless procession, +although merely assembling for the great march past, and therefore +only a fraction of the impending multitude. Some enterprising men +climbed the trees bordering the square, driving away the little flocks +of sparrows which till then had conducted a noisy <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>committee meeting +in the branches, heedless of the drumming and general uproar, but +which now dispersed without so much as a vote of thanks to the chair. +At 12.30 a foam of white faces broke over the roofs of the lofty +buildings around, protected by stone balustrades. At the same moment a +shout of "They are coming" was heard, followed fey a thunderous roar +of cheering. Mr. Balfour slowly emerged from York Road, amid immense +acclamation, his carriage, piloted by the Corporation, moving inch by +inch through the solid mass with inconceivable difficulty. Over and +over again the line of vehicles stopped dead, and it was clear that +the horses had much trouble to maintain their gravity. As the carriage +with Sir Daniel Dixon (the Lord Mayor of Belfast), Sir Samuel Black +(Town Clerk), and Lord Londonderry neared the Grand Stand, the +pressmen agreed that nothing equal to this demonstration had ever +before been held within the British Islands. Mr. Balfour having gained +the platform the procession proper commenced, headed by the banner of +the Belfast Harbour Commissioners, while the people broke into a +chorus, asserting that Britons never, never shall be slaves.</p> + +<p>This at 12.35 precisely. Next came the Belfast Water Commissioners, +the Belfast Board of Guardians, the provincial Corporate bodies, and +the provincial Boards of Guardians. A tremendous tumult of voices +accompanied all these, but when the Trinity College graduates arrived +the din became overpowering. Their standard was halted opposite Mr. +Balfour, and the young fellows burst into wild and uncontrollable +enthusiasm. The medical students of Queen's College, Belfast, with the +<i>alumni</i> of the Methodist and Presbyterian College succeeding, gave +"God Save the Queen" with great vigour, and came in a close second; +but nothing quite touched the Trinity College men. The Scottish +Unionist clubs, a fine body, two thousand strong, confirmed the +statement that Scots who understand the situation are against Home +Rule. Most of these men work in the shipbuilding yards of Belfast. The +Belfast Unionist Clubs and the Provincial Unionist Clubs were, of +course, heartily greeted, returning the applause with interest, and +the Independent Order of Rechabites showed that their alleged +exclusive partiality for cold water had not diminished their lung +power. The British Order of Ancient Free Gardeners, the Loyal Order of +Ancient Shepherds, and the Independent Order of Oddfellows reminded +the Brutal Saxon who might be present of his native shore, the men +being of the familiar sturdy type, marching in dense columns, all +gloriously arrayed. There was none of the artful spreading over the +ground which I observed in the great Birmingham demonstration which +was to "end or mend" the Lords; and another point of divergency +consists in the fact that the Belfast demonstration, which was +incomparably larger, was perfectly spontaneous, and not due to +organisation.</p> + +<p>Baronets and other gentlemen of distinction headed the Unionist clubs, +walking through the streets in such manner as was never <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>known before. +Magistrates and Presbyterian ministers tramped with the rank and file. +Sir William Ewart, Bart., Mr. Thomas Sinclair, J.P.—a great name in +the city—and the Rev. Dr. Lynd were especially prominent. Some of the +teetotallers wore white sashes, which were perhaps more conspicuous +than the gaudy colours affected by the Orangemen, and one body of +Unionists from the suburban clubs waved white handkerchiefs, a feature +which for obvious reasons can never occur in Nationalist processions. +The Shepherds have a pastoral dress, each man carrying a crook, and +the marshals of the lodges bore long halberds. The van of each column +was preceded by a stout fellow, who dexterously raising a long staff +in a twirling fashion peculiar to Ireland, shouted, "Faugh-a-Ballagh," +which being interpreted signifies "Clear the way." The Oddfellows +marched to the tune known in England as "We won't go home till +morning," which is the same as "Marlborough goes to war," the +favourite air of the Great Napoleon. All this time Mr. Balfour is +standing at my elbow as I write, bareheaded, acknowledging the finest +reception ever accorded to any man in Ireland, not excepting Dan +O'Connell and Parnell. The funeral of the uncrowned king was a +comparatively small affair, while the respectability of the crowd was +of course immeasurably below that of the Belfast concourse. An old man +somehow got near the platform and presented Mr. Balfour with a bunch +of orange lilies, saying that was the flower the people would fight +under. The Young Men's Christian Association cheered lustily for the +Union to the tune of three thousand strong. The Central Presbyterian +Association marched past singing "God is our refuge and our strength," +and the Church of Ireland Young Men's Society, headed by the clergy, +superintended by the Bishop of the diocese from the stand, made a +brave and gallant show. Hour after hour glides by, and still the +teeming multitude moves on, and still Mr. Balfour stands uncovered. No +joke to be a hero nowadays. The "Young Irelands" gave a grand cheer, +and passed in brave array, singing with the Y.M.C.A. "Hold the Fort" +and "God Save the Queen." Dr. Kane, the Bishop of Clogher, Captain +Somerset Maxwell, Colonel Saunderson, and the Earl of Erne, Grand +Master of the Orangemen of Ireland, received a stupendous reception as +they followed the Young Men Christians, mustered in overwhelming +force. The "Marseillaise" here broke out with considerable severity, +and Mr. Balfour broke out into a broad smile, which ran over into a +laugh, as the too familiar strains of "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay" made the +welkin ring. Then came "The March of the Men of Harlech," mixed with +"Home Sweet Home" and "The Boyne Water," till the senses reeled again.</p> + +<p>At 3.35 the two miles of Orangemen seemed likely to go on for ever, +and Mr. Balfour said to me, "I think this demonstration undoubtedly +the greatest ever seen, and if you like you may convey that as my +message to the Unionists of Birmingham. They will know what the effect +of this will be. I need say no more." I asked <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>Mr. Balfour if he +thought the bill would pass, and he replied, "Tell the Birmingham men +what I have said already. They will require no more." At 4.10 the +procession was in full swing, but Mr. Balfour seemed to have had about +enough and showed symptoms of making a move, and, as a preliminary, +put on his hat. This was the signal for cheering, which perhaps +surpassed anything that had gone before. The great ex-Irish-Secretary +effaced himself; and Colonel Saunderson, backed by Lord Salisbury's +son and several Irish peers, essayed to fill the gap. I ventured in my +timid way to tap the gallant Colonel on the shoulder with a view to +tapping his sentiments, which proved to be exultant. He told me of the +wire he had received from Lord Salisbury, and spoke of the meeting in +the Botanic Gardens which had taken place while I had watched the +procession. Then he said, "Tell the Birmingham people through the +<i>Gazette</i> that as we have the last Prime Minister and the present +Chief of the Opposition with us, we cannot be called revolutionary. As +for this meeting, it will speak for itself. I think it the biggest +thing ever known." During the procession a copy of the Home Rule Bill +was burnt on the top of a pole in front of the Grand Stand.</p> + +<p>After exactly four hours of watching, I accepted the proffered aid of +an Irish friend who agreed to lead me by roundabout ways to the +telegraph office. After many narrow passages and devious turns, we +struck the Royal Avenue, a long, long way from our starting place. +Here we took the still advancing procession in flank. It was now 4.45, +and my friend said, "By jabers, there's forty million more of them. I +believe the procession reaches all round the world, and moves in a +continuous band." And, sure enough, they were coming on as fresh as +ever, but I felt that four hours and a quarter of bands and drums was +enough at once, so I made a dash for the wires before they should be +absolutely blocked. My account is not, perhaps, quite perfect, but it +was pencilled under extraordinary circumstances—ten people talking to +me at once, a lady's umbrella in my side, a thousand people leaning on +my right elbow, and five hundred bands sounding in my ear. Surely it +may be said to have been written under fire.</p> + +<p class="date">Belfast, April 4th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_5_HAS_Mr_MORLEY_LIED" id="No_5_HAS_Mr_MORLEY_LIED"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 5.—HAS <span class="sc">Mr.</span> MORLEY LIED?<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterb.png" alt="B" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />efore leaving Belfast I obtained incontrovertible evidence anent the +growing fears of Mr. Gladstone's Government. Mr. Morley has denied the +existence of any such nervousness, and has repudiated the assertion +that precautions have been taken. But what is the truth of the matter? +Let us see whether his statement is borne out by facts.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>In February certain military officers received a confidential +communication having reference to the defence of the Belfast barracks. +They were requested to examine and report upon the possibility of +these buildings being tenable against a <i>coup de main</i>, were ordered +to examine the loop-holes for musketry, to prepare plans of the same, +and to duly submit them to the proper authorities, giving their +opinion as to the practicability and sufficiency of existing +arrangements in the event of the buildings being assaulted by +organised bodies of armed civilians, during the absence of soldiers +who might be about the city, taking their walks abroad, after the +regulation manner permitted to Mr. Thomas Atkins under ordinary +circumstances. The order was executed, the plans were duly furnished, +and if Mr. Morley is still unaware of the fact, I have much pleasure +in imparting the information which I have on the best authority +attainable in an imperfect world. He may rely on this statement as +being absolutely undeniable, and to descend to particulars, I will add +that plans were made of the Tram Stables Barracks, the Willow Bank +Barracks, and the Victoria Barracks. As I have said, the instructions +were marked Confidential, and the Irish Secretary may have relied on +this magic word in formulating his denials. The alternative hypothesis +is, of course, obvious enough. The work may have been ordered and +executed without Mr. Morley's knowledge, but it has been done, and, +after proper inquiry, he will not venture to deny it. The circumstance +is a curious commentary on the Gladstonian affectation of perfect +security, and the scornful references of Home Rulers to the alleged +determination of Ulstermen, in the last resource, to push matters to +extremity. I could tell him more than this. It would be easy to adduce +other instances of Governmental nervousness, but prudential and +confidential considerations intervene.</p> + +<p>However, while in the vein, let me submit for serious contemplation +the fact that up to the morning postal delivery of Wednesday, April 5, +1893, written offers of personal assistance in the matter of armed +resistance to the exact number of ten thousand and five have reached a +certain Ulster organisation from England and Scotland, the roll +including five generals, with a percentage of Victoria Cross men. This +statement is made on the authority of the Earl of Ranfurly, who told +me that the matter was within his personal knowledge, and that the +whole of these communications were entirely spontaneous and altogether +unsolicited, and that nobody in Ireland was in any way responsible for +their existence. Lord Ranfurly also said that while the hearty +friendship and co-operation of these gentlemen were warmly appreciated +by Irish Loyalists, he was quite certain that their generous aid would +never be required, for that Home Rule was now defunct, dead, and +buried, and beyond the possibility of resurrection. It may be +remarked, in passing, that this is the feeling of the best-informed +Irish Home Rulers, and that many in my hearing have offered to back +their opinion by laying odds. The rejection of the Bill so far from +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>exasperating the Nationalist party, would positively come as a relief. +To say that they are lukewarm is only to fairly indicate a state of +feeling which is rapidly degenerating into frigidity. They declare +that the Bill is unworkable, and while maintaining their abstract +right to demand whatever they choose, believe that, taking one +consideration with another, the lot of autonomic Ireland would not be +a happy one.</p> + +<p>Mr. Richard Patterson, J.P., the great ironmonger of Belfast, observes +that "according to Mr. Gladstone the only people who really understand +Ulster are those who have never been in it." My interview with him was +both instructive and interesting. He is one of the Harbour +Commissioners, and a gentleman of considerable scientific attainments, +as well as a great public and commercial man. He belongs to the Reform +Club and, with his fellow-members, was up to 1886 a devoted follower +of Mr. Gladstone. The name of his firm, established in 1786 on the +very ground it now occupies, is a household word in Ireland, and Mr. +Patterson himself has the respect and esteem of his bitterest +political opponents. He pointed out the unfairness and injustice of +Mr. Gladstone's reference to religion, when turning a deaf ear to the +Belfast deputation. "The report of the Chamber of Commerce," he said, +"was a purely business statement, and had no element of party feeling. +The fact that the Protestant members of the Chamber outnumber the +Catholics is in no respect due to religious intolerance, which in this +body is totally unknown. Anybody who pays a guinea a year may be +elected a member, whatever his religion, whatever his circumstances, +providing he is a decent member of society, which is the only +qualification required. Members are certainly elected by ballot, but +during the many years I have belonged to the Chamber not a single +person has been black-balled. If the Protestants are more numerous, +the fact simply demonstrates their superior prosperity, arising only +from their more steady application to hard work. We live on terms of +perfect friendship with our Catholic countrymen, and we assiduously +cultivate the sentiment. It is only when a weak and ignorant pandering +to disloyalty excites opposition that enmity begins. Only let us +alone, that is all we ask. We were going on beautifully until Mr. +Gladstone and his accomplices upset everything." Speaking of the +difference between the Ulster men and the Irish Kelts, Mr. Patterson +said, "Prosperity or the reverse is indicative of the breed. The +Southern Irish had more advantages than the Ulstermen. They had better +land, better harbours, a far more productive country, and yet they +always seethe in discontent. Put 20,000 Northerners in Cork, and in +twenty years the Southern port could knock Liverpool out of time." +Addressing himself to the Home Rule Bill, he declared that the +practical, keen-witted merchants of Belfast dismissed the whole +concoction as unworthy of sober consideration, and declared that an +awful responsibility rested on Mr. Gladstone. Said this experienced +J.P.:</p> + +<p>"The Belfast riots of 1886 were terrible. Forty people were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>killed in +the streets, and what I saw in my capacity of magistrate was dreadful +in the extreme. The injuries from gun-shot wounds were almost +innumerable, and many a local doctor gained experience in this line +which is unknown to many an army surgeon. The riots began with the +ruffian class, from which this great city is not entirely free, and +gradually rose upwards to the shipbuilding yards. All this disturbance +and awful loss of life were entirely due to the production of Mr. +Gladstone's first bill. And now they tell us that a worse bill—for it +is a worse bill—might become law without any inconvenience. I submit +to any reasonable man that if the mere menace of a bill cost forty +lives in Belfast alone, the loss of life all over Ireland, once the +bill were passed, would be enormous. And all this will be attributable +to the action of Mr. Gladstone, who has never been in Ulster."</p> + +<p>Walking down Royal Avenue I met Colonel Saunderson, radiant after the +great demonstration of two days ago, wearing a big bunch of violets in +place of Tuesday's bouquet of primroses. He stopped to express good +wishes to the <i>Gazette</i>, and said that the Belfasters were proud of +Birmingham, which city he regarded as being the most advanced and +enlightened in the world. While he so spake, up came the mighty Dr. +Kane, idol of the Ulsterites, towering over the gallant Colonel's +paltry six feet one, and looking down smilingly from his altitude in +infinite space on my own discreditable five feet ten. He agreed with +the Colonel as to the merits of Birmingham, and added that every +Unionist in Belfast cherished a deep sentiment of gratitude to the +hardware city, requesting me to explode the misleading statements of +the Separatist press, which asserts that Tuesday's procession +consisted of Orangemen. "The first two hours," said the Reverend +Doctor, "consisted of bodies who do not processionise, and who never +perform in public, in or out of Belfast, Methodists, Presbyterians, +and the like, while the 25,000 or 30,000 Orangemen who came in at the +tail of the show were a mere fraction of the whole. Colonel +Saunderson, the Earl of Erne, and myself stood up in our carriage and +cheered the Radical Reform Club, a thing we certainly have never done +before." Here the Colonel laughed, and said—</p> + +<p>"The union of hearts, Doctor."</p> + +<p>"Yes, the union of hearts and no mistake, as the Grand Old Man will +find—to his cost. All classes are united against the common enemy" +(Mr. Gladstone). "But tell me something—How is it that the English +people are deceived by that arch-professor of cant? Tell me that!"</p> + +<p>I requested the good doctor to ask me something easier, and he +doubtless would have done so, but at this moment up came the famous +Dr. Traill, the Admirable Crichton of Ireland, and with my usual +thirst for knowledge, I ventured to suggest that the mathematical +intellect of the Trinity College Examiner might possibly grapple with +the problem.</p> + +<p>The learned professor smiled, gripped my unworthy fin, shook <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>out some +words of greeting, wagged his head hopelessly, and—bolted like a +rocket.</p> + +<p>Dr. Traill is said to be equally versed in Law, Physic, and Divinity, +to sport with trigonometry, and to amuse his lighter moments with the +differential calculus. But "this knowledge was too wonderful for him, +he could not attain unto it," and to avoid confession of defeat, he +fled with lightning speed. This erudite doctor is well known in +England, especially among riflemen. Colonel Saunderson describes him +as a wonderful shot at a thousand yards, and thinks he was once one of +the Irish Eight at Wimbledon. I met him on the stand on Tuesday, when +he amusingly described his adventures on the Continent. "The poor +Poles," he said, "wished to take me to their collective bosom, and to +fall on my individual neck, the moment they found I was an Irishman. +They said we were brothers in misfortune!" Whereat this learned pundit +laughed good-humouredly. It may be that Dr. Traill is the long-range +rifleman of whom a Land League man remarked, on hearing that the +marksman had made a long series of bull's eyes—</p> + +<p>"The saints betune us an' harm—but wouldn't he make an iligant +tenant!"</p> + +<p>Dr. Kane was not surprised to see the professor run away. He said, "I +cannot understand it all. I must and will cross the Channel +immediately to investigate this strange phenomenon. I have always +considered the English a people of superior mental force, men who +could not be easily deceived. That they should pin their faith to a +man who has proved to demonstration that Home Rule is impossible, who +more than any other has branded the Nationalist party with ignominy, I +cannot understand." The Doctor perhaps momentarily forgot that the +English do not pin their faith to Mr. Gladstone, that the adverse +majority are dead against him, and that this majority is daily +increasing by leaps and bounds. Gallant Captain Leslie, whom I saw +earlier in the day, more accurately hit the situation. This splendid +old soldier said, "The English people are not to be blamed. Living +under social conditions of perfect freedom and friendship they do not +understand the conditions prevailing in Ireland; they cannot be +expected to understand a state of things differing so widely from +anything within the circle of their own experience. But all the same, +if they grant Home Rule, if they listen to the disloyal party rather +than to their loyal friends, if they truckle to treason rather than +support their own supporters, the consequences will be disastrous to +England, and where the disasters will stop is a piece of knowledge +which 'passes the wit of man.'"</p> + +<p>Running up to Ballymena, I encountered several interesting +personalities, each of whom had his own view of the all-absorbing +subject, and looked at the matter from his own standpoint. An +Irish-American of high culture, a man of science, looked up from what +he regarded as "the most interesting book in existence," which turned +out to be Thompson's "Evolution of Sex," and said that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>once Home Rule +were in force the blackguard American-Irish would return in shoals, +and that the Fenians of America might be expected to "boss the show." +"How is it," he asked, "that the English people listen to what appears +the chief argument of Separatist orators—that agitation will come to +an end, that the Irish will be content to rest and be thankful? +Clearly while money and power can be had by agitation, so long will +agitation continue. That seems so obvious to me, that I wonder at the +patience of the North of England men—I was among them during the +general election—in listening quietly to this argument, if it be one +at all. And with all their experience of the past to enlighten them +into the bargain. Was not the disestablishment of the Church to remove +all cause of discontent? Then it was the land. You gave several Land +Acts, most favourable laws, very one-sided, all in favour of the +tenant, far beyond what English, Scotch, or Welsh farmers hope to get. +Have you satisfied Irishmen yet? No, and you never will. The more you +give, the more they ask. They never will be content. ''Tis not their +nature to.' England now suffers for her own weak good nature. The true +curse of Ireland is laziness. I left Belfast at twenty, but I am well +acquainted with Ireland. In the North they work and prosper. In the +South they do nothing but nurse their grievances. Twenty years' firm +government, as Lord Salisbury said, would enrich the country. Do the +right thing by them—put them level with England and Scotland, and +then put down your foot. Let them know that howling will do no good, +and they'll stop it like a shot. Paddy is mighty 'cute, and knows when +he has a <i>man</i> to deal with. Put a noodle over him and that noodle's +life will be a burden. And serve him right. Fools must expect fools' +reward."</p> + +<p>A Catholic priest I met elsewhere was very chary of his opinions, and +confined himself to the "hope that England would see her way to +compensate the Church and the country for centuries of extortion and +oppression." This he thought was a matter of "common honesty." He did +not exactly suggest a perpetual church-rate for the benefit of the +Catholics of Ireland, but the thing is on the cards, and may be +proposed by Mr. Gladstone later on. Something ought to be done, +something substantial, for the gentlemen educated under the Maynooth +Grant. Mr. Bull has admitted the principle, and his sense of fair play +will doubtless lead him to do the right thing, always, of course, +under compulsion, which is now usually regarded as the mainspring of +that estimable gentleman's supposed virtuous actions.</p> + +<p>Ballymena is a smart looking place, trig and trim, thriving and +well-liking, a place to look upon and live. The people are all +well-clad, and prosperous, well-fed and well-grown. The men are mostly +big, the women mostly beautiful; the houses are of stone, handsome and +well-built. On the bleaching grounds you see long miles of +linen—Irish miles, of course—and all the surroundings are pleasant. +After this, no need to say the place is one of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>blackest, most +Unionist, Protestant, and loyal in the whole country. A number of buff +placards issued by Nationalists attract respectful attention. The same +bill is stuck all over Belfast—in the High Street, on the hoardings +facing the heretic meeting houses, everywhere. It purports to present +the sentiments of the great Duke of Wellington <i>re</i> the Roman +Catholics of Ireland, and is to the effect that in moments of danger +and difficulty the Roman Catholics had caused the British Empire to +float buoyant when other Empires were wrecked; that the Roman +Catholics of Ireland, and they only, had saved our freedom, our +Constitution, our institutions, and in short that it is to the Irish +Roman Catholics that we owe everything worth having. Alone they did +it. The priest, in short, has made Mr. Bull the man he is.</p> + +<p>Can anybody in England "go one better" than this?</p> + +<p>These extracts are plainly taken from some speech on the Roman +Catholic Emancipation Bill, and refer to the valour of the Irish +soldiery, whose bravery in fighting for a Protestant cause was +doubtless invaluable to the cause of liberty. There is an apocryphal +story concerning Alfred de Musset, who on his death-bed is reported to +have conveyed to a friend with his last breath his last, his only +wish, to wit:—</p> + +<p>"Don't permit me to be annotated." The Iron Duke might have said the +same if he had thought of it. He could not know that, shorn of his +context, divorced from his drift, he would be placarded in his native +land as an agent in the cause of sedition and disloyalty. This truly +Grand Old Man, who, in his determination to uphold the dignity and +unity of the Empire "stood four-square to all the winds that blew," +would scarcely have sided with the modern G.O.M. and his satellites, +Horsewhipped Healy and Breeches O'Brien.</p> + +<p>One word as to the alleged "intolerance of the fanatic Orangemen of +Belfast."</p> + +<p>The placards above-mentioned were up on Tuesday last. They are large +and boldly printed, and attracted crowds of readers—but not a hand +was raised to deface them, to damage them, to do them any injury +whatever. I watched them for four-and-twenty hours, and not a finger +was lifted against any one in the High Street or elsewhere, so far as +I could ascertain.</p> + +<p>There are twenty thousand Orangemen in the city, and the Protestants +outnumber the Papists by three to one. Yet the placard was treated +with absolute respect, and although I entered several groups of +readers I heard no words of criticism—no comment, unfavourable or +otherwise, no gesture of dissent. The people seemed to be interested +in the bill, and desirous of giving it respectful consideration. I +have seen Liberal Birmingham, when in the days of old it assembled +round Tory posters—but the subject becomes delicate; better change +our ground. It is, however, only fair to say that the Gladstonians of +Birmingham, who, as everybody knows, formed the extreme and inferior +wing of the old Radical party, can hardly teach the Belfast men +tolerance.</p> + +<p class="date">Ballymena, April 6th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_6_THE_EXODUS_OF_INDUSTRY" id="No_6_THE_EXODUS_OF_INDUSTRY"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 6.—THE EXODUS OF INDUSTRY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterd.png" alt="D" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />erry is a charming town, unique, indescribable. Take equal parts of +Amsterdam and Antwerp, add the Rhine at Cologne, and Waterloo Bridge, +mix with the wall of Chester and the old guns of Peel Castle, throw in +a strong infusion of Wales, with about twenty Nottingham lace +factories, stir up well and allow to settle, and you will get the +general effect. The bit of history resulting in the raising of the +siege still influences Derry conduct and opinions. The 'Prentice Boys +of Derry, eight hundred strong, are ardent loyalists, and having once +beaten an army twenty-five thousand strong, believe that for the good +of the country, like the orator who had often "gone widout a male," +they too could "do it again." They do not expect to be confronted with +the necessity, but both the Boys and the Orangemen of Derry, with all +their co-religionists, are deeply pledged to resist a Dublin +Parliament. "We would not take the initiative, but would merely stand +on our own defence, and offer a dogged resistance. We have a tolerable +store of arms, although this place was long a proclaimed district, and +we have fifteen modern cannon, two of which are six-pounders, the rest +mostly four-pounders, and one or two two-pounders, which are snugly +stored away, for fear of accident." Thus spake one who certainly +knows, and his words were amply confirmed from another quarter.</p> + +<p>Derry makes shirts. The industrious Derryans make much money, and in +many ways. They catch big salmon in the middle of the town, and +outside it they have what Mr. Gladstone would call a "plethora" of +rivers. They ship unnumbered emigrants to the Far West, and carry the +produce of the surrounding agriculturists to Glasgow and Liverpool. +They also make collars and cuffs, but this is mere sport. Their real +vocation is the making of shirts, which they turn out by the million, +mostly of high quality. Numbers of great London houses have their +works at Derry. Welch, Margeston and Co. among others. The Derry +partner, Mr. Robert Greer, an Englishman forty years resident in the +town, favoured me with his views <i>re</i> Home Rule, thus:—</p> + +<p>"The bill would be ruinous to Ireland, but not to the same extent as +to England. Being an Englishman, I may be regarded as free from the +sectarian animosity which actuates the opposing parties, but I cannot +close my eyes to the results of the bill, results of which no sane +person, in a position to give an opinion, can have any doubt. We are +so convinced that the bill would render our business difficult, not to +say impracticable, that our London partners say they will remove the +works, plant, machinery, and all, to the West of Scotland or +elsewhere.</p> + +<p>"About 1,200 girls are employed in the mill, and 3,000 to 4,000 women +at their own homes all over the surrounding country.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Gladstone may think he knows best, but here the unanimous opinion +is that trade will be fatally injured. Ireland <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>is no mean market for +English goods, and the market will be closed because Ireland will have +no money to spend. Go outside the manufacturing towns and what do you +see? Chronic poverty. Manufacturers will remove to the Continent, to +America—anywhere else—leaving the peasantry only. The prospective +taxes are alarming. We know what would be one of the very first acts +of a Dublin Parliament. They would curry favour with the poor, the +lazy districts, by an equalisation of the poor rate. In Derry, where +everybody works for his bread, the rate is about sixpence in the +pound. There are districts where it runs to ten shillings in the +pound. The wealthy traders, the capitalists, the manufacturers of the +North will have to pay for the loafers of the South. The big men would +gather up their goods and chattels and clear out. There are other +reasons for this course."</p> + +<p>Here Mr. Greer made the inevitable statement that Englishmen out of +Ireland did not understand the question; and another large +manufacturer chipped in with:—</p> + +<p>"Leave us alone, and we get on admirably. There is no intolerance; +everybody lives comfortably with his neighbour. But pass the bill and +what happens? The Catholic employés would become unmanageable, would +begin to kick over the traces, would want to dictate terms, would +attempt to dominate the Protestant section, which would rebel, and +trouble would ensue. They would not work together. It is impracticable +to say: Employ one faith only and Home Rule means that Catholicism is +to hold the sway. The Nationalist leaders foster this spirit, +otherwise there would be no Home Rule. The workpeople would act as +directed by the priest, even in matters connected with employment. You +have no idea what that means to us. It means ruin. The people do not +know their own mind, and their ignorance is amazing. My porter says +that when the bill becomes law, which will take place in one month +from date, he will have a situation in Dublin at a thousand a year, +and both he and others sincerely believe in such a changed state of +things for Catholics alone."</p> + +<p>I went over Welch, Margetson's works, a wonderful place, where were +hundreds of women, clean and well-dressed, working at the various +departments of shirt-making. The highest class of mill hands I ever +saw, working in large and well-ventilated rooms, many getting a pound +a week. Another firm over the way employs one thousand five hundred +more. And according to the best authority, that of the owners, all +this is to leave the country when Ireland gets Home Rule.</p> + +<p>A very intelligent Catholic farmer living a few miles out of Donegal +said, "Farmers look at the bill in the light of the land question. +We're not such fools as to believe in Gladstone or his bill for +anythin' else. Shure, Gladstone never invints anythin' at all, but +only waits till pressure is put on him. Shure, iverythin' has to be +dhragged out iv him, an' if he settles the land question, divil thank +him, 'tis because he knows he's bate out an' out, an' <i>has</i> <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>to do it, +whether he will or no. An' now he comes bowin' an' scrapin' an' +condiscindin' to relave us—whin we kicked it out o' his skin. Ah! the +divil sweep him an' his condiscinshun."</p> + +<p>Ingratitude, thy name is Irish Tenant!</p> + +<p>Misther O'Doherty proceeded to say that landlords were all right now, +under compulsion. But the tenantry demanded that they should be +released entirely from the landlords' yoke. He said that the +agriculturists were not in touch with the whole question of Home Rule, +nor would they consider any subject but that of the land. The +Nationalists had preached prairie value, and the people were tickled +by the idea of driving out landowners and Protestants. All the evicted +tenants, all the men who have no land, all the ne'er-do-weels would +expect to be satisfied. Ulster is tillage—the South is mostly +grazing. Ulster had been profitably cultivated by black Protestants, +and their land was coveted by the priests for their own people. My +friend admitted that, although born a Catholic, his religious opinions +were liberal. I asked him if the Protestant minority would be +comfortable under a Dublin Parliament. He shook his head +negatively—"Under equal laws they are friendly enough, but they do +not associate, they do not intermarry, they have little or nothing to +do with each other. They are like oil and wather in the same bottle, +ye can put them together but they won't mix. And the Protestant +minority has always been the best off, simply because they are hard +workers. A full-blooded Irishman is no worker. He likes to live from +hand to mouth, and that satisfies him. When he has enough to last him +a day through he drops work at once. The Protestants have Scotch +blood, and they go on working with the notion that they'll be better +off than their father, who was better off than their grandfather. And +that's the whole of it."</p> + +<p>Mr. J. Gilbert Kennedy, of Donegal, holds similar views of Irish +indolence. He told me that although living in a congested district he +could not obtain men to dig in his gardens, except when thereto driven +by sheer necessity, and that having received a day's pay they would +not return to work so long as their money lasted. "They will put up +with semi-starvation, cold, and nakedness most patiently. Their +endurance is most commendable. They will bear anything, only—don't +ask them to work." Mrs. Kennedy said that with crowds of poor girls +around her, she was compelled to obtain kitchen maids and so forth +from Belfast. "They will not be servants, and when they afford casual +help, they do it as a great favour."</p> + +<p>A Scotsman who employs five hundred men in the mechanical work said: +"I have been in Ireland fifteen years, and have gone on fairly +smoothly, but with a world of management. For the sake of peace I have +not five Protestants in the place; and I would have none if I could +help it. It is, however, necessary to have Protestant foremen. +Irishmen are not born mechanics. In Scotland and England men take to +the vice and the lathe like mother's <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>milk, but here it is labour and +pain. Irishmen are not capable of steady, unremitting work. They want +a day on and a day off. They wish to be traders, cattle-drovers, +pig-jobbers, that they may wander from fair to fair. My men have +little to do beyond minding machines; otherwise I must have Scots or +English. Discharge a man and the most singular things occur. In a late +instance I had seven written requests from all sorts of quarters to +take the man back, although before discharge he had been duly warned. +The entire neighbourhood called on me—the man's father, wife, mother, +the priest, a Protestant lady, three whiskey-sellers, two +Presbyterians, the Church of Ireland parson, God knows who. This +lasted a fortnight, and then threatening letters set in; coffins, +skulls, and marrow-bones were chalked all over the place, with my +initials. Indeed you may say they are a wonderful people."</p> + +<p>Mr. E.T. Herdman, J.P., of Sion Mills, Co. Tyrone, should know +something of the Irish people. The model village above-named belongs +to him. Travellers to Londonderry viâ the Great Northern will remember +how the great Herdman flax-spinning mills, with their clean, +prosperous, almost palatial appearance, relieve the melancholy aspect +of the peaty landscape about the Rivers Mourne and Derg. Mr. Herdman +pays in wages some £30,000 a year, a sum of which the magnitude +assumes colossal proportions in view of the surrounding landscape. The +people of the district speak highly of the Herdman family, who are +their greatest benefactors, but they failed to return Mr. E.T. +Herdman, who contested East Donegal in 1892. The people were willing +enough, but the priests stepped in and sent a Nationalist. Said Mr. +Herdman, "Home Rule would be fatal to England. The Irish people have +more affinity with the Americans or the French than with the English, +and the moment international difficulties arise Ireland would have to +be reconquered by force of arms. And complications would arise, and in +my estimation would arise very early." A landowner I met at Beragh, +County Tyrone, held somewhat original opinions. He said, "I refused to +identify myself with any Unionist movement. If we're going to be +robbed, let us be robbed; if our land is going to be confiscated, let +it be confiscated. The British Government is going to give us +something, if not much, by way of compensation; and my opinion is, +that if the Grand Old Man lives five years longer he'll propose to +give the Irish tenants the fee-simple of the lands without a penny to +pay. That's my view, begad. I'm a sportsman, not a politician, and my +wife says I'm a fool, and very likely she knows best. But, begad, I +say let us have prairie value to-day, for to-morrow the G.O.M. will +give us nothing at all."</p> + +<p>The most extraordinary curiosity of Derry, the <i>lusus naturæ</i> of which +the citizens justly boast, is <i>the</i> Protestant Home Ruler of brains +and integrity who, under the familiar appellation of John Cook, lives +in Waterloo Place. Reliable judges said, "Mr. Cook <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>is a man of high +honour, and the most sincere patriot imaginable, besides being a +highly-cultured gentleman." So excited was I, so eager to see an Irish +Home Ruler combining these qualities with his political faith, that I +set off instanter in search of him, and having sought diligently till +I found him, intimated a desire to sit at his patriotic feet. He +consented to unburden his Nationalist bosom, and assuredly seemed to +merit the high character he everywhere bears. Having heard his opinion +on the general question, I submitted that Mr. Bull's difficulty was +lack of confidence, and that he might grant a Home Rule Bill, if the +Irish leaders were men of different stamp. He said they were "clever +men not overburdened with money," and admitted that a superior class +would have been more trustworthy, but relied on the people. "If the +first administrators of the law were dishonest, the people would +replace them by others. The keystone of my political faith is trust in +the people. The Irish are keen politicians, and may be trusted to keep +things square."</p> + +<p>I submitted that the patriots were in the pay of the Irish-Americans, +who were no friends of England—</p> + +<p>"The present Nationalist members are not purists, but to take money +for their services, to accept £300 a year is no more disgraceful than +the action of the Lord Chancellor who takes £10,000. The +American-Irish cherish a just resentment. They went away because they +were driven out of the country by the land system of that day. And the +Irish people must be allowed to regenerate themselves. It cannot be +done by England. Better let them go to hell in their own way than +attempt to spoon-feed them. But the injustice of former days does not +justify the injustice to the landlords proposed by the present bill. +It is a bad bill, an unjust bill, and would do more harm than good. +England should have a voice in fixing the price, for if the matter be +left to the Irish Parliament gross injustice will be done. The tenants +were buying their land, aided by the English loans, for they found +that their four per cent. interest came lower than their rent. But +they have quite ceased to buy, and for the stipulated three years will +pay their rent as usual, and why? Because they expect the Irish +legislature to give them even better terms—or even to get the land +for nothing. Retributive justice is satisfied. For the last twenty +years the landlords have suffered fearfully. The present bill is +radically unsound, and I trust it will never become law."</p> + +<p>And this was all that the one specimen of a Protestant Home Ruler I +have found in Ireland could say in favour of his views! His +intelligence and probity compelled him to denounce Mr. Gladstone's +Bill as "unjust" and radically unsound, and his patriotism caused him +to pray that it might never become law! I left him more Unionist than +ever.</p> + +<p>The great Orange leader of Derry, Mr. John Guy Ferguson, once Grand +Ruler, and of world-wide fame, deprecated appeal to arms, except under +direst necessity. "I should recommend resistance to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>all except the +Queen's troops. Before all things a sincere loyalist, I should never +consent to fire a shot on them. Others think differently, and in case +of pressure and excitement the most regrettable things might happen. +The people of Derry are full of their great victory of 1688, and +believe that their one hundred and five days' resistance saved England +from Catholic tyranny. The Bishop of Derry, as you know, had ordered +that the troops of King James should be admitted when the thirteen +Prentice Boys closed the gate on the very nose of his army." I saw the +two white standards taken from the Catholic troops flanking the high +altar of the Cathedral; which also contains the grandly-carved case of +an organ taken from a wreck of the Spanish Armada in 1588, just a +century before the siege. The people have ever before them these +warlike spoils, which may account for their martial spirit. An old +Prentice Boy told me of the great doings of 1870, how a Catholic +publican, one O'Donnell, endeavoured to prevent the annual marching of +the Boys, who on the anniversary of the raising of the siege, parade +the walls, fire guns, and burn traitor Lundy in effigy; how 5,000 men +in sleeve-waistcoats entered the town to stop the procession, how the +military intervened, and forbade both marching and burning; how the +Boys seized the Town Hall, and in face of 1,700 soldiers and police +burnt an effigy hanging from a high window, which the authorities +could not reach; how Colonel Hillier broke down the doors and stormed +the hall at the bayonet's point, to search both sexes for arms. +Gleefully he produced an alphabetical rhyme, which he thought rather +appropriate to the present time, and which ended as follows:—"X is +the excellent way they (the authorities) were beaten, and exceeding +amount of dirt they have eaten. Y is the yielding to blackguards +unshorn, which cannot and will not much longer be borne. Z is the zeal +with which England put down the Protestant boys who stood up for the +crown." In 1883 Lord Mayor Dawson of Dublin wished to lecture at +Derry, but the Boys took the Hall and held it, declining to permit the +"colleague of Carey" (on the Dublin Town Council) to speak in the +city. There you have the present spirit of Derry.</p> + +<p>Two miles outside the town I came on a fine Home Ruler, who had +somewhere failed to sell a pig. "Sorra one o' me 'll do any good till +we get Home Rule." He paid £5 a year for two acres of land with a +house. "'Tis the one-half too much, Av I paid fifty shillings, I'd be +aisy," he said. Truly a small sum to stand between him and affluence. +I failed to sympathise with this worthy man, but my spirits fell as I +walked through a collar factory, and thought of Mr. Gladstone. The +dislocation of the shirt trade is less serious. Few Irish patriots +have any personal interest in this particular branch of industry.</p> + +<p class="date">Dublin, April 8th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="MR_BALFOUR_IN_DUBLIN" id="MR_BALFOUR_IN_DUBLIN"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>MR. BALFOUR IN DUBLIN.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterm.png" alt="M" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />r. Balfour is the most popular man in Ireland, and his Dublin visit +will be for ever memorable. The Leinster Hall, which holds several +thousands, was packed by half-past five; ninety minutes before +starting time, and the multitude outside was of enormous proportions. +The people were respectable, quiet, good-humoured, as are Unionist +crowds in general, though it was plain that the Dubliners are more +demonstrative than the Belfast men. The line of police in Hawkins +Street had much difficulty in regulating the surging throng which +pressed tumultuously on the great entrance without the smallest hope +of ever getting in. The turmoil of cheering and singing was incessant, +and everyone seemed under the influence of pleasurable excitement. As +you caught the eye of any member of the crowd he would smile with a +"What-a-day-we're-having" kind of expression. The college students +were in great form, cheering with an inexhaustible vigour, every man +smoking and carrying a "thrifle iv a switch." Portraits of Mr. Balfour +found a ready sale, and Tussaud's great exhibition of waxworks next +door to the hall was quite unable to compete with the living hero. +Messrs. Burke and Hare, Parnell and Informer Carey, Tim Healy and +Breeches O'Brien, Mr. Gladstone and Palmer the poisoner, with other +benefactors and philanthropists, were at a discount. The outsiders +were waiting to see Mr. Balfour, but they were disappointed. Lord +Iveagh's carriage suddenly appeared in Poolbeg Street at the +pressmen's entrance, and the hero slipped into the hall almost +unobserved. Inside, the enthusiasm was tremendous. The building is +planned like the Birmingham Town Hall, and the leading features of the +auditorium are similar. The orchestra was crowded to the ceiling, the +great gallery was closely packed, the windows were occupied, and every +inch of floor was covered. A band played "God Save the Queen," "Rule +Britannia," and the "Boyne Water." The word "Union," followed by the +names of Balfour, Abercorn, Iveagh, Hartington, Chamberlain, and +Goschen, was conspicuous on the side galleries, and over Mr. Balfour's +head was a great banner bearing the rose, thistle, and shamrock, with +the Union Jack and the English crown over all. Boldly-printed mottoes +in scarlet and white, such as "Quis Separabit?" "Union is strength," +"We Won't submit to Home Rule," and "God Bless Balfour," abounded, and +in the galleries and on the floor men waved the British flag. The +people listened to the band, or amused themselves with patriotic songs +and Kentish fire, till Mr. Balfour arrived, when their cheering, loud +and long, was taken up outside, and reverberated through the city.</p> + +<p>The preliminaries being over, the principal speaker rose amid +redoubled applause, which gradually subsided to the silence of intense +expectation. Mr. Balfour's first words fell like drops of water in a +thirsty land, and never had a speaker a more eager, attentive, +respectful audience. Now and then stentorian shouts of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>assent +encouraged him, but the listeners were mostly too much in earnest for +noise. It was plain that they meant business, and that the +demonstration was no mere empty tomfoolery. Parnellites were there—a +drop in the ocean—but their small efforts at interruption were +smilingly received. True, there was once a shout of "Throw him out," +but a trumpet-like voice screamed "Give him a wash, 'tis what he +mostly needs, the crathur," upon which a roar of laughter proclaimed +that the offender was forgiven. The outsiders continued their singing +and cheering, and when Mr. Balfour concluded sent up a shout the like +of which Dublin has seldom heard, if ever. Succeeding speakers were +well received, the audience holding their ground. Mr. J. Hall, of +Cork, evoked great cheering by the affirmation that Protestants +desired no advantage, no privilege, unshared by their Catholic +brethren. Similar points made by other speakers met with an instant +and hearty confirmation that was unmistakable. Lord Sligo pointed out +that firmness and integrity were nowhere better understood than in +Ireland, and said that while William O'Brien, the great Nationalist, +visited Cork under a powerful escort of police, who with the utmost +difficulty prevented the populace from tearing him to pieces; on the +other hand, Mr. Balfour had passed through the length and breadth of +the land, visiting the poverty-stricken and disturbed districts of the +West, with no other protection beyond that afforded by "his +tender-hearted sister." Mr. Balfour rose to make a second speech, and +the enthusiasm reached its climax. The great ex-Secretary seemed +touched, and although speaking slowly showed more than his usual +emotion. When he concluded the people sent up a shout such as England +never hears—an original shout, long drawn out on a high musical note, +something like the unisonous tone of forty factory bulls.</p> + +<p>The students went outside, and with their friends formed in military +columns—the outside files well armed with knobby sticks as a +deterrent to possible Parnellite enterprise. An extemporised arch of +Union Jacks canopied Mr. Balfour in his carriage, which was drawn by +hundreds of willing hands linked in long line. The column, properly +marshalled, moved away, keeping step amid loud shouts of "Right, left, +right, left," until perfect uniformity was attained, and the +disciplined force marched steadily on to College Green, following the +triumphal chariot with alternate verses of "God Save the Queen" and +"Rule Britannia," each verse interpolated with great bursts of +applause. At Trinity College the glare of torches appeared, and +simultaneously an organised attempt at groaning boomed in under the +cheering. Heedless of the rabble the column marched merrily on, not +with the broken rush of an English mob, but with the irresistible +force of unity in a concrete mass, with the multitudinous tramp of an +army division. The yelling slummers hovered on each flank, frantic +with impotent rage; willing to wound and yet afraid to strike, knowing +that to themselves open conflict meant annihilation. A savage, +unsavoury horde <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>of rat-like ruffians, these same allies of Mr. +Gladstone and Mr. Morley, a peculiarly repulsive residuum these Dublin +off-scourings. They screamed "To hell with Balfour," "To hell with the +English," "To hell with your Unionists," "To hell with Queen +Victoria." Some of them sang a doggerel, beginning:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let the English remember,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We'll make them surrender,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And chase them to their boats,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cut their —— throats,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make a big flood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of their bad black blood—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noin">not precisely a poem to herald the famous "Union of hearts" so +confidently expected. The Unionists tramped on cheering triumphantly, +rejoicing in their strength, ignoring the taunting and jeering of the +Parnellite scum as beneath contempt. An old Home Ruler expressed +disapprobation of his party. "What's the use of showing your teeth +when you can't bite?" he said. "Wait till we get the bill and then we +will show them and the English what we can do."</p> + +<p>On through Grafton Street, Nassau Street, and into Dawson Street, +always with great shouting and singing of "God Save the Queen," and +"Rule Britannia," the torches still glaring in front. At Morrisson's +Hotel, where Parnell was arrested, a man shouted "Three cheers for +Gladstone," but nobody responded. The rabble may use him, but they +refused a single shout. On the other hand groans were given with +leonine force both for Morley and his master. Arrived at St. Stephen's +Green, the procession halted at Lord Iveagh's residence, and Mr. +Balfour came on the balcony, receiving a welcome right royal. He made +another speech amid cheering and groaning of tremendous energy, making +himself tolerably well heard under abnormal conditions. When he said +"This day shall never fade from my recollection," the lamp beside him +was removed and all was over. Back tramped the column, with its clouds +of camp-followers, on the way cheering and sending to hell the member +for South Tyrone, with other prominent politicians who live on the +line of march. The students held their sticks aloft, striking them +together in time to their singing. A shindy had been predicted on the +return to College Green, and little groups of Scots Greys and Gordon +Highlanders, the latter in their white uniforms, lounged about smoking +their pipes in happy expectation, but beyond cheering at the statue of +Orange William in Dame Street, nothing whatever occurred, and +presently the crowd began to disperse. Seeing this, the police, who +until now had been massed in strong force broke up into units, and +moving leisurely about said, "Good night, boys; you have had enough +fun for one day. Get to bed, all of you." Then the young men who had +composed the great loyalist column left the square in little bands, +each singing "God save the Queen," and every man feeling that he had +deserved well of his country. The bill may be stone dead, but there is +a satisfaction in the act of shovelling earth on the corpse.</p> + +<p class="date">Dublin, April 8th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_7_BAD_FOR_ENGLAND_RUINOUS_TO_IRELAND" id="No_7_BAD_FOR_ENGLAND_RUINOUS_TO_IRELAND"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 7.—BAD FOR ENGLAND, RUINOUS TO IRELAND.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterh.png" alt="H" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ome Rule for Ireland means damage and loss to English working men. +During the late general election the working men candidates of +Birmingham, and of England generally, argued that once Ireland were +granted Home Rule the distressful land would immediately become a +Garden of Eden, a sort of Hibernian El-Dorado; that the poverty which +drove Irishmen from their native shores would at once and for ever +cease and determine, and that thenceforth—and here was the +bribe—Irishmen would cease to compete with the overcrowded artisans +and labourers of England. That these statements are diametrically +opposed to the truth is well known to all persons of moderate +intelligence, and the personal statement of several great capitalists +with reference to their course of action in the event of Home Rule +becoming law tends to show that multitudes of the industrious classes +of Irish manufacturing towns will at once be thrown out of employment, +and must of necessity flock to England, increasing the congestion of +its great cities, competing with English labour, and inevitably +lowering the rate of wages. Hear what comfortable words Mr. Robert +Worthington can speak.</p> + +<p>Mr. Worthington is no politician; never has interfered with party +questions; has always confined his attention to his business affairs. +It was because of this that Mr. Balfour sent for him to confer anent +the light railways, which have proved such a blessing to the country. +It was Mr. Worthington who carried out most of these beneficent works. +Besides this, Mr. Worthington has built railways to the amount of +three-quarters of a million in Ireland alone. He has employed 5,300 +men at one time, and his regular average exceeds 1,500 all the year +round. He may therefore be said to know what he is talking about. I +called on him at 30, Dame Street, before I left Dublin, and he said, +"The bill would be bad for England in every way, and would ruin +Ireland. The question is certainly one for the English working man. If +he wishes to avoid the competition of armies of Irish labourers and +artisans he must throw out the bill. And this is how it will work—</p> + +<p>"All the railways I have constructed in Ireland have been built on +county guarantees assisted by special grants from the Imperial +Treasury. Without these special grants the work could never have been +undertaken at all. If Home Rule becomes law those special grants from +the Imperial Treasury will be no longer available; and what will be +the result? Clearly that the work will not be undertaken; that the +building of railways will come to an end, and that the Irish peasants +who have devoted themselves to railway work will go to England and try +to find employment there. Once a railway navvy, always a railway +navvy, is a well-known and very true saying.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>"For my own part I shall be compelled to compete in England, having +nothing to do in Ireland, and I shall of course transport my staff and +labourers across the Channel.</p> + +<p>"The railways of Ireland, fostered by English capital, resting on +England's security, have given vast employment to my countrymen. But +they would do so no longer. Let us give an example to prove my point.</p> + +<p>"Before the introduction of the Home Rule Bill the railway stock to +which I have referred stood at a premium of 27 per cent. Since the +bill became public and has been the subject of popular discussion, I +brought out the Ballinrobe and Claremorris Railway—with what result? +Not one-seventh of the sum required has been subscribed, although in +the absence of the bill the amount would certainly have been +subscribed four times over, at a premium of 20 per cent. What does +this prove?</p> + +<p>"Simply this—that the farmers and small shopkeepers who invest in +this class of security will not trust their savings in the hands of +the proposed Irish Legislature. The bill, therefore, stops progress, +retards enterprise, drives away capital, and the workers must follow +the money. That seems clear enough. Everybody here concedes so much. +More than this. I can say from my own experience, and from the reports +of my agents and engineers in the South and West of Ireland, that the +Nationalists do not want this bill. I do not speak of Home Rule, but +of this bill only. All condemn its provisions, and universally concur +in the opinion that once it were passed it would be succeeded by a +more violent agitation than anything we have yet seen—an agitation +having for its object the radical amendment of the measure.</p> + +<p>"There is a complete cessation of railway work. Already the men are +thinking of moving. But this is not all. I am now at a standstill, +pulled up short by the bill. What is the effect on England? Under +ordinary circumstances I buy largely all kinds of railway +material—steel rails, sleepers, fasteners, engines, and carriages. +Every year I send thousands and thousands of pounds to England for +these things, and surely most of the money goes indirectly into the +pockets of English working men, who are now suffering the loss of all +this by reason of their apathy in this matter. I speak only as a man +of business, anxious for the prosperity of my country. I do not +discuss Home Rule; never did discuss it and never will. But I end +where I began, and I repeat the bill will ruin Ireland, will be bad +for England, and I will add that the British Government will soon be +compelled to intervene to stave off Irish bankruptcy. Home Rulers are +now becoming afraid of the bill; artisans, farmers, and labourers +think it a good joke. They relished the hunt, but they don't want the +game.</p> + +<p>"Returning to my own affairs, I say without hesitation that though the +mere threat of the bill has paralysed my business, and that the +passing of the bill would drive my men to England, yet—throw out the +bill, deliver us from the impending dread, and during the next two +years I shall myself expend £150,000 in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>railway material manufactured +by British artisans. Emphatically I repeat that Home Rule to the +British working man means increased competition and direct pecuniary +loss."</p> + +<p>Mr. S. McGregor, of 30, Anglesea Street, Dublin, has been located in +the city for 34 years, and seems to have been a politician from the +first. Coming from the Land o' Cakes, he landed an advanced Radical, +and a devoted admirer of the Grand Auld Mon. Once on the spot a change +came o'er the spirit of his dream. His shop has the very unusual +feature of indicating his political views. Her Gracious Majesty, Lord +Beaconsfield, and Mr. Balfour look down upon you from neat frames. I +am disposed to regard Mr. McGregor as the pluckiest man in Ireland. A +quiet, peaceful citizen he is, one who remembers the Sawbath, and on +weekdays concentrates his faculties on his occupation as a tailor and +clothier. I did not seek the interview, which arose from a business +call not altogether unconnected with a missing button, but his +opinions and his information are well worth recording. Mr. McGregor +said, "I thrust my opinions on none, but I have a right to my +opinions, and I do not affect concealment. The great defect of the +Irish Unionists is want of courage. They dare not for their lives come +forward and boldly state their convictions. If Lord Emly or some other +Irish Roman Catholic nobleman had come forward earlier, it might have +induced weak-kneed members of the party to do likewise. The Unionists +do not exercise the great influence they undoubtedly possess. They +allow themselves to be terrorised into silence. Let them have the +courage of their opinions and they have nothing to fear. The masses of +the industrial population are not in favour of Home Rule. The +corner-men, who want to spend what they never earned, and the farmers, +who hope to get the land for nothing, are the only hearty Home Rulers +in Ireland. I employ ten people, all Roman Catholics, some of them +with me for twenty-five years. None of these are Home Rulers. I became +a convert to Conservatism by my intimate knowledge and personal +acquaintance with many of the leaders of the Fenian movement. I saw +through the hollowness of the whole thing, and declined any connection +therewith. Poor Henry Rowles, who was to be told off by signal to +shoot Mr. Foster, was one of my workmen. He died in prison, some said +from sheer fright, but two or three of his friends were hanged. He was +mixed up by marriage with the Fenian party, and was drawn on and on +like many another. I would rather not name the Fenian leaders I knew, +and the reason is this. I knew them too well. Speaking of the Unionist +lack of courage, you must not be too much surprised. During the last +fourteen years Unionists have had to maintain a guerilla warfare for +existence. But the strangest feature of the present position is +this—the Home Rulers are kicking at the bill! A great Home Ruler of +my acquaintance (Mr. McGregor referred me to him) is getting quite +afraid. He is a farmer holding 300 acres under Lord Besborough, and +says that he trusts things will remain as they are. He has a good +landlord, borrows money by the subvention, and has <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>a perfect horror +of the class of men who will obtain the upper hand in Ireland. A +Nationalist over the way was about to extend the buildings you see +there. Plans were drafted, and offices were to be built. Out comes the +bill and in goes the project. He has no confidence in the Irish +Nationalist leaders; but, strange to say he believes in Mr. Gladstone. +He admits that the Irish M.P.'s are not quite up to his ideal, but +believes that the Grand Old Man's genius for accommodation and +ingenious dovetailing of Imperial interests will pull the country +through. Meanwhile he lays out no penny of money.</p> + +<p>"I am a Presbyterian, and what is more a United Presbyterian, +belonging to the Presbyter of Scotland. All Scotch Presbyterians are +advanced Radicals. We have four hundred members here. They came here +worshippers of Gladstone and Home Rulers to the tune of 97 per cent. +The congregation is now 99 per cent. Unionist or Conservative out and +out. Of the four hundred we have only three Home Rulers. What will the +English people say to that? Tell them that our minister, who came here +a Home Ruler, is now on a Unionist mission in Scotland—the Rev. Mr. +Procter, brother of Procter, the cartoonist of <i>Moonshine</i> and the +<i>Sketch</i>, to wit. My workpeople, all steady, industrious people, ask +but one thing—it is to be let alone."</p> + +<p>Here Mr. G.M. Roche, the great Irish wool-factor and famous amateur +photographer, said—</p> + +<p>"Ah! we must have the bill. 'Tis all we want to finish us up. We're +never happy unless we're miserable; the bill will make us so and we'll +never be properly discontented till we get it!"</p> + +<p>Passing through the Counties of Louth, Dublin, Londonderry, Monaghan, +Tyrone, Donegal, and Fermanagh, I met with many farmers whose +statements amply confirmed the words of the descendant of the great +Sir Boyle Roche. These unhappy men had been divested of their last +grievance, stripped of their burning wrongs, heartlessly robbed of +their long-cherished injuries. It was bad enough before, when Irishmen +had nothing except grievances, but at least they had these, handed +down from father to son, from generation to generation, along with the +family physiognomy, two precious, priceless heirlooms, remarkable as +being the only hereditary possessions upon which the brutal Saxon +failed to cast his blood-shot, covetous eye. And now the grievances +are taken away, the <i>Lares</i> and <i>Penates</i> of the farmer's cabin are +ruthlessly removed, and the melancholy peasant looks around for the +immaterial antiquities bequeathed by his long-lost forefathers. "Ah; +don't the days seem lank and long, When all goes right and nothing +goes wrong, And isn't our life extremely flat, When we've nothing +whatever to grumble at." The Irish farmer is with the poet, who hits +his harrowing anguish to a hair. He folds his hands and looks about, +uncertain what to do next. His rent has been lowered by 35 per cent., +he has compensation for improvements, fixity of tenure, and may borrow +money to buy the land outright at a percentage, which will <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>amount to +less than his immortal Rint. What is the unhappy man to do? His +grievances have been his sole theme from boyhood's happy days, the +basis of his conversation, his actuating motive, the very backbone of +his personal entity. Now they are gone, the fine gold has become dim, +and the weapons of war have perished. Once he could walk abroad with +the proud consciousness that he was a wronged man, a martyr, a brave +patriot struggling nobly against the adverse fates, a broth of a boy, +whose melancholy position was noted by the gods, and whose manly +bearing under proffered slavery established a complete claim to high +consideration in Olympus. But now, with heart bowed down with grief +and woe, he walks heavily, and even as a man who mourneth for his +mother, over the enfranchised unfamiliar turf. He peeps into the +bog-hole, and does not recognise himself. He could pay the rent twice +over, but he hates conventionalities, and would rather keep the money. +He is constructed to run on grievances, and in no other grooves, and +the strangeness of his present position is embarrassing. The tenants +of Lord Leitrim, Lord Lifford, and the Duke of Abercorn make no +complaint of their landlords. On the contrary, they distinctly state +that all are individually kind and reasonable men, and while +attributing their own improved position to the various Land Acts given +to Ireland, which leave the actual possessor of the land small option +in the matter, they freely admit that these gentlemen willingly do +more than is ordained by any act of Parliament, and that over and +above the provisions of the law, all three are fair-minded men, +desirous of doing the right thing by their people and the country at +large. Other landlords there were on whose devoted heads were breathed +curses both loud and deep.</p> + +<p>The late Lord Leitrim was exalted to the skies, but his murdered +father was visited with blackest malediction. At Clones, in the County +Monaghan, I met a sort of roadside specimen of the <i>Agricola +Hibernicus</i>, who explained his position thus:—"Ye see, we wor +rayduced 35 per cent., an' 'tis thrue what ye say; but then produce is +rayduced 50 per cent., so we're 15 per cent. worse off than iver we +wor before. We want another Land Act that'll go to the root. An' that +we'll get from an Oirish Parliament an' only from that. 'Tis not the +tinints that's always the worst off. Many's the time I seen thim that +had a farrum of their own go to the dogs, while thim that had rint to +pay sthruggled and sthrived an' made money an' bought the freeholders +out. For whin they had nothin' to pay they did no work, an' then, +bedad ivery mortial thing wint to the divil. An' that's how it'll be +wid the lazy ones once we get Home Rule, which means the land for +nothin' or next to nothin'. Barney will kick up his heels and roar +whirroo, but call again in a year an' ye'll see he hasn't enough money +to jingle on a tombstone."</p> + +<p>My next from the New Tipperary, whither I journey viâ Kildare, +Kilkenny, and Limerick, <i>en route</i> for Cork and the Blood-taxed Kerry, +where Kerry cows are cut and carved. Now meditation on marauding +moonlighters makes melancholy musing mine.</p> + +<p class="date">Limerick, April 11th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_8_TERRORISM_AT_TIPPERARY" id="No_8_TERRORISM_AT_TIPPERARY"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 8.—TERRORISM AT TIPPERARY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ipperary is Irish, and no mistake. Walking into town from Limerick +the first dwellings you reach are of the most primitive description, +whether regarded as to sanitary arrangements or otherwise. The ground +to the right slopes downwards, and the cabins are built with sloping +floors. The architects of these aboriginal erections stuck up four +brick walls, a hole in, a hole out, and a hole in the top, without +troubling to level the ground. Entering, you take a downward step, and +if you walk to the opposite exit, you will need to hold on to the +furniture, if any. If you slip on the front step you will fall head +first into the back yard, and though your landing might be soft +enough, it would have a nameless horror, far more killing than a stony +fall. The women stand about frowsy and unkempt, with wild Irish eyes, +all wearing the shawl as a hood, many in picturesque tatters, like the +cast-off rags of a scarecrow, rags and flesh alike unwashed and of +evil odour. The children look healthy and strong, though some of them +are almost <i>in puris naturalibus</i>. Their faces are washed once a week; +one of them said so, but the statement lacks confirmation, and is +opposed to the evidence of the senses. Scenes like these greet the +visitor to Old Tipperary, that is, Tipperary proper, if he enter from +Limerick. The town is said to be old, and in good sooth the dunghills +seem to possess a considerable antiquity. In this matter the Tipperary +men are sentimental enough—conservative enough for anything. At +Tipperary, of all places, the brutal Saxon will learn how much has +been bequeathed to Irishmen by their mighty forefathers.</p> + +<p>The eastern side is better. A grand new Roman Catholic church has just +been built at a cost of £25,000, and in front of the gilded +railings—for they are gilt like the railings of Paris—were dreadful +old women, like Macbethian witches, holding out their skinny hands for +alms. Smartly dressed young ladies, daughters of publicans and +shopkeepers, passed in jauntily, took a splash in the holy water, +crossed themselves all over, knocked off a few prayers, and tripped +merrily away. The better parts of the town belong to Mr. Smith-Barry, +the knock-me-down cabins to Mr. Stafford O'Brien, whose system is +different. As the leases fall in the former has modern houses built, +while the latter is in the hands of the middlemen, who sub-let the +houses, and leave things to slide. The <i>laissez-aller</i> policy is very +suitable to the genius of the genuine Irish, who may be said to rule +the roost in Tipperary.</p> + +<p>I interviewed all sorts and conditions of men, but every individual +bound me down to closest secrecy. And although nobody said anything +approaching high treason, their alarm on finding they had ventured to +express to a stranger anything like their real opinion was very +significant. The conversations took place last evening, and this +morning before breakfast a young man called on <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>me at the Station +Hotel, Limerick Junction, three miles from Tipperary, "on urgent +business." "Me father thinks he said too much, an' that ye moight put +what he said in print, wid his name to it. Ye promised ye wouldn't, +an' me father has confidence, but he wishes to remoind ye that there's +plinty in Tipperary would curse him for spakin' wid an Englishman, an' +that dozens of thim would murther him or you for the price of a pot of +porter." Another messenger shortly arrived, bearing a letter in which +the writer said that any mention of his name would simply ruin him, +and that he might leave the country at once. And yet these men had +only said what Englishmen would account as nothing.</p> + +<p>New Tipperary adjoins the old, to which it is on the whole superior. +All the descriptions I have seen of the Land League buildings are +untrue and unfair. Most of them were written by men who never saw the +place, and who paraphrased and perpetuated the original error. It was +described as a "mile or two from Tipperary," and the buildings were +called "tumble-down shanties of wood, warped and decaying, already +falling to pieces." The place adjoins and interlocks with the old +town; it is not separated by more than the breadth of a street, is +largely built of stone, and comprises a stone arcade, which alone cost +many thousands. Some of the cottages are of wood, but they look well, +are slated, and seem in good condition. The butter mart, a post and +rail affair, with barbed wire decorations, is desolate enough, and +nearly all the shops are shuttered. Enamel plates with Dillon Street +and Emmett Street still attest the glory that has departed, but the +plate bearing Parnell Street escaped my research. The William O'Brien +Arcade is scattered to the winds, save and except the sturdy stone +walls, which (<i>à la</i> Macaulay's New-Zealander) I surveyed with +satisfaction, sketching the ruins of the structure from a broken bench +in Dillon Street.</p> + +<p>A full and true history of the New Tipperary venture has never been +written. As in the present juncture the story is suggestive and +instructive, I will try to submit the whole in a form at once concise +and accurate. The particulars have been culled with great pains from +many quarters and carefully collated on the spot, and may be relied on +as minutely exact and undeniable. Everyone admits Mr. Smith-Barry's +claim to the title of a good landlord, an excellent landlord, one of a +thousand. Before the <i>casus belli</i> was found by William O'Brien all +was prosperity, harmony, and peace. Mr. Smith-Barry owns about 5,000 +acres of land situate in the fat and fertile plain of Tipperary, known +as the Golden Vale, with the best part of the county town itself. +Tipperary is a great butter centre. The people are ever driving to the +butter factory, which seemed to be worked in the Brittany way. +Donkey-carts driven by women, and bearing barrels of milk, abound on +the Limerick Road. The land is so rich, grand meadows, and heavy +dairy-ground, that the place prospered abundantly, and was by +commercial men reckoned an excellent place for business. But they have +changed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>all that. The Tipperary folks were once thought as good as +the Bank of England. Now they dislike to pay anything or anybody. +Their delicate sense of <i>meum</i> and <i>tuum</i> is blunted. They take all +they can get, and pay as little as they can. They affect dunghills and +dirt, and have a natural affinity for battle, murder, and sudden +death. How did all this come about?</p> + +<p>First, as to Mr. Smith-Barry's character. The most advanced +Nationalists, the Fenian papers, the Catholic clergy, all concurred in +blessing him. The Roman Catholic Bishop of Cloyne, Canon Hegarty, +P.P., and Tim Healy spoke of him in the character of a landlord in +highest terms. Sir Charles Russell, Tim Harrington, Mr. O'Leary +(Chairman of the Clonakilty Town Commissioners, a violent +Nationalist), and Canon Keller (R.C.) unanimously agreed that Mr. +Smith-Barry must be exempted from the general condemnation of Irish +landlords. They said he was the "kindest of landlords," and that his +tenants were "comfortable, respectable, and happy." They proclaimed +his "generous and noble deeds," declaring that "there have been no +cases of oppression or hardship, and the best and most kindly +relations have existed." All these sayings are gathered from +Nationalist papers, which would supply thousands of similar character, +and up to the time of O'Brien's interference, none of an opposite +sort. But, as Serjeant Buzfuz would have said, the serpent was on the +trail, the viper was on the hearthstone, the sapper and miner was at +work. Thanks to the patriot's influence, the Paradise was soon to +become an Inferno.</p> + +<p>A Mr. Ponsonby wanted his rents, or part of them. His tenants had +lived rent-free for so long—some of them were seven years +behind—that they naturally resented the proposed innovation. Mr. +Smith-Barry and others came to Mr. Ponsonby's assistance, and, +endeavouring to settle the thing by arbitration, proposed that the +landlord should knock off £22,000 of arrears, should make reductions +of 24 to 34 per cent. in the rents, and make the tenants absolute +owners in 49 years. This was not good enough. Judge Gibson thought it +"extravagantly generous," but the Tipperary folks resented Mr. +Smith-Barry's connection with such a disgracefully tyrannical piece of +business, and, at the instance of William O'Brien, determined to make +him rue the day he imagined it. They sent a deputation to remonstrate, +and Mr. Smith-Barry, while adhering to his opinion as to the +liberality of the proposition, explained that he was only one of many, +and that whatever he said or did would not change the course of +events. The Tipperary folks required him to repudiate the arrangement, +to turn his back on his friend and himself, and—here is the cream of +the whole thing, this is deliciously Irish—they soberly, seriously, +and officially proposed to Mr. Smith-Barry that in addition to the 15 +per cent. abatement they had just received on their rent he should +make a further remittance of 10 per cent. to enable them to assist the +Ponsonby tenants in carrying on the war against their landlord, on +whose side Mr. Smith-Barry was fighting. They said in effect, "You +have given us 3s. in the pound, to which we had no claim; <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>now we want +2s. more, to enable us to smash the landlord combination, of which you +are the leader." This occurred in the proceedings of a business +deputation, and not in a comic opera.</p> + +<p>Mr. Smith-Barry failed to see the sweet reasonableness of this +delightful proposition, and then the fun began.</p> + +<p>O'Brien to the rescue, whirroo!</p> + +<p>He rushed from Dublin, and told the Tipperary men to pay Smith-Barry +no rent. If they paid a penny they were traitors, slaves, murderers, +felons, brigands, and bosthoons. If they refused to pay they were +patriots, heroes, angels, cherubim and seraphim, the whole country +would worship them, they would powerfully assist the Ponsonby folks in +the next county, they would be saviours of Ireland.</p> + +<p>And besides all this they would keep the money in their pockets. But +this was a mere detail.</p> + +<p>The people took O'Brien's advice, withholding Mr. Smith-Barry's rent, +keeping in their purses what was due to him, in order that somebody's +tenants in the next county might get better terms. Still Mr. +Smith-Barry held out, and the Land League determined to make of him a +terrible example. He owned most of the town. Happy thought! let the +shopkeepers leave his hated tenements. Let their habitations be +desolate and no man to dwell in their tents. The Land League can build +another Tipperary over the way, the tenants can hop across, and Mr. +Smith-Barry will be left in the lurch! The end, it was thought, would +justify the means, and some sacrifice was expected. Things would not +work smoothly at first. The homes of their fathers were void; new +dunghills, comparatively flavourless, had to be made, the old +accretions, endeared by ancestral associations, had to be abandoned, +and the old effluvium weakened by distance was all that was left to +them. The new town was off the main line of trade and traffic, but it +was thought that these, with the old Tipperary odour, would come in +time. Streets and marts were built by the Land League at a cost of +£20,000 or more. The people moved away, but they soon moved back +again. The shopkeepers could do no business, so with bated breath and +whispering humbleness they returned to Mr. Smith-Barry. The mart was +declared illegal, and the old one was re-opened. But while the +agitation continued, the town was possessed by devils. Terrorism and +outrage abounded on every side. The local papers published the names +of men who dared to avow esteem for Mr. Smith-Barry, or who were +supposed to favour his cause. The Tipperary boys threw bombshells into +their houses, pigeon-holed their windows with stones, threw blasts of +gun-powder with burning fuses into their homes. They were pitilessly +boycotted, and a regular system of spies watched their goings out and +their comings in. If they were shopkeepers everything was done to +injure them, and people who patronised them were not only placed on +the Black List but were assaulted on leaving the shops, and their +purchases taken by violence and destroyed. Broken windows and threats +of instant death were so common as <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>to be unworthy of mention, and the +hundred extra armed policemen who were marched into the town were +utterly powerless against the prevailing rowdyism of the Nationalist +party. Honest men were coerced into acting as though dishonest, and +one unfortunate man, who had in a moment of weakness paid +half-a-year's rent, pitifully besought Mr. Smith-Barry's agent to sue +him along with the rest, and declared he would rather pay it over +again than have it known that the money had been paid. "Ye can pay a +year's gale for six months, but ye can't rise again from the dead," +said this pious victim to circumstances.</p> + +<p>At last the leaders were prosecuted, but before this the Boys had +great divarshun. These good Gladstonians, these ardent Home Rulers, +these patriotic purists, these famous members of the sans-shirt +Separatist section, set no limits to their sacrifices in the Good +Cause, stuck at nothing that would exemplify their determination to +bring about the Union of Hearts, were resolved to take their light +from under a bushel and set it in a candlestick. They wrecked many +houses and sorely beat the inmates. They burnt barns, and stacks, and +homesteads, and in one case a poor man's donkey-cart with its load of +oats. They exploded in people's homes metal boxes, leaden pipes, and +glass bottles containing gun-powder, in such numbers as to be beyond +reckoning. They burnt the doors and window sashes of the empty houses, +knocked people down at dark corners with heavy bludgeons, and fired +shots into windows by way of adding zest to the family hearth. Poor +John Quinlan escaped five shots, all fired into his house. Mr. Bell, +of Pegsboro, beat this record with six. He was <i>believed</i> to +sympathise with Mr. Smith-Barry! Men with white masks pervaded the +vicinity from the gentle gloaming till the witching morn, and woe to +the weak among their opponents, or even among the neutrals, whom they +might meet on their march!</p> + +<p>The tenants were great losers. A commercial man from Dublin assured me +that the agitation cost him £2,000 in bad debts. The people were +inconvenienced, unsettled, permanently demoralised, their peaceful +relations rudely interrupted, themselves and their commercial +connections more or less discredited and injured, and the whole +prosperous community impoverished, by the machinations of O'Brien and +Bishop Croke of Thurles, a few miles away. The inferior clergy were of +course in their element. Father Humphreys and others were notorious +for the violence of their language. Gladstonians who think Home Rule +heralds the millennium, and who babble of brotherly love, should note +the neat speech of good Father Haynes, who said, "We would, if we +could, pelt them not only with dynamite, but with the lightnings of +heaven and the fires of hell, till every British bulldog, whelp, and +cur would be pulverised and made top-dressing for the soil." This is +the feeling of the priests, and the people are under the priestly +thumb. That this is so is proved by recent events in Dublin. None but +the Parnellites could make head against the Catholic Party. In the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>recent conflict the Parnellites were squelched. Tim Healy kicked and +bit, but Bishop Walsh got him on the ropes, and Tim "went down to +avoid punishment." The priest holds Tim in the hollow of his hand. Tim +and his tribe must be docile, must answer to the whistle, must keep to +heel, or they will feel the lash. Should they rebel, their +constituencies, acting on priestly orders, will cast them out as +unclean, and their occupation, the means by which they live, will be +gone. Tim and his congeries hate the clerics, but they fear the +flagellum. They loathe their chains, but they must grin and bear them. +They have no choice between that and political extinction.</p> + +<p>The opinion of Tipperary men on the question of religious toleration +is practically unanimous. Pass Home Rule and the Protestants must +perforce clear out. As it is, they are entirely excluded from any +elective position, their dead are hooted in the streets, their funeral +services are mocked and derided by a jeering crowd. The other day a +man was fined for insulting the venerable Protestant pastor of +Cappawhite, near Tipperary, while the old man was peacefully +conducting the burial service of a member of his congregation. Foul +oaths and execrations being meekly accepted without protest, a more +enterprising Papist struck the pastor with a sod of turf, for which he +was punished. But, returning to our muttons, let me conclude with +three important points:</p> + +<p>(1) Mr. Smith-Barry built the Town Hall of Tipperary at a cost of +£3,000, and gave the use thereof to the Town Commissioners for +nothing. He spent £1,000 on a butter weigh-house, £500 on a market +yard, and tidied up the green at a cost of £300. He gave thirty acres +of land for a park, and the ground for the Catholic Cathedral. He +offered the land for a Temperance Hall (I think he promised to build +it), on condition that it was not used as a political meeting-house. +The Catholic Bishop declined to accede to this, and the project was +abandoned.</p> + +<p>(2) Several dupes of the Land League, for various outrages, were +sentenced to punishment varying from one year's hard labour to seven +years' penal servitude.</p> + +<p>(3) O'Brien, M.P., and Dillon, M.P., who had brought about the +trouble, were with others convicted of conspiracy, and were sentenced +to six months' imprisonment. But this was in their absence, for soon +after the trial commenced, being released on bail, they ran away, +putting the salt sea between themselves and their deservings. Heroes +and martyrs of Ireland, of whom the brutal Briton hears so much, +receive these patriots into your glorious company!</p> + +<p>The spirit of Tipperary is ever the same. No open hostility now, but +the fires of fanaticism are only smouldering, and only a breath is +needed to revive the flame. Every Protestant I saw, and all the +intelligent and enlightened Catholics, concur that this is so, and +that Home Rule would supply the needful impulse. These men also submit +that they understand the matter better than Mr. Gladstone and his +patch-work party.</p> + +<p class="date">Tipperary April 12th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_9_TYRANNY_AND_TERRORISM" id="No_9_TYRANNY_AND_TERRORISM"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 9.—TYRANNY AND TERRORISM.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he peasantry and small shopkeepers of this district can only be +captured by stratagem, and this for two reasons. Their native +politeness makes them all things to all men, and their fear of +consequences is ever before them. Their caution is not the Scotsman's +ingrained discretion, but rather the result of an ever-present fear. +English working men of directly opposite politics chum together in +good fellowship, harbouring no animosity, agreeing to differ in a +friendly way. It is not so in Ireland. The Irish labourer is +differently situated. He dare not think for himself, and to boldly +speak his mind would mean unknown misfortunes, affecting the liberty +and perhaps the lives of himself and those nearest and dearest to him. +That is, of course, assuming that his opinions were not approved by +the village ruffians who watch his every movement, of whom he stands +in deadly terror, and whom he dreads as almost divining his most +secret thoughts. A direct query as to present politics would fail in +every case. As well try to catch Thames trout with a bent pin, or +shoot snipe with a bow and arrow. My plan has been to lounge about +brandishing a big red guide-book, a broad-brimmed hat, and an American +accent; speaking of antiquities, shortest roads to famous spots, +occasionally shmoking my clay dhudeen with the foinest pisantry in the +wurruld and listening to their comments on the "moighty foine weather +we're havin', Glory be to God." They generally veer round to the +universal subject, seeking up-to-date information. Discovering my +ignorance of the question, they explain the whole matter, incidentally +disclosing their own opinions. The field workers of this district are +fairly intelligent. Most have been in England, working as harvesters, +and some of the better-informed believe that in future they will be +compelled to live in England altogether.</p> + +<p>A fine old man, living by the roadside near Oolagh, said:—"I wint to +England for thirty-four years runnin', and to the same place, in North +Staffordshire, first wid father, thin wid son. Whin I got too ould an' +stiff I sent me own son. First it was old Micky, thin it was young +Micky. He's away four months, and brings back enough to help us thro' +the winter, thanks be to God. The other time he mostly works at the +big farrum beyant there. Whin they cut up the big farrums into little +ones, nayther meself nor Micky will get anything, by raison we're +dacent, harmless people. 'Tis the murtherin' moonlighters will get the +land, an' me son wouldn't demane himself by stoppin' in the counthry +to work for them. First 'twas the landlords dhrove us away, next +'twill be the tenants. We're bound to be slaughtered some way, +although 'twas said that when we 'bolished the landlords we'd end our +troubles. But begorra, there's more ways o' killin' a dog than by +chokin' him wid butther." There is a growing feeling among the farmers +that the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>land will be heavily taxed to raise revenue, and that this +means expatriation to the labouring classes, who will swarm to England +in greater numbers than ever.</p> + +<p>Another grand old man, named Mulqueen, spoke English imperfectly, and +it was only by dint of frequent repetition that his meaning could be +mastered. Well clothed and well groomed, he stood at his cottage door, +the picture of well-earned repose. Thirty-two years of constabulary +service and twenty-one years in a private capacity had brought him to +seventy-five, when he returned to end his days on his native spot, +among Irish-speaking people, and under the noble shadow of the Galtee +Mountains. Divested of the accent which flavoured his rusty English, +Mr. Mulqueen's opinions were as follows:—</p> + +<p>"I am a Home Ruler and I voted for a Nationalist. But I am now +doubtful as to the wisdom of that course. I see that Irishmen quarrel +at every turn, that they are splitting up already, that the country +under their management would be torn to pieces, that the people would +suffer severely, and that England would have to interfere to keep our +leaders from each other's throats. It was Irish disputes that brought +the English here at first. In the event of an Irish Legislature Irish +disagreements would bring them here again. We'll never be able to +govern ourselves until the people are more enlightened." I left this +sensible and truly patriotic Irishman with the wish that there were +more like him. He was a pious Catholic, and regretted to learn that I +was otherwise, admitting in extenuation that this was rather a +misfortune than a fault, and, with a parting hand-shake, expressing an +earnest hope that "the golden gates of glory might open to receive my +sowl, and that we might again convarse in the company of the blessed +saints in the peaceful courts of heaven." This old-fashioned pious +kindliness is hardly now the mode, and isolated instances can rarely +be met with even in remote country districts.</p> + +<p>Running down to Limerick, I witnessed a warm contention between a +Unionist from Belfast and a commercial traveller from Mullingar, a hot +Home Ruler, the latter basing his arguments on alleged iniquitous +treatment of his father, a West Meath farmer, and defending boycotting +as "a bloodless weapon," which phrase he evidently considered +unanswerable. The Land League he contended was a fair combination to +protect the interests of the tenants, and avowed that all evictions +were unwarrantable acts of tyranny. The Belfast man showed that these +arguments were equally applicable to the other side, and asked the +patriot if eviction were not likewise "a bloodless weapon," to which +inquiry the Mullingar man failed to find the proper answer, and, not +coming up to time, was by his backers held to have thrown up the +sponge. This incident is only valuable as showing the poor line of +country hunted by the more brainy Nationalists. A County Clare man +boasted of his collection of Irish curiosities. "I have the pistol +O'Connell shot So-and-So with, I have the pistol Grattan used when <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>he +met Somebody else, I have the sword of Wolfe Tone, the pike that Miles +O'Flanagan—" Here the Ulsterman broke in with—</p> + +<p>"Excuse me, Sir. There's one thing I'd like to see if ye have it. Like +you, I am a pathriotic Irishman, and take deloight in relics +appertaining to the histhory of me counthry. Tell me now, have ye the +horsewhip, the thunderin' big horsewhip, that young McDermot, of +Thrinity College, used when he administhered condign punishment to Tim +Healy? Have ye that, now?"</p> + +<p>The County Clare man was completely knocked out. He discontinued the +recital of his catalogue, and surveyed the scenery in dignified +silence. His own friends chuckled. This was the most unkindest cut of +all. Irishmen love to see a splendid knockdown blow. They are full of +fight, and their spirit must have vent. They fight for fun, for love, +for anything, for nothing, with words, with blows, with tongues, with +blackthorns, anywhere, anyhow, only let them fight. Remove Mr. Bull, +they will fight each other. Heaven help the right when nobody stands +by to see fair play!</p> + +<p>A Mr. Magrath, of Killmallock, was inclined to take a jocose view of +the situation. "Faix, the English could never govern Ireland, an' +small blame to thim for that same. Did ye see the Divil's Bit +Mountains as ye came down from Dublin? Ye did? Av coorse, ye couldn't +help but see them. Did ye see the big bite he tuk out o' the range—ye +can see the marks o' the divil's own teeth, an' the very shape of his +gums, divil sweep him! Shure, I seen it meself whin I wint to the +Curragh races wid Barney Maloney; an' by the same token, 'twas Barney +axplained it to me. Didn't the divil take his bite, an' then didn't he +dhrop it on the plain out there forninst ye, the big lump they call +the rock iv Cashel? Av coorse he did. An' if the divil himself found +Ireland too hard a nut to crack, how can the English expect to manage +us? Anyway, 'tis too big a mouthful for Misther Bull." One gentleman +stood at his shop door, and having looked carefully around, said, "Ye +niver know who ye're spakin' wid, an' ye niver know who's spyin' ye. +Ah, this is a terrible counthry since we all got upset wid this Home +Rule question. Did ye hear of Sadleir, of Tipperary? Ye didn't? He was +a savin', sthrivin' man, an' he married a woman wid money. He had a +foine shop, wid ploughs, an' sickles, an' spades for the whole +counthry round. 'Twas a grand business he had, an' he made a powerful +dale o' money. He was a quiet man, an' niver wint to the whiskey +shops, where the boys they would be quarrellin' an' knockin' hell out +iv each other. He introduced a timprance lecturer that towld the boys +the poteen was pizenin' thim, an' 'twas wather they must dhrink. Ha! +Ha! Will I tell ye what owld Sheela Maguire said to the timprance +man?"</p> + +<p>I admitted a delirious delight in discursive digression.</p> + +<p>"The timprance man had a wondherful glass that made iverything a +thousand million times as big. What's this he called it? Ye're right, +'twas a my-cross-scrope; ye hit it to a pop; bedad 'tis yerself has +the larnin.' An' the people looked through it at the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>wather he put in +a glass, an' they seen the wather all swimmin' wid snakes an' +scorpions; 'twas enough to terrify the mortal sowl out o' ye. An' so +Sheela looked in an' saw them. An' the man put in the wather a good +dhrop o' whiskey, an' he says, says he, 'Now ye'll see the effect on +animal life,' says he. An' Sheela looked in again, an' she seen the +snakes all doubled up, an' kilt, an' murthered an' says Sheela, says +she:—</p> + +<p>"'May the divil fly away wid me,' says she, 'if I ever touch wather +again till I first put in whiskey to kill them fellows!'</p> + +<p>"'Twas poor Sadleir, of Tipperary town, brought the man down. Sadleir +must howld land; nothin' less would sarve him, an' he tuk from +Smith-Barry a big houldin', an' paid the out-going tenant five +thousand pounds for his interest. Whin the throubles began he refused +to join the Land League, by raison that he'd put all his money in the +land. They sent him terrible letthers wid skulls an' guns, an' +coffins, an' they said Will ye join? An' he said No, once. They +smashed ivery pane o' glass in his house, an' they said Will ye join? +An' he said No, twice. They bate his servants next, an' said Will ye +join? An' he said No, three times. They threw explosives into the +house, an' said Will ye join? An' he broke down. He was afeard for his +life. He wint in wid the rest, an' refused to pay rint', an' iv coorse +he got evicted, an' lost his five thousand pounds he put into the +farm, an' then he lost his business, an' before long he died with a +broken heart. An' where did he die? Just in the workhouse. 'Twas all +thro' William O'Brien, the great frind iv Oireland, that this +happened. An' if O'Brien an' his frinds got into power, why wouldn't +it happen again? But we're afeard to breathe almost in this +unfortunate counthry, God help us!"</p> + +<p>Amid the varying opinions of the Irish people there is one point on +which they are unanimous. They have no confidence in their present +leaders, whom they freely accuse of blackguardism, lying, and flagrant +dishonesty. Business men, although Home Rulers, agree that the +destinies of the country should not be trusted to either or any of the +jarring factions, which like unclean birds of evil omen hover darkling +around, already disputing with horrid dissonance possession of the +carcase on which they hope to batten. At the Station Hotel, Limerick +Junction, a warm Nationalist said to me, "The country will be ruined +with those blackguards. We have a right to Home Rule, an abstract +right to manage our own affairs, and I believe in the principle. But I +want such men as Andrew Jameson, or Jonathan Hogg, or that other +Quaker, Pym, the big draper. There we have honourable gentlemen, whom +we or the English alike might trust, either as to ability or +integrity. We might place ourselves in the hands of such men and close +our eyes with perfect confidence. Our misfortune is that our men, as a +whole, are a long way below par. They inspire no confidence, they +carry no weight, and nobody has any respect for them." Here my friend +mentioned names, and spoke of an Irish M.P.'s conduct at Sligo. I give +his story exactly as I heard it, premising that my <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>informant's <i>tout +ensemble</i> was satisfactory, and that he assured me I might rely on his +words:—"At the Imperial Hotel a discussion arose—a merely political +discussion—and blows were exchanged, the 'honourable gentleman' and +others rolling about the floor like so many savage bull dogs in a +regular rough-and-tumble fight. The poor 'boots' got his face badly +bruised, and for some days went about in mourning. I see that this +same member is bringing in a Bill in the House of Commons, and I read +it through with great interest, because I remembered the row, which +was hushed up, and never appeared in the papers. Imagine any Irishman, +with any respect either for himself or his country, trusting either to +a parcel of fellows like that."</p> + +<p>My friend spoke more moderately of the objectionable Irish M.P.'s than +they do of each other, but his opinions were obviously strong enough +for anything. The attitude of the <i>Freeman's Journal</i> moved him to +contempt, and its abject subjection to the priesthood excited his +disgust. He said, waving the despised sheet with indignity—"We have +no paper now. We lost all when we lost Parnell. He was a Protestant, +and could carry the English people, and with all his faults he had the +training of a gentleman. Look at the low-bred animals that represent +us now. Look at Blank-Blanky and his whole boiling. I swear I am +ashamed to look an Englishman in the face. The very thought of the +Irish members makes me puke."</p> + +<p>The mention of Mr. Jonathan Hogg reminds me that this eminent Dubliner +submitted to me a point which I do not remember to have seen in print. +Said Mr. Hogg: "When the Irish Legislature has become an accomplished +fact, which is extremely improbable, the land will be divided and +sub-divided until the separate holdings will yield incomes below the +amount required for the payment of income-tax. The effect of this will +be that a large number of incomes now paying tax will disappear, each +leaving a number of small incomes paying no tax, so that a larger tax +must be levied on the remaining incomes to meet the deficiency. Then +the large manufacturers who can move away will certainly do so, and +the country will suffer severely. Employment will be scarce or +altogether lacking, and the people will go to England, by their +competition lowering the rate of wage." The mention of Mr. Andrew +Jameson reminds me of his opinion <i>re</i> Customs. He said to me "The +bill nominally deprecates Separation, and yet proposes to establish a +Custom House between the two countries, making Ireland a foreign +country at once." Mr. John Jameson, who was present along with Mr. +Arundel, the business manager of the great J.J. concern, then +expressed his fears anent the practicability of Customs' collections +on the Irish coast. He said, "We have 1,300 coastguards at present, +and this force is ample when backed by the Royal Irish Constabulary, +marching and patrolling in the interior. But when the constabulary are +no longer engaged in the direct protection of British interests the +little force of thirteen hundred <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>coastguards must prove quite +insufficient, and I doubt if even thirteen thousand would prove an +adequate force. The Irish people will have no interest in protecting +the British Government. Their interest will be exactly the other way. +Grave difficulties attend the proposition having regard to the Customs +duties between the two countries." Another eminent authority then +present referred to the encouragement which the Act would give to the +enterprising smuggler, and thought that a small fleet of American +steamers, smart built, fast little boats, would instantly spring into +existence to carry on a splendidly paying trade—a trade, too, having +untold fascination for the Yankees, while the average Irishman, as +everybody knows, is a smuggler by nature, disposition, heredity, and +divine right. It was also pointed out that, whereas huge quantities of +spirits now pass to Ireland through the ports of Bristol and London, +under the new dispensation Irish merchants would order direct, which +would inflict loss on England. The details of this loss were fully +explained, but I omit them for the reason that experts will +understand, while lay readers may safely accept a statement uttered in +the presence of the two Jamesons and receiving their assent.</p> + +<p>But my friend's conversation reminded me of something more, and I +remembered a little story I heard in Dublin respecting a daily +disseminator of priest-ordered politics. It owed some rent for the +premises it occupies on the thymy banks of the odorous Liffey. It +owed, I say, for owing, not paying, is the strong suit of the party it +represents. It was pressed to pay, coaxed to plank down, soothered to +shell out. A registered letter with premonitory twist of the screw +"fetched" the patriot laggards. They or "It" paid up, but failed to +look pleasant. In his hurry the glad recipient of the cash gave a +receipt up to date instead of up to the time the rent was due. The +immaculate organ of highly-rectified morality wished to hold the +writer of the receipt to his pen-slip, to nobble the rent; and being +reproached backed out with:—</p> + +<p>"We thought you wanted to give it as a present." The landlord is a +strong Unionist. The rottenness of repudiation is spreading +everywhere. Lying and theft, under other names, would be, the dominant +influences under the new <i>régime</i>. But it may be objected—If Irishmen +have no respect for their members, why did they elect them? If they +object to Home Rule, why did they vote for it? And so on, and so on. +These queries at first blush seem unanswerable, but they are not +really so. Attentive readers of later letters will discover the reason +why. Further, it may be remarked, in passing, that questions are more +easily asked than answered. Here is an instance. The facts are +undeniable, staring us in the face:—</p> + +<p>The base and bloody Balfour, unaccompanied by men who have been called +his black and brutal bloodhounds, moves about in Ireland unmolested, +with no other protection than that of his sister.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>The bright and brilliant O'Brien, the purist-patriot, visiting the +constituency of which he is the senior member, is with difficulty +protected by a powerful force of the police he has so often affected +to despise.</p> + +<p>Other Nationalist members dare not appear in Nationalist quarters. How +is this?</p> + +<p>To return to the objections given above. Since the appearance of the +bill, Irishmen have been changing their minds. Day by day they dread +it more and more. They still believe that under certain conditions +Home Rule would be a good thing for Ireland. But they begin to see +that the required conditions do not exist. They begin to see that they +have been used by such men as O'Brien and Healy, they see the +incompetency which has reduced the party paper to so low an ebb, they +see the misery and degradation which the Land League inflicted on the +once thriving districts of Tipperary; they saw their neighbours, poor, +unlettered men, dupes of unscrupulous lying eloquence, men whom it was +murder to deceive—they saw these men sentenced to long terms of penal +servitude, while the instigators of the crimes for which they had +suffered, availing themselves of the liberal English law, broke their +bail, and, travelling first-class to Paris, lived in the best hotels +of that gay city on the plunder they had wiled from ignorant servant +girls, being clothed in purple and fine linen, and faring sumptuously +every day, while their friends the felons trod the tireless wheel and +the housemaids went on with their scrubbing.</p> + +<p>The Irish people have seen these things and many more, and, as the +French say, they have reflected. A very considerable proportion of the +lower classes have already changed their minds, but—they dare not own +it. So the process of education is comparatively slow. A small farmer +said to me, "Not an hour's walk from here, a small tinant like meself +was suspicted to be a thraitor to the cause. He was a sthrivin' man, +an' he had really no politics, an' only wanted to get lave to work his +land, an' earn his bit an' sup.</p> + +<p>"He had two sthrappin' daughters, as nice, dacent young girls as ye'd +see in a summer's day. They were seen spakin' to a pliceman—that was +all they done—an' four men came that night, four ruffians wid white +masks, an' havin' secured the father, they dhragged the young girls +out of bed at the dead hour, an' stripped them to the skin. Thin they +cut off their hair close wid a knife, the way ye'd cut corn, an' +scarified their bodies wid knives. Would ye wondher we're careful?"</p> + +<p>I asked him whether a Protestant could in his district hope to be +elected to any public position, the Board of Guardians for instance +(he was a good Catholic). His answer was an unqualified No. Then he +took time, and shortly proposed the following statement of the +position, which I present on account of its gem-like finish:—</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't say but they'd put on a Protestant av he paid for it by +settlin' wid the priest that for certain considerations he would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>be +contint wid a seat on the boord. An' thin he must renounce his +political ideas, or promise never to mintion thim in public. But, +begorra, he'd have to sell his birthright for a mess of pottage by +makin' a decoy duck of himself!"</p> + +<p>In adding this great specimen to the immortal list of memorable mixed +metaphors, I feel that my visit to Ireland has not been quite in vain.</p> + +<p class="date">Oolagh, (Co. Tipperary), April 15th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_10_DEFYING_THE_LAND_LEAGUE" id="No_10_DEFYING_THE_LAND_LEAGUE"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 10.—DEFYING THE LAND LEAGUE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterb.png" alt="B" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />urn everything English except English coals." That was the first +sentiment I heard in "rebel Cork," and it certainly expresses the +dominant feeling of the local Nationalist party, who do not seem to +have heard of the proposed Union of Hearts, or, if they have heard, +they certainly have not heeded. Nor will anyone who knows for one +moment assert that the Corkers entertain the idea. My hotel is a +hotbed of sedition. It is the southern head-quarters of the Parnellite +party. The spacious entrance hall is a favourite resort of the leading +Cork Nationalists, who air their views in public with much excited +gesture, having its basis in whiskey-nourished hatred of English rule. +They walk to the bar, suck in the liquid bliss, and return to the spot +whence they may look upon the beauteous promenaders of Patrick Street. +They prefer the kaleidoscopic change of the streets to the stationary +beauty of the bar, and while admitting the unfleeting quality of the +fixed stars they worship the procession of the equinoxes. On Saturday +last, the day O'Brien died, the Mayor of Cork, with Mayoral chain and +hosts of satellites, might have been seen under the familiar portal, +discussing the proposed public funeral of the lamented friend, once +Mayor of the City, and described as "a gentleman who had, by his +courageous and outspoken utterances, obtained the distinguished honour +of imprisonment by the British Government." Particulars were not +given, as the first two incarcerations occurred under Forster and +Trevelyan. The third, under Balfour, was a term of fourteen days for +assaulting a policeman. The Corporation discussed the patriot's merits +without descending to detail. Outside, the newspaper boys were yelling +"Arrest of Misther Balfour-r-r," but the Corporation were no buyers. +The populace might be taken in, but official Cork know it was the +"wrong 'un," and clave to its hard-earned pence.</p> + +<p>Public opinion here is much the same as in Dublin, only hotter. +Respectable people who have anything to lose are, if possible, more +seriously alarmed. The lower classes are, if possible, more bitter, +more implacable in their animosity to everything English. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>Nevertheless, the feeling against Home Rule is assuredly gaining +ground, even among the most ardent Nationalists. The great meeting of +last Wednesday showed what the Unionists could do, how they could +crowd a great platform with the intelligence of the country, and fill +a great hall with the Unionist rank and file. The Loyalists have +astonished themselves. They knew not their own strength. Now they are +taking fresh heart, determined to hold out to extremity. The +Separatists—for the Corkers are Separatists <i>au naturel</i>—are +somewhat disconcerted, and try to minimise the effect of the meeting +by sneering and contumely; but it will not do. They affect hilarity, +but their laughter is not real. Perhaps nothing shows the shallowness +of men more than the tricks they think sufficient to deceive. And then +the leaders are accustomed to a credulous public. The place is +eminently religious. Cork is the Isle of Saints—with a port and a +garrison to enhance its sanctity. At certain seasons a big trade is +done in candles, on which names are written, which being blessed and +burnt have powerful influence in the heavenly courts. It costs a +trifle to hallow the tallow, but no matter. A friend has seen a muddy +little well, which is fine for sore eyes. Offerings of old bottles and +little headless images were planted around, but the favourite gift was +a pin, stuck in the ground by way of fee. Jolly Mr. Whicker, of +Dublin, who represents three Birmingham houses, saw Father McFadden, +of Gweedore, waving his hat when in custody. A policeman insisted that +this should cease, when a man in the crowd said to Mr. Whicker:—</p> + +<p>"Arrah, now, look at the holy man. He puts on his hat widout a wurrud, +whin he could strike the man dead wid jist sayin' a curse. 'Tis a good +saint he is, to go wid the police, whin if he sthretched out his hand +he could wither thim up, an' bur-rn thim like sthraws in the blazin' +turf!"</p> + +<p>These people have votes, and to a man support the Nationalist party. +It is proposed to place Ireland under a Government governed by these +good folks, who are in turn governed by their sacred medicine-men.</p> + +<p>A member of the firm of Cooke Brothers, a native of Cork, in business +in this city fifty years, said:—</p> + +<p>"There can be no doubt that the bill means ruin for Ireland, and +therefore damage to England. The poor folks here believe the most +extravagant things, and follow the agitators like a flock of sheep. +They are undoubtedly wanting in energy. We have the richest land in +Ireland, wonderful pastures that turn out the most splendid cattle in +the world, big salmon rivers, a most fruitful country, a land flowing +with milk and honey. As the rents are judicially fixed there can be no +ground for complaint, but the people will not help themselves. Whether +it is in the climate I cannot say, but I must reluctantly admit—and +no one will gainsay my statement—that the people of the South, to put +it mildly, are not a striving sort.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>"They want somebody else to do something for them. They get on a stick +and wait till it turns to a horse before they ride. No Act of +Parliament will help them, for they will not help themselves.</p> + +<p>"Look at the magnificent country you saw from Dublin to this city. +Compare it with the black and desolate bogs of Ulster, and then ask +yourself this question—How is it that the Ulster people, with far +worse land, worse harbours, worse position, and having the same laws, +are prosperous and content to have no change? If the Northerns and +Southerns would swop countries, Ireland must develop into one of the +most prosperous countries in the world. The Ulster men are +tremendously handicapped as against the Munster folks, but—they are +workers. Some say that if they were here the climate would enervate +them, but I do not find that my experience countenances this +supposition. Fifty years ago all the leading merchants and tradesmen +of Cork were Catholics. It is not so now. What does that prove? I +withhold my own opinion.</p> + +<p>"The Southerners are better fixed than the Ulstermen, but they are +idle, and—this is very important—extremely sentimental."</p> + +<p>An avowed Nationalist, one Sullivan, completely bore out this last +statement. "We want to manage our own business, and be ruled by +Irishmen. You say in England that we shall be poor, and so we may, but +that is no argument at all. It might influence a nation of +shopkeepers, but it has no weight with Irishmen, who have a proper and +creditable wish to make their country one of the nations of the world. +The very servant girls feel this, and the poorest peasant woman now +having what she calls a 'tay brakefast' is willing to go back to +porridge if the country was once rid of the English. Never you mind +what will happen to us. Cut us adrift, and that will be all we ask. If +we need help we can affiliate with America or even France. The first +is half our own people, the second understands the Irish nation, which +fought for centuries in the French armies, and, under Marshal Saxe, an +Irishman, routed the English at Fontenoy." This gentleman was civil +and moderate in tone, but he did not promise to walk down the ages +arm-in-arm with England, attesting eternal amity by exchanging smokes +and drinks. "We'll be very glad to see the English as tourists," he +said. "And they will have to behave themselves, too," he added, +reflectively.</p> + +<p>A large trader of Patrick Street has most serious misgivings as to the +effect of the bill. He said:—</p> + +<p>"I had just been over to England to make purchases. Arriving here, I +found the bill just out. I read it, and at once cancelled half my +orders. We are reducing stock. What Home Rule would do for us I cannot +contemplate. The mere threat amounts to partial paralysis. What the +Cork people want with Home Rule is beyond me. They have everything in +their own hands. The city elections of all kinds are governed by the +rural voters of five miles round. Wealth and commercial capital are +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>completely swamped by these obedient servants of the priests. Mr. +Gladstone talks of an Upper House, with a £20 qualification. Why, the +qualification for the Grand Jury is £40. Many of the twenty-pounders +round here cannot read or write, and yet they will be qualified for +the Irish House of Lords.</p> + +<p>A customer came up and said:—"Gladstone wants to hand the capital and +commerce of this country to men like Tim Healy, who expects to be +Prime Minister, and who will succeed, if the bill passes and he can +eat priestly dirt enough. I knew where he was reared in Waterford, in +a little tripe and drischeen shop."</p> + +<p>I rose to a point of order. Would the honourable member now addressing +the House kindly explain the technical term "drischeen shop?" +"Certainly. The drischeen is a sort of pudding, made of hog's blood +and entrails, with a mixture of tansy and other things. Tim would know +them well for he was reared on them, which accounts for his +characteristic career. Do you know that the Queenstown Town +Commissioners call each other liars, and invite each other to come out +and settle it on the landing? Get the <i>Cork Constitution</i>, look over +the file, and you'll drop on gems that will be the soul of your next +letter. Don't miss it. And that's the sort of folks Mr. Gladstone +would trust with the fate of England as well as Ireland, for their +fates would be the same. You cannot separate them. The people of +England do not seem to see through that. They will have an awful +awakening. And serve them right. They make a pact with traitors; they +offer their throats to the murderer, and they say, 'Anything to oblige +you. I know you won't hurt us much.'</p> + +<p>"The Southern Irish are the most lovable people in the world, with all +their faults, if they were not led astray by hireling agitators, who +ruin the country by playing on the people's ignorance, exciting the +Catholic hope of religious domination, and trusting to damage England +as a great spreader of Protestantism. A lie is no lie if told to a +Protestant. To keep a Protestant out of heaven would be a meritorious +action. And they would readily damage themselves if by doing so they +could also damage England. Englishmen hardly believe this, but every +commercial traveller from an English house knows it is true."</p> + +<p>I tested a number of English commercials on this point. All confirmed +the statement above given. Many had been Gladstonians, but now all +were Unionists. None of them knew an English or Scotch commercial who, +having travelled in Ireland, remained a Home Ruler. Such a person, +they thought, did not exist. Admitted that for business purposes the +apparent <i>rara avis</i> might possibly, though not probably, be found, +all agreed that no Englishman in his senses, with personal knowledge +of the subject, could over support Home Rule. Two Gladstonians went +from Chester to Tipperary to investigate the troubles: both returned +converted. Six men from a shop-fitting establishment in Birmingham +worked some weeks in Dublin: all returned Unionist <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>to the core. This +from Mr. Sibley, of Grafton street, Dublin, in whose splendid shop I +met the Duchess of Leinster, handsomest woman in Ireland, and +therefore (say Irishmen) handsomest in the world. She was buying books +for Mr. Balfour, who, she said, was a great reader of everything +connected with Ireland or Irish affairs. Mr. Sibley is a partner of +Mr. Combridge, of New street, Birmingham, and is a leading Irish +Unionist. Returning to the cancelling of orders, I will add that Mr. +Richard Patterson, J.P., of Belfast, the largest buyer of hardware in +Ireland, has cancelled very largely, together with two other large +firms, whose names he gave me. You will remember Mr. John Cook, the +Protestant Home Ruler, of Derry. His manager, Mr. Smith, has written +the Birmingham factor of the house, to omit his usual visit, as the +firm will have no orders for him. A strange comment on Mr. Cook's +theories of confidence. Mr. Cook is an excellent, a high-minded man. +He asked me how I would class him among his party. I called him a +Visionary in Excelsis.</p> + +<p>Every self-respecting Saxon visitor to Cork visits the famous castle +of Blarney, seven miles away, to see the scenery and kiss the Blarney +Stone, the apparent source of Home Rule inspiration.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There is a stone there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That whoever kisses<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Och! he never misses<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To grow eloquent.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis he may clamber<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To a lady's chamber,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or become a member<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of Parliament.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A clever spouter<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He'll sure turn out, or<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An out-an'-outer<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To be let alone!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Don't hope to hindher him<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or to bewildher him—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sure, he's a pilgrim<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the Blarney stone!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The walk is delightful, not unlike that from Colwyn Bay to Conway, but +more beautiful still, as instead of the London and North Western +Railway a lovely river runs along the valley on your right. The Cork +and Muskerry Light Railway occupies the roadside for the first four +miles, relic of the beneficent Balfour—winding by the river side for +the rest of the journey, through fat meadows dotted with thriving +kine, and having a background of richly-wooded hills. At Carrickrohane +your left is bounded by a huge precipitous rock, covered from base to +summit with ivy and other greenery, a great grey building on the very +brink of the abyss, flanked by Scotch firs, peering over the +precipice. A fine stone bridge, garrisoned by salmon-fishers, leads to +the Anglers' Rest, and here I found a splendid character, one Dennis +Mulcahy, who boasted of his successful resistance to the Land League. +Having told me of his adventures in America, and how his oyster-bar +experiences in the Far West had opened his eyes to the fact that the +Irish people were being humbugged, he narrated his return to his +native land, on his succession to a small farm left him by "an ould +aunt he had." His language was so forcible and picturesque that I +despair of conveying its effect, more especially as no pen can +describe the rich brogue, which, notwithstanding his two years' +residence in the States, was still thick enough to be cut <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>with a +knife. Apart from its amusing side, his story has a moral, and may be +instructively applied.</p> + +<p>"'Twas at Ballina I was, the toime o' the Land Lague. 'Twas there +Captain Moonlight started from, an' the whole disthrict was shiverin' +in their shoes. I refused to subscribe to the Land Lague, an' they +started to compil me, but, be the powers, they tackled the wrong +tom-cat whin they wint to coarce Dennis Mulcahy. Threatenin' letthers, +wid pictures o' death's-heads, an' guns, an' pikes, an' coffins, was +but a thrifle to the way they wint on. But they knew I had a thrifle +of a sivin-shooter, an' bad luck to the one o' thim that dared mislist +me at all. At last it got abroad that I was to get a batin' wid +blackthorn sticks, for they wor tired the life out o' them, raisonin' +wid me. Well, says I, I'm here, says I, an' the first man that raises +a hand to me, I'll invite him to his own inquist, says I, for, bedad, +I'll perforate him like a riddle, says I. Well, it wint on an' on, +till one day I was stayin' at a bit of a shebeen outside the place, +when a slip o' a girleen kem to me—I was sittin' on a bench in the +back garden, the way I'd enjoy my pipe in the fresh air, an', says +she, 'Get out o' this, for there's a whole crew o' thim inside going +to bate you.' That was six or seven o' a fine summer's night, an' I +walked into the house an' took a look at thim—a thievin' heap o' +blayguards as iver ye seen wid your two eyes."</p> + +<p>"I wint out again an' sat in the haggard, where I could kape my eye on +the dure. Prisintly out comes one o' thim, to commince the row, I +suppose.</p> + +<p>"He spoke o' the Land Lague, an' I towld him I didn't agree wid it at +all, and 'twas a thievin' invintion o' a set o' roguish schamers.</p> + +<p>"'Ye'd betther mind yer manners,' says he, 'onless ye have yer +revalver,' says he, lookin' at me maningly.</p> + +<p>"Faix, 'tis here, says I, pullin' out the tool.</p> + +<p>"'But can ye handle it?' says he.</p> + +<p>"Begorra, says I, I'd shoot a fly off yer nose; an' wid that I looked +round for a mark, an' I seen in a three foreninst me a lump o' a crow +sittin' annoyin' me. 'Will ye quit yer dhrimandhru?' says I, to the +botherin' ould rook.</p> + +<p>"'Caw, caw, caw,' says he, vexin' me intirely.</p> + +<p>"Bang! says I, an the dirty blackburd comes fluttherin' down, an' +dhropped in the haggard like a log o' limestone.</p> + +<p>"Ye should have seen that fellow! The landlord wid the whole rout o' +thim runs out. 'What's the matter?' says he, starin' round like a sick +cod-fish.</p> + +<p>"'I'm afther charmin' a burd out iv a three; 'tis a way I have,' says +I, shovin' in a fresh cartridge from my waistcoat pocket, fair an' +aisy, an' kapin' me back to the haystack.</p> + +<p>"'Was it you kilt the jackdaw?' says he.</p> + +<p>"''Twas meself,' says I, 'that did it,' says I.</p> + +<p>"'An' ye carry a murdherin' thing like that in a paceful <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>counthry,' +says he. ''Tis yer American thrainin' says he, sneerin'.</p> + +<p>"I tuk off me hat an' giv' him a bow an' a scrape. 'Is it yerself +would insinse me into the rudiments o' polite larnin'?' says I. Thin I +looked him straight into the white iv his eye, an' give him the length +o' my tongue. Me blood was up whin I seen this spalpeen wid his dirty +set o' vagabones waitin' to murther me if they ketched me unbeknownst. +'Michael Hegarty,' says I, 'where did ye scour up yer thievin' set o' +rag-heaps?' says I. 'Ye'd bate me wid blackthorns, would ye? Come on, +you and your dirty thribe, till I put sivin shots into yez. Shure I +could pick the eye out o' yez shure I could shoot a louse off yer +ear,' says I. 'Anger me,' says I, 'an' I'll murther the whole parish; +raise a stick to me, an' I'll shlaughter the whole counthry side.' An' +wid that I cocked me little shootin'-iron.</p> + +<p>"Ye should have seen that shebeen-keeper; ye should have seen the +whole o' them whin I raised me voice an' lifted me little Colt!</p> + +<p>"They tumbled away through the dure, crossin' each other like threes +ye'd cut down, lavin' the landlord, struck all iv a heap, the mug on +him white as a new twelve-pinny, staggerin' on his two shin-bones, an' +thrimblin' an' shiverin' wid fright, till ye'd think he'd shake the +teeth out iv his head.</p> + +<p>"The murdherin' vilyans want shtandin' up to, an' they'll rispict ye. +I had no further trouble. That was the last o' thim. 'Tis the wake an' +difinceless people they bate an' murther. I heerd there was talk o' +shootin' me from the back iv a ditch; an' that one said, 'But av ye +missed?' says he. 'What thin?' says he.</p> + +<p>"Ye should sind ould Gladstone an' Morley an' the other ould women to +Carrignaheela till I give them a noggin' o' right poteen an' insinse +thim into the way iv it. The only way o' managin' me counthrymin is to +be the masther all out, an' 'tis thrue what I spake, an' sorra one o' +me cares who hears me opinion. I'm the only man in the counthry that +dares open his teeth, an' yet they all thrate me well now, an' the +priest invites me to his house. An' all because I spake me mind, an' +don't care three thraneens for the whole o' thim. 'Twas in America I +larned the secret."</p> + +<p class="date">Cork, April 20th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_11_THE_CRY_FOR_PEACE_AND_QUIETNESS" id="No_11_THE_CRY_FOR_PEACE_AND_QUIETNESS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 11.—THE CRY FOR PEACE AND QUIETNESS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterw.png" alt="W" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />hat's the next place to this?" I asked, as the Southern and Western +Railway deposited me at Tralee. I was uncertain as to whether the +place was a terminus, but the gintleman who dhrove the cyar I hailed +marvelled greatly at my ignorance. He surveyed me from top to toe with +a compassionate expression. No doubt he had heard much of the +ignorance of the uncivilised English, but this <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>beat the record. Not +to know that Tralee was on the sea, not to know that the little port +frowned o'er the wild Atlantic main, as Mr. Micawber would have said. +He struggled for a moment with his emotion and then said,</p> + +<p>"Musha, the next parish is Amerikay!"</p> + +<p>I apologised for my imperfect geographical knowledge, but the cyar-man +was immovable. No pardoning look stole over his big red face, which +was of the size and complexion of a newly cut ham. Nor would he enter +into conversation with the inquiring stranger. He cursed his horse +with a copiousness which showed his power of imagination, and with a +minute attention to detail which demonstrated a superior business +capacity. Put him in the House amongst the Nationalist members, and he +is bound to come to the front. The qualifications above-mentioned +cannot fail to ensure success. We have the examples before us, no need +to mention names. A hard cheek, a bitter tongue, and a good digestion +are the three great steps in the Irish Parliamentary <i>gradus ad +Parnassum</i>, the cheek to enable its happy possessor to "snub up" to +gentlemen of birth and breeding, the tongue to drip gall and venom on +all and sundry, the digestion to eat dirt <i>ad libitum</i> and to endure +hebdomadal horsewhippings. Such a man, I am sure, was the dhriver of +my cyar, who may readily be identified. His physiognomy is very like +the railway map of Ireland, coloured red, with the rivers and mountain +ranges in dark-blue or plum-colour. As a means of ready reference he +would be invaluable in the House of Commons. How interesting to see +Mr. Gladstone poring over his cheek (Connaught and Leinster), his jaw +(Munster, with a pimple for Parnellite Cork), and his forehead +(Ulster, with the eyes for Derry and Belfast). The G.O.M. would find +the Kerry member invaluable. Like the rest he would probably be devoid +of shame, untroubled by scruples, and a straight voter for his side, +so long as he was not allowed to go "widout a male." Who knows but +that, like the Prime Minister's chief Irish adviser, he may even have +been reared on the savoury tripe and the succulent "drischeen"?</p> + +<p>All the Tralee folks are shy of political talk. They eye you for a +long time before they commit themselves, but when once started they +can hardly stop, so warm are they, so intensely interested in the +great question. Running down the line, a Cork merchant said "The Kerry +folks are decent, quiet folks by nature. Do not believe that these +simple villagers are the determined murderers they would seem to be. +No brighter intellects in Ireland, no better hearts, no more +hospitable hosts in the Emerald Isle. They are very superstitious. +There you have it all. 'Tis their beautiful ingenuousness that makes +them so easily led astray. What do these simple country folks, living +on their farms, without books, without newspapers, without +communication with large centres—what do they know about intricate +State affairs? What can they do but listen to the priest, regarded as +the great scholar of the district, reverenced as almost—nay, quite +infallible, and credited <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>with the power to give or withhold eternal +life? For while in England the people only respect a parson according +to the esteem he deserves as a man, in Ireland the priestly office +invests the man with a character entirely different from his own, and +covers everything. These poor folks felt the pinch of hard times, and +the agitators, backed by their Church, saw their opportunity and +commenced to use it. Hence the Kerry moonlighters, poor fellows, +fighting in their rude and uncouth way for what they believed to be +patriotism and freedom. They should be pitied rather than blamed, for +they were assuredly acting up to their light, and upon the advice of +men they had from childhood been taught to regard as wise, sincere, +and disinterested counsellors.</p> + +<p>"Ah me, what terrible times we had in Cork! Belfast may boast, but +Belfast is not in it. We were in the centre of the fire. The +shopkeepers of Patrick Street deserve the fullest recognition from the +British nation. They had to furnish juries to well and truly try the +moonlighters of Kerry, Clare, and several other counties. They sat for +eight months, had to adjourn over Christmas, and those men returned +true bills at the peril of their lives. The venue was changed to Cork +for all these counties, and every man jack of the jury knew full well +that any day some fanatic friend of the convicted men might shoot or +stab him in the street. The loyalty of Belfast is all the talk, but it +has never undergone so severe a test. There the Loyalists have it all +their own way. Here the Loyalists, instead of being three to one, are +only one to three. The Ulstermen are the entrenched army; the Cork +Unionists are the advanced picket. More judges got promotion from Cork +than elsewhere. We changed the barristers' silk to ermine, too. All +this shows what we went through. Everything is quiet now; Balfour +terrified the life out of them, and Captain Moonlight at the mention +of that name would skip like spring-heeled Jack."</p> + +<p>The Kerry folks turned out bright as their reputation. It was hard to +believe that these simple, kindly peasants had ever stained their +beautiful pastoral country with the bloodiest, cruellest deeds of +recent times. They have a polite, deferential manner without +servility, and a pious way of interpolating prayer and thanksgiving +with their ordinary conversation.</p> + +<p>"Good morning, Sir."</p> + +<p>"Good mornin', an' God save ye, Sorr."</p> + +<p>"Fine weather."</p> + +<p>"'Tis indeed foine weather, glory be to God."</p> + +<p>"Nice country."</p> + +<p>"Troth, it is a splindid country. The Lord keep us in it."</p> + +<p>A prosperous-looking shop with a portly personage at the door looked +so uncommonly Unionistic that I ventured to make a few inquiries <i>re</i> +the antiquities of the district. The inevitable topic soon turned up, +and to my surprise my friend avowed himself a Home Ruler and a +Protectionist. His opinions and illustrations <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>struck me as +remarkable, and with his permission I record them here.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I am a Home Ruler—in theory. I think Home Rule would be best +for both. Best for you and best for me, as the song says; but mark me +well—<span class="sc">Not Yet</span>.</p> + +<p>"You are surprised that I should say Not Yet so emphatically, but the +fact is I love my country, and, besides, all my interests and those of +my children are bound up with the prosperity of the country. This +ought to sharpen a man's wits, if anything could do it, and I have for +many years been engaged in thinking out the matter, and my mind is now +made up.</p> + +<p>"Home Rule from Gladstone will ruin us altogether. We must have Home +Rule from Balfour. We <i>must</i> have Home Rule, but we must have it from +a Conservative Government. You smile. Is that new to you? It is? Just +because Home Rulers in this country cannot afford to express their +views at this moment. But the hope is entertained by all, I will say +all, the most advanced Irish Home Rulers. By advanced I mean educated, +enlightened. Let me give you an illustration which I heard from a +friend in Cork.</p> + +<p>"Here is Ireland, a delicate plant requiring untold watching and +careful training. Around it on the ground are a number of slugs and +snails. Or call them hireling agitators if you like. I sprinkle salt +around the roots to kill off the brutes and save my darling plant. +That salt is Conservatism. It is furnished by people of property, by +men who have interests to guard. Salt is a grand thing, let me tell +you! Balfour is the man to sprinkle salt. Home Rule from him would be +safe. He is the greatest man that ever governed Ireland, but that must +be stale to you. You must have heard that everywhere. He put his foot +on rebellion and crushed it out of existence. On the other hand the +poor folks of the West coast would lie down and let him walk over +them. They hold him in such esteem that they would regard it a favour +if he would honour them by wiping his feet on them. He might walk +unarmed and unattended through Ireland from end to end with perfect +safety. But which of the Nationalist members could do that? Not one. +The city scum, the criminal, irreclaimable class, shout 'Hell to +Balfour,' but these poor readers of the <i>Freeman's Journal</i> and +such-like prints, prepared for their special use and written down to +their level, must not be classed with the people of Ireland at all. +Every country has its ruffian element, every country has its poisonous +press. Ireland is no worse than other countries in these respects."</p> + +<p>My Irish Conservative Home Ruler would have gone on indefinitely, +furnishing excellent matter, for he improved as he warmed up, but +unhappily a priest called on him to make some purchase, and he had to +leave me without much notice. "Over the way," he said. "Trip across to +the opposite shop, and you'll find another Tory Home Ruler."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>As I "tripped" across I thought of the Pills and Ointment man who +amassed a colossal fortune by fifty years' advertising of the fact +that wonders never will cease. Mr. Overtheway was not quite so Tory as +might be supposed, after all. He said:—</p> + +<p>"I have no objection to Home Rule, but, although a Catholic, I have +the greatest objection to Rome Rule, which is precisely what it means. +I object to this great Empire being ruled from Rome. The greatest +Empire that the world ever saw to be bossed by a party of priests! Do +the English know what they are now submitting to?</p> + +<p>"Let me put the thing logically, and controvert me if you can.</p> + +<p>"If Mr. Gladstone wished to go to war to-morrow, is he not at the +mercy of the Irish Nationalist party? Could he get votes of supply +without their aid? In the event of any sudden, or grave emergency, any +serious and critical contingency, would they not hold the key of the +position, would they not have the power to make or mar the Empire? +Surely they would. And are not these men in the hands of the priests? +Surely they are. That is a matter of common knowledge, as sure as that +water will drown and fire will burn. A pretty position for a sensible +man like John Bull to be placed in by a blethering idiot, who can +argue with equal volubility on either side, but with more conviction +when in the wrong. Bull must have been drunk, and drunk on stupid +beer, when he placed his heart strings between the finger and thumb of +a quack like that, who, whatever the result, whether we get Home Rule +or not, has ruined the country for five-and-twenty years.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I am a Home Ruler. But for heaven's sake don't thrust +self-government on an unfortunate country that is not ready for it. +That country cries for it, you say. The snuffling old air-pump across +the Channel says the same thing. Says he: 'Beloved brethren, I greet +you. I fall on your neck and kiss your two ears, and give you all you +ask. For why, beloved brethren? Why do I this thing. Let us in a +spirit of love enquire. Because it is the wish of the country; because +it is the aspiration of the people; because I feel a deep-seated, +internal affection for your beautiful land, in whose affairs, during +my eighty-four years' pilgrimage in this vale of tears, I have, as you +know, always shown the strongest, the warmest, the most passionate +interest, and on whose lovely shores I have during my seven dozen +years spent (altogether) nearly a week. It has been said that I have +never been in Ulster, and that, therefore, I am unable to appreciate +the situation. An atrocious falsehood. I have spent two hours (nearly) +in the northern province, having landed from Sir Somebody's yacht to +see the Giant's Causeway. I have studied the Irish question by means +of mineral specimens gathered from the four provinces, and I am, +therefore, competent to settle the Irish question for ever. Do you +know a greater man than myself? I confess I don't. Bless you, my +children. You ask for Home Rule. Enough. The fact that you ask proves +a Divine right to have what you ask for. You are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>a people rightly +struggling to be free,' says owld Gladstone. 'Hell to my sowl,' says +he, 'but that's what ye are,' says he.</p> + +<p>"And he starts to murder us by giving what the most ignorant, +unthinking, unpatriotic, self-seeking people in the country have asked +for, and swears that because they ask they must have.</p> + +<p>"As well give a razor to a baby that cried for it.</p> + +<p>"Ireland must be treated as an infant.</p> + +<p>"An Irish Legislature would lead to untold miseries. We might arrive +there some day, but not at a jump. The change is too sudden. We want a +little training. We want to grow, and growth is a thing that cannot be +forced. It takes time. Give us time for heaven's sake. Give us Home +Rule, but also give us time. Give us milk, then fish, then perhaps a +chop, and then, as we grow strong, beefsteak and onions. A word in +your ear. This is certain truth, you can go Nap on it. Tell the +English people that the people are getting sick of agitation, that +they want peace and quietness, that they are losing faith in +agitators, having before them a considerable stretch of history, +which, notwithstanding the scattered population, is filtering down +into the minds of the people, with its morals all in big print. The +Irish folks are naturally quick-witted. They are simple and confiding, +many of them very ignorant, if you will, but they find out their +friends in the long run. Look at Balfour. Not a man in the whole world +for whom the people have so much affection. Which do you think would +get the best welcome to-morrow—Balfour or Morley? Balfour a hundred +thousand times. Ah, now; my countrymen know the real article when they +see it. Home Rule we want for convenience and for cheapness. We don't +want to be compelled to rush to London before we can build a bridge. +But rather a million times submit to expense and inconvenience than +hand the country over to a set of thieves who'd sell us to-morrow. +We're not such fools as ye take us for. Don't we know these heroes? +And when we see them and Gladstone and Morley and Humbug Harcourt with +his seventeen chins, all rowling together in Abraham's bosom (as ye +may say)—Harcourt licking Harrington's boots, when only yesterday Tim +was spittin' in his eye—we say to ourselves 'Wait yet awhile, my +Boys, wait yet awhile.' But when ye've finished yer slavering and +splathering, and when Tim Healy can find time to take his heel off +Morley's neck, then, and not before, we'll have something to say to +you.</p> + +<p>"But you should call on my friend on the right. He is also a Home +Ruler—like myself."</p> + +<p>Number three had powerfully-developed opinions. He said—"Home Rule on +Conservative lines is my ticket. We'll get it on no other. I console +myself with that idea. Otherwise it would be a frightful business, and +what would become of us, I cannot tell. But I do not believe that even +Gladstone would be so insane as to give it us. I cannot believe that +the middle class voters of England would stand by and see the +corresponding class in this country exterminated. Home Rule as much as +you like, if we had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>the right men. The very poorest peasants are +becoming alive to the fact that under present circumstances the thing +would never do for them. They want the right men, that is, men of +money and character, to come forward. And I declare most solemnly, +that I am convinced that the Irish people would fall into line, and +see the bill thrown out with perfect quietude. Now the push has come, +they really do not want Home Rule, and, what is more, they absolutely +dread it, and I firmly believe that a general election at the present +moment would send a majority of Unionists to power. The priests are +working for life and death. They see that this is their best chance, +perhaps their very last opportunity. I am a Catholic; but then I am a +Parnellite, a Tory Parnellite. And I have no intention of bartering +away my political freedom to my Church, which, in my opinion, should +keep clear of politics. The clergy have now advised payment of rent, +so that the Government may not be embarrassed at a very critical +juncture. And the tenants are paying their rent, although the present +period is one of great agricultural depression. Look at this: The +Ulster farmers are terribly hard up, are complaining that they cannot +pay. This is the Protestant province, where the priests have little +scope. But in Leinster, Munster, and Connaught, the people are paying +the landlord. The word has gone round—pay the landlord, whomever else +you don't pay! The oilcake man, the implement man, the shopkeeper, are +not getting their dues, but notwithstanding the pinch of the present +moment, the landlord (who knows all about it) is paid. And the priests +in some cases are actually remitting the clerical dues to enable the +small men to pay the rint. Pay the rint, say they, if you pledge your +very boots, if you have to go to the gombeen man (money-lender), if +you have almost to rob the Church. They want to get possession, they +want to get power, they want to get Home Rule; and then they know +that, as Scripture says, 'All these things shall be added unto them.' +Let them once get the upper hand, and they can very soon recoup +themselves.</p> + +<p>"The priests are showing England their power, with a view to future +good bargains. 'You see what we can do,' say they. Arrange the matter +with us. We are the boys. The Reverend Father O'Codling is the man. +Have no dealings, except such as are authorised by us, with the +red-headed Tim Healy Short. The Clergy have only one idea; that is, of +course, the predominance of their Church. Very natural, and, from +their point of view, very proper. I find no fault with them, but I say +their object hardly commends itself to my undivided admiration, and, +being still friendly, we on this subject part company. I wish to let +the priests down easy. They are mostly very good men, apart from +politics. They are good customers to me, and they pay very promptly. +They spend their money in the country, and I'd have no fault to find +if they'd lave politics alone. Mind that owld Gladstone doesn't become +a Papist all out. 'Twould be better for him, no doubt, and as the +whole jing-bang that turned round with him before would no doubt +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>still follow at his heels, we'd get a considerable quantity of +converts, if we could say little about the quality. D'ye hear what +that owld woman's singing?"</p> + +<p>I listened with interest. The minstrelsy of Ireland seems to have +drifted into the hands of the most unpoetical people in the green +isle. The poor old creature walked very, very slowly along the gutter, +ever and anon giving herself a suggestive twitch, which plainly +indicated some cutaneous titillation—the South is a grazing country. +This was all I heard—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Owld Oireland was Owld Oireland<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whin England was a pup.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oireland will be Owld Oireland<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whin England's bur-r-sted up!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If my friends are right as to the change of feeling <i>re</i> Home Rule, +the dear old lady was hardly up to date. But the great author of +"Dirty Little England"—I judge of the author by the internal evidence +of sentiment, style, and literary merit—certainly composed the above +beautiful stanza in the sure and certain hope that the present bill +would become law.</p> + +<p>Number Three qualified his remarks on rent, when speaking of the +County Clare. "There they embarrass the Government by refusing to pay, +and by shooting people in the good old way, just at the most ticklish +time." He said, "Clare has always been an exceptional county. Clare +returned Daniel O'Connell, by him secured Catholic Emancipation, and +from that time has called itself the premier county of Ireland. They +are queer, unmanageable divils, are the Clare folks, and we are only +divided from them by the Shannon. So the Kerry folks go mad sometimes +by contagion. I should advise you to keep away from Clare. You might +get a shot-hole put into you. Every visitor is noticed in those lonely +regions, and the little country towns only serve to disseminate the +arrival of a stranger to the rural districts. Suppose you walk five +miles out of Ennis the day after you arrive there, I would wager a +pound the first woman that sees you pass her cottage will say, 'That's +the Englishman that Maureen O'Hagan said was staying at the Queen's +Hotel.' The servants are regular spies, every one of them. I couldn't +speak politics in my house because I've a Catholic nurse. Good bye, I +hope ye won't get shot."</p> + +<p>I thanked him for the interest expressed, but failed to share his +nervousness. After having mingled with the Nationalist crowd that +followed the Balfour column in the Dublin torchlight procession, after +having escaped unhurt from the blazing Nationalists who swarm in the +Royal Victoria Hotel, Cork, having walked down the Limerick entrance +to the balmy Tipperary, a little shooting, more or less, is unworthy a +moment's consideration. Besides which, my perpetual journeying and +interviewing and scribbling have made me so thin that Captain +Moonlight himself would be bound to miss. However, it is well to be +prepared for the worst, so—<i>Pax vobiscum</i>, and away to County Clare.</p> + +<p class="date">Tralee (Co. Kerry), April 20th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_12_ENGLISH_IGNORANCE_AND_IRISH_PERVERSITY" id="No_12_ENGLISH_IGNORANCE_AND_IRISH_PERVERSITY"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 12.—ENGLISH IGNORANCE AND IRISH PERVERSITY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> most enchanting place when you have time to look at it. My flying +visit of ten days ago gave the city no chance. Let me redeem this +error, so far as possible. There are two, if not three Limericks in +one, a shamrock tripartition, a trinity in unity,—English-town, +Irish-town, and New Town Perry. New Limerick is a well-built city, +which will compare favourably with anything reasonable anywhere. Much +of it resembles the architecture of Bedford Square, London. The streets +are broad and rectangular, the shops handsome and well furnished. But +it is the natural features of the vicinity which "knock" the +susceptible Saxon. The Shannon, the classic Shannon, sweeps grandly +through the town, winding romantically under the five great bridges, +washing the walls of the stupendous Castle erected by King John, the +only British sovereign who ever visited Limerick—serpentining through +meadows backed by mountains robed in purple haze, reflecting in its +broad mirror many a romantic and historic ruin, its banks dotted with +salmon-fishers pulling out great fish and knocking them on the head, +its promenades abounding with the handsomest women in the world. For +the Limerick ladies are said to be the most beautiful in Ireland, and +competent English judges—I know nothing of such matters—assure me +that the boast is justified. Get to Cruise's Royal Hotel, which for a +hundred years has looked over the Shannon, take root in its airy, roomy +precincts, pleasant, clean, and sweet, with white-haired servitors like +noble earls in disguise to bring your ham and eggs, Limerick ham, mind +you, which at this moment fetches 114s. per cwt. in London; and with +the awful cliffs of Kilkee within easy distance, where the angry +Atlantic Ocean, dashing with gigantic force against the rock-bound +coast, sends spray two or three miles inland, the falls of Castleconnel +with the salmon-fisheries under your very nose, and the four hours +river-steamer to Kilrush, with more Cathedrals, statues, antiquities, +curiosities, novelties, quaintnesses than could be described in a +three-volume novel—do all those things, and, while on your back in the +smoke room, after a hard day's pleasure, you will probably be heard to +murmur that in the general Fall some of us dropped easily enough, and +that, all things considered, Adam's unhappy collapse was decidedly +excusable.</p> + +<p>The Limerick folks are said to be the most Catholic people in Ireland. +They are more loyal than the Corkers. Why is this? The more Catholic, +the more disloyal, is the general experience. Nobody whose opinion is +worth anything will deny this, and however much you may wish to +dissociate religion from politics, you cannot blink this fact. In +dealing with important matters, it is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>useless to march a +hair's-breadth beside the truth. Better go for it baldheaded, calling +things by their right names, taking your gruel, and standing by to +receive the lash. You are bound to win in the long run. I say the +Catholic priests are disloyal to the Queen. Men of the old school, the +few who remain, are loyal, ardently loyal. The old-timers were +gentlemen. They were sent to Douai or some other Continental +theological school, where they rubbed against gentlemen of broad +culture, of extensive view, of perfect civilisation. They returned to +Ireland with a personal weight, a cultivation, a refinement, which +made them the salt of Irish earth. These men are still loyal. The +Maynooth men, sons of small farmers, back-street shopkeepers, +pawnbrokers, and gombeen men, aided by British gold, these half-bred, +half-educated absorbers of eleemosynary ecclesiasticism, are deadly +enemies to the Empire. This is Mr. Bull's guerdon for the Maynooth +grant. My authority is undeniable. The statement is made on the +assurance of eminent Catholics. Two Catholic J.P.'s yesterday +concurred in this, and no intelligent Irish Catholic will think +otherwise. Surely this consideration should be a factor in arguments +against Home Rule.</p> + +<p>Then why are the Limerick Catholics loyal? Because the Limerick Bishop +is loyal. Bishop O'Dwyer is opposed to Home Rule. Said Mr. James +Frost, J.P., of George's Street: "When the Bishop first came here he +invited some four hundred Catholics to a banquet at the palace. After +dinner he proposed the health of the Queen, and all the company save +two or three rose and received the toast with enthusiasm, waving their +handkerchiefs and showing an amount of warmth that was most gratifying +to me. I need not tell you that an average Home Rule audience would +not have accepted the toast at all. This shows you the feeling of the +most intelligent Catholics. The people of education and property are +loyal. It shows also that they are opposed to Home Rule."</p> + +<p>"But if the best Catholics are opposed to Home Rule, why don't they +say so publicly?"</p> + +<p>"A fair question, which shall have a precise answer. But first, we +must go back to Mr. Balfour's great Land Act, and the lowering of the +franchise, and observe the effect of these two enactments.</p> + +<p>"The people were at one time terribly ill-used. That is all over now, +but the memory still rankles. The Irish are great people for +tradition. The landlords have for ages been the traditional embodiment +of tyranny and religious ascendency. The Irish people have long +memories, very long memories. Englishmen would say: 'No matter what +happened to my great-grandfather; I am treated well, and that is +enough for me.' Irishmen still go harping on the landlord, although he +no longer has any power. The terrible history of the former +relationship between landlord and tenant is still kept up and +remembered, and will be remembered for ages, if not for ever. +Presently you will see the bearing of all this on your question—Why +do not the best Catholics come forward and speak against Home Rule?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>"When the franchise was lowered the rebound from repression was +tremendous, like a powerful spring that has been held down, or like an +explosive which is the more destructive in proportion as it is more +confined. People newly made free go to the opposite extreme. +Emancipate a serf and he becomes insolent, he does not know how to use +his freedom, and becomes violent. The great majority of the people are +smarting from the old land laws, which have left a bitter animosity +against English rule, which is popularly denounced as being +responsible for them.</p> + +<p>"To speak against Home Rule is to associate yourself with the worst +aspects of the land question. The bulk of the people are incapable of +making a distinction. And while they entertain some respect for a +Protestant opponent, they are irreconcilable with Unionist Catholics, +just as the English Gladstonians have a far more virulent dislike for +the Liberal Unionists than for the rankest Tories. They say to the +Protestants, 'We know why you uphold Unionism'—that is, as they +believe, landlordism—'for the landlords are English and Protestant; +your position is understandable.' But to the Catholic they say, 'You +are not only an enemy, but a renegade, a traitor, and a deserter.' And +whatever that man's position may be, the people can make things +uncomfortable for him."</p> + +<p>Another Catholic living near, said: "'How would Home Rule work?' you +ask. Most destructively, most ruinously. Under the most favourable +circumstances, whether Home Rule passes or not, the country will not +recover the shock of the present agitation for many a year; not, I +think, in my lifetime. I was over in the North of England last year, +and I found that the people there knew nothing of the question, +literally nothing. Clever men, intelligent men, men who had the ear of +the people, displayed a profundity of ignorance on Irish questions, +conjoined with a confidence in discussing them, surpassing belief. +They changed their minds on hearing my statements, and on obtaining +exact information. I must give them credit for that. I believe the +English Gladstonians are only suffering from ignorance. Their leader +is certainly not less ignorant than the bleating flock at his heels. +They smugly argue from the known to the unknown on entirely false +premises. They know that when Englishmen act in this or that way, such +and such things will happen. They know what they themselves would do +in certain conjunctures, and when they are told by Irishmen that +Irishmen under similar conditions would act quite differently, they +snort and say 'nonsense.' They are too dense to appreciate the radical +difference between the two races. The breeds don't mix and don't +understand each other. It was miserable to hear these men—I am sure +they were good men—prattling like bib-and-tucker babies about Irish +affairs, and speaking of Gladstone as possessing a quality which we +Catholics only ascribe to the Pope. Ha! ha! They think that vain old +cataract of verbiage to be infallible. He knows nothing of the matter, +does not understand the tools he is working with, any one of whom +could <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>buy and sell him and simple, clever Morley twenty times over. +Both Gladstone and Morley <i>are</i> clever in books, in words, in +theories, adepts in debating, smart and adroit in talk. But they know +no more of Paddy than the babe unborn. I say nothing of Harcourt and +the other understrappers. They'll say anything that suits, whatever it +may be. We reckoned them up long since. Cannot the English people see +through these nimble twisters and time-servers, this crowd of lay +Vicars of Bray?"</p> + +<p>Catholic Home Ruler Number Three said, "I agree with all who say that +the priests would do their best to secure a dominating influence in +political affairs. And although I think we ought to have an Irish +Legislature, although I believe it would be good for us, yet if the +priestly influence were to become supreme for one moment of time—if +you tell me that the Catholic Church is to hold the reins for one +second, then I say, away with Home Rule, away with it for ever! Better +stay as we are."</p> + +<p>This gentleman seems to have about as much logical foresight as some +of those he criticises. He dreads priestly domination above +everything, and yet would approve of giving the priests a chance of +being masters. He continued:—</p> + +<p>"The present Irish leaders are the curse of the movement, which, +should it succeed, would in their hands bring untold sorrows on the +country. As a Catholic Home Ruler, I put up my hands in supplication, +and I beg, I implore of the English people to withhold their assent. +For God's sake don't give it us at present. We must have it sooner or +later, but wait till we have leaders we can trust. Have you met a +decent Home Ruler who trusts the present men? No. I knew you would say +so. Such a man cannot be found in Ireland. Then why send them to +Parliament, say you? That is just what you Englishmen do not +understand. That is one of the points old Gladstone is wrecking the +country on. You think it unanswerable. Listen to me.</p> + +<p>"When the franchise was lowered, then the mistake was made. You let in +an immense electorate utterly incapable of discussing any question of +State; and, rushing from the extreme of abject servility to a sort of +tyrannical mastery, they elected as their representatives, not the +most able men, not the most orderly men, not the men of some training +and education, not the men who had some stake in the country, but the +most violent men, the glibbest men, the most factious, the most +contumacious, the most pragmatical men were the men they elected. Look +at the Poor-Law Boards. See the set sent there. Those are the men who +will be sent to the Dublin Parliament. Are they men to be trusted with +the affairs of State? Look up your Burke, and observe the +qualifications he thinks necessary to a statesman. Then look at the +blacksmith who represents the county Tipperary, the mason who +represents Meath, the drapers' assistants and bacon factors' clerks +who represent other places. You don't quite see this in England. These +men perhaps tell you that they are kings in their <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>own country. +Ireland is a long way off, and far-away hills are green.</p> + +<p>"Reverse the situation. Let Dublin be the seat of Empire and London +wanting Home Rule. You really want it, and think it would be best for +both—a convenience for yourself and a saving of time for all. Would +you not draw back at the last moment if under the circumstances I have +named, your country was to be handed over to fellows whose sole income +was derived from their political work, artisans, clerks, and +shopkeepers' assistants? What would these men do with their power? +Make haste to be rich—nothing more. Patriots are they? Rubbish; they +are mere mercenaries. Parnell knew that. He said to me:—</p> + +<p>"'Under the circumstances I must use these men, whom I would not +otherwise touch with a forty-foot pole. Adversity makes us acquainted +with strange bedfellows. Any port is good in a storm. These men will +fight well—for their pay, and will work the thing up. But when we get +the bill, when we come into power, their work is done. They will be +dropped at once, or furnished with places where they may get an honest +living.'"</p> + +<p>Catholic Home Ruler Number Four said: "The Meath election shows the +feeling of the priests, and what they would do if they could. They +loathed Parnell, but he was too strong for them. And weren't they glad +to give him the slip on the ground of morality. Home Rule was +comparatively a safe thing while Parnell lived. Now I would not advise +it for some years. We must have better men to the fore. We in Limerick +are loyal, although Catholics and Home Rulers. Don't laugh at that. It +is a fact, though I admit it is hard to believe. Put it down, if you +like, to the influence of the Bishop. The young priests I say nothing +about. Their loyalty is a negligeable quantity. They do not object to +Protestants <i>qua</i> Protestants, but they object to them as +representatives of English rule."</p> + +<p>This reminded me of Dr. Kane, of Belfast, who said to me, "They hate +us, not because we are Protestants, not because we are Orangemen, not +because we are strangers in the land, but because we are the hated +English garrison."</p> + +<p>Here I am bound to interpolate a word of qualification. The Mardyke +promenade of Cork, a mile-long avenue of elms, has many comfortable +seats, whereon perpetually do sit the "millingtary" of the +sacrilegious Saxon, holding sweet converse with the Milesian +counterparts of the Saxon Sarah Ann. The road is full of them, Tommy's +yellow-striped legs marching with the neat kirtle of Nora, Sheela, or +Maureen. As it was in the Isle of Saints, so it was in Ulster, is now +in Limerick, and shall be in Hibernia <i>in sæcula sæculorum</i>. A +Limerick constable said, "A regiment will come into the city at four +o'clock, and at eight they'll every man walk out a girl. The +infatuation of the servant-girl class for the military is surprisin'. +Only let them walk out with a soldier, and they 'chuck' everything, +even Home Rule." The hated garrison are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>not among the people who +never will be missed. Wherever Tommy goes he seems to be able to +sample the female population. The soldiers always have a rare good +time.</p> + +<p>A carman who drove me to Castleconnel proved the most interesting +politician since Dennis Mulcahy, of Carrignaheela. He knew all about +the average English voter, and resented his superior influence in +Irish affairs. "Shure, we're all undher the thumb o' a set o' black +men that lives undher the bowils o' the airth. Yer honner must know +all about thim miners in the Black Counthry, an' in Wales, an' the +Narth o' England? Ye didn't? Ah, now, ye're jokin' me, ye take me for +an omadhaun all out. Ye know all about it; ye know that these poor men +goes down, an' down, an' down, till ye'd think they'd niver shtop, an' +that they stay there a whole week afore they come up agin. An' then +they shtand in tubs while their wives an' sweethearts washes an' +scrubs thim, an' makes white men out o' the black men that comes up, +an' thin walks thim off home. Now, shtandin' in a tub at the mouth o' +the pit to be washed by yer wimmenfolks is what we wouldn't do in this +counthry—'tisn't black naygurs we are—an' these men that lives in +the dark and have no time to think, an' nothin' to think wid, these +are the men ye put to rule this counthry, men that they print sich +rubbish as <i>Tit-Bits</i> for, because they couldn't understand sinse. An' +the man that first found out that they couldn't understand sinse, an' +gave thim somethin' that wanted no brains, they say has made a +fortune. Is that thrue, now?</p> + +<p>"As for owld Gladstone, I wouldn't trust him out o' me sight. We'll +get no Home Rule, the owld thrickster doesn't mane it. 'Tis like a man +I knew that was axed to lind a friend £100. He didn't like to lind, +an' he was afeared to say No, an' he was in a quondairy intirely. So, +says he 'I'll lind ye the money,' says he, 'if ye'll bring the +securities down to the bank,' says he, 'an' get the cash off me +banker.' Thin he went saycretly to the banker, an' says he, 'This +thievin' blayguard,' says he, 'wants the money, and he'll never repay +me; I wouldn't thrust him,' says he. 'Now, will ye help me, for I +couldn't say No, by raison he's a relative, an' an owld acquaintance,' +says he.</p> + +<p>"'An' how'll I do that?' says the banker.</p> + +<p>"'Ye can tur-rn up yer nose at the securities.'</p> + +<p>"'Ha, Ha,' says the banker, 'is it there ye are? Ye're a deep one; +begorra ye are. Nabocklish,' says he, 'I'll do it for ye,' says he.</p> + +<p>"So whin the borrower wint for the money, the banker sent out word +that the securities wor not good enough, an' that he wouldn't advance +a farden.</p> + +<p>"Then the borrower goes to his frind an' complains, an' thin the frind +acts all out the way Gladstone'll act when the bill's refused at the +Lords, or may be at the Commons. 'Hell to him,' he roars, 'the +blayguard thief iv a thievin' banker. I'll tache him to refuse a +frind, says he. 'Sarve him right,' says he, 'av I bate his head <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>into +a turnip-mash an' poolverise him into Lundy Foot snuff. May be I +won't, whin I meet him, thrash him till the blood pours down his +heels,' says he. That'll be the way iv it. That's what Gladstone will +say whin the bill's lost, which he manes it to be, the conthrivin' +owld son o' a schamer.</p> + +<p>"A gintleman axed me which o' them I like best o' the two Home Rule +Bills, an' I towld him that whin I lived at Ennis, an' drove a car at +the station there, the visithors, Americans an' English, would be +axin' me whin they lepped on the car which was the best hotel in +Ennis. Now, whiniver I gave them my advice they would be cur-rsin' an' +sinkin' at me whin they met me aftherwards in the sthreet, be raison +that there was only two hotels in the place, an' nayther o' thim was +at all aiqual to what they wor used to in their own counthries. So I +got to know this, an' iver afther, whin they would be sayin' to me,</p> + +<p>"'Which is the best hotel in Ennis?' says they, an' I would answer,</p> + +<p>"'Faix, there's only two o' thim, an' to whichiver one ye go ye will +be sorrowin' that ye didn't go to the other,' says I.</p> + +<p>"An' that's my reply as to which of the two Home Rule Bills I like +best."</p> + +<p>In the city of Limerick itself all is quiet and orderly. Outside, +things are different. Disturbed parts of the County Clare are +dangerous to strangers, and, what is more to the point, somewhat +difficult of access. The country is not criss-crossed with railways as +in England, and vehicles for long journeys are rather hard to get. +However, I have chartered a car for a three-day trip into what may be +called the interior, have fired several hundred cartridges from a +Winchester repeating rifle, and written letters to my dearest friends. +I start to-morrow, and if I do not succeed in bottoming the recent +outrages—which are hushed up as much as possible, and of which the +local newspaper-men, both Nationalist and Conservative, together with +Head-Constable MacBrinn, declare they cannot get at the precise +particulars—if I cannot get to the root of the matter, I shall in my +next letter have the honour of stating the reason why.</p> + +<p class="date">Limerick, April 22nd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_13_THE_CURSE_OF_COUNTY_CLARE" id="No_13_THE_CURSE_OF_COUNTY_CLARE"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 13.—THE CURSE OF COUNTY CLARE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettero.png" alt="O" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />nce again the difference between Ireland and England is forcibly +exemplified. It was certain that several moonlighting expeditions had +recently been perpetrated in the neighbourhood of Limerick, which is +only divided by the Shannon from the County Clare. You walk over a +bridge in the centre of the city and you change your county, but +nobody in Limerick seems to know anything about the matter. The local +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>papers hush up the outrages when they hear of them, which is seldom or +never. The people who know anything will not, dare not tell, and even +the police have the utmost difficulty in establishing the bare facts +of any given case. English publicity is entirely unknown. Local +correspondents do not always exist in country towns, and the distances +are so great, in comparison with the facilities for travel, that +newspaper-men seldom or never visit the scene of the occurrence. And +besides the awkward and remote position of the country hamlets and +mountain farms, there are other excellent reasons for journalistic +reticence. The people do not wish to read such news, the editors do +not wish to print these discreditable records, and the police, +although eminently and invariably civil and obliging, are debarred by +their official position from disclosing what they know. The very +victims themselves are often silent, refusing to give details, and +almost always declining to give evidence. That the sufferers usually +know and could easily identify the cowardly ruffians who so cruelly +maltreat them is a well-ascertained fact. That they usually declare +they have no clue to the offenders is equally well known. The +difficulty of arresting suspected men is enhanced by the fact that the +moonlighters have a complete system of scouts who in this bare and +thinly populated district, descry the police when miles away, giving +timely warning to the marauders; these, besides, are readily concealed +by their neighbours and friends, who in this display an ingenuity and +enthusiasm worthy a better cause. Suppose the villains are caught +red-handed; even then the difficulties are by no means over. In +Ireland a felon once in the hands of the police, by that one +circumstance at once and for ever becomes a hero, a martyr, a man to +be excused, to be prayed for, to be worshipped. No matter how black +his offence, the touch of the constabulary washes him whiter than +snow, purifies him from every earthly taint, surrounds him with a halo +of sanctity. Those whom he has injured will not bear witness against +him, because their temerity might cost them their lives, the loss of +their property, the esteem of their fellow-men. What this means we +shall shortly see. The cases I have examined will speak for +themselves. And let it be remembered that close proximity to the +scenes described produces an incomparably stronger effect than any +description, however minute, however painstaking. The utter +lawlessness of the districts I have visited since penning Monday's +letter has produced a profound, an indelible impression. I pass over +the means employed to get over the ground, merely stating that +horseflesh has borne the brunt of the business. That and pedestrianism +are the only means available, with untold patience and perseverance to +worm out the true story. People will not show the way, or will direct +you wrongly. Their ignorance, that is, their assumed ignorance, is +wonderful, incredible. They are all sthrangers in those parts. They +never knew a family of that name, never heard of any moonlighting, +swear that the amusement is unknown thereabouts, assert that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>the +whole thing is a fabrication of the police. All the people round are +decent, honest, hard-working folks, without a fault; pious, virtuous, +immaculate. You push on, and your friend runs after you. Stay a +moment, something has struck him. Just at the last distressing hour, +his brain displayed amazing power. Now he comes to think of it, +something was said to have happened over there, at Ballygammon, ten +miles in the opposite direction. A stack was fired, and they said it +was the Boys. It was the police who burnt the hay, but they deny it +"av coorse." He is suspiciously anxious to afford all the information +he can. Ballygammon is the spot, and Tim Mugphiller your man. Mention +Mike Delany and you will get every information, and—have ye a screw +of tobacky these hard times. You pursue your way certain that at last +you are on the right track, and Mike's jaw drops to his knees. Too +late he sees that his only chance of altering your course was to point +out the right one.</p> + +<p>Dropping for once scenery and surroundings, let us at once plunge, as +Horace advises, <i>in medias res</i>. The district in Mr. Balfour's time +was pleasant and peaceable. Curiously enough its troubles commenced +with the change of Government. From March 18 to April 18 the police of +Newcastlewest received tidings of fifteen outrages. How many have been +perpetrated no man living can tell, for people often think it wisest +to hold their peace. Ireland is often said to be almost free from +crime, except of the agrarian kind, and moonlighting is partly +condoned by reason of its alleged cause. How must we class the +following case?</p> + +<p>On February 19, 1893, four armed men with blackened faces and dressed +as women, attacked the dwelling of T. Donoghue, of Boola, not far from +Newcastle. They burst open the door and entered, not to revenge any +real or fancied wrong, but purely and simply to obtain possession of a +sum of £150, which Donoghue's daughter had brought from America. They +believed they would have an easy prey, but they were mistaken; there +were two or three men in the house, and the heroes decamped instanter, +followed, unknown to themselves, by one of Donoghue's family. Having +duly run them to earth, he informed the police, who caught them neatly +enough, their shoes covered with fresh mud, and with every +circumstance of guilt. The Donoghue folks identified them. The case +was perfectly clear—that is the expressed opinion of everybody I have +met, official and otherwise. It was tried at the Limerick Spring +Assizes, and the jury returned a verdict of "Not guilty!" These +patriotic jurors had doubtless much respect for their oaths, more for +the interests of justice, more still for their own skins. This case is +public property, and is only cited to prove that when the difficulty +of arrest and the greater difficulty of obtaining evidence are with +infinite pains overcome, the jury will not convict, no matter what the +crime. Before he commences his career of crime, the moonlight marauder +knows the chances of being caught are immensely in his favour, that +should <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>luck in this matter be against him, his very victim will +decline to identify him, nay, will affirm that he is not the man, and +that when the worst comes to the worst, no jury in the counties of +Kerry, Clare, or Limerick will convict.</p> + +<p>Here are some results of my researches. The particulars of these cases +now first appear in print.</p> + +<p>A man named James Dore, who keeps a public-house in Bridge Street, +Newcastlewest—I can vouch for his beer—also held a small farm of +forty-nine acres from the Earl of Devon, for which he paid the modest +rent of £11 10s. per annum—the land maintaining sixteen cows and +calves, which, on the usual local computation of £10 profit on each +cow, would leave a gain of £148 10s.—not a bad investment, as Irish +farming goes. So it was considered, and when the tenant-right was +announced as for sale by auction, two cousins of Dore, who held farms +contiguous, agreed to jointly bid for the tenant-right, and having +secured the land, to arrange its partition between themselves. They +went to £400, but this was not regarded as enough, and the +tenant-right was for a specified time held over for purchase by +private agreement. A farmer named William Quirke offered £590, which +was accepted, and the money paid. After this, the two cousins came +forward and said they would purchase the tenant-right, offering £40 +more than Quirke had paid. They were told that they were too late, and +the Earl's agent (Mr. Curling) said nothing could now be done. This +was on the 13th of the present month of April. On the 14th, Mr. James +Cooke, Lord Devon's bailiff, was seen showing the purchaser Quirke +over the newly-acquired holding. Poor Quirke little knew what was at +that moment hanging over him. He had not long to wait. The dastard +demon of moonlight ruffianism was on his track.</p> + +<p>Quirke had a son aged fourteen years, but looking two years younger, a +simple peasant lad, who cannot have injured his country very much. He +was tending a cow, which required watching, his father and mother +taking their rest while the child sat out the lonely hours in the +cowhouse. He heard something, and listened with all his ears. Not +voices, but a subdued whispering. It was the dead hour of night, two +or half-past two, and the boy was frightened. The place is lonely, +seven miles or more from Newcastlewest, and up towards the mountains. +He listened and listened, and again heard the mysterious sounds. He +says he "thought it was the fairies." He stole from the byre and went +to the house. A horrible dread had crept over him, and father and +mother were there. As he opened the door a terrible blow from behind +struck him down. He was not stunned, though felled by the butt-end of +a gun. They beat and kicked him as he lay. He gave an anguished cry. +The mother heard and recognised her boy's voice, and, waking the +father, said "Go down, they're killing my lad." The old man, for he is +an old man, went down the stairs naked and unarmed. The foul marauders +met him half-way up, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>served him as they had served the boy, +throwing him down, kicking him, and beating him with butt-ends of +guns; with one terrible blow breaking three of his ribs; and saying, +"Give it up, give it up." He said he would "give it up"; promised by +all he held sacred, begged hard for his life, and implored them at +least to spare the young lad. Their reply to this was to fire a charge +of shot into the boy's legs, a portion of the charge entering the +limbs of an old woman—his grandmother, I think—who was feebly trying +to shield the lad. This was such excellent sport that more was thought +expedient. A charge of shot was fired into the father's legs, and as +one knee-joint is injured, the elder Quirke's condition is precarious +even without his broken ribs and other injuries. The cowardly hounds +then left, in their horrid disguise adding a new terror to the lonely +night. The evening's entertainment was not yet over. They crossed a +couple of fields to a house where dwelt Quirke's married son. They +burst open the door of his cottage and dragged the young fellow—he is +about twenty-five—from his bed, beating him sorely, and in the +presence of his wife firing a charge of shot into his legs. Then they +went home, each man to his virtuous couch, to dream fair dreams of the +coming Paradise, when they and their kind may work their own sweet +will, free from the fear of a hireling constabulary, and under the +ægis of a truly national senate, given to a grateful country by a +Grand Old Man.</p> + +<p>The Quirkes know their assailants, but they will not tell. "What good +would it do me to have men imprisoned?" says William Quirke, senior. +"My lad's life might pay for it, and perhaps my own." The most +influential people of the district have remonstrated with him, argued, +persuaded, all in vain. William Quirke has a wish to remain in this +sublunary sphere. His spirit is not anxious to take unto itself the +wings of a dove, that it may fly away and be at rest. Like the dying +Methodist, whose preacher reminded him of the beauties of Paradise, he +likes "about here pretty well." Mr. Heard, Divisional Commissioner in +charge of the constabulary organisation of the Counties of Cork, +Limerick, and Kerry can get nothing out of William Quirke. +County-inspector Moriarty can stir nothing, nor Major Rolleston, +Resident Magistrate, nor Inspectors Wright, Pattison, and Huddy, all +of whom have done their level best. These gentlemen assert that +obviously Quirke knows the moonlighters, and for my own part, I am +certain of it. The married son is equally dumb. "They were disguised," +he says. "But you would recognise their voices." Then comes the +strangest assertion, "They never spoke a word." In other words, he +affirms that a number of men, not less than seven or eight, burst open +his door, dragged him from bed, maltreated and shot him, to the +accompaniment of his wife's terrified screaming and his own +protestations, without uttering a single syllable! The bold +Gladstonians whose influence removed Mr. Balfour from office and +delivered the country into ruffian <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>hands, will say: And serve the +people right! If they will not bear witness let the victims suffer. +You cannot help people who will not help themselves. The police are +there, the magistrates are there, the prisons are there, the hangman, +if need be, is there. If they will not avail themselves of the +protection provided, let them suffer. Let them go at it. All their own +fault. Nobody but themselves to blame.</p> + +<p>All very plausible and reasonable—in theory. Let us look a little +closer into this matter. What does William Quirke say:—"Nobody can +help an Irish farmer in a lonely part of Ireland. There are too many +ways of getting at him. Suppose I gave such evidence as would satisfy +anybody—I do not say I could—I don't know anything; but suppose I +knew and told, would a Limerick jury convict? Certainly not. Everybody +knows that. The police, the magistrates, will tell you that, every one +of them. Nobody will say anything else. Then, why rouse more enmity? I +shall give up the land even if I lose the money, the savings of a +life-time, added to a loan, which I can repay in time. That is +settled. What good would the land do me, once I were dead? I value my +life more than my money, and more especially do I think of those +belonging to me. Suppose I held on, and kept the land. Every time the +lad went out I'd expect him to be brought in shot to his mother and +me. And when I saw the lad's dead face, what would I think? And what +would I say when his mother turned round and said, 'Ye have the land, +haven't ye, William?' Our lives would not be worth twopence if I held +on. Do you remember Carey, the informer? The British Empire couldn't +protect him, though it shipped him across the world. How would I be +among the mountains here? I could be shot going to or coming from +market, my cattle houghed or mutilated, nobody would buy from me, +nobody would sell to me, nobody would work on my farm. My stacks would +be burnt. Look at the hay burnt in the last few weeks! You say I'd get +a presentment against the county—and if I did I'd have to wait till +next March for the money. Where's the capital to carry on? Suppose I +wanted thirty tons of hay between this and that. That would cost £90. +Where would I get the money? But that's not it. Life is dear, and life +might at any moment be taken. If my stacks were burnt in July I'd have +to wait a year for my money. I'd be cut off from all communication +with the people, and shunned as if I'd the plague. If I went to market +the people would leave the road to me, would cross over to the other +side when they saw me coming. You never saw boycotting; you don't know +what it means."</p> + +<p>In a lonely stretch of gorse-bordered road, steep and rough, I came +upon two members of the Royal Irish Constabulary, with rifles, +sword-bayonets, and bâtons. We had a chat, and I examined their short +Sniders while they admired the humble Winchester I carried for +company, and which on one occasion had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>acted like a charm. They +carried buckshot cartridges and ball, and had no objection to express +their views. "Balfour was the man to keep the country quiet. Two +resident magistrates could convict, and the blackguards knew that, if +caught, it was all up with them. They are the most cowardly vermin on +the face of the earth, for although if any of our men (who never go +singly, but always in twos or threes) were to appear unarmed, they'd +be murdered at sight. Yet although they often fire on us, they mostly +do it from such distances that their bullets have no effect, so that +they can run away the moment they pull the trigger. Lately things have +been looking rather blue over there." One pointed to the hills +dividing the county from Kerry. "The Kerry men are getting rifles. I +know the 'ping' of the brutes only too well. Let them get a few men +who know their weapons, and we'll be potted at five hundred yards +easily enough. Yes, they have rifles now, and what for? To shoot +sparrows? No. You can't guess? Give it up? Ye do? Then I'll tell you. +To carry out the Home Rule Bill. Yes, I do think so. Will you tell me +this? Who will in future collect rates and taxes? The tenants do not +think they will have any more rent to pay. Lots of them will tell you +that. These very men have the members of the Irish Parliament in their +hands. That is; they can return whomsoever they choose. The +representation of the country is in their hands. And the priests agree +with them. No difference there, their object is one and the same, and +when the priests and the farmers unite, who can compel them to pay up? +Is the Irish Legislature which will be returned by these men—is it a +likely body to compel payment of tribute to the hated Saxon at the +point of the bayonet? When the British Government, with all the +resources of Gladstonian civilisation, failed to put down boycotting, +how do you suppose a sympathetic Government, returned by the farmers, +consisting of farmers' sons, with a sprinkling of clever attorneys, +more smart than honest, will proceed with compulsory action? Why they +could do nothing if they wished, but then they will have no desire to +compel. The English people are only commencing their troubles. They +don't know they're born yet. Gladstone will have some explaining to +do, but he can do it, he can do it. He'd explain the shot out of the +Quirke family's legs. Ah! but he's a terrible curse to this country."</p> + +<p>The other officer said:—"Our duty is very discouraging. We are +hindered and baffled on every side by the people, whose sympathies are +always against the law. Now in England your sympathies are with the +law, and the people have the sense to support it, knowing that it will +support them, so long as they do the right thing. It was bad enough to +have the people against us, but now things are a hundred times worse. +When Balfour was in power, we felt that our labour was not in vain. We +felt that there was some chance of getting a conviction—not much, +perhaps, but still a chance. Now, if we catch the criminals redhanded, +we know no jury will <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>convict. We try to do our duty, but of course we +can't put the same heart into it as we could if we thought our work +would do any good. And another thing—we knew Balfour, so long as we +were acting with integrity, would back us up. Now we never know what +we're going to get—whether we shall be praised or kicked behind. This +Government is not only weak but also slippery. Outrages are +increasing. News of three more reached the Newcastlewest Barracks this +very day. We had a man on horseback scouring the mountains for +information. The outraged people sometimes keep it close. What's the +good, they say. We hear of the affair from other people, and the +principals, so to speak, ask us to make no fuss about it, as they +don't want to be murdered. The country is getting worse every day. +We'll have such a bloody winter as Ireland never saw."</p> + +<p>Another small moonlighting incident, now appearing for the first time +on this or any other stage. Some tenants years ago were evicted on the +Langford estates. Negotiations were proceeding for their proximate +restoration, but nothing could be settled. A few days ago a small +farmer named Benjamin Brosna, aged 55, agreed with the proper +authorities to graze some cattle on the land in question pending the +arrangement of the matter. A meeting at Haye's Cross was immediately +convened by two holy men of the district, to wit, Father Keefe, P.P., +and Father Brew, C.C., both of Meelin, and under the guidance of these +good easy men, it was resolved that any man grazing cattle on the +Langford land was as bad as the landlord, and must be treated +accordingly. On the same day, April 18, or rather in the night +succeeding the day of the meeting, eleven masked and armed men entered +Brosna's house, and one of them, presenting a gun, said, "We have you +now, you grass-grabber." Brosna seized the gun, and being hale and +active, despite his 55 years, showed such vigorous fight that he fell +through the doorway into the yard along with two others, where he was +brutally beaten, and must have been killed—it was their clear +intention—but for the pitchy darkness of the yard and the number of +his assailants, who in their fury fell over each other, enabling +Brosna, who being on his own ground knew the ropes better than they, +in the darkness to glide under a cart and escape over an adjacent +wall, where he hid himself. They lost him, and returned to the house, +firing shots at whatever they could damage, and smashing everything +breakable, from the windows upwards. Brosna will lose the sight of one +eye, which is practically beaten out. His servants, named Larkin, have +been compelled to leave by means of threatening letters. Their father +has also been threatened with death unless he instantly removes them +from Brosna's house.</p> + +<p>I could continue indefinitely, continuing my remarks to the +occurrences of one month or so; and if I abruptly conclude it is +because time presses, my return to civilisation having been effected +at 3.30 this morning, after a ten miles' mountain walk, followed by +three hours' ride in the blissful bowels of an empty cattle-truck. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>But for the good Samaritan of a luggage train I must last night have +camped beneath the canopy of heaven. No scarcity of fun in +Ireland—which beats the world for sparkling incident.</p> + +<p class="date">Rathkeale (Co. Limerick), April 24th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_14_LAWLESSNESS_AND_LAZINESS" id="No_14_LAWLESSNESS_AND_LAZINESS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 14.—LAWLESSNESS AND LAZINESS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he fruits of Gladstonian rule are ripening fast. Mr. Morley's visit +to Cork <i>en route</i> for Dublin corresponds with Inspector Moriarty's +visit to the Irish capital. Mr. Moriarty is the county inspector in +whose district most of the recent outrages have been perpetrated, and +is therefore able to give the Irish Secretary plenty of news. His +report will doubtless remain secret, as it is sensational. Mr. Morley +has too much regard for the sensibilities of Mr. and Mrs. Bull, and +when the Limerick inspector, entering the State confessional of Dublin +Castle, advances and says, "I could a tale unfold whose lightest word +Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, Make thy two eyes, +like stars, start from their spheres, Thy knotted and combined locks +to part, And each particular hair to stand on end, Like quills upon +the fretful porcupine,"—when Mr. Moriarty utters the familiar and +appropriate words the Irish Secretary will say with deprecatory +gesture, "Enough, enough. 'Twas ever thus. This is the effect of +kindness. What ho, my henchmen bold! A flagon, a mighty flagon of most +ancient sack. I feel that I am about to be prostrated. Such is the +fate of greatness. Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. It is a +great and glorious thing, To be an Irish Sec. But give to me my hollow +tree, A crust of bread and liberty. The word is porpentine, not +porcupine, Mr. Inspector. A common corruption. Verify your quotations. +Have them (in future) attested by two resident magistrates. And now to +work. All in strict confidence. Let not the world hear of these +things. Let not the people know that violence and rapine walk +hand-in-hand with my administration. Nameless in dark oblivion let it +dwell. Let it be <i>sub rosâ, sub sigillâ confessionis, sub-auditer, +sub</i> everything. Tell it not in Gath, proclaim it not in Askalon, for +behold, if the people heard, they would marvel, and fear greatly; +and—be afraid."</p> + +<p>The officer would then produce his budget, with its horrors, its +indecencies, its record of trickery, treachery, cowardly revenge, and +midnight terrorism. The local press correspondents of the rural +districts are nearly all Nationalists, and they either furnish garbled +reports, or none at all. The reporters of Conservative papers, +comparatively Conservative, I mean, are also Nationalists. The Irish +themselves know not what is taking place ten miles away. How is +England to learn the precise state of things? I have fished up a few +recent samples of minor occurrences which will form part of Mr. +Moriarty's news. These smaller outrages <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>invariably lead up to murder +if the victim resist. They are so many turns of the screw, just to let +the recalcitrant feel what can be done. In the large majority of cases +he gives way at the first hint. Let us relate some neighbouring +experiences.</p> + +<p>David Geary, of Castlemahon, late in the evening heard an explosion at +the door of his cottage. He ran out, and found a fuse burning, lying +where it had been cast, while a volley of large stones whizzed past +his head. There had been some litigation between a man named Callaghan +and a road contractor, and Geary had allowed the road contractor's men +to take their food in wet weather under his roof.</p> + +<p>On April 15, at two in the morning, a party of masked moonlighters +visited the cottage of Mrs. Breens, of Raheenish, and having fired two +shots through the parlour window, shattering the woodwork by way of +letting the widow know they were there, fired a third through her +bed-room window to expedite the lady's movements. Almost paralysed +with fear, she parleyed with the besieging force, which, by its +spokesman, demanded her late husband's gun, threatening to put +"daylight through her" unless it were instantly given up. It was in +her son's possession, and she hurried to his room. The young dog came +on the scene, and instead of handing out the gun, fired two shots from +a revolver into the darkness. Whereupon the band of Irish +hero-patriots outside fled with electric speed, and returned no more. +At Ardagh the police found a haystack burning. They saved about ten +tons, but Patrick Cremmin claims £88 from the county. He had offended +somebody, but he declares he knows not the motive. In other words, he +wants to let the thing drop—bar the £88. Another stack of hay, partly +saved by the police, was burnt because evictions had taken place: +damage £20, which the county must pay. R. Plummer, a labourer with +Brosna, whose case was given in my last, has received a letter +threatening him with death unless he left Brosna's employ. Some say +the name is Brosnan or Bresnahan. Beware of the quibbling of Irish +malcontents, who on the strength of a misprint or a wrongly-spelt +name, boldly state that no such person ever existed, and that +therefore the case is a pure invention. Here is a specimen of the +toleration Loyalists and Protestants may expect:—A special train +having been run from Newcastle to Limerick to enable people to attend +a Unionist meeting in the latter city, the Nationalists took steps to +mark their sense of the railway company's indiscretion, and a train +soon afterwards leaving Newcastle for Tralee, they hurled a great +stone from the Garryduff Bridge, smashing the window of the guard's +van and doing other injury. At Gurtnaclochy, to deter a witness in a +legal case, a threatening letter was sent, sixty yards of a sod fence +thrown down, and a coffin and gun neatly cut on the field. On the +Roman Catholic Chapel wall at Ashford a notice was posted threatening +with death anyone who bought hay or turnips from a boycotted man, and +the same day a man <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>named Herlihy received a threatening letter. On +April 15 a party of armed, disguised men with blackened faces, called +on a poor man at Inniskeen, and having smashed the windows, tried to +force the door, but stopped to parley. They called on "Young Patrick" +to hand out the father's gun, and the young man complied. Being +twitted with this he said, "I want to live. If I had refused the gun +my life would not be worth twopence. I would be 'covered' from a bush +or a fence when I walked out, or shot dead in the door as I looked +down the lane, as was done in another case. I know the parties well, +but I would not give evidence. Neither will I give the police any more +information. It would not hurt the criminals, but it would hurt me. +For while the jury would not convict, the secret tribunal that sat on +me would not be so merciful, and many a man would like the distinction +of being singled out to execute the secret decrees of the Moonlight +fraternity." Another person standing by said, "What happened at +Galbally, near Tipperary? A priest denounced a Protestant named Allen +from the altar, and a week after the man was shot dead in his tracks. +Everybody knew perfectly well who did the deed. All knew the man who +wanted Allen's land, and it was thought that there was evidence enough +to hang him twenty times. He is alive and well, and if you go any +Saturday to the Tipperary market Father Humphreys will introduce you +to him. He was discharged without a stain on his character, and brass +bands met him on his return, also a torchlight procession."</p> + +<p>In Ireland, even more than in England, brass bands are necessary to +the expression of the popular emotion. Brass bands met Egan, the +liberated, everywhere. Brass bands accompanied the march of O'Brien's +mourners at the Cork funeral last week. Not a murderer in Ireland +whose release would not be celebrated with blare of brass bands, and +glare of burning grease. Mr. Morley could not land in Cork, however +privately, for he did not wish to speak, without a brass band being +loosed on his heels. The great philosophical Radical, the encyclopædia +of political wisdom, the benefactor, the saviour, the regenerator of +Ireland, left Cork to the strains of the Butter Exchange Band—<i>con +amore</i>, <i>affetuoso</i>, and doubtless <i>con spirito</i>. Yet some will say +that the Irish are not grateful! Mr. Morley stayed at the hotel I had +just left, the Royal Victoria, which I justly described as a hot-bed +of sedition. It was here, in room No. 72, that Dalton so terribly +punched the long-suffering head of Tim Healy. At the Four Courts, +Dublin, I saw a waiter who witnessed the famous horsewhipping in that +city. I asked him if it were a severe affair, or whether, as the +Nationalist papers affirmed, only a formality, a sort of +Consider-yourself-flogged. How that waiter expanded and enjoyed the +Pleasures of Memory! "It was a most thrimindious affair, Sorr. +McDermott was a fine, powerful sthrip of a boy, an' handled the +horsewhip iligant. Ye could hear the whack, whack, whack in the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>refreshment room wid the doors closed, twenty yards away. It was for +all the world a fine, big, healthy kind of batin' that Tim got. An' +the way he wriggled was the curiousest thing at all. 'Twas enough to +make yer jump out of yer skin wid just burstin' with laffin'."</p> + +<p>Leaving outrages and violence to Messrs. Morley and Moriarty, let me +narrate the effect of the impending Home Rule Bill on some of the +commercial community. A well-known tradesman says: "A man in +Newcastlewest owed me £24 for goods delivered. He had a flourishing +shop and also an excellent farm. He was so slow in paying, and +apparently so certain that in a little while he would escape +altogether, that I sued him for the amount. It was a common action for +a common debt, between one Irish tradesman and another. But I am a +Unionist, and therefore fair game. I got judgment, but no instalments +were paid. I remonstrated over and over again, and was from time to +time met with solemn promises, the debtor gaining time by every delay. +At last I lost patience, and determined to distrain. Everybody laughed +at me. 'Where will you get an auctioneer, and who will bid? they +asked. I determined to carry through this one case, if it cost a +hundred pounds. I got a good revolver, and succeeded in bringing an +auctioneer from a distance. The debtor said he would brain me with a +bill-hook if I put my foot on his ground, and another man promised to +shoot me from a bed-room window. It was necessary, to carry out the +sale at all, to have police protection. I went to the barracks and +submitted the case. Had I a sheriff's order, &c., &c., &c.? All +difficulties overcome I went to the 'sale.' We seized a cow, a watch, +and some of my own goods, and commenced the auction. Nobody bid but +myself, and when I had covered the amount due the sale ceased, the +aspect of the people being very menacing. Remember, this was not +agrarian at all. The debt was for goods delivered to be sold in the +way of trade. Most of them were there before my face. The debtor came +and said, 'You can't take the things away. But we like your pluck, and +if you will settle the matter for £5 I will give you the money.' I +declined to take £5 for £24 and costs, although the police looked on +the offer as unexpectedly liberal, and the bystanders shed tears of +emotion and said that Gallagher was 'iver an' always the dacent boy.' +When I wished to remove the things the troubles began. I had my +revolver, the police their rifles, but things looked very blue. I +drove the cow to the station and got her away, but the other things +could not walk aboard, and how to get them there was hard to know. I +asked people I knew to lend me their carts—people who were under some +obligation to me, men I had known and done business with for years. +They all refused; they feared the evil eye of the vigilance committee +of a Fenian organisation still in full swing among us, and keeping +regular books for settlement when they have the power. I was +determined not to be beat, so I went to Limerick, nearly thirty <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>miles +away, to get a float or wagon. The news was there before me, not a +wheel to be had in the city. At last, by means of powerful influence, +I got a cart, on condition that the owner's name should be taken off, +and my name painted on. Then I returned to Newcastle and bore away the +goods in triumph. Alas! my troubles were only beginning! I had been +told that the goods were not the debtor's, but belonged to someone +else. The cow, they said, was a neighbour's, who had 'lent' it to my +debtor. The watch, they said, was the property of a friend, who had +handed it to my debtor that he might take it somewhere to be repaired. +The landlord of the house claimed that he had previously seized +everything, but had allowed things to remain out of kindness. I was +cited in four actions for illegal distraint, all of which were so +evidently trumped-up that they were quashed. But the time they took! +And the annoyance they caused. The expense also was considerable, and +the idea of getting expenses out of these people—but I need add +nothing on that score.</p> + +<p>"There were six witnesses in one case, and they could never be found, +so long as the judge could have patience to wait. Every lie, trick, +subterfuge you can imagine, was practised on poor me. At last all was +over, but at what a cost! The big chap who had threatened me with the +bill-hook came humbly forward and said: "Plase yer honner's worship, +I'm very deaf, an' I'm short sighted, and I'm very wake intirely, an' +ye must give me toime to insinse meself into the way of it." And that +rascal had everything repeated several times, until I was on fifty +occasions on the point of chucking up the whole thing.</p> + +<p>"Before the Home Rule Bill had implanted dishonest ideas in his head, +before the promises of unscrupulous agitators had unsettled and +demoralised the people, that man was a straightforward, good, paying +fellow. Only he thought that by waiting till the bill was passed he +would have nothing to pay. The ignorant among us harbour that idea, +and the disloyalty of the lower classes is so intense that you could +not understand it unless you lived here at least two years."</p> + +<p>English friends who praise the affection of the Irish people, and who +speak of the Union of Hearts, may note the lectures of the popular +Miss Gonne, who is being enthusiastically welcomed in Nationalist +Ireland. No doubt the local papers expurgated the text; at the present +moment the word has gone round:—"Let us get the bill, let us get the +bill, and then!" But enough remains to show the general tone. +Addressing the Irish National Literary Society, of Loughrea, Miss +Gonne said that she must "contradict Lord Wolseley in his statement +that England was never insulted by invasion since the days of William +the Conqueror. It would be deeply interesting to the men and women of +Connaught to hear once again how a gallant body of French troops, +fighting in the name of Liberty and Ireland, had conquered nearly the +whole of that province at a time when England had in her service in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>Ireland no less than one hundred and fifty thousand trained troops. +She would remind them that France was the one great military nation of +Europe that had been the friend of Ireland"—a remark which was +received with loud and prolonged applause. "And it would be a matter +of some pride to us to reflect that in these military relations the +record of the Irish brigades in the service of France compared not +without advantage with the military services which France had been +able to render to Ireland." This passage clearly refers to the aid the +two countries have afforded each other as against England, and the +whole lecture seems to have aimed at the heaping of ignominy on the +British name. The stronger the denunciation of England, the more +popular the speaker. The Union of Hearts gets "no show" at all. The +phrase is unknown to Irish Nationalists. However deceitful they may +be, it cannot yet be said that they have sunk thus low.</p> + +<p>Looking over Wednesday's <i>Cork Examiner</i>, I observe that amid other +things the Reverend John O'Mahony attributes the fact that "The +teeming treasures of the deep were almost left untouched," that is, +off the Irish coast, and that this is "a disgrace and a dishonour to +the people through whose misrule and misgovernment the unhappy result +was brought about." Father O'Mahony is a Corker, and should know that +he is talking nonsense. Let me explain.</p> + +<p>In Cork I met a gentleman for twenty-five years engaged in supplying +fishermen with all their needs. He said, "The Irish fishermen are the +laziest, most provoking beggars under the sun." He showed me two sizes +of net-mesh and said, "This is the size of a shilling, this is the +size of a halfpenny. The Scotsmen and Shetlanders use the shilling +size. The difference seems small, but it is very important. The +Irishmen use the halfpenny size, and will use no other. They say that +what was good enough for their fathers is good enough for them. When +the fish are netted they make a rush, and many of them escape the +larger mesh, which they can get through, unless of the largest size. +The small mesh catches them by the gills and hangs them. This, +however, is a small matter. The most important thing is the depth of +fishing. The Scotsmen and Shetlanders come up to the Irish coast, +which is remarkably rich in fish, and when they meet a school of fish +they fish very deep and bring them up by tons, while the Irishmen are +skimming the tops of the shoals, and drawing up trumpery dozens, +because their fathers did so. Years ago I used to argue the point, but +I know better now. When the water is troubled, when the wind is +blowing, and things are a trifle rough, then is the time to fish. The +herrings cannot see the net when the water is agitated. The Scotsmen +are on the job, full of spirits and go, but Paddy gets up and takes a +look and goes to bed again. He waits for fine weather, so as to give +the fish a chance. The poor Shetlanders come over long leagues of sea, +catch ling a yard long, under Paddy's nose, take it to Shetland, cure +it, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>bring it back to him, that he may buy it at twopence a pound. +At the mouth of the Blackwater are the finest soles in the world, but +the Irish are too lazy to catch them;—great thick beggars of fish +four inches thick, you never saw such soles, the Dover soles are lice +to them, they'd fetch a pound apiece in London if they were known. +Change the subject. Every time I come round here I get into a rage. +The British Government finds these men boats. The Shetlanders +sometimes land, and when they contrast the fat pastures and teeming +south coast of Ireland with their own cold seas and stony hills they +say with the Ulstermen, 'Would that you would change countries!'"</p> + +<p>I asked him how he accounted for this extraordinary state of things. +He said:—</p> + +<p>"As an Irishman I am bound to answer one question by asking another. +Was there ever a free and prosperous country where the Roman Catholic +religion was predominant?"</p> + +<p>I could not answer him at the moment, but perhaps Father O'Mahony, who +knows so much, may satisfy him on the point. Or in the absence of this +eloquent kisser of the Blarney Stone some other black-coated Corker +may respond. Goodness knows, they are numerous enough. All are well +clothed and well fed, while the flock that feed the pastor are mostly +in squalid poverty, actually bending the knee to their greasy +task-masters, poor ignorant victims of circumstances.</p> + +<p>Among the many nostrums offered to Ireland, nobody offers soap. The +greatest inventions are often the simplest, and with all humility I +make the suggestion. Ireland is badly off for soap, and cleanliness is +next to godliness. Father Humphreys, of Tipperary, boasts of his +influence with the poor—delights to prove how in the matter of rent +they took his advice, and so on. Suppose he asks them to wash +themselves! The suggestion may at first sight appear startling. All +novelties are alarming at first; but the mortality, except among old +people, would probably prove less than Father Humphreys might expect. +He would have some difficulty in recognising his flock, but the +resources of civilisation would probably be sufficient to conquer this +drawback. Persons over forty might be exempted, as nothing less than +skinning would meet their case, but the young might possibly be +trained, against tradition and heredity, to the regular use of water. +But I fear the good Father will hardly strain his authority so far. An +edict to wash would mean blue ructions in Tipperary, open rebellion +would ensue, and the mighty Catholic Church would totter to its fall. +The threat to wash would be an untold terrorism, the use of soap an +outrage which could only be atoned by blood. And Father Humphreys (if +he knew the words) might truly say <i>Cui bono</i>? Why wash? Is not soap +an enemy to the faith? Do not the people suit our purpose much better +as they are? <i>Thigum thu</i>, brutal and heretic Saxon?</p> + +<p class="date">Killaloe (Co. Clare), April 27th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_15_THE_PERIL_TO_ENGLISH_TRADE" id="No_15_THE_PERIL_TO_ENGLISH_TRADE"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 15.—THE PERIL TO ENGLISH TRADE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />s the great object of public interest in the city of Limerick is the +Treaty Stone, a huge block of granite, raised on a pedestal on the +Clare side of Thomond Bridge, to commemorate the Violated Treaty so +graphically described by Macaulay, and to keep in remembrance of the +people the alleged ancient atrocities of the brutal Saxon—so the +key-note of Ennis is the memorial to the Manchester Martyrs, erected +outside the town to commemorate the people who erected it. That is how +it strikes the average observer. For while the patriotic murderers of +the Manchester policemen, to wit, O'Brien, Allen, and Larkin, have +only one tablet to the three heroes, the members of the committee who +were responsible for this Nationalist or rather Fenian monument have +immortalised themselves on three tablets. But although party feeling +runs high, and the town as a whole appears to be eminently disloyal +and inimical to England, there are not wanting reasonable people who +look on the proposed change with grave suspicion, even though they +nominally profess to support the abstract doctrine of Home Rule. +Naturally, their main opinions are very like those I have previously +recorded as being prevalent in the neighbouring counties of Limerick, +Cork, and Kerry. They believe the present time unseasonable, and they +have no confidence in the present representatives of the Nationalist +party. They believe that the Irish people are not yet sufficiently +educated to be at all capable of self-government, and they fail to see +what substantial advantages would accrue from any Home Rule Bill. More +especially do they distrust Mr. Gladstone; and although in England the +Nationalist leaders speak gratefully of the Grand Old Man, it is +probable that such references would in Ireland be received in silence, +if not with outspoken derision. A well-known Nationalist thus +expressed himself on this point:—</p> + +<p>"Gladstone's recent attack on Parnell was one of the meanest acts of a +naturally mean and cowardly man, whose whole biography is a continuous +story of surrender, abject and unconditional. Parnell was his master. +With all his faults, Parnell was much the better man. He was too cool +a swordsman for Gladstone, and, spite of the Grand Man's tricky +dodging and shifting, Parnell beat him at every point, until he was +thoroughly cowed and had to give in. What surprises me is that the +English people are led away by a mere talker. They claim to be the +most straightforward and practical people in the world. Answer me +this:—Did you, did anybody, ever know Gladstone to give a +straightforward answer to any one question? Straight dealing is not in +him. He is slippery as an eel—with all his 'honesty,' his piety, his +benevolence. But as he reads the Bible in Hawarden Church, the English +believe in him. They have no other reason that I can see. Have you +heard any Irishman speak well of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>Gladstone? No, and you never will. +How long in the country? Five weeks only? You may stay five years, and +you will not hear a word expressing sincere esteem. About separation? +Well, most of the unthinking people, that is, the great majority, +would vote in favour of it to-morrow. All sentiment, the very romance +of sentimentality. I have been in England, I have been in America, and +you could hardly believe the difference in the people's views. The +Irish are not practical enough. 'Ireland a nation' is bound to be the +next cry, if Home Rule become law under the present leaders of the +Nationalist party."</p> + +<p>"But how about the pledges, the solemn and reiterated pledges, of +Michael Davitt and the rest?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose you ask me seriously? You do? An Irishman would regard the +question as a joke. The pledges are not worth a straw. Their object is +to deceive, and so to carry the point at issue. Would John Bull come +with an injured air and say, with tears in his voice, 'You said you'd +be good. You promised to be loyal. You really did. Did you not, now?' +Don't you think John would cut a pretty figure? Davitt knows where to +have him. He knows that a quiet, moderate, reasonable tone fetches +him. Parnell, too, knew that the method with John was a steady, quiet +persistence without excitement. John listens to Davitt, and says to +himself, 'Now this is a calm, steady fellow. Nothing fly-away about +<i>him</i>. No shouting and screaming there. This is the kind of man who +<i>must</i> boss the show. Give him what he wants.'</p> + +<p>"Look how Morley was taken in. And so, no doubt, was many another.</p> + +<p>"If England trusts the assurances of these men, and if the bill under +present conditions becomes law, we shall have two generations of +experiment, of corruption, of turmoil, of jobbery such as the British +Empire has never seen.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I am a Home Ruler—at the proper time. But Home Rule in our +present circumstances would mean revolution, and, a hundred to one, +the reconquest of Ireland. And in the event of any foreign +complication you would have all your work cut out to effect your +purpose."</p> + +<p>A gentleman from Mallow said, "The Gaelic clubs all over the country +are in a high state of organisation, and a perfect state of drill. The +splendid force of constabulary which are now for you would be against +you. The Irish Legislature, from the first, would have the power to +raise a force of Volunteers, and the Irish are such a military nation +that in six months they could muster a very formidable force. I am a +Unionist, a Protestant too, but I find that my Catholic and Home Rule +friends, that is, the superior sort, the best-read, the most thinking +men, agree with me perfectly. But while I can understand Irish Home +Rulers, even the most extreme sort, I cannot understand any sensible +Englishman entertaining such an insane idea. As manager of one of the +largest concerns in Cork I have made many visits to England, and I +found <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>the supporters of Mr. Gladstone so utterly misinformed, so +credulous, so blankly ignorant of the matter, that I forbore to debate +the thing at all. And their assumption was on a level with their +ignorance, which is saying a good deal."</p> + +<p>Mr. Thomas Manley, the great horse dealer, a famous character +throughout the three kingdoms, said to me, "The Limerick horse fair of +Thursday last was the worst I ever attended in forty years. There is +no money in the country. The little that changed hands was for horses +of a common sort, and every one, I do believe, was bought for England +and Scotland, tramcar-horses and such like. Home Rule is killing the +country already. I farmed a thousand acres of land in Ireland for many +a long year, and since I went more fully into the horse-dealing +business I kept two hundred and fifty acres going. I have horsed the +six crack cavalry regiments of the British army, and I know every nook +and corner of Ireland; know, perhaps, every farmer who can breed and +rear a horse, and I also know their opinions. Give me the power and I +would do four things. Here they are:—</p> + +<p>"I would first settle the land question, then reform the poor-laws, +then rearrange the Grand Jury laws, then commence to reclaim the land, +which would pay ten per cent.</p> + +<p>"The Tories should undertake these measures. They would then knock the +bottom out of the Home Rule agitation. The people are downright sick +of the whole business. They expected to be well off before this. They +find themselves going down the nick."</p> + +<p>Mr. Abraham P. Keeley said: "There is much fault found with the +landlords, but they are by no means so much to blame as is supposed. +Put the saddle on the right horse. And the right horse is the steam +horse. The rapid transit of grain and general farm produce has lowered +the value of land more rapidly than the landlords could lower the +rent. Every year the prairie lands of America are further opened up by +railways; India and Egypt and Australia are now in the swim, and +Ireland, as a purely agricultural country, must suffer. A curious +illustration of the purely rural condition of the country was +mentioned the other day. Nearly all the great towns drink the water of +the rivers upon which they stand. Cork drinks the Lee; Limerick drinks +the Shannon; you can catch trout from the busiest quay in Limerick. +Now, the towns of England don't drink their own rivers. You don't +drink the Rea at Birmingham, I think?"</p> + +<p>I was obliged to admit that the pellucid waters of the crystal Rea +were not the favourite table beverage of the citizens of Brum, but +submitted that Mr. Joseph Malins, the Grand Worthy Chief Templar, and +his great and influential following might possibly use this innocent +means of dissipation.</p> + +<p>Mr. Thomas Manley continued: "The tenant farmer has cried himself up, +and the Nationalists have cried him up as the finest, most +industrious, most honest, most frugal, most self-sacrificing <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>fellow +in the world. But he isn't. Not a bit of it. The landlords and their +agents have over and over again been shot for rack-renting when the +rents had been forced up by secret competitions among neighbours and +even relations.</p> + +<p>"Ask any living Irish farmer if I am right, and he will say, Yes, ten +times yes.</p> + +<p>"The Irishman has a land-hunger such as is unknown over the water. And +why? Because the land is his sole means of living. We have no +enterprise, no manufactures to speak of. The Celtic nature is to +hoard. The Englishman invests what the Irishman would bury in his back +garden, or hang up the chimney in an old stocking. So we have no big +works all over the country to employ the people. And as we are very +prolific, the only remedy is emigration. Down at Queenstown the other +day I saw 250 Irish emigrants leaving the country. A Nationalist +friend said, 'If they'd only wait a bit till we get Home Rule, they +needn't go, the crathurs.' What's to hinder it? How will they be +better off? Will the land sustain more with Home Rule than without it? +And when capital is driven away, as it must and will be the moment we +pass the bill, instead of more factories we'll have less, and England +and Scotland will be over-run with thousands of starving Irish folks +whose means of living is taken away.</p> + +<p>"As an Irish farmer, and an Irish farmer's son, living on Irish farms +for more than sixty years, having an intimate acquaintance with the +whole of Ireland, and almost every acre of England, I deliberately say +that the Irish farmer is much better off than the English, Scotch, or +Welsh farmer, not only in the matter of law, but in the matter of +soil.</p> + +<p>"In many parts of England the soil must be manured after every crop. +Every time you take out you must put in. Not so in Ireland. Nature has +been so bountiful to us that we can take three, and even six, crops +off the land after a single dose of manure. Of course the farmer +grumbles, and no wonder. The price of stock and general produce is so +depressed that Irish farmers are pinched. But so they are in England. +And yet you have no moonlighting. You don't shoot your landlords. If +the land will not pay you give it up and take to something else. An +Irishman goes on holding, simply refusing to pay rent. His neighbours, +who are in the same fix, support him. When the landlord wishes to +distrain, after waiting seven years or so, he has to get a decree. The +tenants know of it as soon as he, and they set sentinels. When the +police are signalled the cattle are driven away and mixed with those +of other farmers—every difficulty that Irish cleverness can invent is +placed in the way. Then the landlord, whether or not successful in +distraining, is boycotted, and the people reckon it a virtue to shoot +him down on sight. Conviction is almost, if not quite, impossible, for +even if you found a willing witness—a very unlikely thing I can tell +you—even then the witness knows himself marked for the same fate. If +he went to America or Australia he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>would be traced, and someone would +be found to settle him. Such things have happened over and over again, +and people know the risk is great. But about rack-rents.</p> + +<p>"I have told you of Irish avariciousness in the matter of land, and +have explained the reason of it. Rents have been forced up by people +going behind each other's backs and offering more and more, in their +eagerness to acquire the holding outbidding each other. Landlords are +human; agents, if possible, still more human. They handed over the +land to the highest bidder. What more natural? The farmers are not +business men. They offered more than the land could pay. You know the +results. But why curse and blaspheme the landlords for what was in +many cases their own deliberate act?"</p> + +<p>On Friday last I had a small object-lesson in Irish affairs. Colonel +O'Callaghan, of Bodyke, went to Limerick to buy cattle for grazing on +his estate. The cattle were duly bought, but the gallant Colonel had +to drive them through the city with his own right hand. I saw his +martial form looming in the rear of a skittish column of cows, and +even as the vulture scenteth the carcase afar off, even so, scenting +interesting matter, did I swoop down on the unhappy Colonel, startling +him severely with my sudden dash. He said, "I'm driving cows now," +and, truth to tell, there was no denying it. Even as he spoke, a +perverse beast of Nationalist tendencies effected a diversion to the +right, plainly intending a charge down Denmark Street, <i>en route</i> for +Irish Town, and the gallant Colonel waiving ceremony and a formidable +shillelagh, hastened by a flank movement to cut off this retreat, and +to guide the erring creature in the right way to fresh woods and +pastures new. I fired a Parthian arrow after the parting pair. +"Appointment?" I shouted, but the Colonel shook his head. It was no +time for gentle assignations. The cursed crew in front of him absorbed +his faculties, and then he half expected to be shot from any street +abutting on his path. Perhaps I may nail him yet. He has been +attempting to distrain. If the Colonel refuses to speak I will +interview his tenants. I have said I will pursue, I will overtake, I +will divide the spoil—with the readers of the <i>Gazette</i>. <i>Dixi.</i> I have +spoken! There is much shooting on the Bodyke estates, and in Ennis +they say that sixty policemen are stationed there to pick up the game. +Nobody has been bagged as yet, but the Clare folks are still hoping. +To-morrow a trusty steed will bear me to the spot. Relying on a +carefully-considered, carefully-studied Nationalist appearance, an +anti-landlord look, and a decided No-Rent expression in my left eye, I +feel that I could ride through the most dangerous districts with +perfect impunity. "Base is the slave that pays," says Ancient Pistol. +That is my present motto. One touch of No Rent makes the Irish kin.</p> + +<p>The English people should be told that nearly all Irishmen, whether +Unionist or otherwise, are strong Protectionists. The moment Home Rule +becomes law a tremendous attempt will be <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>made to shut out English +goods. "The very first thing we do," said to me an influential +Dubliner I met here, "is to double the harbour dues; you can't prevent +that, I suppose? The first good result will be the choking-off of all +the Scotch and Manx fishermen who infest our seas. At present they +bring their fish into Dublin, whence it is sent all over Ireland, +competing against Irish fishermen. Then we'll tax all manufactured +goods. We will admit the raw material duty-free, but we must be +permitted to know what suits us best, and we must, and will, tax +flour, but not wheat. We in Ireland, forsooth, must submit to having +all our flour mills closed to suit the swarming populations of +Manchester and Birmingham. They must have a cheap loaf. Dear me! and +so flour comes here untaxed, having given employment to people in +America, while our folks are walking about idle. Go down the river +Boyne, from Trim to Drogheda. What do you see? Twelve mills, with +machinery worth £100,000 or more, lying idle. One of those mills once +employed fifty or sixty men. Now it employs none. Tax flour, I say, +and so says everybody. We must have Protection, and very stringent +Protection. Irish manufacturers must be sustained against English +competition. Twenty years ago Dublin was a great place for cabinet +work. Now nothing is done there, or next to nothing. Everything must +come from London. At the same period we did a great trade in leather. +The leather trade is gone to the devil. We did a big turnover in boots +and shoes. Now every pair worn in the city comes from Northampton. +Ireland and Irish goods for the Irish, and burn everything English but +English coals. Give us Home Rule, and all these trades will be +restored to us."</p> + +<p>Thus spoke the great Home Ruler, who declined to permit his name to +appear, as he said it might affect his business. His sentiments are +universal, and, as I have said, his opinions are shared by the great +majority of Irishmen, even though professedly Unionist.</p> + +<p>A word of comment on the patriotic sentiments of my friend. I went to +Delany, of George Street, Limerick, for a suit of Blarney tweed. He +had not a yard in the place. He was indicated as the leading clothier +and outfitter of the city, but the Mahony Mills were not represented +amongst his patterns. He had Scotch tweeds, Yorkshire tweeds, West of +England tweeds, but although the Blarney tweeds are said to be the +best in the world as well as the handsomest, I had to seek them +elsewhere. An English friend says, "The Irish politicians are rather +inconsistent. They came into this hotel one evening, six of them, +red-hot from a Nationalist meeting, cursing England up hill and down +dale, till I really felt quite nervous. I hadn't got a Winchester like +that. (I hope it won't go off.) They agreed that to boycott English +goods was the correct thing, and of course they were for burning all +but English coals, when the leader of the gang said, 'Now, boys, what +will you drink,' and hang me! if they didn't every one take a bottle +of Bass's bitter beer! Did you ever know such inconsistency?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>The quirks and quips of the Irish character would puzzle a +Philadelphia lawyer. Spinning along the lane to Killaloe, with Mr. +Beesley, of Leeds, and Mr. Abraham Keeley, of Mallow, balanced on +opposite sides of a jaunting car, we came on a semi-savage specimen of +the genuine Irish sort. Semi-savage! he was seven-eighths savage, and +semi-lunatic, just clever enough to mind the cows and goats which, +with a donkey or two, grazed by the way-side. He might be +five-and-twenty, and looked strong and lusty. His naked feet were +black with the dirt of his childhood, and not only black, but shining +and gleaming in the sun. His tattered trousers were completely worn +away to the knee, showing his muscular legs to perfection. The rags +that clothed his body were confusing and indefinite. You could not +tell where one garment ended and another began, or whether there were +more than one at all. Cover a pump with boiling glue, shake over it a +sack of rags, and you will get an approximate effect of his costume. +His tawny, matted hair and beard had never known brush, comb, or +steel. It was a virgin forest. He scratched his head with the air of +the old woman who said "Forty years long have this generation troubled +me;" and ran after the car with outstretched hand. I threw him a +penny, upon which he threw himself at full length, his tongue hanging +out, a greedy sparkle in his eye. My Irish friend instantly stopped +the car.</p> + +<p>"Now I'll show you something. This man is more than half an idiot, but +watch him." Then he cried:</p> + +<p>"Come here, now, I'll toss you for the penny."</p> + +<p>The man came quickly forward.</p> + +<p>"Now then, put down your penny, and call. What is it? Head or harp, +speak while it spins!"</p> + +<p>"Head," shouted the savage, and head it was.</p> + +<p>He picked up the second penny with glee, and said with a burst of wild +laughter. "Toss more, more, more; toss ever an' always; toss agin, +agin, agin."</p> + +<p>The car-driver was disgusted. "Bad luck to ye for a madman. Ye have +the gamblin' blood in ye. Bedad, ye'd break Monty Carly, ye would."</p> + +<p>Then looking at the gambler's black and polished feet, he said:—</p> + +<p>"Tell me, now, honey, is it Day an' Martin's ye use?"</p> + +<p class="date">Ennis (Co. Clare), April 29th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_16_CIVIL_WAR_IN_COUNTY_CLARE" id="No_16_CIVIL_WAR_IN_COUNTY_CLARE"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 16.—CIVIL WAR IN COUNTY CLARE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he name of Bodyke is famous throughout all lands, but few people know +anything about the place or the particulars of the great dispute. The +whole district is at present in a state of complete lawlessness. The +condition of matters is almost incredible, and is such as might +possibly be expected in the heart of Africa, but hardly in a civilised +country, especially <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>when that country is under the benignant British +rule. The law-breakers seem to have the upper hand, and to be almost, +if not quite, masters of the situation. The whole estate is divided +into three properties, Fort Ann, Milltown, and Bodyke, about five +thousand acres in all, of which the first two comprise about one +thousand five hundred acres, isolated from the Bodyke lands, which +latter may amount to some three thousand five hundred acres. Either by +reason of their superior honesty, or, as is sometimes suggested, on +account of their inferior strategic position, the tenants of the Fort +Ann and Milltown lands pay their rent. The men of Bodyke are in a +state of open rebellion, and resist every process of law both by +evasion and open force. The hill-tops are manned by sentries armed +with rifles. Bivouac fires blaze nightly on every commanding eminence. +Colonel O'Callaghan's agent is a cock-shot from every convenient +mound. His rides are made musical by the 'ping' of rifle balls, and +nothing but the dread of his repeating rifle, with which he is known +to be handy, prevents the marksmen from coming to close quarters. Mr. +Stannard MacAdam seems to bear a charmed life. He is a fine athletic +young man, calm and collected, modest and unassuming, and, as he +declares, no talker. He has been described as a man of deeds, not +words. He said, "I am not a literary man. I have not the skill to +describe incident, or to give a clear and detailed account of what has +taken place. I have refused to give information to the local +journalists. My business is to manage the estate, and that takes me +all my time. You must get particulars elsewhere. I would rather not +speak of my own affairs or those of Colonel O'Callaghan."</p> + +<p>There was nothing for it but to turn my unwilling back on this +veritable gold mine. But although Mr. MacAdam could not or would not +speak, others were not so reticent, and once in the neighbourhood the +state of things was made plainly evident. The road from Ennis to +Bodyke is dull and dreary, and abounds with painful memories. +Half-an-hour out you reach the house, or what remains of it, of +Francis Hynes, who was hanged for shooting a man. A little further and +you reach the place where Mr. Perry was shot. A wooded spot, +"convaynient" for ambush, once screened some would-be murderers who +missed their mark. Then comes the house of the Misses Brown, in which +on Christmas Eve shots were fired, by way of celebrating the festive +season. From a clump of trees some four hundred yards from the road +the police on a car were fired upon, the horse being shot dead in his +tracks. The tenantry of this sweet district are keeping up their rifle +practice, and competent judges say that the Bodyke men possess not +less than fifty rifles, none of which can be found by the police. Said +one of the constabulary, "They lack nerve to fire from shorter +distances, as they think MacAdam is the better shot, and to miss him +would be risky, as he is known to shoot rabbits with ball cartridge. +At the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>same time, I remember Burke of Loughrea, who was shot, had +also a fine reputation as a rifleman, but they settled him neatly +enough. I saw him in the Railway Inn, Athenry, just before he was +killed, with a repeating rifle slung on his back and a revolver on his +hip. I saw him ride away, his servant driving while Burke kept the +cocked rifle ready, the butt under his armpit, the trigger in his +hand. He sat with his back to the horse, keeping a good look-out, and +yet they shot both him and his servant as they galloped along. The +horse and car came in without them. To carry arms is therefore not a +complete security, though no doubt it is, to some extent, a deterrent. +But my opinion is that when a man is ordered to be shot he will be +shot. Clare swarms with secret societies, and you never know from one +moment to another what resolutions they will pass. I don't know what +the end of it will be, but I should think that Home Rule, by giving +the murderers a fancied security, would in this district lead to +wholesale bloodshed. The whole country would rise, as they do now, to +meet the landlord or his agent, but they would then do murder without +the smallest hesitation."</p> + +<p>His companion said—the police here are never alone—"The first thing +Morley did was to rescind the Crimes Act. When we heard of that we +said 'Now it's coming.' And we've got it. Every man with a head on +him, and not a turnip, knew very well what would happen. The police +are shot at till they take no notice of it. Sometimes we charge up the +hills to the spot where the firing started, but among the rocks and +ravines and hills and holes they run like rabbits, or they hand their +arms to some fleet-footed chap to hide, while they stay—aye, they do, +they actually stand their ground till we come, and there they are +working at a hedge or digging the ground, and looking as innocent and +stupid as possible. They never saw anybody, and never heard any +firing—or they thought it was the Colonel shooting a hare. We hardly +know what to do in doubtful cases, as we know the tenants have the +support of the Government, and it is as much as our places are worth +to make any mistake under present circumstances. The tenants know that +too, so between them and Morley we feel between two fires."</p> + +<p>The trouble has been alive for fifteen years or so, but it was not +until 1887 that Bodyke became a regularly historic place. The tenants +had paid no rent for years, and wholesale evictions were tried, but +without effect. The people walked in again the next day, and as the +gallant Colonel had not an army division at his back he was obliged to +confess himself beaten at every point. He went in for arbitration, but +before giving details let us first take a bird's eye view of his +position. I will endeavour to state the case as fairly as possible, +premising that nothing will be given beyond what is freely admitted by +both parties to the dispute.</p> + +<p>The Colonel, who is a powerfully-built, bronzed, and active man, +seemingly over sixty years old, left the service just forty years ago. +Four years before that his father had died, heavily in debt, leaving +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>the estate encumbered by a mortgage, a jointure to the relict, Mrs. +O'Callaghan, now deceased (the said jointure being at that time +several years in arrear), a head rent of a hundred guineas a year to +Colonel Patterson, with taxes, tithe rent-charges, and heaven knows +what besides. In 1846 and 1847 his father had made considerable +reductions in the rents of the Bodyke holdings, but the tenants had +contrived to fall into arrears to the respectable tune of £6,000, or +thereabouts. Such was the state of things when the heir came into his +happy possessions.</p> + +<p>A Protestant clergyman said to me—"Land in Ireland is like +self-righteousness. The more you have, the worse off you are." Thus +was it at Bodyke.</p> + +<p>Something had to be done. To ask the tenants for the £6,000 was mere +waste of breath. The young soldier had no agent. He was determined to +be the people's friend. Although a Black Protestant, he was ambitious +of Catholic good-will. He wanted to have the tenants blessing him. He +coveted the good name which is better than rubies. He wished to make +things comfortable, to be a general benefactor of his species; if a +Protestant landlord and a Roman Catholic tenantry can be said to be of +the same species at all, a point which, according to the Nationalist +press, is at least doubtful. He called the tenants together, and +agreed to accept three hundred pounds for the six thousand pounds +legally due, so as to make a fresh start and encourage the people to +walk in the paths of righteousness. When times began to mend, the +Colonel himself a farmer, commenced to raise the rents until they +reached the amount paid during his father's reign. The people stood it +quietly enough until 1879, when the Colonel appointed agents. This +year was one of agricultural depression. A Mr. Willis succeeded the +two first agents, but during the troubles he resigned his charge. The +popular opinion leans to the supposition that his administration was +ineffective, that is, that he was comparatively unused to field +strategy, that he lacked dash and military resource, and that he +entertained a constitutional objection to being shot. The rents came +under the judicial arrangement, and reductions were made. Still things +would not work smoothly, and it was agreed that bad years should be +further considered on rent days. This agreement led to reductions on +the judicial rent of 25 to 30 per cent., besides which the Colonel, in +the arbitration of 1887, had accepted £1,000 in lieu of several +thousand pounds of arrears then due. After November, 1891, the tenants +ceased to pay rent at all, and that is practically their present +position. The Colonel, who being himself an experienced farmer is a +competent judge of agricultural affairs, thinks the tenants are able +to pay, and even believes that they are willing, were it not for the +intimidation of half-a-score village ruffians whose threatened +moonlighting exploits, when considered in conjunction with the bloody +deeds which have characterised the district up to recent times, are +sufficient to paralyse the whole force of the British Empire, when +that force is directed by the feeble fumblers now in office.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>That they can pay if they will, is clearly proved by recent +occurrences. Let us abandon ancient history and bring our story down +to date. The number of incidents is so great, and the complications +arising from local customs and prejudices are so bewildering that only +after much inquiry have I been able to sort from the tangled web a few +clear and understandable instances, which, however, may be taken as a +fair sample of the whole.</p> + +<p>New brooms sweep clean. The new agent, Mr. MacAdam, began to +negotiate. Pow-wows and palavers all ended in smoke, and as meanwhile +the charges on the estate were going on merrily, and no money was +coming in to meet them, writs were issued against six of the best-off +farmers; writs, not decrees, the writ being a more effective +instrument. One Malone was evicted. He was a married man, without +encumbrances, owed several years' arrears, had mismanaged his farm, a +really good bit of land, had been forgiven a lot of rent, and still he +was not happy. A relative had lent him nearly £200 to carry on, but +Malone was a bottomless pit. What he required was a gold mine and a +man to shovel up the ore, but unhappily no such thing existed on the +farm. The relative offered to take the land, believing that he could +soon recoup himself the loan, but Malone held on with iron grip, +refusing to listen to the voice of the charmer, charmed he never so +wisely. The relative wished to take the place at the judicial rent, +and offered to give Malone the house, grass for a cow, and the use of +three acres of land. Malone declined to make any change, and as a last +resort it was decided to evict him. On the auspicious day MacAdam +arrived from Limerick, accompanied by two men from Dublin, whom he +proposed to instal as caretakers in Malone's house. The Sheriff's +party were late, and MacAdam, waiting at some distance, was discovered +and the alarm given. Horns were blown, the chapel bell was rung, the +whole country turned out in force. Anticipating seizure, the people +drove away their cattle, and shortly no hoof nor horn was visible in +the district. A crowd collected and, observing the caretakers, at once +divined their mission, and perceived that not seizure, but eviction, +was the order of the day. They rushed to Malone's house, and, with his +consent and assistance, tore off the roof, smashed the windows, and +demolished the doors. The place was thus rendered uninhabitable.</p> + +<p>This having been happily effected, the Sheriff's party arrived an hour +or so late, in the Irish fashion. Possession was formally given to the +agent, who was now free to revel in the four bare walls, and to enjoy +the highly-ventilated condition of the building. The crowd became more +and more threatening, and if they could have mustered pluck to run in +on the loaded rifles, Sheriff, agent, and escort must have been +murdered without mercy. The shouting and threatening were heard two +miles away. But the tenants had taken other measures. A firing party +was posted on a neighbouring hill, and as the Sheriff left the shelter +of the walls a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>volley was poured in from a clump of trees four +hundred yards away, one bullet narrowly missing a man who ducked at +the flash. The riflemen were visible among the trees, and the Sheriff +returned the fire. Several policemen also fired into the clump, but +without effect, and their fire was briskly returned from the hill, +this time just missing the head of a policeman covered by a bush, a +bullet cutting off a branch close to his ear. The police then prepared +to charge up the hill, when the firing party decamped. No arrests were +made, although the marksmen must have been dwellers in the +neighbourhood. A policeman said, "We know who they are; you can't +conceal these things in a country place; but we have no legal +evidence, and although we saw them at four hundred yards, who will +accept our identification at such a distance? And of course no jury +would convict. We have no remedy in this unfortunate country. So long +as Gladstone and such folks are bidding for the people's votes so long +we shall have lawlessness. But for the change of Government all would +long have been settled amicably. But I heard a young priest say to the +people, 'Hold on a bit till the new Government goes in.'"</p> + +<p>To return to the Malone affair, Mr. MacAdam applied to the police for +resident protection not for himself, but for the caretakers, whom he +now proposed to instal in a farmhouse in the occupation of one of the +Colonel's servants, and from which no one had been evicted. The +authorities refused protection on the very remarkable plea that the +situation of the aforesaid premises was so dangerous! so that had the +place been quite safe, they would have consented to protect it. +MacAdam determined to carry out his plan, with or without protection. +He left Limerick at midnight with an ammunition and provision train of +seven cars, with two caretakers and four workmen, with materials to +fortify the place. He had previously given the authorities notice that +he meant to occupy Knockclare, the house in question, and before he +started they sent a police-sergeant from Tulla, a twenty miles drive, +to formally warn him off, for that his life would assuredly be taken, +and the officer also demanded that he should be permitted to +personally warn the caretakers of the risk they ran. This was granted, +but the men stuck to their guns. At the eviction a man had funked, +frightened out of his seven senses. The police declined all +responsibility, but offered to guard the farm for a shilling per man +per day. MacAdam thought this proposal without precedent, and left the +police to their own devices, driving along the twenty miles of hilly +road, with sorry steeds that refused the last hill, so that the loads +had to be pushed and carried up by the men. This was at eight or nine +in the morning, after many hours' toilsome march. The fun was not over +yet. Like the penny show, it was "just a-goin' to begin."</p> + +<p>The crowd turned out and with awful threats of instant death menaced +the lives of the party, who, with levelled rifles, at last gained the +building. The people brought boards, and showed the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>caretakers their +coffins in the rough. They spoke of shooting, and swore they would +roast them alive that night by burning the house in which they were +sheltered. A shot was fired at MacAdam. A sergeant with one man +arrived from Tulla police-barracks and urged the party to leave before +they were murdered. MacAdam would hold his post at all risks. Later +eight armed policemen arrived, and then two carmen started to go home. +A wall of stones blocked the road. They somehow got over that, and +found a second wall a little further on. Here was a menacing crowd, +and the police who followed the car drew their revolvers, and with +great determination advanced on the mob, saving the carmen's lives, +for which they were publicly praised from the Bench. But the jarveys +returned, and by a circuitous route reached Limerick viâ Killaloe, +thanking Heaven for their whole skins, and vowing never to so risk +them again. The County Inspector who refused the party police +protection explained that he did so "out of regard for the safety of +his men." He said, "I had more than Mr. MacAdam and his party to +consider. I must preserve the lives of the men in my charge."</p> + +<p>At present the two caretakers hold the citadel, which is also +garrisoned by a force of sixteen policemen regularly relieved by day +and by night, every man armed to the teeth. Now and then the foinest +pisintry in the wuruld turn out to the neighbouring hills and blaze +away with rifles at the doors and windows of the little barn-like +structure. The marksmen want a competent instructor. Anyone who knows +anything of shooting knows the high art and scientific knowledge +required for long-range rifle practice. These men are willing, but +they lack science. Knowledge to their eyes her ample page, Rich with +the spoils of time, has ne'er unrolled. Mr. Gladstone might bring over +from the Transvaal a number of the Boers whose shooting impressed him +so much to coach these humble Kelts in the mysteries of rifle +shooting. Such a measure would perceptibly accelerate the passage of +the Home Rule Bill.</p> + +<p>Such is the state of things in Bodyke at this moment. Colonel +O'Callaghan has had no penny of rent for years—that is, nothing for +himself. What has been paid by the tenants of Fort Ann and Milltown +has been barely sufficient to meet the charges on the estate. The +Colonel thinks that the more he concedes the more his people want. He +has had many narrow escapes from shooting, and rather expects to be +bagged at last. He seems to be constitutionally unconscious of fear, +but the police, against his wish, watch over him. In the few instances +in which Mr. MacAdam, his agent, has effected seizures, the people +have immediately paid up—have simply walked into their houses, +brought out the money, and planked down the rent with all expenses, +the latter amounting to some 20 or 25 per cent. They <i>can</i> pay. The +Colonel, who lives by farming, having no other source of income, knows +their respective positions exactly, and declines to be humbugged. The +tenants believe that they will shortly have the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>land for nothing, and +they are content to remain in a state of siege, themselves +beleaguering the investing force, lodged in the centre of the +position. The fields are desolate, tillage is suspended, and the whole +of the cattle are driven out of sight. Armed men watch each other by +night and by day, and bloodshed may take place at any moment. The +farming operations of the whole region are disorganised and out of +joint. Six men have been arrested for threats and violence, but all +were discharged—the jury would not convict, although the judge said +the evidence for the defence was of itself sufficient to convict the +gang. A ruffian sprang on MacAdam with an open knife, swearing he +would disembowel him. After a terrible struggle the man was disarmed +and secured, brought up before the beak, and the offence proved to the +hilt. This gentleman was dismissed without a stain on his character. +MacAdam asked that he should at least be bound over to keep the peace. +This small boon was refused. Comment is needless. How long are the +English people going to stand this Morley-Gladstone management?</p> + +<p>I have not yet been able to interview Colonel O'Callaghan himself, but +my information, backed by my own observation, may be relied on as +accurate. The carman who drove me hither said "The Bodyke boys are +dacent fellows, but they must have their sport. Tis their nature to be +shootin' folks, an' ye can't find fault with a snipe for havin' a long +bill. An' they murther ye in sich a tinder-hearted way that no +raisonable landlord could have any objection to it."</p> + +<p>I have the honour of again remarking that Ireland is a wonderful +country.</p> + +<p class="date">Bodyke (Co. Clare), May 2nd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_17_RENT_AT_THE_ROOT_OF_NATIONALISM" id="No_17_RENT_AT_THE_ROOT_OF_NATIONALISM"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 17.—RENT AT THE ROOT OF NATIONALISM.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he tenants of the Bodyke property stigmatise Colonel O'Callaghan as +the worst landlord in the world, and declare themselves totally unable +to pay the rent demanded, and even in some cases say that they cannot +pay any rent at all, a statement which is effectually contradicted by +the fact that most of them pay up when fairly out-generalled by the +dashing strategy of Mr. Stannard MacAdam, whose experience as a racing +bicyclist seems to have stood him in good stead. The country about +Bodyke has an unfertile look, a stony, boggy, barren appearance. Here +and there are patches of tolerable land, but the district cannot +fairly be called a garden of Eden. Being desirous of hearing both +sides of the question, I have conversed with several of the +complaining farmers, most of whom have very small holdings, if their +size be reckoned by the rent demanded. The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>farmers' homes are not +luxurious, but the rural standard of luxury is in Ireland everywhere +far below that of the English cottar, who would hold up his hands in +dismay if required to accommodate himself to such surroundings. +Briefly stated, the case of the tenants is based on an alleged +agreement on the part of Colonel O'Callaghan to make a reduction of +twenty-five per cent. on judicial rents and thirty-seven and a half +per cent. on non-judicial rents, whenever the farming season proved +unfavourable. This was duly carried out until 1891, when the question +arose as to whether that was or was not a bad year. The tenants say +that 1891 was abnormally bad for them, but that on attending to pay +their rent, believing that the reductions which had formerly been +made, and which they had come to regard as invariable, would again +take place, they were told that the customary rebate would now cease +and determine, and that therefore they were expected to pay their +rents in full. This they profess to regard as a flagrant breach of +faith, and they at once decided to pay no rent at all. The position +became a deadlock, and such it still remains. They affect to believe +that the last agent, Mr. Willis, resigned his post out of sheer +sympathy, and not because he feared sudden translation to a brighter +sphere. They complain that the Colonel's stables are too handsome, and +that they themselves live in cabins less luxurious than the lodgings +of the landlord's horses. There is no epithet too strong to express +their indignation against the devoted Colonel, who was described by +one imaginative peasant, who had worked himself up to a sort of +descriptive convulsion, as a "Rawhacious Vagabone," a fine instance of +extemporaneous word-coining of the ideo-phonetic school, which will +doubtless be greedily accepted by Nationalist Parliamentarians who, +long ago, exhausted their vocabulary of expletives in dealing with Mr. +Gladstone and each other.</p> + +<p>The Bodykers have one leading idea, to "wait yet awhile." Home Rule +will banish the landlords, and give the people the land for nothing at +all. The peasantry are mostly fine-grown men, well-built and +well-nourished, bearing no external trace of the hardships they claim +to have endured. They are civil and obliging, and thoroughly inured to +the interviewer. They have a peculiar accent, of a sing-song +character, which now and then threatens to break down the stranger's +gravity. That the present state of things is intolerable, and cannot +last much longer, they freely admit, but they claim to have the tacit +sympathy of the present Government, and gleefully relate with what +unwillingness police protection was granted to the agent and his men. +They disclaim any intention of shooting or otherwise murdering the +landlord or his officers, and assert that the fact that they still +live is sufficient evidence in this direction. Said one white-headed +man of gentle, deferential manner:—</p> + +<p>"The days o' landlord shootin' is gone by. If the Boys wanted to shoot +the Colonel what's to hinder them? Would his double-barrel protect +him, or the four dogs he has about him, that he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>sends sniffin' an' +growlin' about the threes an' ditches. If the word wint out he +wouldn't live a day, nor his agint nayther. An' his durty emergency +men, that's posted like spies at the house beyant, could be potted any +time they showed their noses. An' couldn't we starve thim out? +Couldn't we cut off their provisions? Why would we commit murther whin +we have only to wait till things turn round, which wid the help of God +will be afore long. We're harassed an' throubled, always pullin' the +divil by the tail, but that won't last for ever. We'll have our own +men, that ondershtands Oireland, to put us right, an' then O'Callaghan +an' all his durty thribe'll be fired out of the counthry before ye can +say black's the white o' my eye; an' black curses go wid thim."</p> + +<p>The caretakers are not accessible. Stringent orders forbid the giving +of information to any person whatever. This is unfortunate, as a look +at their diaries would prove amusing. They must feel like rabbits +living in a burrow bored in a sporting district, or the man in the +iron mask, or the late respected Damocles, or the gentleman who saw +the handwriting on the wall. Their sleep must be troubled. They must +have ugly dreams of treasons, stratagems, and spoils, and when they +wake, swearing a prayer or two, they doubtless see through the gloom, +<span class="sc">Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin</span> (I quote from memory), in lurid +letters on the ceiling of their stronghold. Their waking visions and +their daily talk must be of guns and pikes, of graves and coffins, +shrouds and skeletons. Perhaps they, like Mr. MacAdam and some others, +have received missives sprinkled with blood, and ornamented with +skulls and cross-bones, those famous national emblems which the Irish +tenant sketches with a rude, untutored art; bold, freehand drawings, +done in gore by hereditary instinct. It may be that they see the +newspapers, that they learn how the other day the house of a caretaker +at Tipperary was, by incendiaries, burned to the ground, the poor +fellow at the time suffering from lockjaw, taking his food with +difficulty, owing to his having some time previously been shot through +the face. Or they may read of the shooting case at Castleisland, and +how Mr. Magilicuddy suggests that such cases be made public, that the +people may know something of the present lawlessness of the country, +or of the narrow squeak of Mr. Walshe, a schoolmaster, living just +outside Ennis, who barely escaped with his life from two bullets, +fired at him, because his wife had been appointed mistress of the +girls; or the sad affair of Mr. Blood of the same district, who being +an admittedly kind and amiable man, is compelled to be always under +the escort of four armed policemen for that he did discharge a herdman +without first asking permission from the local patriots. Or they may +meditate on the fate of the old man near Clonmel, who was so beaten +that he has since died, his daughter, who might have aided him, having +first been fastened in her room. These and a hundred similar instances +of outrage and attempted murder have crept into print during the last +few days. Red ruin and the breaking-up of laws herald the Home Rule +Bill. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>And if the premonitory symptoms be thus severe, how shall we +doctor the disease itself?</p> + +<p>The other day I stumbled on Mr. Lynn, of Dublin, whom I first met at +the Queen's Hotel, Portadown, County Armagh. He said, "We ought to +know what the Home Rule Bill will do. We know the materials of which +the dish is composed, we have seen their preparation and mixing, we +now have the process of cooking before us, and when we get it it will +give us indigestion."</p> + +<p>The Bodykers have a new grievance, one of most recent date. They had +found a delightful means of evasion, which for a time worked well, but +the bottom has been knocked out of it, and their legal knowledge has +proved of no avail. To pay rent whenever a seizure was effected was +voted a bore, a calamitous abandonment of principle, and a loss of +money which might be better applied. So that when MacAdam made his +latest seizures, say on the land of Brown and Jones, these +out-manœuvred tenants brought forward friends named Smith and +Robinson who deeply swore and filed affidavits to the effect that the +cattle so seized belonged to them, Smith and Robinson to wit, and not +to the afore-mentioned Brown and Jones, on whose land they were found. +Here was a pretty kettle of fish. Colonel O'Callaghan, or his agent, +were processed for illegal distraint, and the evidence being dead +against the landlord, that fell tyrant had on several occasions to +disgorge his prey, whereat there was great rejoicing in Bodyke. The +new agent, however, is a tough customer, and in his quality of Clerk +of Petty Sessions dabbles in legal lore. He found an Act which +provides that, after due formalities, distraint may be made on any +cattle found on the land in respect of which rent is due, no matter to +whom the said cattle may belong. The tenants are said to have been +arranging an amicable interchange of grazing land, the cows of Smith +feeding on the land of Brown, and <i>vice versâ</i>, so that the affidavit +agreement might have some colour of decency. The ancient Act +discovered by the ardent MacAdam has rendered null and void this +proposed fraternal reciprocity, and the order to conceal every hoof +and horn pending discovery of the right answer to this last atrocity +has been punctually obeyed, the local papers slanging landlord and +agent, but seemingly unable to find the proper countermine. No end of +details and of incident might be given, but no substantial increase +could be made to the information, given in this and my preceding +letter. The tenants say that the landlord perversely refuses the +reductions allowed in better times, and the landlord says that as a +practical farmer he believes that those upon whom he has distrained or +attempted to distrain are able to pay in full. He declares that he has +not proceeded against those who from any cause are unable to meet +their obligations, but only against the well-to-do men, who, having +the money in hand, are deliberately withholding his just and +reasonable due, taking advantage of the disturbed state of the country +and the weakness of the Government to benefit themselves, regardless +of the suffering their selfishness entails on innocent people.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>In striking contrast to the turbulence of the Bodyke men is the +peaceful calm of the Castleconnel people. I have had several pleasant +interviews with Lady de Burgho, whose territory embraces some sixty +thousand acres, and who, during a widowed life of twenty-two years, +has borne the stress and strain of Irish estate administration, with +its eternal and wearisome chopping and changing of law, its +labyrinthine complications, its killing responsibilities. Lady de +Burgho is, after all, very far from dead, exhibiting in fact a +marvellous vitality, and discoursing of the ins and outs of the +various harassing Land Acts, and the astute diplomacy needful to save +something from the wreck, with a light, airy vivacity, and a rich +native humour irresistibly charming. The recital of her troubles, +losses, and burdens, the dodgery and trickery of legal luminaries, and +the total extinction of rent profits is delivered with an easy grace, +and with the colour and effervescence of sparkling Burgundy. To be +deprived of nine-tenths of your income seems remarkably good fun; to +be ruined, an enviable kind of thing. Lady de Burgho commenced her +reign with one fixed principle, from which nothing has ever induced +her to deviate. Under no conceivable circumstances would she allow +eviction. No agent could induce her to sign a writ. "I could not sleep +if I had turned out an Irish family," says Lady de Burgho, adding, +with great sagacity, "and besides eviction never does any good." So +that this amiable lady has the affections of her people, if she +handles not their cash. And who shall estimate the heart's pure +feelings? Saith not the wisest of men that a good report maketh the +bones fat? Is not the goodwill of the foinest pisintry in the wuruld +more to be desired than much fine gold? Is it not sweeter also than +honey or the honeycomb?</p> + +<p>Certain mortgagees who wished to appropriate certain lands offered +liberal terms to Lady de Burgho on condition that she would for three +years absent herself from Ireland, holding no communication with her +tenants during that period. Lady de Burgho objected. She said, "If I +accepted your terms my people on my return would believe, and they +would be justified in believing, that I had been for three years +incarcerated in a lunatic asylum." Tableau! Three American gentlemen +visiting Castleconnel told Lady de Burgho that the success of the +present agitation in favour of Home Rule would be the first step +towards making Ireland an American dependency, a pronouncement which +is not without substantial foundation. The feeling of the masses is +towards America, and away from England. To the New World, where are +more Irish than in Ireland (so they say) the poorer classes look with +steadfast eye. To them America is the chief end of man, the earthly +Paradise, the promised land, the El Dorado, a heaven upon earth. Every +able-bodied man is saving up to pay his passage, every good-looking +girl is anxious to give herself a better chance in the States. Nearly +all have relatives to give them a start, and glowing letters from +fortunate emigrants are the theme of every village. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>The effect of +these epistles is obvious enough. Home Rule, say the Nationalists, +will stop emigration. That this is with them a matter of hope, or +pious belief, is made clear by their conversation. They give no good +reason for their faith. They are cornered with consummate ease. The +plausibilities gorged by Gladstonian gulls do not go down in Ireland. +They are not offered to Irishmen. "Made in Ireland for English gabies" +should be branded upon them. The most convincing arguments against the +bill are those adduced by Home Rulers in its favour. Here is a +faithful statement of reasons for Home Rule, as given by Alderman +Downing, of Limerick, and another gentleman then present whose name I +know not:—</p> + +<p>"When you allow the Irish Legislature to frame its own laws, disorder +and outrage will be put down with an iron hand. We have no law at +present. Put an Irish Parliament in Dublin, and we would arrange to +hang up moonlighters to the nearest tree. Everybody would support the +law if imposed from Dublin. They resent it as imposed by Englishmen in +London."</p> + +<p>"I am not in favour of handing over the government of Ireland to the +present leaders of the Irish party. I believe that, once granted Home +Rule, they would disappear into private life, and that we should +replace them by better men. What reason for believing this? Oh, I +think the people would begin to feel their responsibility. Do I think +the idea of 'responsibility' is their leading idea? Perhaps not at +this moment, but they will improve. You think that the people may be +fairly expected to return the same class of men? Perhaps so. I hope +not. I should think they would see the necessity of sending men of +position and property. Why don't they send them now? Simply because +they won't come forward; that class of men do not believe in Home +Rule."</p> + +<p>I humbly submitted that this would prevent their coming forward in +future, and that if Home Rule were admittedly bad under the present +leaders, there was really no case to go to a jury, as there was no +evidence before the court to show that the leaders would be dropped. +On the contrary, there was every probability that the victorious +promoters of the bill would be returned by acclamation. Further, that +if Home Rule be gladly accepted as a pearl of great price, to drop the +gainers thereof, to dismiss the men who had borne the burden and heat +of the day, would be an act of shabbiness unworthy the proverbial +gratitude and generosity of the Irish people.</p> + +<p>Alderman Downing would only exclude them from Parliamentary place, and +would not exclude all even then. The bulk of them might be found some +sort of situation where decent salaries would atone for the dropping. +Would that be jobbery? "Ah, you ask too many questions."</p> + +<p>Let it be noted that although the greater part of the Irish +Nationalist members are everywhere rejected beforehand by <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>superior +Home Rulers, as unfit for an Irish Parliament, they are apparently for +that very reason sent to the House of Commons as the best sort to +tease the brutal Saxon. The bulldog is not the noblest, nor the +handsomest, nor the swiftest, nor the most faithful, nor the most +sagacious, nor the most pleasant companion of the canine world, but he +is a good 'un to hang on the nose of the bull.</p> + +<p>The Great Unknown said:</p> + +<p>"You must admit that English Rule has not been a success. Home Rule is +admittedly an experiment—well, yes, I will accept the word risk—Home +Rule is admittedly, to some extent, a risk, but let us try it. And if +the worst comes to the worst we can go back again to the old +arrangement."</p> + +<p>The speaker was a kindly gentleman of sixty or sixty-five years, and, +like Alderman Downing, spoke in a reasonable, moderate tone. Doubtless +both are excellent citizens, men of considerable position and +influence, certainly very pleasant companions, and, to all appearance, +well-read, well-informed men. And yet, in the presence of Unionist +Irishmen, the above-mentioned arguments were all they ventured to +offer. Arguments, quotha? Is the hope that the ignorant peasantry of +Ireland will return "the better class of men," who "do not believe in +Home Rule" an argument? Is the as-you-were assertion an argument? What +would the Irish say if Mr. Bull suggested this movement of +retrogression? We should have Father Hayes, the friend of Father +Humphreys, again calling for "dynamite, for the lightnings of heaven +and the fires of hell, to pulverise every British cur into +top-dressing for the soil." We should have Father Humphreys himself +writing ill-spelt letters to the press, and denouncing all liars as +poachers on his own preserves. We should have Dillon and O'Brien and +their crew again leading their ignorant countrymen to the treadmill, +while the true culprits stalked the streets wearing lemon-coloured kid +gloves purchased with the hard-earned and slowly-accumulated cents of +Irish-American slaveys. The Protestants would be denounced as the +blackest, cruellest, most callous slave-drivers on God's earth. And +this reminds me of something.</p> + +<p>Doctor O'Shaughnessy, of Limerick, is the most wonderful man in +Ireland. His diploma was duly secured in 1826, and Daniel O'Connell +was his most intimate friend, and also his patient. The Doctor lived +long in London, and was a regular attendant at the House of Commons up +to 1832. Twice he fought Limerick for his son, and twice he won +easily. The city is now represented by Mr. O'Keefe, and Mr. +O'Shaughnessy is a Commissioner of the Board of Works in Dublin. The +Doctor has conferred with Earl Spencer on grave and weighty matters, +and doubtless his opinion on Irish questions is of greatest value. His +pupil and his fellow-student, Dr. Kidd and Dr. Quain (I forget which +is which), met at the bedside of Lord Beaconsfield, and medical men +admit the doctor's professional eminence. His eighty-four years sit +lightly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>upon him. He looks no more than fifty at most, is straight as +a reed, active as a hare, runs upstairs like a boy of fourteen, has +the clear blue eye and fresh rosy skin of a young man. He would give +the Grand Old Man fifty in a hundred and beat him out of his boots. He +might be Mr. Gladstone's son, if he were only fond of jam. The Doctor +said several hundred good things which I would like to print, but as +our many conferences were unofficial this would be hardly fair. +However, I feel sure Doctor O'Shaughnessy will forgive my repeating +one statement of his—premising that the Doctor is a devout Catholic, +and that he knows all about land.</p> + +<p>"The Protestants are not the worst landlords. The hardest men, the +most unyielding men the tenants have to meet are the Roman Catholic +landlords, the new men."</p> + +<p>Here is some food for thought. These few words, properly considered, +cover much ground. The Doctor is a Home Ruler, an ardent lover of his +country, one of the best of the many high-minded men I have met in +Ireland. Were such as he in the forefront of the battle, John Bull +might hand the Irish a blank cheque. The consciousness of trust is of +all things most binding on men of integrity. But for Mr. Gladstone to +hand the honour of England to Horsewhipped Healy and Breeches O'Brien, +showing his confidence in them by permitting it to be taken round the +corner—that is a different thing. I forgot to mention a remarkable +feature in the history of Limerick City, a parallel of which is found +in the apocryphal castle in England for which the unique distinction +is claimed that Queen Elizabeth never slept there. And so far as I can +learn, Tim Healy has not yet been horsewhipped in Limerick.</p> + +<p class="date">Bodyke (Co. Clare), May 2nd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_18_HARD_FACTS_FOR_ENGLISH_READERS" id="No_18_HARD_FACTS_FOR_ENGLISH_READERS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 18.—HARD FACTS FOR ENGLISH READERS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterg.png" alt="G" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ort is a quiet wayside country town about forty miles from Limerick, +a little oasis of trees and flowers, with a clear winding trout-stream +running all about it. The streets are wide, the houses well-built, the +pavements kerbed and in good condition. Trees are bigger and more +numerous than usual, and the place has a generally bowery appearance +such as is uncommon in Ireland, which is not famous for its timber. +Trees are in many parts the grand desideratum, the one thing needful +to perfect the beauty of the scenery, but Ireland as compared with +England, France, Holland, Belgium, or Germany may almost be called a +treeless country. Strange to say, the Home Rule Bill, which affects +everything, threatens to deprive the country of its few remaining +trees. A Scotsman resident thirteen years in Ireland said to me:—</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>"The timber you see lying there is not American, but Irish. The people +who have timber are in many cases cutting it down, because they +foresee a state of general insecurity and depression, and they need +all the cash they can command. But there is another reason for the +deforesting of the country, which is—that if Home Rule becomes law, +the landowners are disposed to believe that no allowance will be made +for the timber which may be on the land when the land is sold to the +tenant under some unknown Act to be passed at some future day." This +fits into the point raised by a tenant farmer living just outside the +town, an extraordinary character said to rise at seven o'clock in the +morning. He said:—</p> + +<p>"They say the farmer is to get the land—but what then? Somebody must +own the land, and whoever has it will be reckoned a bloody tyrant. +Won't the owner be a landlord? No, say they, no more landlords at all, +at all. But isn't that nonsense, says I? If ye split up the land into +patches as big as yer hand and give every man a patch, wouldn't some +men have twenty or a hundred, or maybe a thousand patches in five +years? An' thin, thim that was lazy an' wasteful an' got out o' their +land would be for shootin' the savin', sthrivin' man that worked his +way up by buying out the drones. For wouldn't he be a landlord the +moment he stopped workin' all the land himself. An' that would be sure +to happen at wanst. Lord Gough is landlord here, an' ye'll not better +him in Ireland. Look at the town there—all built of stone an' paved, +wid a fine public well in the square, an' a weigh-house, an' the +groves of lilac an' laburnums all out in flower an' dippin' in the +wather; where ye may catch mighty fine trout out iv yer bedroom +window, bedad ye may, or out of yer kitchin, an' draw them out iv the +wather an' dhrop thim in' the fryin' pan off the hook with the bait in +their mouths, an' their tails waggin', finishing their brakefasts +thimselves while they get yours ready! Throth ye can. None iv us that +has any sinse belaves in Home Rule. 'Tis only the ignorant that'll +belave anything. No, we're quiet hereabouts, never shot anybody, an' +not likely to. Yes, the Protestant Church is iligant enough, but +there's very few Protestants hereabouts. It's the gentry an' most +respectable folks that's Protestants. Protestants gets on because they +kape their shops cleaner, an' has more taste, an' we'd sooner belave +thim an' thrust thim that they'd kape their word an' not chate ye, +than our own people. Yes, 'tis indeed quare, but it's thrue. The very +priests won't deny it. An' another thing they wouldn't deny. The +murtherin', sweatin' landlords that'll grind the very soul out of +ye—who are they? Tell me now. Just the small men that have got up out +of the muck. 'Tisn't the gintry at all. The gintry will wait a year, +three years, five years, seven years for rint. The man that bought his +farm or two wid borrowed money won't wait a day. 'Out ye go, an' +bloody end to ye,' says he. Ye don't hear of thim evictions. The man +that sint it to the paper would get bate—or worse.</p> + +<p>"An' some of the little houldhers says, 'Pat,' says they, 'what'll <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>we +do wid the money whin we've no taxes to pay?' 'Tis what they're tould, +the crathurs. God help them, but they're mighty ignorant."</p> + +<p>Those who ridicule the assertions of Protestants and Catholic +Unionists with reference to the lack of liberty may explain away what +was told me by Mr. J.B. Barrington, brother of Sir Charles Barrington, +a name of might in Mid-Ireland. He said, "Someone in our neighbourhood +went about getting signatures to a petition against the Home Rule +Bill. Among others who signed it was Captain Croker's carpenter, who +since then has been waylaid and severely beaten. Another case +occurring in the same district was even harder. A poor fellow has +undergone a very severe thrashing with sticks for having signed the +bill when, as a matter of fact, he had refused to sign it! Wasn't that +hard lines? Both these men know their assailants, but they will not +tell. They think it better to bear those ills they have than fly to +others that they know not of. They are quite right, for, as it is, +they know the end of the matter. Punish the beaters, and the relations +of the convicted men would take up the cause, and if they could not +come on the principal, if he had removed, or was awkward to get at, +they would pass it on to his relations. So that a man's rebelling +against the village ruffians may involve his dearest friends in +trouble, may subject them to ill-usage or boycotting. A man might +fight it out if he only had himself to consider; but you see where the +shoe pinches."</p> + +<p>A decent man in Ennis thus expressed himself anent the Bodyke affair. +(My friend is a Catholic Nationalist.) "The Bodyke men are not all out +so badly off as they seem. But their acts are bad, for they can pay, +and they will not. No, I do not call the Colonel a bad landlord. We +know all about it in Ennis; everybody agrees, too. The farmers meet in +this town and elsewhere. Two or three of the best talkers lead the +meeting, and everything is done <i>their</i> way. The more decent, sensible +men are not always the best talkers. Look at Gladstone, have ye +anybody to come up to him? An' look at his character—one way to-day +an' another way to-morrow, an' the divil himself wouldn't say what the +day afther that. But often the most decent, sensible men among these +farmers can't express themselves, an they get put down. An' all are +bound by the resolutions passed. None must pay rent till they get +leave from all. What would happen a man who would pay rent on the +Bodyke estate? He might order his coffin an' the crape for his +berryin, an' dig his own grave to save his widow the expense. Perhaps +ye have Gladstonian life-assurance offices in England? What praymium +would they want for the life of a Bodyke man that paid his rint to the +Colonel?"</p> + +<p>The "praymium" would doubtless be "steep." Boycotting is hard to bear, +as testified by Mr. Dawson, a certain Clerk of Petty Sessions. He +said:—"The Darcy family took a small farm from which a man had been +evicted after having paid no rent for seven <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>years. The land lay waste +for five years, absolutely derelict, before the Darcys took it in +hand. They were boycotted. Their own relations dare not speak to them +lest they, too, should be included in the curse. A member of the Darcy +family died.</p> + +<p>"Then came severe inconveniences. Friends had secretly conveyed +provisions to the Darcys, and, at considerable risk to themselves, had +afforded some slight countenance and assistance. But a dead body, that +was a terrible affair. No coffin could be had in the whole district, +and someone went thirty miles and got one at the county town by means +of artful stratagem. Then came the funeral. It was to take place at +twelve one day, but we found there would be a demonstration, and +nobody knew what might happen. The corpse, that of a woman, might have +been dragged from the coffin and thrown naked on the street. In the +dead of night a young fellow went round the friends, and we buried the +poor lady at four in the morning."</p> + +<p>The laziness of the Irish people was here exploited with advantage. A +great French chief of police, who had made elaborate dispositions to +meet a popular uprising, once said, "Send the police home and the +military to their barracks. There will be no Revolution this evening +on account of the rain." A very slight shower keeps an Irishman from +work, and you need not rise very early to get over him. A police +officer at Gort said to me, "The people are quiet hereabouts, but I +couldn't make you understand their ignorance. They do just what the +priest tells them in every mortal thing. They believe that unless they +obey they will go to Hell and endure endless torture for ever. They +believe that unless they vote as they are told they will be damned to +all eternity. But oh! if you could see their laziness. They lie abed +half the day, and spend most of the rest in minding other people's +business. Before you had been in the town half-an-hour every soul in +the place was discussing you. They thought you had a very suspicious +appearance, like an agent or a detective or something. Laziness and +ignorance, laziness and ignorance, that's what's the matter with +Ireland."</p> + +<p>The farmers of this truly rural district distinctly state that they do +not want Home Rule. They only want the land, and nearly all are +furnished with Tim Healy's statement that "The farmer who bought his +own land to-day would, when a Home Rule Parliament was won, be very +sorry that he was in such a hurry." Just as the men of Bodyke are +getting the rifles for which Mr. Davitt wished in order to chastise +the Royal Irish Constabulary, by way of showing these "ruffians, the +armed mercenaries of England, that the people of Ireland had not lost +the spirit of their ancestors." Well may a timid Protestant of Gort +say, "These men are deceiving England. They only want to get power, +and then they will come out in their true colours. All is quiet here +now, but the strength of the undercurrent is something tremendous. The +English Home Rulers may pooh-pooh our fears, but they know nothing +about it. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>And, besides, <i>they</i> are quite safe. That makes all the +difference. The change will not drive them from all they hold dear. I +do not agree with the nonsense about cutting our throats in our beds. +That speech is an English invention to cast ridicule on us. But we +shall have to clear out of this. Life will be unendurable with an +Irish Parliament returned by priests. For it <i>will</i> be returned by +priests. Surely the Gladstonian English admit that? To speak of +loyalty to England in connection with an Irish Parliament is too +absurd. Did not the Clan-na-Gael circular say that while its objects +lay far beyond anything that might openly be named, the National +Parliament must be first attained by whatever means? Then it went on +to say that Ireland would be able to command the working plant of an +armed revolution. Do you not know that the Irish Army of Independence +is already being organised? What do you suppose the men who join it +think it means? Did not Arthur O'Connor say that when England was +involved in war, that would be the time? Did he not say that 100,000 +men were already prepared, and that at three days' notice Ireland +could possess double that number, all willing to fight England for +love, and without any pay? If the English Home Rulers lived in Galway +they would remember these things as I do. <i>You think the Bill can +never become law. If you could assure me of that, I would be a happy +man this night.</i> I would go to my pillow more contented than I have +been for years. <i>I and my family would go on our knees and thank God +from our hearts.</i>"</p> + +<p>Mr. Wakely, of Mount Shannon Daly, said:—"I live in one of the +wildest parts of Galway, but all went on well with us until this Home +Rule Bill upset the country. Now I am completely unsettled. Whether to +plant the land or let it lie waste, I cannot tell. I might not be able +to reap the harvest. Whether to buy stock to raise and fatten, or +whether to keep what cash we have with a view to a sudden pack-up and +exit, we do not know. And I think we are not the only timid folks, for +the other day I took a horse twenty-four miles to a fair where I made +sure of selling him easily. I had to take him back the twenty-four +miles, having wasted my trouble and best part of two days. The +franchise is too low, that is what ruined the country."</p> + +<p>Another desponding Galwegian found fault with the Liberal party of +1884. He said, "They were actuated by so much philanthropy. Their +motto was "Trust the people." We know what was their object well +enough, They let in the flood of Irish democracy. The Radicals got +forty, but the Nationalists gained sixty, and then part of the +Radicals—the steady, sensible party among them—ran out a breakwater +to prevent both countries being swamped. A break-water is a good +thing, but there was no necessity for the flood. They cannot +altogether repair the damage they have done. Look at the Irish members +of twenty years ago, and look at them now. Formerly they were +gentlemen. What are they to-day? A pack of blackguards. Their own +supporters shrink from <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>entrusting them with the smallest shred of +power. Mr. Gladstone must be as mad as a March hare. The idea of a +Dublin Parliament engineered by men whom their own supporters look +upon as rowdies would be amusing but for the seriousness of the +consequences. Have you been in Ennis? Did you see the great memorial +to the Manchester murderers—'Martyrs' they call them? Their lives +were taken away for love of their country, and their last breath was +God save Ireland! That's the inscription, and what does it mean? +Loyalty to England? Would such a thing be permitted on the Continent? +Why, any sensible Government would stamp out such an innuendo as open +rebellion. It teaches the children hatred of England, and they are fed +with lies from their very cradle. Every misfortune—the dirt, the +rags, the poverty of the country, are all to be attributed to English +rule. Take away that and the people believe they will live in laziness +combined with luxury."</p> + +<p>The lying of the Home Rulers is indeed unscrupulous. An Irish +newspaper of to-day's date, speaking of the opening of the Chicago +Exposition, says that "it is fitting to remember that our countrymen +have in the United States found an asylum and an opportunity which +they have never found at home, that there they have been allowed +untrammelled to worship God as they thought right," clearly implying +that in Ireland or in England they have no such liberty. A car driver +of Limerick, one Hynes, a total abstainer, and a person of some +intelligence, firmly believed that England prevented Ireland from +mining for coal, which disability, with the resulting poverty, would +disappear with the granting of Home Rule. Everywhere this patent +obliqueness and absurd unreason. A fiery Nationalist in white heat of +debate shook his fist at an Ulsterman, and said, "When we get the +bill, you'll not be allowed to have all the manufactories to +yourselves," an extraordinary outburst which requires no comment. This +burning patriot looked around and said, with the air of a man who is +posing his adversary, "Why should they have all the big works in one +corner of the island?" In opposition to the melancholy carman was the +dictum of Mr. Gallagher, the great high-priest of Kennedy's tobaccos. +He said—</p> + +<p>"The poverty of Ireland is due to the fact that she has no coal. +Geologists say that tens of thousands of years ago a great ice-drift +carried away all the coal-depositing strata."</p> + +<p>"Another injustice to Ireland," interrupted a sacrilegious Unionist.</p> + +<p>"And doubtless due to the baleful machinations of the Base and Bloody +Balfour," said another.</p> + +<p>It is easy to bear other people's troubles. He jests at scars who +never felt a wound. That the Irish nation has untold wrongs to bear is +evidenced by a Southern Irish paper, which excitedly narrates the +injuries heaped on the holy head of Hibernia by the scoffing Yankee, +the wrongful possessor of the American soil. A meeting of +distinguished Irish emigrants, who have from time to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>time favoured +the States with their notice, was recently convened in New York, not +on this exceptional occasion to metaphorically devour the succulent +Saxon, nor to send his enemies a dollar for bread, and ten dollars for +lead, nor yet to urge the Gotham nurses and scullerymaids to further +contributions in favour of patriot Parliamentarians, but to protest +with all the fervour of the conveners' souls, with all the eloquence +of their powerful intellects, with all the solemnity of a sacred deed, +against the irreverent naming of the animals in the Central Park +Zoological Gardens after Irish ladies, Irish gentlemen, Irish saints. +Misther Daniel O'Shea, of County Kerry, stated that the great +hippotamus had actually been named Miss Murphy! A hijeous baste from a +dissolute counthry inhabited wid black nagurs, to be named after an +Oirish gyurl! Mr. O'Shea uncorked the vials of his wrath, and poured +out his anger with a bubble, the meeting palpitating with hair-raising +horror. Some other animal was called Miss Bridget. And Bridget was the +name iv an Oirish saint! This must be shtopped. Mr. O'Shea declared he +would rather die than allow it to continue. No further particulars are +given, but it is understood that the viper had been christened "Tim +Healy," the rattlesnake "O'Brien," the laughing hyæna John Dillon, and +so on. The Chairman wanted to know why the Yankees did not call the +ugly brutes after Lord Salisbury and Colonel Saunderson? Nobody seemed +to know, so eight remonstrants were appointed a committee of inquiry.</p> + +<p>Mr. O'Shea also denounced the American people as unlawfully holding a +country which properly belonged to the Irish, an Irish saint, St. +Brengan, having discovered the New World in the <i>sixteenth</i> century!</p> + +<p>Enough of Ireland's wrongs; there is no end to them. As one of her +poets sings, "The cup of her bitterness long has overflowed, And still +it is not full."</p> + +<p>The great bulk of the intelligent people of Ireland regard Home Rule +with dread, and this feeling grows ever deeper and stronger. The +country is at present exploited by adventurers, paid by the enemies of +England, themselves animated by racial and religious prejudices, +willing to serve their paymasters and deserve their pay rather by +damaging England than by benefiting Ireland, for whose interests they +care not one straw. Ignorance manipulated by charlatanism and bigotry +is, in these latter days, the determining factor in the destinies of +the British Empire. Intelligence is dominated by terrorism, by threats +of death, of ill-usage, of boycotting—the latter I am told an outcome +of an old engine of the Roman Catholic Church, improved and brought up +to date. Humphreys, of Tipperary, may know if this is true. It was +from one of the "Father's" feculent family, in the heart of his own +putrescent parish, that I heard of the local chemist who dare not +supply medicine urgently needed by a boycotted person, who was +suspected of entertaining what the learned Humphreys would spell as +"Brittish" sympathies.</p> + +<p class="date">Gort (Co. Galway), May 6th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_19_INDOLENCE_AND_IMPROVIDENCE" id="No_19_INDOLENCE_AND_IMPROVIDENCE"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 19.—INDOLENCE AND IMPROVIDENCE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterm.png" alt="M" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />r. James Dunne, of Athenry, is an acute observer and a shrewd +political controversialist. He said: "The people about here, the poor +folks such as the small farmers and labourers, have really no opinion +at all. They know nothing of Home Rule, one way or the other. If they +say anything, it is to the effect that they will obtain some advantage +in connection with the land. Beyond that they care nothing for the +matter. Not one has any sentiment to be gratified. They only want to +live, if possible, a bit more easily. If they can get the land for +nothing or even more cheaply, then Home Rule is good. They can see no +further than their noses, and they cannot be expected to follow a long +chain of argument. They believe just what they are told. Yes, they go +to the priest for advice under all circumstances. They ask him to name +the man for whom they are to vote, or rather they would ask him if he +waited long enough. They vote as they are told; and as the Catholic +priest believes that the Catholic religion is the most important thing +in the world, which from his point of view is quite proper and right, +he naturally influences his people in the direction which is most +likely to propagate the true faith, and give to it the predominance +which he believes to be its rightful due.</p> + +<p>"The people round here are harmless, and will continue so, unless the +agitators get hold of them. They are ignorant, and easily led, and an +influential speaker who knew their simplicity could make them do +anything, no matter what. No, I couldn't say that they are +industrious. They do not work hard. They just go along, go along, +like. They have no enterprise at all, and you couldn't get them out of +the ways of their fathers. They'd think it a positive sin.</p> + +<p>"Look at the present fine weather. This is a very early season. No +living man has seen such a spring-time in Ireland. Two months of fine +warm weather, the ground in fine working condition, everything six +weeks before last year. Not a man that started to dig a day earlier. +No, the old time will be adhered to just as if it was cold and wet and +freezing. You could not stir them with an electric battery. They moon, +moon, moon along, in the old, old, old way, waiting for somebody to +come and do something for them.</p> + +<p>"If they had the land for nothing they would be no better off. They +would just do that much less work. They live from hand to mouth. They +have no ambition. The same thing that did for their fathers will do +for them, the same dirtiness, the same inconvenience. If their father +went three miles round a stone wall to get in at a gate they'll do it +too. Never would they think of making another gate. They turn round +angrily and say, 'Wasn't it good enough for my father, an' wasn't he a +betther man than ayther me or you?' If you lived here, you would at +first begin to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>show them things, but when you saw how much better +they like their own way you'd stop it. You'd very soon get your heart +broke. You couldn't stir them an inch in a thousand years. What will +Home Rule do for them? Nobody knows but Gladstone and the Divil."</p> + +<p>A bystander said: "Down at Galway there was a man wid a donkey goin' +about sellin' fish, which was carried in two panniers. Whin he had +only enough to fill one pannier, he put a load o' stones into the +other pannier to balance the fish an' make the panniers stick on, an' +ride aisier.</p> + +<p>"Well, one day an Englishman that had been watchin' Barney for some +time comes up to him an' he says, says he—</p> + +<p>"'Whin ye have only fish for one pannier why do ye fill up the other +wid stones off the beach?' says he.</p> + +<p>"'Sure, 'tis to balance it,' says Barney, mighty surprised an' laffin +widin himself at the Englishman's ignorance. 'Sure,' says Barney, 'ye +wouldn't have a cock-eyed load on the baste, all swingin' on one side, +like a pig wid one ear, would ye?' says he.</p> + +<p>"But this Englishman was one of thim stiff sort that doesn't know whin +he's bate, an' he went on arguin'. Says he—</p> + +<p>"'But couldn't you put the half of the fish in one pannier, and the +other half in the other pannier, instead of putting all the fish in +one, and filling up the other with stones?' says he. 'Wouldn't that +balance the load?' says he. 'And wouldn't that be only half the load +for the poor baste?' says he. An' Barney sthruggled a bit till he got +a fair grip iv it, d'ye see, but by the sivin pipers that played +before Moses, he couldn't see the way to answer this big word of the +Englishman; so he says, says he, 'Musha, 'twas me father's way, rest +his sowl,' says he. 'An' would I be settin' meself up to be bettherin' +his larnin'?' says he. 'Not one o' me would show him sich impidence +and disrespect,' says he. 'An' I'll carry the rocks till I die, glory +be to God,' says he.</p> + +<p>"Now what could ye do with the like iv <i>him</i>?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Armour, who lived five years near Sligo, said:—"The Connaught +folks have no idea of preparing for to-morrow. They are almost +entirely destitute of self-reliance. So long as they can carry on from +one day to another they are quite content. The bit of ground they live +on is not half cultivated. In the summer time you may see two or even +three crops growing up together. If they had potatoes on last, they +got them up in the most slovenly way, leaving half the crop in the +ground. They just hoak out with a stick or a bit of board what they +require for that day's food, picking the large ones and leaving the +small ones in the ground. Oats or something else will be seen +half-choked with weeds and the growth from the potatoes so left. The +slovenliness of these people is most exasperating. Of course they are +all Home Rulers in effect, though not in theory. By that I mean that +they have no politics, except to produce politicians by their votes. +They know no more of Home Rule than they know of Heidsieck's +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>champagne, or Christmas strawberries, or soap and water, or any other +unknown commodity. They are precisely where their ancestors were, +except for the crop of potatoes, which enables them to exist in +greater luxury and with less trouble. Their way is to plant the +potatoes, dig them as required, and live on them either with the aid +of a cow or with the butter-milk of a neighbour who has a cow. No +provision for the future is attempted, because the relatives are sure +to provide for the worn-out and sickly. That shows their +goodheartedness, but it does away with self-dependence. There are some +things so deeply ingrained in the Irish character that nothing and +nobody can touch them. The very priests themselves cannot move them. +Although these people believe that the priests could set them on fire +from head to heel, or strike them paralytic, or refuse them entrance +into heaven, yet the force of habit is so great, and the dread of +public opinion is so powerful, that the people, so long as they remain +in Ireland, will never depart a hair's-breadth from the old ways."</p> + +<p>A woman who washed and tidied her children would be a mark for every +bitter tongue in the parish. A striking case came under my own +observation. A woman of the place was speaking most bitterly of +another, and she finished up with,—</p> + +<p>"She's the lady all out, niver fear. Shure, she washes and dhresses +the childer ivery mornin', and turns out the girls wid hats on their +heads an' shoes on their feet. Divil a less would sarve her turn! She +has a brick flure to her house, an' she washes it—divil a lie I tell +ye—she washes it—wid wather—an' wid soap an' wather, ivery +Sattherday in the week! The saints betune us an' harm, but all she +wants now is to turn Protestant altogether!"</p> + +<p>Four miles away is the village of Carnaun, and there I met Philip +Fahy, with his son Michael, and another young fellow, all three +returning from field work, wearily toiling along the rocky road which +runs through the estate of Major Lobdell. The party stopped and sat +down to smoke with me. The senior took the lead, not with a brogue but +with an accent, translating from the Irish vernacular as he went on. +"Long ye may live! We're glad we met ye, thanks be to God. Yer +honner's glory is the foinest, splindidist man I seen this twinty +year. May God protect ye! 'Tis weary work we does. That foine, big boy +ye see foreninst ye, has eighteenpence a day, nine shillin' a week. +'Tis not enough to support him properly. I have a son in England, the +cliverist lad ye seen this many a day. Sich a scholar, 'twould be no +discredit to have the Queen for his aunt, no it wouldn't. No, he's +only just gone, an' I didn't hear from him yet. I didn't tell ye where +he'd be, for I wouldn't know meself. But me other boys is goin', for +they tell me things will be afther getting worse. God help us, an' +stand betune us an harm! Did ye hear of the Home Rule Bill? What does +it mane at all, at all? Not one of us knows, more than that lump of +stone ye sit on. Will it give us the land for nothin'? for that's all +we hear. We'd be obliged av ye <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>could axplain it a thrifle, for sorra +a one but's bad off, an' Father O'Baithershin says, Howld yer whist, +says he, till ye see what'll happen, says he. Will we get the bit o' +ground without rint, yer honner's glory?"</p> + +<p>Philip was dressed for agricultural work in the following style, which +is clearly considered the correct thing in Galway. One tall "top-hat," +with a long fur like that of a mangy rabbit, waving to the jocund +zephyrs of Carnaun; one cut-away coat of very thick homespun cloth, +having five brass buttons on each breast; breeches and leggings and +stout boots completed the outfit, which fitted like a sentry-box, and +bore a curiously caricatured resemblance to the Court suit of a +Cabinet Minister in full war-paint. The spades with which the +labourers till the ground are strange to the English eye, and seem +calculated to get through the smallest amount of work with the +greatest amount of labour. That they were spades at all was more than +I could make out. "What are those implements?" I asked, to which the +answer came, "Have ye no shpades in England thin!"</p> + +<p>The business end is about two feet long and not more than three inches +broad, with a sort of shoulder for the foot. The handles are about six +feet long and end like a mop-stick, without any crossbar. A slight +alteration would turn these tools into pikes, a much more likely +operation than the beating of swords into plough-shares and spears +into pruning-hooks. Meanwhile the length of the handle keeps the +worker from too dangerous proximity to his work. There is a broader +pattern of blade, but the handle is always of the same sanitary +length. The children of the soil turn it over at a wholesome distance. +They keep six feet of pole between the earth and their nobility. Small +blame to them for that same! Shure the wuruld will be afther thim. +Shure there's no sinse at all, at all, in workin' life out to kape +life in.</p> + +<p>"Ah, no," said Misther Fahy. "That tobacky has no strinth in it. We +get no satisfaction out iv it. We shmoked a pipe iv it to make frinds, +but we'd not shmoke another. 'Tis like chopped hay or tay-leaves, it +is. Will we walk back wid yer honner's glory? 'Tis only four miles, it +is. No, we bur-rn no powdher here. But on the other side, above +Athenry, 'tis there ye'll see the foin shootin'. Thims the boys for +powdher an' shot! 'Tis more than nine they shot, aye, and more than +tin it was. An' sarve thim right, if they must turn the people out, +an' have their own way. May the Lord protect ye! May angels make yer +bed this night! Long may ye live, an' yer sowl to glory!"</p> + +<p>I had written so far, when glancing through the window, I saw a +familiar form, a rosy, healthy, florid gentleman parading on the lawn +which fronts the Railway Hotel, puffing a cigarette, briskly turning +and returning with something of the motion of a captive lion. I knew +that pinky cheek, I knew that bright blue eye; yet here, in the wilds +of Galway who could it be? He plays with two sportive spaniels, and +cries "Down, Sir, down." Thy voice <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>bewrayeth thee, member for North +Galway! The Parnellitic Colonel Nolan, thou, <i>in propriâ personâ</i>. +What makes he here? When the great Bill impends, why flee the festive +scene? I'll speak a little with this learned Theban. I board him, as +the French say. For a moment he regards me with suspicion—with a kind +of vade-in-retro-Satanas air—but presently he goes ahead. A fair at +Tuam, which he never misses. Has paired with somebody, Pierpoint he +thinks is the name. His vote will therefore not be lost to his side. +"Nothing will now be done before Whitsuntide. Both parties will be on +their best behaviour. The Conservatives and obstruction, the Liberals +and closure. Strategy to obtain some show of advantage at the recess +is now the little game. Knows not what will happen <i>re</i> Home Rule. The +English Liberals not now so confident as they were. The Government may +be ruined by liquor. 'Tis the fate of Liberal Governments to be ruined +by drink. The Government of 1874 and the next Liberal Cabinet went to +the dogs on liquor. And if the English people are called upon to give +a verdict on a local option bill, the result is rather uncertain. +Chances perhaps against Mr. Gladstone. The Home Rule question is now +quite worked up. The English people are now satisfied to have Home +Rule, but some intervening question might delay its final settlement. +No, the agitation of the past four or five months had not changed the +position one bit. No amount of agitation would now make any difference +at all."</p> + +<p>From the probable wrecking of the Gladstonian Cabinet on "liquor" to +the question of Customs, or, as Colonel Nolan preferred to call it, of +Excise, was but an easy step. By a simple <i>adagio</i> movement I +modulated into the Customs question, mentioning the opinion given to +me by Mr. John Jameson himself. The Colonel did not deny, nor admit, +that the Irish people were excellent smugglers, but thought the fears +of the Unionists exaggerated. He was well aware that smuggling might +be carried on—say, on the coast of Connemara and elsewhere, where +were roads and bays and natural harbours galore, with a wild and +lonely shore far from the centres of Government. Probably at first +some money might be lost that way; some little chinks would doubtless +be found; there would be some little leakage. But suppose an initial +loss of £100,000 or £200,000, it was not likely that such a state of +things would be allowed to continue. As to the argument that the rural +police would not then assist the 1,300 coastguards, who with the +police have been sufficient, there was little or no solidity in this +assumption. The Irish Parliament would order the police to assist, and +if they did not execute their orders, or if they allowed themselves to +be bribed, and the Irish Parliament did not prosecute them for +accepting bribes, then the English Government would step in and put +matters right. This is just a typical Home Rule argument, the +confidence trick all over. The Colonel thought that after a certain +amount of shaking down, everything would work sweetly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>enough. He said +nothing about the Union of Hearts, nor have I yet heard the phrase +from an Irishman.</p> + +<p>A keen observer resident at the Athenry Hotel says:—"Of those who +come here the proportion against Home Rule is not less than twenty to +one. Now mark my figures, because they are based on careful notes +extending over the last six months. When you have all the money in the +country, and all the best brains in the country, against the bill, +what good could the bill do if it became law? And while I can see, and +all these people can see, no end of risk, disturbance, upset, loss, +ruin, and everything that is bad, we cannot see anything at all to +compensate for the risk. Nobody can put his finger on anything and +say, 'There, that's the advantage we'll get from the bill.' 'Tis all +fancy, pure fancy. Ireland a nation, and a Roman Catholic nation, is +the cry. We may get that, but we'll be bankrupt next day. 'Tis like +putting a poor man in a grand house without food, furniture, or money, +and without credit to raise anything on the building. There now, ye +might say, ye have a splendid place that's all your own. But wouldn't +the poor man have to leave it, or die of starvation? Of course I wish +to respect my clergy, but I think they should not interfere with +politics."</p> + +<p>Colonel Nolan said to me: "The priests wield an immense, an +incalculable power. All are on the same path, all hammer away at the +one point. It is the persistency, the organisation, that tells. In +some cases they have been known to preach for a year and a half at a +stretch on political subjects. What is going to stand against that?"</p> + +<p>With these golden words I close my letter. The priest holds the +sceptre of the British Empire. Circumstances have placed in his hands +an astonishing opportunity. Nearly every priest in Ireland is using +his supernatural credit with one solitary aim. We know their +disloyalty, we know they are no friends of England—we know their +influence, their organisation, their perseverance, their +unscrupulousness, their absolute supremacy in Ireland—and it is high +time that England asked herself, in the words of Colonel Nolan—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"What is going to stand against that?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="date">Athenry (Co. Galway), May 6th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_20_RELIGION_AT_THE_BOTTOM_OF_THE_IRISH_QUESTION" id="No_20_RELIGION_AT_THE_BOTTOM_OF_THE_IRISH_QUESTION"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 20.—RELIGION AT THE BOTTOM OF THE IRISH QUESTION.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />uam has two cathedrals but no barber. You may be shriven but you +cannot be shaved. You may be whitewashed but you cannot be lathered. +"One shaves another; we're neighbourly here," said a railway porter. +They cut each other's hair by the light of nature, in the open street, +with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>a chorus of bystanders. The Tuamites live in a country of +antiquities, but they have no photographer. Nor could I find a +photograph for sale. The people are sweetly unsophisticated. A +bare-footed old lady sat on the step of the Victoria Hotel, sucking a +black dhudeen, sending out smoke like a factory chimney, the picture +of innocent enjoyment. The streets were full of pigs from the rural +parts, and great was the bargaining and chaffering in Irish, a +language which seemed to be composed of rolling r's and booming +gutturals. A sustained conversation sounds like the jolting of a +country cart over a rocky road, a sudden exclamation like the whirr of +a covey of partridges, an oath like the downfall of a truck-load of +bricks. I arrived in time for the great pig fair, and Tuam was very +busy. It is a poor town, of which the staple trade is religion. The +country around is green and beautiful, with brilliant patches of gorse +in full bloom, every bush a solid mass of brightest yellow, dazzling +you in the sunshine. Many of the streets are wretchedly built, and the +Galway Road shows how easily the Catholic poor are satisfied. Not only +are the cabins in this district aboriginal in build, but they are also +indescribably filthy, and the condition of the inmates, like that of +the people inhabiting the poorer parts of Limerick, is no whit higher +than that obtaining in the wigwams of the native Americans. The hooded +women, black-haired and bare-footed, bronzed and tanned by constant +exposure, are wonderfully like the squaws brought from the Far West by +Buffalo Bill. The men look more civilised, and the pig-jobbers, with +their tall hats, dress coats, and knotty shillelaghs, were the pink of +propriety. Now and then a burst of wild excitement would attract the +stranger, who would hurry up to see the coming homicide, but there was +no manslaughter that I could see. A scene of frantic gesticulation +near the Town Hall promised well, but contrary to expectation, there +was no murder done. Two wild-eyed men, apparently breathing slaughter, +suddenly desisted, reining in their fury and walking off amicably +together. An Irish-speaking policeman explained that one having sold +the other a pig the buyer was asking for twopence off, and that they +now departed to drink the amount between them. People who had done +their business went away in queer carts made to carry turf—little +things with sides like garden palings four or five feet high. Three or +four men would squat on one, closely packed, looking through the bars +like fowls in a hen-coop. The donkeys who drew these chariots had all +their work cut out, and most of their backs cut up. The drivers laid +on with stout ash-plants, sparing no exertion to create the donkey's +enthusiasm. Prices ruled low. "'Tis not afther sellin' thim I am," +said a peasant who had got rid of his pigs, "'tis bestowin' thim I +was, the craythurs. The counthry is ruinated intirely, an' so it is. +By the holy poker of Methesulum, the prices we got this day for +lowness bangs Banagher, an' Banagher bangs the divil."</p> + +<p>The Tuamites spare a little time for politics and boycotting. The +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>public spirit and contempt for British law are all that could be +desired by Irish patriotism. Mr. Strachan has recently bought some +land. The previous owner, Mr. Dominick Leonard, brother of Dr. Leonard +of Athenry, and of Judge Leonard of London, had raised money on the +property, and failed to pay interest or principal. An English +insurance company determined to realize, and the affair went into the +Land Court, Mr. Strachan buying part of the estate for £2,765. It was +easy enough to buy, and even to pay, but to get possession was quite +another thing. Precise information is difficult to get, for while some +decline to say a word, others are mutually contradictory, and a State +Commission would hardly sift truth from the confusing mass of details, +denials, assertions, and counter-assertions. This much is clear +enough. A tenant named Ruane was required to leave a house, with +ground, which he had held on the estate bought by Mr. Strachan. He had +paid no rent for a long time. Of course he refused to leave, and, a +decree having been obtained, he was duly evicted. But, as Lady de +Burgho said, evictions do no good. When the officers of the law went +home to tea, Mr. Ruane went home also, breaking the locks, forcing the +doors, reinstating himself and his furniture, planting his Lares and +Penates in their old situations, hanging up his caubeen on the +ancestral nail, and crossing his patriotic shin-bones on the familiar +hearth. Pulled up for trespass, he declared that if sent to prison +fifty times he would still return to the darling spot, and defied the +British army and navy—horse, foot, and artillery—ironclads, marines, +and 100-ton guns, to keep him out. For three acts of trespass he got +three weeks imprisonment. The moment he was released Mr. Ruane walked +back home, and took possession once again. There he is now, laughing +at the Empire on which the sun never sets. When a certain bishop read +"Paradise Lost" to a sporting lord, the impatient auditor's attention +was arrested by some bold speech of Satan, whereupon he exclaimed +"Dang me, if I don't back that chap. I like his pluck, and I hope +he'll win." Something like this might be said of Ruane.</p> + +<p>And Ruane will stick to his land. A public meeting held on Sunday week +determined to support him, and to show forth its mind by planting the +ground for him. Mr. Strachan seems to have seen the futility of +looking to the law, on the security of which he invested his money. +Too late he finds that his savings are not safe, and he endeavours to +make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness. He has offered Ruane +five acres of land and a house, and Ruane would have accepted with +thanks had he been allowed. But he went to a meeting in some outlying +village, and received his orders from the Land League. For, be it +observed, that the people of these parts speak of the Land League as +existing in full force. Ruane declined the handsome offer of the +kind-hearted Strachan. Ruane will hold the house and land from which +he has been evicted, <i>because</i> he had been evicted, and that the +people may see that they have the mastery. Ruane would prefer the +proffered <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>land, but private interests must give way to the public +weal. England must be smashed, treated with contumely; her laws, her +officers, her edicts treated with contempt, laughed at by every naked +gutter-snipe, rendered null and void. That this can be done with +perfect impunity is the teaching of priests, Fenians, Nationalists, +Federationists—call them what you will—all alike flagrantly disloyal +to the English Crown. Not worth while to differentiate them. As the +sailor said of crocodiles and alligators, "There's no difference at +all. They're all tarnation varmint together."</p> + +<p>Mr. Strachan is boycotted, and goes about with a guard of three +policemen. What will happen from one day to another nobody can tell. +Since I last mentioned Mr. Blood, of Ennis, that most estimable +gentleman has been again fired on, this time at a range of 400 yards, +and when guarded by the four policemen who accompany him everywhere. +Three shots were fired, and the police found an empty rifle cartridge +at the firing point. A Protestant in Tuam said to me:—</p> + +<p>"Home Rule would mean that every Protestant would have to fly the +country. Why should there not be a return to the persecutions of years +ago? When first I came to the place the Protestants were hooted as +they went to church, and I can remember seeing this very Strachan +going to worship on Sunday morning, his black go-to-meeting coat so +covered with the spittle of the mob that you would not know him. His +wife would come down with a Bible, and the children would run along +shouting 'Here comes mother Strachan, with the devil in her fist.' +Why, the young men got cows' horns and fixed them up with strings, so +that they could tie them on their foreheads. Then with these horns on +they would walk before and behind the Protestants as they went to +church or left it, to show that the devil was accompanying them. They +always figure the devil as being horned. One of the little barefooted +boys who ran after these Protestants is now a holy priest in Tuam. And +what the people were then, so they will be now, once they get the +upper hand. The educated Catholics are excellent people, none better +anywhere, none more tolerant. Nothing to fear from them. But how many +are there? Look at the masses of ignorant people around us. The +density of their ignorance is something that the people of England +cannot understand. They have no examples of it. The most stupid and +uninformed English you can find have some ray of enlightenment. These +people are steeped in ignorance and superstition. Their religion is +nothing but fetichism. Their politics? well, they are blind tools of +the priests: what else can be said? And the priests have but one +object. In all times, in all countries, the Roman Catholic Church has +aimed at absolute dominion. The religious question is at the bottom of +it all."</p> + +<p>No matter where an educated Irishman begins, that is where he always +ends. Catholics and Protestants alike come round to the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>same point at +last, though with evident reluctance. The Protestant Unionists +especially avoid all mention of religion as long as possible. They +know the credal argument excites suspicion. They attack Home Rule from +every other point of view, and sometimes you think you have +encountered a person of different opinion. Wait till he knows you a +little better, has more confidence in your fairness, stands in less +fear of a possible snub. Sooner or later, sure as the night follows +the day, he is bound to say—</p> + +<p>"The religious question is at the bottom of it all."</p> + +<p>The people of Ireland do not want an Irish Parliament, and the failure +of the bill would not trouble them in the least. They do not care a +brass farthing for the bill one way or the other. The great heart of +the people is untouched. The masses know nothing of it, and will not +feel its loss. They are in the hands of priests and agitators, these +poor unlettered peasants, and their blind voting, their inarticulate +voice, translated into menace and mock patriotism. Everybody admits +that the people would be happy and content if only left alone. +Half-a-dozen ruffians with rifles can boss a whole country side, and +the people must do as they are told. They do not believe in the +secrecy of the ballot. They believe that the priests by their +supernatural powers are able to know how everybody voted, and I am +assured on highly respectable authority that the secrecy of the ballot +in Ireland is, in some parts, a questionable point. At the same time, +there is everywhere a strong opinion that another election will give +very different results in Ireland. And everywhere there is a growing +feeling that the Bill will not become law. This explains the slight +rise in the value of Irish securities.</p> + +<p>Just outside Tuam I came upon a neatly built, deep-thatched villa, +with a flower garden in front, a carefully cultivated kitchen garden +running along the road, trim hedges, smart white palings, an orchard +of fine young trees, a general air of neatness, industry, prosperity, +which, under the circumstances, was positively staggering. I had +passed along a mile of cabins in every stage of ruin, from the +solitary chimney still standing to the more recent ruin with two +gables, from the inhabited pig-sty to the hut whereon grew crops of +long grass. I had noted the old lady clad in sackcloth and ashes, who, +having invested the combined riches of the neighbourhood in six +oranges and a bottle of pop, was sitting on the ground, alternately +contemplating the three-legged stool which held the locked-up capital +and her own sooty toes, immersed in melancholy reflections anent the +present depression in commercial circles. The Paradisaic cottage was +startling after this. I stopped a bare-legged boy, and found that the +place belonged to a Black Protestant, and, what was worse, a +Presbyterian, and, what was superlatively bad, a Scots Presbyterian. +Presently I met a tweed-clad form, red-faced and huge of shoulder, +full of strange accents and bearded like the pard. Berwickshire gave +him birth, but he has "done time" in Ireland.</p> + +<p>"I'm transported this forty-three years. I thought I'd end my <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>days +here, but if this bill passes we'll go back to Scotland. We'll have +Catholic governors, and they'll do what they like with us. Ye'll have +a tangled web to weave, over the Channel there. Ye'll have the whole +island in rebellion in five-and-twenty minutes after ye give them +power. Anybody that thinks otherwise is either very ignorant of the +state of things or else he's a born fule. No, I wouldn't say the folks +are all out that lazy, not in this part of Galway. They will work weel +enough for a Scots steward, or for an Englishman. But no Irish steward +can manage them. Anybody will tell you that. No-one in any part of the +country will say any different. Now, that's a queer thing. An Irish +steward has no control over them. They don't care for him. And he runs +more risk of shooting than an English or Scots steward.</p> + +<p>"There was an Irish bailiff where I was steward, and he saw how I +managed the men, and thought he'd do it the same way. So once when he +and a lot of diggers went in for the praties and buttermilk, the +praties were not ready, and he gives the fellow who was responsible a +bit of a kick behind with the side of his foot, like.</p> + +<p>"The very next night he got six slugs in his head and face and one of +his front teeth knocked out. That taught him to leave kicking to +foreigners. Once two men were speaking of me. I overheard one say, +'Ah, now, Micky, an' isn't it a pity that Palmer's a Black Protestant, +an' that his sowl will blaze in hell for ever, like a tur-rf soddock +ye'd pick up in the bog?'"</p> + +<p>"Settle the land question and you settle Home Rule. The bad times made +Parnell's success. He was backed by the low prices of produce, and the +general depression of agricultural interests. The rent has been +reduced, but not enough to compensate the drop in the prices of +produce. Why, cattle have been fetching one-half what they fetched a +short time ago. Potatoes are twopence-halfpenny a stone! Did you ever +hear of such a thing? Yes, it enables the people to live very cheaply, +but how about the growers? If every man grew his own potatoes and +lived on them, well and good, but he must have no rent to pay. That +price would not pay for labour and manure. Oats are worth sixpence to +ninepence a stone,—a ridiculous price; and we have not yet touched +the bottom.</p> + +<p>"The land question should be settled. No, it is not satisfactory. +People have to wait seven years for a settlement, and meanwhile they +could be kicked out of their holdings at one day's notice. The people +who bought under Ashbourne's Act are happy, prosperous, and contented. +The people who are beside them are the contrary. Home Rulers, bosh! +Farmers know as much about Home Rule as a pig knows about the Sabbath +Day. The land, the land, the land! Let the Tories take this up and +dish the Liberals. Easiest thing alive. How? Compulsory sale, +compulsory purchase. Leave nothing to either party. Then you'll hear +no more of Home Rule. Let the Unionists hold their ground a bit, till +it dies out, or until the rival factious destroy each other. Loyalty? +Why those Nationalist members have themselves told <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>you over and over +again that they are rebels. Don't you believe them? Some few may be +inspired with the idea that the thing is impracticable, but they will +all preach separation when the right time comes. 'Pay no taxes to +England,' they'll cry. The people can follow that. Tell them that any +course of action means non-payment of anything, and they're on it like +a shot. Why, the Paying of Tribute to England is already discussed in +every whiskey shop in Galway, and every man is prepared to line the +ditches with guns and pikes rather than pay one copper. When you can't +give Strachan the farm for which he paid last February, when you can't +keep a small farmer who won't pay rent from occupying his farm and +getting his crops as usual, for he <i>will</i> do so, how are you going to +raise the famous Tribute Money?"</p> + +<p>Near the Town Hall was a great crowd of people listening to a couple +of minstrels who chanted alternate lines of a modernised version of +the <i>Shan van vocht</i>. "Let me make the songs of a people, and I care +not who makes its laws." Mr. Gladstone is appreciated now. The heart +of the Connaughtman throbs responsive to his pet appellation. This is +part of the song—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oi'm goin' across the say, says the Grand Old Man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oi'll be back some other day, says the Grand Old Man;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When Oireland gets fair play<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We'll make Balfour rue the day,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Remimber what I say, says the Grand Old Man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whin will ye come back? says the Grand Old Man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whin will ye come back? says the Grand Old Man,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Whin Balfour gets the sack<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wid Salisbury on his back,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or unto hell does pack, says the Grand Old Man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will ye deny the Lague? says the Grand Old Man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No, we'll continue to the Lague, says the Grand Old Man.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">John Dillon says at every station,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">'Twill be his conversation<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Oireland is a nation, says the Grand Old Man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There are three more verses of this immortal strain. The <i>Shan van +vocht</i> was the great song of the '98 rebellion, and possibly the +G.O.M.'s happy adaptability to the music may put the finishing touch +to his world-wide renown. Other songs referred to the arrest of Father +Keller, of Youghal. "They gathered in their thousands their grief for +to revale, An' mourn for their holy praste all in Kilmainham Jail." +These ballads are anonymous, but the talented author of "Dirty little +England" stands revealed by internal evidence. The voices which +chanted these melodies were discordant, but the people around listened +with reverential awe, from time to time making excited comments in +Irish. Altogether Tuam is a depressing kind of place, and but for the +enterprise of a few Protestants, the place would be a phantasmagoria +of pigs, priests, peasants, poverty, and "peelers." Perhaps Galway +would have more civilization, if less piety. You cannot move about an +Irish country town after nightfall without barking your shins on a +Roman Catholic Cathedral. This in time becomes somewhat monotonous.</p> + +<p class="date">Tuam (Co. Galway), May 9th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_21_MR_BALFOURS_FISHERIES" id="No_21_MR_BALFOURS_FISHERIES"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 21.—MR. BALFOUR'S FISHERIES.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> clean, well-built town, with a big river, the Corrib, running +through the middle of it, splashing romantically down from the salmon +weir, not far from the Protestant Church of Saint Nicholas, a +magnificent cathedral-like structure over six hundred years old. There +is a big square with trees and handsome buildings, several good +hotels, a tramway, and, <i>mirabile dictu!</i> a veritable barber's shop. +The Connaught folks, as a whole, seem to have fully realised the old +saying that shaving by a barber is a barbarous custom, but there is no +rule without an exception, and accordingly Mr. McCoy, of Eyre Square, +razors and scissors her Majesty's lieges, whether gentle or simple, +rebel or loyal, Unionist or Separatist, Catholic or Protestant. The +good Figaro himself is an out-and-out Separatist. He swallows complete +Independence, and makes no bones about it. He believes in Ireland a +Nation, insists on perfect autonomy, and, unlike the bulk of his +fellow Nationalists, has the courage of his opinions. His objection to +English interference with Irish affairs is openly expressed, and with +an emphasis which leaves no doubt of his sincerity. According to Mr. +McCoy, the woes of Ireland are each and all directly attributable to +English rule. The depopulation of the country, the lack of enterprise, +of industry, of the common necessaries of life, of everything to be +desired by the sons of men—all these disagreeables are due to the +selfishness, the greed, the brutality of Englishmen, who are not only +devoid of the higher virtues, but also entirely destitute of common +fairness, common honesty, common humanity. Mr. McCoy holds that +England exploits Ireland for her own purposes, is a merciless sucker +of Hibernia's life-blood, a sweater, a slave-driver, a more than +Egyptian taskmaster. Remove the hated English garrison, abolish +English influence, let Ireland guide her own destinies, and all will +at once be well—trade will revive, poverty will disappear, emigration +will be checked, a teeming population will inhabit the land, and the +Emerald Isle will once more become great, glorious, and free, Furst +flower o' the airth, Furst gem o' the say. No longer will the gallant +men of Connaught bow their meek heads to American shears, no longer +present their well-developed jaws to Yankee razors; but, instead of +this, flocking in their thousands on saints' days and market days to +their respective county towns, and especially to Galway, will form <i>en +queue</i> at the door of Mr. McCoy, to save the country by fostering +native industries. No longer will it avail the Chinaman of whom he +told me to sail from New York to Ireland, because the latter is the +only country wherein Irishmen do not monopolise all the good things, +do not boss the show—have, in fact, no voice at all in its +management. "But," said my friend, "we'll get no Home Rule, we'll get +no Parlimint, we'll get nothin' at all at all till <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>Irishmen rise up +in every part o' the wuruld an thrash it out o' ye. What business have +the English here at all domineering over us? Didn't one o' their great +spakers get up in Parlimint an' say we must be kept paupers? Didn't he +say that 'the small loaf was the finest recruiting sergeant in the +wuruld?' There ye have the spirit o' the English. We want the counthry +to ourselves, an' to manage it our way, not yours. An' that thievin' +owld Gladstone's the biggest scut o' thim all. No, I'm not grateful to +Gladstone, not a bit iv it. Divil a ha'porth we have to thank him for. +Sure, he was rakin Parnell out iv his grave, the mane-spirited scut, +that cringed and grinned whin Parnell was alive. Sure, 'twas Gladstone +broke up the party wid his morality. 'Ah,' says he, 'I couldn't +associate wid such a person, alanna!' An' he wouldn't let it be a +Parlimint at all—it must be a leg-is-la-ture, by the hokey, it must, +no less. Let him go choke wid his leg-is-la-ture, the durty, +mane-spirited owld scut."</p> + +<p>Mr. McCoy declines to regard Mr. Gladstone as a benefactor of Ireland, +but in this he is not alone. His sentiments are shared by every +Irishman I have met, no matter what his politics. The Unionist party +are the more merciful, sparing expletives, calling no ill names. They +admire his ability, his wonderful vitality, versatility, ingenuity of +trickery. They sincerely believe that he is only crazy, and think it a +great pity. They speak of the wreck of his rich intellect, and say in +effect <i>corruptio optimi pessima est</i>. There is another monkish +proverb which may strike them as they watch him in debate, +particularly when he seems to be cornered; it runs, <i>Non habet +anguillam, Per caudam qui tenet illam</i>, which may be extemporaneously +rendered, He has not surely caught the eel, Who only holds him by the +tail.</p> + +<p>Every Nationalist I have met entertains similar opinions, but few +express them so unguardedly. Mr. McCoy must be honoured for his +candour and superior honesty. If his brethren were all as frankly +outspoken as he England would be saved much trouble, much waste of +precious time. The secret aspirations of the Irish Nationalist +leaders, if openly avowed, would dispose of the Home Rule agitation at +once and for ever. No risk of loss, no possible disadvantage, daunted +Mr. McCoy. He accepted the statement of a rabid Separatist, quoted in +a previous letter, that the Irish would prefer to go to hell their own +way. That was his feeling exactly. Not that there was any danger. +Great was his confidence, implicit, sublime, ineffably Irish. His was +the faith that removes mountains. Not like a grain of mustard seed, +but like the rock of Cashel. <i>Floreat</i> McCoy!</p> + +<p>Mr. Athy, of Kinvarra, has very little to say. He thinks the bill +would make Ireland a hell upon earth for all Protestants living in +Catholic communities, and that a settlement of the land question would +settle the hash of the agitators. Mr. Kendal, of Tallyho, an +Englishman twenty-five years resident in Ireland, agrees in the latter +opinion. I forgot to question him <i>re</i> toleration. He thinks <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>the Home +Rule Bill simply insane, absurd, not worth serious discussion by +sensible men. "No intelligent man who knows the country would dream of +such madness. The simplicity of the English people must be incredible. +Pity they cannot come over and examine for themselves."</p> + +<p>Mr. Beddoes, traffic manager of the Limerick and Waterford Railway, +came to Ireland an enthusiastic Gladstonian. He had worked with might +and main to send Mr. Price to Parliament, and was largely instrumental +in returning him. He is now a staunch Unionist, admits the error of +his ways, and rejoices that a personal acquaintance with the subject +at once led him into the true fold. I had this confession of faith +from Mr. Beddoes himself, a keen, successful man of eminently +Conservative appearance, a scholar, a traveller, and a great favourite +with his men.</p> + +<p>"How long were you in Ireland before you changed your mind?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Mr. Beddoes, "to tell the truth, I began to have my +doubts during the first week."</p> + +<p>A prosperous Presbyterian of Galway said:—"To say that the Irish +people, the masses, want an Irish Parliament is the height of +absurdity; and to argue that their aspirations are expressed by their +votes is a gross perversion of the truth. The ignorance of the people +explains everything. They voted as the priests told them to vote, +without the smallest conception of what they were voting for, without +the smallest idea of what Home Rule really means. They are quite +incapable of understanding a complicated measure of any kind, and they +naturally accept the guidance of their spiritual advisers, whom they +are accustomed to regard as men of immense erudition, besides being +gifted with power to bind and loose, and having the keys of heaven at +command. You know how they canvass their penitents in the +confessional, and how from the altar they have taught the people to +lie, telling them to vote for one man and to shout down the streets +for another. The Irish priests are wonderfully moral men in other +respects, and cases of immorality in its ordinary sense are so rare as +to be practically unknown. I could forgive their politics, and even +their confessional influence, if they were not such awful liars. Their +want of truthfulness reacts on the people, and if you send a man to do +a job, he will return and get his money when he has only half done it. +'Oh, yes,' he'll say, as natural as possible, 'I've done it well, very +well.' And they are not ashamed when they are proved to be liars. They +think nothing of it. And the way they cheat each other! A few days ago +I met a man who pulled out a bundle of one-pound notes, and said, 'I'm +afther selling thirteen cows, an' I'm afther buying thirteen more. I +sowld me cows to Barney So-and-So, afther givin' him six noggins of +poteen, an' I got out of him twenty per cint. more than the price that +was goin', thanks be to God!' They are so pious—in words."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>"What they want is emancipation from the priests and from the +superstitions of the dark ages. They believe in the fairies still, and +attribute all kinds of powers to them. Look at the <i>Tuam News</i> of +yesterday evening. Perhaps the English people would hesitate before +conferring self-government on the poor folks who read that paper, if +they could only see the rag for a week or two."</p> + +<p>I secured the <i>Tuam News</i> for Friday, May 12, 1893, and found the +sheet instructive, suggestive, original. There is a big advertisement +in Irish, an ancient Irish poem with translation, and a letter from +Mr. Henry Smyth, of Harborne, Birmingham, addressed to the National +Literary Society of Loughrea, under whose auspices Miss Gonne the +other day delivered the rebel lecture quoted in the Killaloe letter. +Our fellow-citizen speaks of "the spirit of revival that is abroad +amongst you, of your new society rising phoenix-like from the ashes of +the old, not uninspired, we may suppose, by the project of your being +in the near future masters in your own house, the arbiters of your own +destiny, for you will be governed by the men of your own choice." Side +by side with this heart-felt utterance let us print another letter +appearing in the same issue of the same hebdomadal illuminator:—</p> + +<div class="block"><h4>TO THE EDITOR OF THE TUAM NEWS.</h4> + +<p>Sir,—Permit me a little space in the next issue of the <i>Tuam +News</i>, relative to my father being killed by the fairies which +appeared in the <i>Tuam News</i> of the 8th of April last. I beg to +say that he was not killed by the fairies, but I say he was +killed by some person or persons unknown as yet. Hoping very +soon that the perpetrators of this dastardly outrage will be +soon brought to light, I am, Mr. Editor, yours obediently,</p> + +<p class="right sc">David Redington.</p> +<p style="padding-bottom: .5em;">Kilcreevanty, May 8th, '93.</p> +</div> + +<p>What would be thought of an English constituency which required such a +contradiction? The people who believe in the fairies form the bulk of +the Irish electorate. Their votes have sent the Nationalist members to +Parliament; their voice it is which directs the action of Gladstone, +Morley, and Tail; their influence ordains the course of legislation; +in their hands are the destinies of England and Englishmen. The people +themselves are innocent enough. If they hate England it is because +they have been so taught by priests and agitators for their own ends. +The only remedy is enlightenment, but the process must be slow. The +accursed influences are ever at work, on the platform, in the press, +at the altar, and I see no countervailing agency. The people are 'cute +enough, and would be clever, if once their bonds were broken. They are +not fettered by English rule. They are bound down by Ignorance, rank +Ignorance, in an Egyptian darkness that may be felt. They are poor in +this world's goods, although seemingly healthier and stronger than the +English average. Much of their poverty is their own fault. Much more +is due to the teachings of agitators. The Land League has mined whole +communities. Poverty and Ignorance made the Irish masses an easy prey. +Their ancient prejudices are kept alive, their ancient grievances +industriously disinterred, their imagination pleased with an +illimitable <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>vista of prosperity artfully unrolled before their +untutored gaze. We have the result before us. The Gladstonian party in +England are responding to the dictates of a handful of hirelings and +sacerdotalists, and not to the aspirations of a people. Credulity is +the offspring of Ignorance, and accordingly we see that the Irish +people believe in Tim Healy and the priests, the Grand Old Man and the +fairies. They must be saved from themselves.</p> + +<p>The harbour of Galway is very picturesque. A massive ivy-covered arch +marks the boundary line of the ancient walls, some of which are still +extant. The raggedness and filthiness of the fisher-wives and children +must be seen to be understood. A few sturdy fishermen sat gloomily +beside two great piles of fish, thrown out of the boats in heaps. +Large fish, like cod, and yet not cod; bigger than hake, but not +unlike the Cornish fish. To ask a question at a country station or in +the street is in Connaught rather embarrassing, as all the people +within earshot immediately crowd around to hear what is going on. Not +impudent, but sweetly unsophisticated are the Galway folks, openly +regarding the stranger with inquiring eye, not unfriendly, but merely +curious. Having no business of their own, they take the deepest +interest in that of other people. And they make a fuss. They are too +polite. They load you with attentions. No trouble is too great. Give +them the smallest chance and they put themselves about until you wish +you had not spoken. However, I wanted to know about the fish, so I +strolled up to two men who were lying at full length on the quay, and +said—</p> + +<p>"What do you call those fish?"</p> + +<p>Both men sprang hastily to their feet, and said—</p> + +<p>"Black pollock, Sorr."</p> + +<p>"Where do you catch them?"</p> + +<p>At this juncture two or three dozen urchins galloped up, most of them, +save for a thick skin of dirt, clad in what artists call the nude. +They surrounded us, and listened with avidity.</p> + +<p>"Outside the Aran Islands."</p> + +<p>Here several women joined the group, and more were seen hastening to +the scene of excitement from every point of the compass.</p> + +<p>"How far away is that?"</p> + +<p>"Thirty miles, Sorr."</p> + +<p>"What are they worth?"</p> + +<p>"A shilling a dozen."</p> + +<p>"That is, a penny a pound?"</p> + +<p>"No, but a shilling for a dozen fish, and there's thirteen to the +dozen."</p> + +<p>"And how heavy is the average fish?"</p> + +<p>He picked up one by the jaws, and weighing him on his hand, said—</p> + +<p>"That chap would be nigh-hand fourteen pounds. Some's more, some's +less."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>It was even so. The agent of the Congested Districts Board, Mr. +Michael Walsh, of Dock Street, confirmed this startling statement. +Thirteen huge codlike fish for a shilling! More than a hundredweight +and a half of fish for twelve pence sterling! And, as Father Mahony +remarks, still the Irish peasant mourns, still groans beneath the +cruel English yoke, still turns his back on the teeming treasures of +the deep. The brutal Balfour supplied twenty-five boats to the poor +peasants of the western seaboard, and these, all working in +conjunction under direction, have proved both a boon and a blessing. +"Yesterday I sent sixty boxes of mackerel to Messrs. Smith, of +Birmingham, and to-day I think I shall send them a hundred," said Mr. +Walsh. "These Balfour boats have been a wonderful success. You'll hear +the very ignorant still cursing him, but not the better-informed, nor +the people he has benefited. I think him a great man, a very great +man, indeed. I am no politician. I only look at the effect he produced +and the blessing he was to the people. On Wednesday last the Duras +steamer brought in 400 boxes of fish, which had been caught in one +day. We thought that pretty good, but Thursday's consignment was +simply astonishing, 1,100 boxes coming in. We sent them all to +England. Mackerel have fetched grand prices this year. Early in the +season we sold them to Birmingham at tenpence apiece wholesale, with +carriage and other expenses on the top of that. Better price than the +pollock? Well, that fish is not very good just now. Sometimes it +fetches six shillings a dozen fish, nearly sixpence each. No, not much +for twelve or fourteen pounds of good fish. Half-a-crown a dozen is +more usual. There's no demand. Yes, they're cheap to-day. A dozen +pounds of fish for a penny would be reckoned 'a cheap loaf' in +Birmingham."</p> + +<p>A shopkeeper near the harbour complained of the unbusiness-like ways +of the Galway townsmen:—"They have no notion of business management. +Take the Galway Board of Guardians. They resolved that any contractor +furnishing milk below a certain standard should have his contract +broken if he were caught swindling the authorities three times in six +months. What would they think of such a resolution in England? Well, +one fellow was caught three times or more. His milk was found to +contain forty-four per cent. of water. Instead of kicking him out at +once there was a great debate on the subject. It was not denied that +the facts were as I have stated them. His friends simply said, 'Ah, +now, let the Boy go on wid the conthract; shure, isn't he the dacent +Boy altogether? An' what for would ye break the conthract whin he put +in a dhrop of clane wather, that wouldn't hurt anybody. Shure, 'tis +very wholesome it is intirely.' As Curran said, 'we are ruined with +to-day saying we'll do some thing, and then turning round and saying +to-morrow that we won't do it.' Another Guardian named Connor stuck up +for the right thing, and another named Davoren gave the contractor's +friends a good tongue-thrashing. The milkman was sacked by fifteen +votes to nine. The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>right thing was done, but my point is that a lot +of time was wasted in trying to bolster up such a case, and nine men +actually voted for the defaulter, whose action was so grossly +fraudulent, and who had been caught at least three times in six +months.</p> + +<p>"The bag factory has just been closed. The Home Rule Bill is at the +bottom of this mischief. It was the only factory we had in Galway, and +what the people here are to do now God only knows. It gave employment +to the working classes of the town, who will now have to go further +afield. Some are off to America, some to England, some to Scotland. +Curious thing I've noticed. A Scotsman lands here with twopence, next +day has fourpence, in five years a house and farm of his own, in +twenty-five years an estate, in thirty years is being shot at as a +landowner, in forty years has an agent to be deputy cock-shot for him. +But Irishmen who go to Scotland nearly always return next year +swearing that the country is poor as the Divil. Now, how is that?</p> + +<p>"The bag works was just short of money and management. Irishmen are +not financiers. They are always getting into holes, and waiting for +somebody to get them out. They have no self-reliance. You may hold +them up by the scruff of the neck for years and years, and the moment +you drop them they hate you like poison. Many shooting cases would +show this if impartially looked into. Pity the English do not come +over here more than they do. The people get along famously with +individual Englishmen, and sometimes they wonder where all the +murdering villains are of whom they hear from their spiritual and +political advisers. A priest said in my hearing, 'Only the best men +come over here. They are picked out to impose on you.' And the poor +folks believed him. We want to know each other better. The English are +just as ignorant as the Irish, in a way. They know no more of the +Irish than the Irish know of them. The poor folks of Connaught firmly +believe that they would be well off and able to save money but for the +English that ruin the country. And here this Jute Bag Company is +bursted up because it had not capital to carry on with. Belfast men or +Englishmen would have made it a big success. It stopped because it +could not raise enough money to buy a ship-load of jute, and was +obliged to buy from hand to mouth from retailers.</p> + +<p>"Take the wool trade. Everywhere over Ireland you will see Wool, Wool +in big letters on placards for the farmers—notices of one sort or +another. We are the centre of a wool district. Not a single wool +factory, although the town is in every way fitted for excelling in the +woollen trade. We have a grand river, and the people understand wool. +They card and spin, and make home-made shawls and coat-pieces at their +own homes, just for themselves, and there they stop. They are waiting +for Home Rule, they say. Pass the bill, and factories will jump out of +the ground like mushrooms. Instead of taking advantage of the means at +their disposal, they are looking forward to a speculative something +which they cannot define. The English are the cause of any trouble +they may have, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>and an Irish Parliament will totally change the aspect +of things. Everybody is going to be well off, and with little or no +work. The farmers are going to get the land for nothing, or next to +nothing, and all heretics will be sent out of the country, or kept +down and in their proper place."</p> + +<p>Thus spake a well-to-do Protestant, born in Galway some sixty years +ago, a half-breed Irish and Scotchman. I have now heard so many +exasperating variations of this same tune, that I should be disposed, +had I the power, to take a deep and desperate revenge by granting the +grumblers Home Rule on the spot. It would doubtless serve them right, +but England has also herself to consider.</p> + +<p class="date">Galway Town, May 13th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_22_THE_LAND_LEAGUES_REIGN_AT_LOUGHREA" id="No_22_THE_LAND_LEAGUES_REIGN_AT_LOUGHREA"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 22.—THE LAND LEAGUE'S REIGN AT LOUGHREA.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his is the most depressing town I have seen as yet. Except on market +and fair days, literally nothing is done. The streets are nearly +deserted, the houses are tumbling down, gable-ends without side-walls +or roofs are seen everywhere, nettles are growing in the old chimney +corners, and the splendid ruins of the ancient abbey are the most +cheerful feature of the place. A few melancholy men stand about, the +picture of despondent wretchedness, a few sad-eyed girls wander about +with the everlasting hood, hiding their heads and faces, a few +miserable old women beg from all and sundry, and the usual swarm of +barefooted children are, of course, to the fore. The shopkeepers +display their wares, waiting wearily for market day, and dismally +hoping against hope for better times. Everybody is in the doleful +dumps, everybody says the place is going down, everybody says that +things grow worse, that the trade of the place grows smaller by +degrees and gradually less, that enterprise is totally extinguished, +that there is no employment for the people, and no prospect of any. +Those whose heads are just above water are puzzled to know how those +worse off than themselves contrive to exist at all, and look towards +the future with gloomiest foreboding. Like the man who quoted +Christmas strawberries at twelve dollars a pound, they ask how the +poor are going to live. The young men of the place seem to have quite +lost heart, and no longer muster spirit enough to murder anybody. +Loughrea is disloyal as the sea is salt. The man in the street is full +of grievances. His poverty and ignorance make him the mark of lying +agitators, who arouse in his simple soul implacable resentment for +imaginary wrongs. A decent civil working-man named Hanan thus +expressed himself:—</p> + +<p>"The town was a fine business place until a few years ago, whin the +Land League ruined it. Ah, thim was terrible times. We had murthers in +the town an' all round the town. Perhaps the people that got shot +desarved it, they say here that they did; but, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>all the same, the +place was ruined by the goin's on. It's no joke to kill nine or ten +people in and about a quiet little place like this. An' ever since +thin the place is goin' down, down, down, an' no one knows what will +be the ind iv it. 'Tis all the fault of the English Governmint. The +counthry is full of gowld mines, an' silver mines, an' copper mines, +an' we're not allowed to work thim. Divil a lie I spake. The +Government wouldn't allow us to bore for coal. Sure, we're towld by +thim that knows all about it, men that's grate scholars an' can spake +out iligant. Why wouldn't we be allowed to sink a coal mine in our own +counthry? Why wouldn't we be allowed to get the gowld that's all +through the mountains? 'Tis the English that wants iverything for +thimsilves, an' makes us all starvin' paupers intirely."</p> + +<p>This serves to indicate the kind of falsehoods palmed off upon these +poor people in order to make them agitators or criminals. Hanan went +on—</p> + +<p>"Look at the Galway Bag Factory. I'm towld that's shutting up now. +What'll the people do at all, at all, that was employed in it? An' the +English Parlimint ordhers it to be closed because it turns out bags +chaper than they can make thim in England, an' betther, and the +English maker couldn't compate. Ye know betther? I wouldn't +conthradict yer honour's glory, ye mane well; but I have it from them +that knows. Look at the Galway marble quarries. There's two sorts o' +marble in one quarry, an' tis grand stone it is, an' the quarries +would give no ind iv imploymint to the poor men that's willin' to +work. God help thim, but they're not allowed to cut a lump of stone in +their own counthry. What stops them? Sure 'tis the English Government, +an' what would it be else? A gintleman isn't allowed to cut a stone on +his own land. All must come from England. Ye make us buy it off ye, +an' us wid millions of pounds' worth of stone. Ah, now, don't tell me +'tis all rubbish. Sure, I have it sthraight from mimbers of Parlimint. +Didn't the English Governmint send out soldiers an' policemen, wid +guns an' swords, an' stop the men that wint to cut the stone in the +marble quarries I was afther mintionin' to yer honour? Yes, 'twas the +Land League that ruined this place, but 'twas the Governmint that made +the Land League by dhriving the people into it. No, I wouldn't trust +Gladstone or any other Englishman. They'll take care of thimselves, +the English. We'll get no more than they can help. What we got out o' +Gladstone we bate out o' him. We get nothing but what we conquered. +Small thanks we owe, an' small thanks we'll give."</p> + +<p>A small farmer said, "The rints isn't low enough. The judicial rints +is twice too much, an' the price of stock what it is. We must have a +sliding scale, an' pay rint according to the price of produce. We must +have the land for half what we pay now. I wouldn't say anythin' agin' +the English. I have two brothers there an' they come over here +sometimes, an' from what they tell me I believe the English manes +well. An' the English law isn't bad at all. 'Tis <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>the administhration +of the law that's bad. We have the law, but 'tis no use to us because +the landlords administhers it. Divil a bit o' compinsation can we get. +An' if we want a pump, or a fence, or a bit o' repairs, we may wait +for seven years, till our hearts break wid worryin' afther it. Thin +we've our business to mind, an' we've not the time nor the money to go +to law, even whin the law is with us an we have a clear case. The +landlord has his agint, that has nothin' else to do but to circumvint +us, so that the land laws don't do us the good that ye think over in +England. Ye have grand laws, says you, an' 'tis thrue for you; but who +works the laws? says I. That's where the trouble comes in. Who works +the laws? says I.</p> + +<p>"Thin ye say, ye can buy your farms all out, says you. But the +landlords won't sell, says I. Look at the Monivea disthrict. French is +a good landlord enough, but he won't sell. The tinants want to buy, +but if ye go to Monivea Castle ye'll have your labour for your pains. +The agint is the landlord's brother, an' a dacent, good man he is. I +have a relative over there, an' sorra a word agin aither o' thim will +he spake. But when he wint to buy his farm, not an inch would he get."</p> + +<p>This statement was so diametrically opposed to that of Mr. John Cook, +of Londonderry, who said that the farmers had ceased to buy, owing to +their belief that the land would shortly become their own on much +better terms than they could at present obtain, that I tramped to +Monivea, a distance of six miles from Athenry, for the purpose of +ascertaining, if possible, how far my Loughrea friend's assertion was +borne out by facts. Monivea is a charming village, built round a great +green patch of turf, whereon the children play in regiments. Imagine +an oblong field three hundred yards long by one hundred wide, bounded +at one end by high trees, at the other by a great manor house in +ruins, the sides closed in by neat white cottages and a pretty +Protestant Church, and you have Monivea, the sweetest village I have +seen in Ireland. Here I interviewed four men, one of whom had just +returned by the Campania from America, to visit his friends after an +absence of many years. This gentleman was a strong Unionist, and +ridiculed the idea of Home Rule as the most absurd and useless measure +ever brought forward with the object of benefiting his countrymen. +"What will ye do wid it when ye've got it?" he said; "sure it can +never do ye any good at all. How will it put a penny in yer pockets, +an' what would ye get by it that ye can't get widout it?" Two farmers +thought they would get the land for a much lower rent. They said that +although the landowner, Mr. French, was an excellent, kind, and +liberal man, and that no fault at all could be found with his brother, +the agent, yet still the land was far too dear, and that a large +portion of it was worth nothing at all. "I pay eight and sixpence an +acre for land that grows nothing but furze, that a few sheep can +nibble round, an', begorra, 'tis not worth half-a-crown. Most iv it is +worth just nothin' at all, an' yet I have to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>scrape together eight +and sixpence an acre," said he. "'Tis not possible to get a livin' out +iv it."</p> + +<p>"Thin why don't ye lave it?" said the man from Missouri.</p> + +<p>"Why thin, how could I lave the bit o' ground me father had? Av ye +offered me a hundhred acres o' land for nothin' elsewhere, I vow to +God I would rather stay on the bit o' rock that grows heath and gorse, +if I could only get a crust out iv it, far sooner," said the grumbler.</p> + +<p>"An' d'ye think Home Rule will enable ye to do betther? Ye'll believe +anythin' in Monivea. Ye are the same as iver ye wor. It's no use +raisonin' wid yez at all. Sure, the counthry won't be able to do +widout loans, an' who'll lind ye money wid an Irish Parlimint?"</p> + +<p>"Why would we want money whin there's gowld to be had for the diggin', +av we got lave to dig it?" said the man of Monivea.</p> + +<p>The villagers believe that England prevents their mining for coal, +gold, silver, copper; that the British Government tyrannically puts +down all enterprise; that Home Rule will open mines, build railways, +factories, institute great public works; that their friends will flock +back from America; that all the money now spent out of the country +will be disbursed in Ireland for Irish manufactures; that the land +must and will become their own for nothing, or next to nothing; and in +short, that simultaneously with the first sitting of an Irish +Parliament an era of unprecedented prosperity will immediately set in. +The two farmers confirmed what I have been told of the reluctance of +the landlords to part with an acre of the land, and said that men had +returned from America with money to buy farms, and after having +wandered in vain over Ireland were fain to go back to the States, +being unable to purchase even at a fancy price. They have been told +this by persons in whom they had implicit trust, and I am sure they +believed it. A fairly educated man, who had travelled, and from whom I +expected better things, has since assured me that the stories about +compulsory closing of mines and quarries had been dinned into him from +infancy, and that he was of opinion that these assertions were well +founded, and that they could not be successfully contradicted. +Everywhere the same story of English selfishness and oppression. He +cited a case in point. "Twenty years ago there was a silver mine in +Kinvarra. It gave a lot of employment to the people of those parts, +and was a grand thing for the country at large. The Government stepped +in and closed it. I'm towld by them I can believe that 'twas done to +keep us poor, so that they could manage us, because we'd not be able +to resist oppression and tyranny, we'd be that pauperised. England +does everything to keep us down. They have the police and the soldiers +everywhere to watch us that we'd get no money at all. So when they see +us starting a factory, or a fishery, or opening a mine or a quarry, +the word comes down to stop it, and if we'd say No, this is our own +country, and we'll do what we like in it, they'd shoot us down, and we +couldn't help ourselves. I'm not sayin' that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>I want Home Rule or +anything fanciful just for mere sentiment. We only want our own, and +Home Rule will give us our own."</p> + +<p>The Home Rule party, the Nationalist patriots who know full well the +falsity of these and such-like beliefs, are responsible for this +invincible ignorance. Hatred and distrust of England are the staple of +their teachings, which the credulous peasantry imbibe like mother's +milk. The peripatetic patriots who invade the rural communities seem +to be easy, extemporaneous liars, having a natural gift for +tergiversation, an undeniable gift for mendacity, an inexhaustible +fertility of invention. Such liars, like poets, are born, not made, +though doubtless their natural gifts have been improved and developed +by constant practice. Like Parolles, they "lie with such volubility +that you would think Truth were a fool." The seed has been +industriously sown, and John Bull is reaping the harvest. Is there no +means of enlightenment available? Is there no antidote to this poison? +I am disposed to believe that if the country were stumped by men of +known position and integrity much good would be done. Leaflets bearing +good names would have considerable effect. The result might not be +seen at once, but the thing would work, and the people have less and +less confidence in their leaders. The most unlettered peasant is a +keen judge of character, and, given time, would modify his views. The +truth about the mines, given in clear and simple language, would have +a great effect. Education is fighting for the Union. Time is all the +Loyalists require. The National Schools must, in the long run, be +fatal to political priestcraft and traitorous agitation.</p> + +<p>To return to Loughrea. I walked a short distance out of the town to +see the place where Mr. Blake, Lord Clanricarde's agent, was so foully +murdered. A little way past the great Carmelite Convent I encountered +an old man, who showed me the fatal spot. A pleasant country road with +fair green meadows on each side, a house or two not far away, the +fields all fenced with the stone walls characteristic of the County +Galway. "'Twas here, Sorr, that the guns came over the wall. Misther +Blake was dhrivin' to church, at about eleven o'clock o' a foin +summer's mornin'. His wife was wid him, an' Timothy Ruane was runnin' +the horse—a dacent boy was Tim, would do a hand's turn for anybody. +The childer all swore by Tim, be raison he was the boy to give them +half-pince for sweets and the like o' that. So they dhrove along, and +whin they came tin yards from this, says Tim, sittin' in front wid the +reins, says he, 'Misther Blake, I see some men at the back iv the +ditch,' says he. 'Drive on, Tim,' says Misther Blake, 'sure that's +nothin' to do with aither you or me.' An' the next instant both of +thim wor in Eternity! Blake and poor Tim wor kilt outright on the +spot, an' nayther of them spoke a word nor made a move, but jist +dhropped stone dead, God rest their sowls. An' the wife, that's +Misthress Blake, a good, kind-hearted lady she was, was shot in the +hip, an' crippled, but she wasn't kilt, d'ye see. Blake was a hard +man, they said, an' must have the rint. An' <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>poor Tim was kilt the way +he wouldn't tell o' the boys that did it. 'Twas slugs they used, an' +not bullets, but they fired at two or three yards, an' so close that +the shot hasn't time to spread, an' 'tis as good as a cannon ball. Who +were they? All boys belongin' to the place. Mrs. Blake dhropped, an' +they thought she was dead, I believe. Some thinks she was shot by +accident, an' that they did not mane to kill a wake woman at all. But +whin they shot Tim, to kape his mouth shut, why wouldn't they shoot +the woman?"</p> + +<p>Seven men were arrested, and everybody in the place was believed to +know the murderers. The police had no doubt at all that they had the +right men. All were acquitted. No evidence was offered. No witness +cared to meet the fate of Blake. Silence, in this case, was golden, +and no mistake about it.</p> + +<p>Walking from the railway station along the main street, in the very +heart of the town, you see on your left the modest steeple of the +Protestant church, some fifty yards down Church Street. The town is +built on two parallel streets, and Church Street is the principal +connecting artery, about a hundred yards long. Exactly opposite the +church the houses on the right recede some five or six feet from the +rank; and here poor Sergeant Linton met his death. He was an Antrim +man, a Black Presbyterian, and a total abstainer. His integrity was so +well known that he was exempted from attendance at the police +roll-call. He was death on secret societies, and was thought to know +too much. In the soft twilight of a summer's eve he left the main +street and sauntered down Church Street. When he reached the +indentation above-mentioned a man shot him with a revolver, and fled +into the main street. The unfortunate officer gave chase, pursuing the +assassin along the principal thoroughfare, his life-blood ebbing fast, +until, on reaching the front of Nevin's Hotel, he fell dead. Arrests +were made, and, as before, the criminal was undoubtedly secured. Again +no evidence. The murderer was liberated, but he wisely left the +country, and will hardly return. A policeman said: "There was no doubt +about the case. The criminal was there. Everybody spotted the man, +even those who did not see him shoot. But nobody spoke, and if they +had spoken he would have got off just the same. The people of this +happy country have brought the art of defeating the law to its highest +perfection. The most ignorant peasants know all its weak spots, and +they work them well, very well indeed, from their own point of view. +Suppose ten of Linton's comrades had seen the shot fired, and that +they had immediately caught the assassin, with the revolver in his +hands. The jury would not have convicted him. Yes, I know that the +judge in certain cases can set aside the verdict of the jury. If you +did that in Ireland it would cost some lives. Wouldn't there be a +shindy! And then there's strong judges and weak judges. Judges don't +like being shot more than other people. And Irish judges are made of +flesh and blood. Look at O'Halloran's case. I was in the Court when it +was tried. A moonlighting case. The police <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>caught a man on the spot, +with a rifle having a double load. The thing was clear as the sun at +noonday. Acquitted. The jury said, 'Not guilty'; and the man went +quietly home. The administration of justice with a weak judge, or with +a strong judge who feels a weak Government behind him, is a farce in +Ireland.</p> + +<p>"What will happen if we do not get the Bill? I think there will be +some disturbance—the ruffians are always with us—although the people +do not want Home Rule. I mean, they don't care about it. The bulk of +the people would not give sixpence for Home Rule. They have been told +it will pay them well, and they go in for that. Not one of them would +have Home Rule if it cost him a penny, unless he believed he'd get +twopence for his outlay. It's the land, and nothing else. The party +that puts the land question on a comfortable footing will rule Ireland +for ever. That's the opinion of every man in the force, in Loughrea or +elsewhere. We have a curiosity here—a priest who goes against Home +Rule. A very great man he was, head of a college or something, not one +of the common ruck, and he's dead against it, and says so openly. The +<i>Tuam News</i> used to pitch into him, but he didn't care, so they got +tired of it. No good rowing people up when they laugh at you."</p> + +<p>An old woman of the type too common in Ireland came up as the officer +left me, and said:—</p> + +<p>"Musha, now, but 'tis the foin, handsome man ye are, an' ye've a +gintleman's face on ye, bedad ye have, an,'" here she showed a +halfpenny in her withered claw, "this is all I got since I kem out, +and me that's twistin' wid the rummatacks like the divil on a hot +griddle; the holy Mother o' God knows its thrue, an' me ould man, +that's seventy or eighty or more—the divil a one o' him knows his own +age—he's that sick an' bad, an' that wake intirely, that he couldn't +lift a herrin' wid a pair o' hot tongs; 'tis an ulster he has, that +does be ruinin' him, the docthor says; bad luck to it for an ulster +wid a powltice, an' he's growlin' that he has no tobacky, God help +him. (Here I gave her something.) Almighty God open ye the gates in +heaven, the Holy Mother o' God pour blessin's upon ye. 'Tis Englishmen +I like, bedad it is; the grandest, foinest, greatest counthry in the +wuruld, begorra it is—an' why not?"</p> + +<p>This outburst somehow reminded me of a certain gentleman I met at the +Railway Hotel, Athenry. He said, "I'm a Home Ruler out and out. The +counthry's widin a stone's throw o' Hell, an' we may as well be in it +althegither."</p> + +<p>"Now, Mr. Kelly," said the charming Miss O'Reilly, "you are most +inconsistent; you sometimes say you are a Conservative——"</p> + +<p>"Aye, aye," assented Mr. Kelly, "but that's only when I'm sober!"</p> + +<p>The Loughreans are quiet now, but the secret societies which dealt so +lightly with human life are still at work, and the best-informed +people believe that the murderous emissaries of the Land League, whose +terrorism ruined the town, are only kept down by a powerful <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>and +vigilant police. I have only described three of the murders which took +place in the town and neighbourhood during a comparatively short +period. Add Mr. Burke and driver Wallace; both shot dead near +Craughwell. J. Connor, of Carrickeele, who had accepted a situation as +bog-ranger, <i>vice</i> Keogh, discharged. Shot. Three men arrested. No +evidence. Patrick Dempsey, who had taken a small farm from which +Martin Birmingham had been evicted. Shot dead in the presence of his +two small children, with whom he was walking to church. No evidence. +No convictions, but many more crimes, both great and small. So many +murders that outrages do not count for much.</p> + +<p>It is to the men who are directly responsible for all these horrors +that Mr. Gladstone proposes to entrust the government of Ireland.</p> + +<p class="date">Loughrea, May 16th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_23_THE_REIGN_OF_INDOLENCE" id="No_23_THE_REIGN_OF_INDOLENCE"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 23.—THE REIGN OF INDOLENCE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letteri.png" alt="I" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> have just returned from Innishmore, the largest of the Aran islands, +the population of which have been lifted from a condition of chronic +starvation and enabled to earn their own livelihood by the splendid +organisation of Mr. Balfour for the relief of the congested districts. +Postal and other exigences having compelled a hasty return to the +mainland, I defer a full account of this most interesting visit until +my next letter, when I shall also be in possession of fuller and more +accurate information than is attainable on the island itself.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, let us examine the state of Irish feeling by the sad sea +waves of Galway Bay. Salthill is a plucky little bathing place; that +is, plucky for Ireland. It is easily accessible from Galway town, and +looks over the bay, but it is more like a long natural harbour without +ships. There is a mile or so of promenade with stone seats at +intervals, a shingle dotted with big rocks, a modicum of +slate-coloured sand, like that of Schevening, in Holland, and blue +hills opposite, like those of Carlingford Lough. The promenade is +kerbed by a massive sea wall of limestone, and here and there flights +of stone steps lead to the water's edge. Facing the sea are handsome +villas, with flower gardens, tidy gravelled walks, shrubberies, snowy +window blinds and other appurtenances of a desperately Protestant +appearance. No large hotels, no villas with "Apartments" on a card in +the fanlight, no boatmen plying for hire, no boats even, either ashore +or afloat; no bathing-machines no anything the brutal Saxon mostly +needs, except fresh air and blazing sunshine. The Galway end of this +fashionable resort has a few shady houses, aggressively Anglicised +with names like Wave View House and Elm Tree View, the first looking +at a whitewashed wall, the second at a telegraph post. But although +some of these <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>houses announce "Furnished Lodgings," no English +tourists would "take them on." If you want to bathe you walk into the +sea as you stand, or hand your toga virilis to the bystanders, if any. +The Connaught folks have no false modesty.</p> + +<p>A white-haired gentleman descends from a wagonette and promenades for +a while. Then he sits down beside me. The conversation turns on Home +Rule. My friend is impatient, has been spending a few days in Belfast. +The ignorance of the poor people is astonishing. A Roman Catholic of +the Northern city told him that the first act of the Irish Parliament +would be to level Cave Hill, and on the site thereof to build cottages +for the poor. The hill was full of diamonds, which Queen Victoria +would not allow the poor Irish folks to get. The country would be full +of money. Didn't Mr. Gladstone say we'd have too much?—a clear +allusion to the "chronic plethora." The people would have the upper +hand, as they ought to have, and the first thing would be to evict the +evictors. The only question was, would they clear out peaceably, or +would it be necessary to call in the aid of the Irish Army of +Independence?</p> + +<p>"This poor man evidently believed that every respectable person, +everybody possessing means and property, was an enemy to the +commonwealth. An ardent Home Ruler asked me if the majority had a +right to rule. He thought that was a triumphant, an unanswerable +question. I replied that during a long and busy life I had always +observed how, in successful enterprises, the majority did not rule. +The intelligent minority, the persons who had shown their wisdom, +their industry, their sagacity, their integrity, that they were +competent and reliable, those, I said, were the people who were +entrusted with the management of great affairs, and not the +many-headed mob. The management of Irish affairs promises to be a task +of tremendous difficulty, and those to whom you propose to entrust +this huge and complicated machinery stand convicted of inability to +manage with even tolerable success such comparatively simple affairs +as the party journal, or the rent collection of new Tipperary. Both +these enterprises turned out dead failures owing to the total +incapacity of the Irish Parliamentary party. And we are asked to +entrust the future of the country to these men, whose only +qualifications are a faculty for glib talk and an unreasonable hatred +of everything English.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Gladstone has shown to demonstration that statesmen are no longer +to direct the course of legislation; are no longer to lead the people +onward in the paths of progressive improvement. The unthinking, +uneducated masses are in future to signify their will, and statesmen +are to be the automata to carry out their behests, whatever they may +be. The unwashed, unshorn incapables who have nothing, because they +lack the brains and industry to acquire property, are nowadays told +that they, and they alone, shall decide the fate of empires, shall +decide the ownership of property, shall manipulate the fortunes of +those who have raised themselves from the dirt by ability, +self-denial, and unremitting hard work. Look <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>at the comparative +returns of the illiterate electorate. In Scotland 1 in 160, in England +1 in 170, in Ireland 1 in 5. In one quarter of Donegal, a Catholic +one, more illiterates than in all Scotland. Not that there is so much +difference as these figures would seem to show. But if men who can +write declare themselves illiterate, so that the priests and village +ruffians may be satisfied as to how they individually voted, is not +this still more deplorable? The conduct of the English Gladstonians +passes my comprehension. They do not examine for themselves. They say +Mr. Gladstone says so-and-so, and for them this is sufficient. Do they +say their prayers to the Grand Old Man?"</p> + +<p>Another Salthill malcontent said:—"An English visitor sneeringly +asked me how it was that the Irish could not trust one another. I +said, 'We cannot trust these men, and we can give you what ought to be +a satisfactory reason for our distrust. They have been condemned as +criminals by a competent tribunal, presided over by three English +judges, one of them a Roman Catholic. They have been found guilty of +criminal conspiracy, of sympathy with crime, and of having furnished +the means for its committal, and that after the fairest trial ever +held in the world. By a law passed in 1787 by Grattan's Parliament +they would have suffered the punishment of death for this same +criminal conspiracy. And, apart from Home Rule, leaving the present +agitation altogether out of the question, the respectable classes of +Ireland entirely object to be represented by such men, either at +Westminster or College Green. Their conduct has done more to ruin +Ireland than any other calamity which the country has endured for long +ages. They have displayed an ingenuity of torture, and a refinement of +cruelty, worthy of the Inquisition. Look at the case of +District-inspector Murphy, of Woodford, in this county. Not by any +means the worst of the tens of thousands of cases all over the +country, but impressive to me because it came under my own +observation. At the trial of Wilfrid Blunt, Mr. Murphy deposed upon +oath that so severely was he boycotted for the mere performance of his +duty, that his children were crying for bread, and that he was unable +to give them any. Policemen had to bring milk from miles away. In +other cases the pupils of these patriots, the preachers of the Land +League, poured human filth into the water supply of their victims, who +were in many cases ladies of gentle birth and children of tender +years. Go up to Cong, and walk out to the place where Lord Mountmorres +was murdered, near Clonbur. His whole income was £150 or £200, a poor +allowance for a peer, one of the noble house of De Montmorency. He was +shot in broad daylight, a dozen houses within call, and an open +uncovered country, save for low stone walls, all around. The people +danced in derision on the spot where he fell, and threw soil stained +with his life blood in the air. He wanted his due, and, goodness +knows, he was poor enough to satisfy oven an Irish agitator. His name +was down for the next vacancy among the resident magistrates. The +people who were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>guilty of inciting to those outrages are the most +prominent of the Nationalist party. Is this the class of men you wish +to set over us as governors?"</p> + +<p>An artist named Hamilton, a Guernsey man, said, "The English people do +not understand what stonethrowing means in Ireland. They read of rows, +and so long as no shooting is done, they do not think it serious. The +men of Connaught are wonderful shots with big stones, and you would be +surprised at the force and precision with which they hurl great lumps +of rock weighing three or four pounds. Poor Corbett, a man in Lord +Ardilaun's employ, was killed outright by one of these missiles, and +only the other day I was reading of the Connaught Rangers in Egypt, +the old 88th, how they were short of ammunition at the battle of +Aboukir, and how they tore down a wall and actually stopped the +French, who were advancing with the bayonet."</p> + +<p>A Galway merchant said:—"Balfour is the man for Ireland. A +Nationalist member told me he was the cleverest man in the House. He +said, 'Chamberlain goes in for hard hitting, and he is very effective, +but nobody ever answered the Irish members so readily and smartly as +Balfour. We thought twice before we framed our questions, and although +we of course disapprove of him, we are bound to admire him immensely.' +And as a business man I think Balfour was fully up to the mark. He it +was who subsidised the Midland and Western Railway to build the light +line now being made between Galway and Clifden. No company would have +undertaken such a concern. As a mere business transaction it could not +pay. But look at the good that is being done. The people were starving +for want of employment, and no unskilled labour is imported to the +district, so that the Connemara folks get the benefit of the work, and +also a permanent advantage by the opening up of the Galway fisheries, +which are practically inexhaustible. We have the Atlantic to go at. +And the fish out of the deep, strong, running water are twice as big +as those just off the coast, on herring-banks and shoals. The +fishermen know this, and they call these places the mackerel hospitals +and infirmaries. These fishermen always knew it, but they had no boats +to go out to the deep seas, no nets, no tackle. They have them now, +and they got them from Balfour. They get nothing but Home Rule from +Morley and Gladstone, and they find it keeps them free from +indigestion, although it puts their livers out of order. Amusing +chaps, these fishermen. I was in a little country place on the coast, +where the judicial and magisterial proceedings are of a very primitive +character, and where most of the people speak Irish as their +vernacular. One old chap declined to give evidence in English, and +asked for an interpreter. The magistrate, who knew the old wag, said, +'Michael Cahill, you speak English very well,' to which the old man +replied, ''Tis not for the likes o' me to conthradict yer honner, but +divil resave the word iv it I ondhersthand at all, at all.' There was +a great roar <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>from the Court, and the interpreter was trotted forward. +Another witness was said to have been drunk, but he claimed to be a +temperance man. 'What do you drink,' said the magistrate. 'Wather, yer +honner,' said the total abstainer. 'Jist pure wather from the spring +there beyant,' and then he looked round the Court, and slyly added, +'Wid jist as much whiskey as will take off the earthy taste, yer +honner.' He was like the temperance lecturer who preached round +Galway, and was afterwards seen crushing sugar in a stiff glass of the +crathur at Oughterard. When he was caught redhanded, as it were, he +said, 'To be sure I'm a timprance man, but, bedad, ye can't say that +I'm a bigoted one'!</p> + +<p>"We want Morley to give us a light railway from Clifden to Westport, +and then we'd have the whole coast supplied. But he's a tight-fisted +one as regards practical work. We've no chance with him, except in +matters of sentiment. He wants to give Home Rule, but we can't eat +that. And my impression is that we are fast drifting into the position +of the man who has nothing, and from whom shall be taken the little +that he hath. As to arguments against Home Rule, I do not think it a +case for argument. That the thing is bad is self-evident; and +self-evident propositions, whether in Euclid or elsewhere, are always +the most difficult to prove. Ask me to prove that two added to two +make four, ask me how many beans make five, and I gracefully retire. +Ask me to show that Home Rule will be bad for Ireland, and I will make +but a slight departure from this formula. I say, on the supporters of +Home Rule rests the <i>onus probandi</i>; they are the people who should +show cause, let them prove their case in its favour. Here I am, quite +satisfied with the laws as they now are. Show me, say I, how I shall +benefit by the proposed change. That knocks them speechless. In +England they may make a pretence of proving their case, but in this +country they are dumb in the presence of Unionists. They cannot argue +with enlightened people. They have not a leg to stand upon, and they +know it.</p> + +<p>"Consider the fulminations of Archbishop Walsh with regard to that +Dublin Freemason Bazaar in aid of orphan children. As you must have +heard, the Sacraments were refused to any Catholic attending this +purely charitable movement. The Church said in effect—Any one who +aids the orphans of freemasons by going to this bazaar, or by +patronising the function, whether directly or indirectly, will be +damned everlastingly. And the Catholics kept away, frightened by this +threat. What would you expect of a people who believe such rubbish? Do +you think that a people powerfully influenced, supremely influenced, +by the word of a priest are fit to govern themselves? Can you depend +on the loyalty of the Catholic priesthood? You surely know better than +that. Suppose you gave Ireland Home Rule, and the Church turned rusty? +With matters in the hands of an Irish Parliament, who would have the +pull in weight of influence, John Bull or the priests? <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>You are +walking into a snare with your eyes open. Soon you will be punching +your own head and calling yourself a fool. And you will be quite +right. England is giving herself away at the bidding of a crowd of +fellows who in Ireland are not received into decent society, and few +of whom could get 'tick' for a week's board or a week's washing. Not +that the latter would be much hardship. Clean linen is a novelty to +the bulk of them. And seventy-one out of eighty of these upstarts must +do the bidding of the priests.</p> + +<p>"Poor old Bull! The fine fellow he was. Respected by everybody. Strong +but good-humoured, never hurting a soul. Slapping his breeches pocket +now and then, and looking round the world with an eye that seemed to +say, 'I could buy and sell the lot of ye; look what a fine fellow I +am!' And he was. And he knew it, too. His only fault. Ready to lend a +deserving friend a trifle, and apt to poke his nose into what didn't +concern him, especially when a small country was being put upon. Then +John would come up and say, 'Let him alone, will yer.' A +laughing-stock in his old age. But yesterday he might have stood +before the world: now none so poor to do him reverence,—Shakespeare! +That's what's coming. Poor old Bull! In his dotage making a rod to +whip himself. Well, well."</p> + +<p>There are Presbyterians at Salthill. Wherever they are they always +wear good coats, have good houses, well-clad children. To be +comfortably off seems part of their creed. One of them said, "There +never was a more faithful worshipper of the Grand Old Man than +myself,—up to a certain time, I mean. I dropped him before he went +over to Parnell. I gave him up on account of his inconsistency. What +staggered me was a trick he tried to play the Queen's College +arrangements in Ireland. It was a supplemental charter really changing +the whole constitution of the thing, and he tried to carry his point +by a dodge. I did not care much about the matter one way or the other, +but I thought his underhanded trickery unworthy a statesman, or any +other man. I tried not to believe it; that is, I would rather not have +believed it. I had a sort of feeling that it couldn't be. But it was +so. Then his pamphlet about Vaticanism, in which he said no Roman +Catholic could be loyal, after which he appointed the Marquess of +Ripon, a Catholic convert, or pervert, to the Governor-Generalship of +India, the most important office in the gift of the Crown. Again, I +had no objection to the action in itself, but I considered it from Mr. +Gladstone's point of view, and then it dawned on me that he would say +anything. You never know what he'll do next. What he says is no guide +at all nowadays to what he'll do. He was my hero, but a change has +come over him, and now he cannot be trusted. He ought to be looked +after in some public institution where the keepers wouldn't contradict +him. He was a great man before his mind gave way."</p> + +<p>A bustling Belfaster of fatiguing vitality told me this little story +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>which my friends the Catholic clergy may disprove if they can. He +said:—"Mr. McMaster, of the firm of Dunbar, McMaster and Co., of +Gilford, County Down, conceived the idea of aiding his fellow-countrymen +and women who were starving in the congested districts. This was some +time ago, but it is a good illustration of the difficulty you have in +helping people who will not help themselves. He drew up a scheme, well +thought-out and workable, such as a thorough business man might be +expected to concoct, and sent down his agent to the districts of +Gweedore in Donegal and Maam in Galway, with instructions to engage as +many families as possible to work in the mills of the firm, noted all +over the world for thread, yarn, and linen-weaving. An enormous affair, +employing a whole township. The agent was provided with a document +emanating from the priest of the district into which they were invited +to migrate, setting forth that no proselytism was intended, and that +the migrants would be under the care of Catholic clergy. As they had +neither money nor furniture worth moving, it was agreed to pay the cost +of transit, and to provide clean, sweet cottages, ready furnished, and +with every reasonable convenience. The furniture was to be paid for by +instalments, but the cost of removal was to be a gift from Mr. +McMaster, who was desirous of aiding the people without pauperising +them. They were to work the ordinary factory hours, as enacted by +statute, and to be paid the ordinary wages. But they were required to +work regularly. No saints' days, no lounging about on the "pattherns" +(patron saints' days), no in-and-out running, but steady, regular +attendance. People who knew the Keltic Irish laughed at Mr. McMaster, +but he had seen their poverty, their filth, their mud cabins, their +semi-starvation, and he thought he knew. He offered them work, and +everything they seemed to want, out of pure humanity.</p> + +<p>"How many people moved to Gilford out of the two counties?"</p> + +<p>"Peradventure there might be a hundred found, peradventure there might +be fifty, thirty, twenty, ten."</p> + +<p>"Guess again. Give it up? Not a single solitary soul accepted Mr. +McMaster's offer. These are the people who are waiting for Home Rule. +Much good may it do them."</p> + +<p>A little Galway man became irate. "'Tis our birthright to hate +England. That's why we want Home Rule that we may tache thim their +place. I'd fight England, an' I'd do more." Here he looked sternly at +the Ulsterman. "I'd do more, I say, I'd fight thim that'd shtand up +for her. D'ye see me now?"</p> + +<p>The Belfast man proved an awkward customer. He said, "You're too busy +to fight anybody just now, you Nationalists. Wait till you've settled +your differences, wait till you've cut each other's throats, wait till +you've fought over the plunder, like the Kilkenny cats, till there's +nothing left of you but the tail. Then we'll send down an army of owld +women with besoms to sweep ye into the Atlantic. 'Twill be the first +bath your Army of Independence ever got. 'Twill cool their courage and +clean their hides at the same time."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>The small Separatist was about to make an angry reply, when I +interposed with an inquiry as to his estimate of Mr. Gladstone.</p> + +<p>"Ah," said the little man, with a pucker of his little nose, and a +grand gesture of contempt, "sure he's not worth as much powdher as +would blow him to hell."</p> + +<p>His sentiment lacks novelty, but I quote him for the picturesqueness +of his style.</p> + +<p class="date">Salthill, May 18th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_24_THE_ARAN_ISLANDS" id="No_24_THE_ARAN_ISLANDS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 24.—THE ARAN ISLANDS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he Aran Islanders seem to have passed most of their time in a state +of chronic starvation. The land seems to grow little but rock, and the +burning of seaweed, the kelp trade, does not seem to have helped them +much. True, the Atlantic was all before them, where to choose, but +what Father Mahony would call the teeming treasures of the deep were +practically left untouched. If we accept the plain meaning of the good +priest's speech, we must believe that the Aran Islanders and Irish +fishermen generally preferred to starve rather than to catch fish, +unless an Irish Parliament were fixed on College Green. They had no +objection to accept charitable aid, no matter from what quarter it +came, and the Araners required assistance every other year. They were +not unwilling to catch fish, but they had nothing to catch them with; +and, strange as it may seem, these islanders, who could scarcely move +five yards in any direction without falling into the sea, these +amphibious Irishmen, did not know the art of catching fish! They +tinkered and slopped around the shoals in the vicinity of the island, +but they were never able to catch enough fish to keep themselves from +starvation, much less to supply the Dublin and London markets. Their +boats were the most primitive affairs imaginable, and showed the Irish +spirit of conservatism to perfection. These coraghs are practically +the same boat as the Welsh coracle, but much larger. Those I examined +were from ten to fifteen feet long and three feet wide. Oak ribs, over +which are nailed laths of white deal, two inches wide and half an inch +thick. Cover this slight skeleton with tarred canvas, and the ship is +nearly complete. It only needs two pairs of wooden thole-pins, and two +pairs of oars, long, light, and thin, coming nearly to a point at the +water-end, having a perforated block which works on the thole-pins +before-mentioned. You want no keel, no helm, no mast. Stay! You need a +board or two for seats for the oarsmen. With these frail cockleshells +the Araners adventure themselves twelve miles on the Atlantic, and +mostly come home again. These makeshift canoes are almost useless for +catching fish. Having no helm, it is hard to keep them straight; +having no keel, it is needful to sit still, or at any rate to maintain +a perfect balance, or over you go. A gust of wind spins the canoe +round like a top. These primeval boats are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>made on the island, thrown +together out of fifteen-pennyworth of wood, a few yards of canvas, and +a pitch-pot. They have some virtues. They are cheap, and they will not +sink. The coraghs always come back, even if bottom up. And when they +reach the shore the two occupants (if any) invert the ship, stick a +head in the stem and another in the stern, and carry her home to tea. +This process is apt to puzzle the uninformed visitor, who sees a +strange and fearful animal, like a huge black-beetle, crawling up the +cliffs. He begins to think of "antres huge and deserts vast, and +anthropophagi, and men whose heads do grow beneath their shoulders." +He hesitates about landing, but if he be on the Duras, Captain Neal +Delargy, who equally scoffs at big beetles and Home Rule, will +explain, and will accompany him to the tavern on the cliff side, where +they charge ordinary prices for beer and give you bread-and-cheese for +nothing. And yet the Araners profess to be civilised.</p> + +<p>In pursuance of his policy of helping the people to help themselves, +Mr. Balfour determined to educate the Araners, and to give them +sufficient help in the matter of boats and tackle to make their +education of some avail. It was useless to give them boats and nets, +for they knew not how to use them, and it is certain that any boat +club on the Birmingham Reservoir, or any tripper who has gone mackerel +fishing in Douglas Bay, could have given these fishermen much valuable +information and instruction. Having once determined to attempt on a +tolerably large scale the establishment of a fresh mackerel and fresh +herring trade with England, Mr. Balfour set about the gigantic and +discouraging task of endeavouring nothing less than the creation of +the local industry. But how were the people to be taught the +management of large boats, and the kind of nets that were used? After +much inquiry, it was decided to subsidise trained crews from other +parts of Ireland to show the local fishermen what earnings might be +theirs, and at the same time to impart needful instruction to the +Connemara and Aran people. It was also arranged to make loans for the +purchase of boats and tackle to such persons as might prove likely to +benefit by them. Accordingly arrangements were made with the crews of +seven Arklow boats to proceed to the Aran Islands, and in order to +indemnify them for the risk of working on an untried fishing ground, +each crew received a bounty of £40 from the Congested Districts Board. +But there was no use in catching fish unless it could be quickly put +on the market, and again the necessary plant proved a matter involving +considerable expenditure. A derelict Norwegian ship, which two or +three years ago had been discovered at sea and towed into Queenstown +Harbour, was purchased from the salvors, and anchored in Killeany Bay, +outside the harbour of Kilronane, the capital city of the biggest +Aran, as an ice-hulk. The Board then entered into an agreement with +Mr. W.W. Harvey, of Cork, to market the mackerel at a fixed rate of +commission, it being also arranged that he should pay the fishermen +the English <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>market price less by a deduction of 7s. a box to cover +the cost of ice-packing, carriage, and English salesman's commission. +The ice-hulk and boxes were provided by the Board, but Mr. Harvey was +to purchase the ice and defray all the cost of labour except the +salary of a manager.</p> + +<p>In addition to the seven Arklow crews two boats were fitted out by +Miss Mansfield for training crews from the parish of Carna, in +Connemara; and Miss Skerritt also placed two English-built boats at +the Board's disposal for the training of crews from the pretty +watering place of Clifden, also in Connemara. An Aran hooker, +belonging to Innishmore, joined the little fishing fleet, bringing up +the number to exactly a dozen boats. The Rev. W.S. Green, a Protestant +parson, who is said to have first discovered these fishing grounds, +and who threw himself into the work with wonderful enthusiasm, +superintended the experiment in the steamer Fingal, which was +specially chartered for the purpose. Mr. Green as a skilled Fisheries +Inspector, knew what he was about, and he was empowered to lend nets, +where advisable, to the Aran beginners. Away they went to sea, to +start with a fortnight's heart-breaking luck. The water in those +regions was cold, and the fish were amusing themselves elsewhere. The +ice-hulk with its two hundred tons of Norwegian ice was waiting, and +its staff of packers might cool their ardour in the hold. The mackerel +would not come to be packed, and the dozen boats, with their master +and apprentice crews, cruised up and down on the deep blue sea, with +the blue sky overhead, and hope, like Bob Acres' valour, gradually +oozing out of their finger-ends. The Arklow men began to talk of going +home again. Altogether it was a blue look-out.</p> + +<p>At last the luck turned. On April 6th, 1892, six thousand mackerel +were despatched to the English market. The weather during much of the +season was stormy and unfavourable, but on May 18th, seventy-three +thousand three hundred and fifty mackerel were sent to Galway, thirty +miles away by sea, and were forwarded thence by two special trains. +The Midland and Western Railway, under the management of Mr. Joseph +Tatlow, has been prompt, plucky, and obliging, and runs the fish to +Dublin as fast as they arrive in Galway. During the season of ten +weeks the experienced Arklow crews made on an average £316 per boat, +and the greenhorns who were learning the business earned about £70 per +boat, although they could not fish at all at the beginning of the +season. The total number of mackerel packed on the ice-hulk amounted +to the respectable total of two hundred and ninety-nine thousand four +hundred and eighty. The "teeming treasures of the deep" were not left +untouched on this occasion, though, doubtless, "still the Irish +peasant mourns, still groans beneath the cruel English yoke."</p> + +<p>Mr. Balfour's benefactions have not been confined to the Aran Islands. +Every available fishing place from top to bottom of the whole west +coast has been similarly aided, and the value of their produce has +increased from next to nothing to something like <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>fifty thousand +pounds per month. This on the authority of Father P.J. McPhilpin, +parish priest of Kilronane, Innishmore, who said:—</p> + +<p>"We never had a Chief Secretary who so quickly grasped the position, +who so rapidly saw what was the right thing to do, and who did it so +thoroughly and so promptly. Strange to say the Liberals are always the +most illiberal. When we get anything for Ireland it somehow always +seems to come from the Tories."</p> + +<p>Having been carried from Galway to the ice-hulk in Killeany Bay, and +having been duly put ashore in a boat, one of the first persons I saw +was Father Thomas Flatley, coadjutor of Father McPhilpin, an earnest +Home Ruler, like his superior, and like him a great admirer of Mr. +Balfour. Father Flatley wore a yachting cap, or I might have sheered +off under all sail—the biretta inspires me with affright—but his +nautical rig reassured me, and yawing a little from my course, I put +up my helm and boarded him. Too late I saw the black flag—I mean the +white choker—but there was nothing of the pirate about Father Tom. He +was kindly, courteous, earnest, humorous, hospitable, and full of +Latin quotations. Before our acquaintance was two minutes old he +invited me to dinner. Then I ran aground on an Arklow boatman, James +Doyle by name, a smart tweed-suited sailor, bright and gay. The Post +Office was near, and the letters were being given out. Three +deliveries a week, weather permitting. The parish priest was there, +grave, refined, slightly ascetic, with the azure blue eyes so common +in Connaught, never seen in England, although frequently met with in +Norway and North Germany. The waiting-women were barefoot, but all the +men were shod. The Araners have a speciality in shoes—pampooties, to +wit. These are made of raw hide, hair outwards, the toe-piece drawn +in, and the whole tied on with string or sinew. The cottages are +better built than many on the mainland. Otherwise the winter gales +would blow them into the Atlantic main. The thatch is pegged down +firmly, and then tied on with a close network of ropes. The people are +clean, smart, and good-looking. Miss Margaret Flanagan, who escorted +me in my search after pampooties, would pass for a pretty girl +anywhere, and the Aran Irish flowed from her lips like a rivulet of +cream. She spoke English too. An accomplished young lady, Miss +Margaret Kilmartin, aged nineteen, said her father had been wrongfully +imprisoned for two and a half years for shooting a bailiff. The +national sports are therefore not altogether unknown in the Arans. +Miss Kilmartin was <i>en route</i> for America, per Teutonic, first to New +York, and then a thousand miles by rail, alone, and without a bonnet. +She had never been off the island. This little run would be her first +flutter from the paternal nest.</p> + +<p>The Araners know little of politics, save that the Balfour Government +lifted them out of the horrible pit and the miry clay, and set their +feet upon a rock and established their goings. The Balfour boats are +there, the Balfour nets are full of fish, the Balfour <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>boys are +learning a useful occupation, and earning money meanwhile. If there is +anything in the Aran cupboards, the Araners know who enabled them to +put it there. If the young ladies have new shoes, new shawls, new +brooches; if the Aran belles make money by mending nets; if the men +sometimes see beef; if they compass the thick twist; if they manage +without the everlasting hat going round, they have Mr. Balfour to +thank, and they know it. They own it, not grudgingly or of necessity, +but cheerfully. One battered old wreck raised his hat at every mention +of the name. I saw no Morley boats. I saw no Gladstone nets. I saw no +Home Rule fish. The Araners do not care for the Grand Old Mendacium. +Perhaps they lack patriotism. It may be that they do not share what +Mr. Gladstone calls the Aspirations of a people. So far as I could +judge, their principal aspiration is to get something to eat. A +pampootied native who has often visited the main-land, and is +evidently looked upon as a mountain of sagacity and superior wisdom, +said to me—</p> + +<p>"Not a bit they care but to look afther the wife and childher an' pray +to God for good takes o' fish. An' small blame to thim. Before Balfour +the people were starvin', an' ivery other year Father Davis that's +dead this six months would go round beggin' an' prayin' for a thrifle +to kape life in thim. The hardships and the misery the poor folks had, +God alone knows. An' would ye say to thim, 'tis Home Rule ye want?</p> + +<p>"There was a young fellow fishin' here from Dublin. He went out in the +hookers an' injoyed himself all to pieces, a dacent sthrip of a boy, +but wid no more brains than a scalpeen (pickled mackerel). He got me +to be interpreter to an owld man that would spake wid him over on +Innishmair, an' the owld chap wos tellin' his throubles. So afther a +bit, the young fellow says, says he,</p> + +<p>"''Tis Home Rule ye want,' says he.</p> + +<p>"'No,' says the owld chap, shakin' his head, 'tis my dinner I want,' +says he.</p> + +<p>"An' that young fellow was mad whin I thranslated it. But 'twas thrue, +ivery word iv it. 'Ah! the ignorance, the ignorance,' says he. But +then he was spakin' on a full stomach, an' 'tis ill arguin' betwixt a +full man and a fastin'.</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't say but they'd take more notice afther a while. But +they're not used to bein' prosperous, an' they don't know themselves +at all. Ye can't cultivate politics on low feed. 'Tis the high livin' +that makes the Parliamint men that can talk for twenty-four hours at a +sthretch. An' these chaps is gettin' their backs up. In twelve months' +time they'll be gettin' consated. 'Tis Balfour that's feedin' thim +into condition. Vote against him? Av coorse they will, ivery man o' +thim. Sure they'll be towld to vote for a man, an' they'll do it. How +would they ondhersthand at all? Av 'twas Misther Balfour himself that +wanted their vote he'd get it fast enough. But 'tisn't. An' they'll +vote agin' him without knowin' what they're doin'."</p> + +<p>Father McPhilpin said, "It is very hard to get them to move. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>The +Irish people are the most conservative in the world. They will not +stir for telling, and they will not stir when you take them by the +collar and haul them along. They are wedded to the customs of their +ancestors; and yet, when once they see the advantage to be obtained by +any given change, no people are so quick to follow it up. The +difficulty is to start them. The Araners had actually less knowledge +of the sea, of boats, nets, and fishing, than people coming here from +an inland place. Surprising, but quite true."</p> + +<p>Speaking on the general question of Home Rule, I asked Father +McPhilpin if the people of Ireland would be loyal.</p> + +<p>"Loyal to what?" said the Father, replying quickly.</p> + +<p>"Loyal to England, to the Crown, to Queen Victoria."</p> + +<p>"The Irish people have always been loyal—much more loyal than the +English people. You have only to look at English history. How far +shall I go back, Father Tom?" said my genial host to the coadjutor, +who just then entered the room. "Shall we go back to Henry II.? Where +shall we begin, Father Tom?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Father Tom, "I'd not be for going back quite so far. I +think if we began with Charles I.——"</p> + +<p>"Very good. Now, were not the Irish loyal when the English people +disloyally favoured their Oliver Cromwell and their William the +Third?"</p> + +<p>I proceeded with the imbibition of Father McPhilpin's excellent tea. +The answer was obvious, but Father Tom clearly believed that his +senior had me on the hip, and good-naturedly came in with a Latin +quotation or two. Both clerics were deeply interested in the condition +of the poor in their charge, and indeed all over Ireland, and their +profound belief that a Home Rule Bill would benefit the poorer +classes, by changing the conditions affecting the tenure or ownership +of land, was apparently their chief reason for advocating a College +Green Parliament. Father McPhilpin holds some honorary official +position in connection with the Aran fisheries, and from him I derived +most of my information. Another authority assured me that the Araners +were not grateful to England nor to Mr. Balfour, and spoke of the +viper that somebody warmed in his bosom with disagreeable results. +But, as Father Tom would say, <i>Omnis comparatio claudicat</i>, and all my +experience points to a proper appreciation of the great ex-Secretary's +desire to do the country good. The people know how thoroughly he +examined the subject; how he spent weeks in the Congested Districts; +how he saw the parish priests, the head men of the districts, the +cotters themselves. Every Irishman, whatever his politics, will +readily agree that Mr. Balfour knows more about Ireland than any +Englishman living, and most of them credit him with more knowledge of +the subject than any Irishman. My thorough-going friend, Mr. McCoy, of +Galway, hater of England, avowed Separatist, longing to wallow in the +brutal Saxon's gore, thinks Mr. Balfour the best friend that Ireland +ever had. "I'd agree with you there," said Mr. McCoy. "I don't agree +with charity, but I agree with putting people in a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>way to do things +for themselves, which is what Mr. Balfour has done."</p> + +<p>Back on the ice-hulk by favour of Thomas Joyce, of Kilronane, skipper +and owner of a fishing smack. Mr. William Fitzgerald showed the +factory, the great hold with the ice, the windmill which pumps the +hulk, the mountains of boxes for fish, the mackerel in process of +packing, sixty in a box, most of them very large fish. An unhappy +halibut, which had come to an untimely end, stood on his tail in a +narrow basket, his mouth wide open, looking like a Home Rule orator +descanting on the woes of Ireland. He was slapped into a box and +instantly nailed down, which summary process suggested an obvious +wish.</p> + +<p>Mr. Fitzgerald said: "The fisheries have been a great success, and +have done much good. The spring fishery paid well on account of the +great price we got for the mackerel. It is not customary to catch fish +so early, but when you can do it it pays splendidly. Just now the +price is not up to the mark, but we hope for better times. The Arklow +men are not subsidised this year. They didn't need it. The ground +proved productive, and they were glad to come on their own hook. If +they had required a second subsidy they would not have got it."</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"I'm no politician," said Mr. Fitzgerald. "The Araners are so strong +and hardy that they would surprise you. They will stand all day on the +ice, with nothing on but those pampooties, and you would think they'd +need iron soles, instead of a bit of skin. They work hard, and come +regularly and give no trouble. No, I could not find any fault with +them. They mostly speak Irish among themselves. It's Greek to me, but +I can make out that they think a great deal of Mr. Balfour."</p> + +<p>A week on the hulk would be refreshing, for on one side there is no +land nearer than America. However, I have to go, for the Duras is +getting uneasy, so I leave the hulk, the mackerel, the big sea trout +which are caught with the mackerel, and steam back to Galway. A +splendid fellow in the cabin discloses his views. "We must have +complete independence. We shall start with 120,000 men for the Army of +Independence. That will be only a nucleus. We shall attract all the +brave, chivalrous, adventurous spirits of America. England has India +to draw from. Trot your niggers over, we'll make short work of them. +We draw from America, Australia, every part of the world. We draw from +24,000,000 of Irishmen all willing to fight for nothing, and even to +pay money to be allowed to fight against England. An Irish Republic, +under the protection of America. That's the idea. It's the natural +thing. Work the two countries together and England may slide. We'll +have an Independent Irish Republic in four years; perhaps in three +years. Rubbish about pledges of loyalty. The people must be loyal to +themselves, not to England. Our members will do what the people want, +or they will be replaced by men who will. We <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>have the sentiments of +the people, backed by the influence of religion, all tending to +complete independence. Who's going to prevent it? We'll have a +Declaration of Independence on Saint Patrick's Day, 1897, at latest. +Who'll stop it? Mr. Gladstone? Why long before that time we'll convert +him, and ten to one he'll draw up the document. What'll you bet that +he doesn't come over to Dublin and read it in <span class="sc">The House</span>?"</p> + +<p class="date">Galway, May 20th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_25_THE_PRIESTS_AND_OUTRAGE_THEY_NEVER_CONDEMNED_IT" id="No_25_THE_PRIESTS_AND_OUTRAGE_THEY_NEVER_CONDEMNED_IT"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 25.—THE PRIESTS AND OUTRAGE. THEY NEVER CONDEMNED IT.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he people of Moycullen with whom I have spent a day are hardly +patriotic. So far as I can gather, they have always paid their rents +and worked hard for their living. They know nothing of Home Rule, and +they do not murder their friends and neighbours. They send forth a +strong contingent of men to work on Mr. Balfour's railway between +Galway and Clifden, and find the weekly wages there earned very +convenient. They vote as they are told, and do not trouble themselves +with matters which are too high for them. If a candidate proposes to +make the land much cheaper, or even to spare the necessity of paying +any rent at all, the Moyculleners give him their voice. Like every +Catholic villager in Ireland they look to Father Pat, Tom, Dick, or +Harry for advice, and the good priest gives them the right tip. He +points out that Micky O'Codlin promises to support such legislation as +shall place the land in the hands of the tillers of the soil, while +the Protestant Short declares that the thing is not honest, and cannot +be done. The result is precisely what might be expected. The +Nationalist members are returned, and Mr. Gladstone, with his most +grandiose manner, and with the abject magnanimity he always shows when +thoroughly beaten, comes forward and declares he can no longer resist +the aspirations of a people. The Separatist sheep tumble over each +other in their nervous anxiety to keep close on the heels of the +bell-wether, and the Empire is threatened with disintegration to suit +the convenience of a party of priests. An eminent Roman Catholic +lawyer of Dublin, a Home Ruler, said to me:—</p> + +<p>"I vote for Home Rule because the sooner the thing is settled the +better, and it will never be settled until we get Home Rule in some +form or other. The country is weary of the agitation of the last +twenty years, and I am of opinion that Home Rule would do much to +restore the freedom of Ireland. For Ireland is in a state of +slavery—not to England, but to the priesthood. I believe in the +fundamental doctrines of the faith, but I don't believe everything the +priests choose to tell me. I am ready to admit that they have more +spiritual gifts and graces than anybody else, but I will not believe +that they know more about politics, and I will not submit <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>to their +dictation. They control the course of affairs both sacred and secular. +At the present moment they are running the British Empire. You cannot +get away from the fact that they return the Irish majority, and you +will admit that the Irish majority is now the ruling power. Let me +illustrate my point.</p> + +<p>"You in England think we have the franchise in Ireland. Nothing of the +kind. There may be a hundred thousand in the North who vote as they +think proper, but an overwhelming majority of the South are absolutely +in the hands of the clergy, who in many cases lead or drive them in +hundreds to the poll."</p> + +<p>Here an English civil engineer said:—"When I was engaged on a line at +Mayo I actually saw the priest walking in front of some hundreds of +voters brought into the town from the rural districts. I was driving +along in a car, and my driver shouted 'Parnell for ever!' He was +struck on the head and face, his cheek cut open, and himself knocked +off the car. How the priestly party do hate the Parnellites! I wonder +what would happen if the Nationalists got into power."</p> + +<p>"They would exterminate each other, if possible," said the Dublin man. +"We should have an awful ferment, a chaos, an immediate bankruptcy. +But let us have it. Let us make the experiment, and thus for ever +settle the question. To return to the priests. The people of Ireland +have not the franchise, which is monopolised by a few thousand priests +and bishops. The Nationalist members, the dauntless seventy-one, are +as much the nominees of the Catholic clergy as the old pocket-borough +members were nominees of the local landlords. And the same thing will +hold good in future. People tell you it will not be so, but that's all +humbug. It may be different in five-and-twenty years, when the people +are educated, when the National Schools have done their work, but half +that time is enough to ruin England. Thanks to agitators, Ireland +cannot be any worse off than she is."</p> + +<p>Some time ago there was a Convention in Dublin, a Home Rule +Convention. There were five hundred delegates, sent up by the votes of +the people. Four hundred and nine were priests, who had returned +themselves. Can the English Gladstonians get away from the +suggestiveness of this fact? Is it sufficiently symptomatic? Can they +not diagnose the progress of the disease?</p> + +<p>One of the Galway Town Commissioners, also a Roman Catholic, declared +that the Irish people, once the kindliest, most honest, most +conscientious amongst the nations of the earth, had for years been +taught a doctrine of malevolence. "They were naturally benevolent, but +their nature has been changed, and I regret to say that in a large +measure the priests are responsible for the change. Where once mutual +help and perfect honesty reigned, you now find selfishness and mutual +distrust. The priests have made the altar a hustings, and even worse +than electioneering has been done on that sacred spot. From the altar +have been denounced old friends and neighbours who had dared to have +an opinion of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>their own, had dared to show an independent spirit, and +to hold on what they thought the true course in spite of the +blackguard population of the district. Take the case of O'Mara, of +Parsonstown. He was the principal merchant of the place, a very kindly +man, of decided politics, a Catholic Conservative, like myself. He +sold provisions to what the local priest called the 'helmeted minions +of our Saxon taskmasters.' In other words, he sold bread to the +constabulary at a time when outrage and murder were being put down +with a strong hand. The priest threatened him with boycotting, his +friends urged him to give way, and let the police get their 'prog' +from a distance, but O'Mara, who was an easy-going man, and who had +never obtruded his politics on anyone, showed an unexpected obstinacy, +and said he would do as he chose, spite of all the priests on earth. +They denounced him from the altar, but, although they tried hard, they +failed to ruin him. In other cases, clerical influence has dragged men +from positions of competency and caused them to end their days in the +workhouse. Then, again, the priests never denounced outrage. They +might have stopped the fiendish deeds of the murderous blackguards +whose evil propensities were fostered and utilised by the Land League, +but they said no word of disapproval. On the contrary they tacitly +favoured, or seemed to favour, the most awful assassinations. When the +Phœnix Park murders took place, a Galway priest whom I will not +name said that he had been requested to ask for the prayers of the +faithful in favour of Mr. Burke, one of the murdered men, who belonged +to an old Galway family. And what was the remark made by that follower +of Jesus Christ? He said, 'I have mentioned the request. You can pray +for his soul—<i>if you like</i>.' What he meant was plain enough."</p> + +<p>"Let me tell you of something even worse," said the Dublin lawyer. "In +a certain Catholic church which I regularly attend, and on a Sunday +when were present two or three eminent Judges, with a considerable +number of the Dublin aristocracy, a certain dignitary, whom I also +will not name before our Sassenach friend, actually coupled the names +of honest people who had died in their beds with the names of Curley +and the other assassins who were hanged for the Phœnix Park +murders. We were invited to pray for their souls <i>en bloc</i>! And this, +mind you, not at the time of the execution, but a year afterwards, on +the anniversary of the day, and when the thing might well have been +allowed to drop. Did you ever hear of anything more outrageous than +the conduct of this priest, who took upon himself to mention these +brutal murderers in the same breath with the blessed departed, whose +friends and relations were kneeling around? The fact that this cleric +could so act shows the immunity of the Irish priesthood, and their +confidence in their influence over the people. Don't forget that this +was in the capital of Ireland, and that the congregation was +aristocratic. How great must be priestly influence over the unlettered +peasantry. You see my point? What would the English say to such an +exhibition? <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>What would the relatives of decent people in England do +if they had been submitted to such an insult by a Protestant parson?"</p> + +<p>I disclaimed any right to speak for the brutal Saxon with any degree +of authority, but ventured to say that to the best of my knowledge and +belief the supposititious reverend gentleman, when next he took his +walks abroad, might possibly become acquainted with a novel but +vigorous method of propulsion, or even might undergo the process so +familiar to Tim Healy, not altogether unconnected with a horsewhip.</p> + +<p>The Galway Town Commissioner said:—"We respectable Catholics are in a +very awkward position. We have to live among our countrymen who are of +a different way of thinking, and unhappily we cannot express our +honest opinions without embarassing consequences. In England, where +people of opposite politics meet on terms of most sincere friendship, +you do not understand our difficulties. We are denounced as +unpatriotic, as enemies to our native land, and as aiders and abettors +of the hated English rule. Now we know very well—my friend from +Dublin, who understands law, will bear me out—we know very well that +the English laws are good, excellent, liberal. We know that the +English people are anxious to do what is fair and right, and that they +have long been doing their best to make us comfortable. But we must +keep this knowledge to ourselves, for such of us who are in business +would run great risk of loss, besides social ostracism, if we ventured +to boldly express our views. Moreover, we do not care to put ourselves +in open conflict with the clergy, upon whom we have been taught to +look from earliest childhood with reverence and awe. It is almost, if +not quite, a matter of heredity. I declare that, in spite of what I +might call my intellectual convictions, I am to some extent overawed +by any illiterate farmer's son, who has been ordained a priest. I feel +it in my blood. I must have imbibed it with my mother's milk. No use +for Conservative Catholics to kick against it. We are too few, and we +are bound hand and foot."</p> + +<p>So did the Galway man deliver himself. I was reminded of Mr. O'Ryan, +of Larne, a devoted Catholic, who said, "I protest from my innermost +heart against Home Rule. I protest not only for myself, but also on +behalf of my co-religionists that dare not speak, because if they did +speak their lives might not be worth an hour's purchase, not being +situated, as I am, in the midst of a loyal, and law-abiding +population. I believe that all that Ireland requires is a just +settlement of the land question, and a fair, reasonable measure of +local self-government. For several generations past England has been +doing all the good she could for Ireland, and none have more reason +than the Roman Catholics of Ireland to be thankful for that good. The +loyal Roman Catholics of Ireland are convinced that Home Rule would be +the ruin of Ireland in particular and of the British Empire in +general, which would find itself deprived in a few hours of a +Constitution the workmanship of centuries, and the admiration of the +whole nineteenth-century civilisation."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>This is tolerably outspoken for an Irish Roman Catholic, but Mr. +O'Ryan lives in Ulster, where people do not shoot their neighbours for +difference of political opinion. He said more: "We loyal Catholics +could never submit to Mr. Gladstone's ticket-of-leave men placed in +power over us in this country, and rather than submit to them we are +prepared for the worst, and ready, if need be, to die with the words, +'No surrender,' on our lips."</p> + +<p>Archbishop Walsh cursed the Dublin Bazaar for the Irish Masonic +Orphanage until he was black in the face, but neither he nor any other +Catholic Bishop denounced the perpetrators of outrage, of mutilation, +of foul assassinations. When Inspector Martin was butchered on the +steps of the presbytery at Gweedore; when Joseph Huddy and John Huddy +were murdered and their bodies put in sacks and thrown into Lough Mask; +when Mrs. Croughan, of Mullingar, was murdered because she had been +seen speaking to the police, four shots being fired into her body; when +Luke Dillon, a poor peasant, was shot dead as he walked home from work; +when Patrick Halloran, a poor herdsman, was shot dead at his own +fireside; when Michael Moloney was murdered for paying his rent; when +John Lennane, an old man who had accepted work from a boycotted farmer, +was shot dead in the midst of his family; when Thomas Abram met +precisely the same fate under similar circumstances; when Constable +Kavanagh was murdered; when John Dillon had his brains beaten out and +his ears torn away; when Patrick Freely was murdered for paying his +rent; when John Curtin was shot dead by moonlighters, to whom he +refused to give up his guns; when John Forhan, a feeble old man of +nearly seventy years, was murdered for having induced labourers to work +on a boycotted farm; when James Ruane, a labourer who worked for a +boycotted farmer, was murdered by three shots; when James Quinn was +wounded by a bullet, and while disabled, killed by having his throat +cut; when Peter McCarthy was murdered because it was thought he meant +to pay rent; when James Fitzmaurice, aged seventy, was shot dead in the +presence of his daughter Norah, because he had taken a farm which his +brother had left, the latter declining to pay rent, although the +landlord offered a reduction of 66 per cent.; when Margaret Macmahon, +widow, and her little children were three times fired at because the +poor woman had earned a few pence by supplying turf to the police; when +Patrick Quirke, aged seventy-five, was murdered for taking a farm which +somebody else wanted; when the wife of John Collins was indecently +assaulted while her husband was being brutally beaten for caretaking; +when John Curtin (another John Curtin), a school-master, was shot, and +his wife received forty-two slugs in her face, neck, and breast for +something they had not done, the school also being fired into, and all +children attending it boycotted; when John Connor's wife was shot in +the head by moonlighters who wished to vex the husband; when Cornelius +Murphy was shot dead while sitting at his "ain fireside" chatting with +his wife and children; when Daniel O'Brien, aged seventy-five, talking +with his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>wife, aged seventy, was murdered by a shot; when Patrick +Quigley had the roof of his skull blown away for taking some grazing; +when David Barry was shot in the main street of Castleisland; when +Patrick Taugney was murdered in the presence of his wife and daughters; +when Edmund Allen was shot dead because of a right-of-way dispute—he +was a Protestant; when young Cashman, aged twenty, was beaten to death +for speaking to a policeman; when poor Spillane was murdered for acting +as a caretaker; when Patrick Curtin, John Rahen, and a farmer named +Tonery were murdered; when James Spence, aged sixty-five, was beaten to +death; when Blake, Ruane, Linton, Burke, Wallace, Dempsey, Timothy +Sullivan, John Moylan, James Sheridan, and Constable Cox were shot +dead; when James Miller, Michael Ball, Peter Greany, and Bridget +McCullagh were murdered—the last a poor widow, who was beaten to death +with a spade; when Ryan Foley was brutally murdered; when Michael +Baylan was murdered; when Viscount Mountmorres was murdered, and the +dead body left on the road, the neighbouring farmers being afraid to +give the poor corpse the shelter of a barn; when a car-driver named +John Downey was killed by a bullet intended for Mr. Hutchins, J.P.; +when young Wheeler, of Oolagh, whence I dated a letter, was shot dead, +to punish his father, who was an agent—when all these murders took +place, every one of them, and as many more, the work of the Land +League, which also was responsible for more outrages, filthy +indecencies, and gross brutalities than the entire <i>Gazette</i> would +hold, and which would in many cases be unfit for publication—then were +the clergy <span class="fakesc">SILENT</span>. No denunciations from the altar; no +influence exerted in the parish. In many cases a direct encouragement +to persevere in the good path. When John Curtin's daughters attended +church after their father's murder they were attacked by a hostile +crowd. The police were compelled to charge the infuriated mob. +Otherwise the pious Papists would in all probability have consummated +the good work by murdering the remainder of the family, after having, +in the presence of daughters who nobly fought the murderers, +assassinated the father.</p> + +<p>What did the good priest, Father O'Connor, say to all this; how +express his deep sense of this abject cowardice, this atrocious +savagery, this unheard-of-sacrilege?</p> + +<p>He "took no notice of the occurrence"—good, easy man. But I am +forgetting something. Mr. Curtin was killed by a gang of moonlighters, +who knocked him up, and, presenting loaded rifles at the children, +asked for the father's arms. Before the terrified boys and girls could +comply the father appeared and shot a moonlighter dead in his tracks. +The rest fled precipitately, but unhappily Curtin gave chase and was +killed. Good Father O'Connor attended the funeral of the moonlighter, +who did not belong to his parish, and refused to attend that of Mr. +Curtin, who did!</p> + +<p>The Catholic Bishops of Ireland stood by and looked on all this +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>without a word of censure. Silence gives consent. Had they fulminated +against outrage and secret wholesale murder of poor working men, for +nearly all those I have cited were of this class; had they used their +immense influence to stem the murderous instincts of ruffians who in +many cases took advantage of the prevailing disregard for human life +to wreak their private revenge on their neighbours, satisfied that no +man dare testify, and that the clergy would aid them to frustrate the +law—had the Bishops done this, even the dull and sluggish brain of +the brutal Saxon could have understood their action. They uttered no +single word of condemnation. An eminent Catholic, a clever +professional man, who reveres the faith in which he was bred, but +holds its priesthood in lowest contempt, said to me:—"You cannot find +a word of condemnation uttered by any Bishop during the whole period +when brutal murders were of daily occurrence. I give you your best. I +would stake anything on my statement. I have challenged people over +and over again, but nobody has ever been able to produce a syllable of +censure, of warning, of reprobation. The Bishops were strangely +unanimous in their silence."</p> + +<p>But when the Irish Masons try to provide for the orphans of their +brethren the Archbishop's back is up at once; for Masons have secrets +which they may not tell even to priests; and therefore Dr. Walsh +declares that whosoever gives sixpence to this cause of charity, or +associates with its promoters, shall be cast into hell, there to abide +in torture everlastingly—unless previously whitewashed by himself in +person. And as I have clearly shown, the influence of Archbishop Walsh +and his kind is at this moment supremely powerful in matters affecting +the prestige and integrity of England and her people. Wherefore I do +not wonder at the saying of an earnest Irishman of famous name, a +baronet of long descent, whom I saw yesterday—</p> + +<p>"When I see how the thing is being worked, and when, as a Catholic, I +recognise the progress and character of the Church policy, and when I +see England walking so stupidly into the trap, I don't know what to +do—whether to swear, or to go out and be sick."</p> + +<p class="date">Moycullen (Connemara), May 23rd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_26_THE_CONNEMARA_RAILWAY" id="No_26_THE_CONNEMARA_RAILWAY"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 26.—THE CONNEMARA RAILWAY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterm.png" alt="M" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />r. Balfour's railway from Galway to Clifden will be exactly fifty +miles long, and will run through Crooniffe, Moycullen, Ross, +Oughterard, and the wildest and most desolate parts of Connemara. The +line has been in contemplation for thirty years at least, but the +strong suit of its Irish projectors was talking, not doing, and the +project might have remained under discussion until the crack of doom +but for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>Mr. Balfour's energy and administrative power. The Irish +patriots had no money, or they would not invest any. The Galway +authorities would not authorise a county rate. Anybody who chose might +make the line, but the local "powers that be" refused to spend a +single penny on an enterprise which would for years provide employment +for the starving people of Connemara, and would afterwards prove of +incalculable benefit to the whole West of Ireland by opening up an +attractive, an immense, an almost inaccessible tourist district, +besides affording facilities of transit for agricultural stock and +general market produce, and powerfully aiding the rapidly-developing +fish trade of the western sea-board. Not a bit of it. The Western +Irish are always standing about waiting for something. They talked +about the line for a generation or two, but they cut no sod of turf. +They harangued meetings convened to hear the prospective blessings of +the line, but they declined to put any money on their opinions. The +starving peasants of Connemara might have turned cannibals and eaten +each other before Irishmen had commenced the railway. The people of +the congested districts were unable to live on the sympathy of their +fellow-countrymen, and nothing else was offered to them. The +Connemarans have an occasional weakness for food. They like a square +feed now and again. Their instincts are somewhat material. They think +that Pity without Relief is like Mustard without Beef. They like +Sentiment—with something substantial at the back of it. Their +patriot-brethren, those warm-hearted, dashing, off-hand, +devil-may-care heroes of whom we read in Charles Lever, sometimes +visited the district, to rouse the people against the brutal Saxon, +but they did no more than this. Sometimes, I say, not often, did the +patriots patrol Connemara. There were two reasons for this. First, the +Irish patriots do not speak their native language; and the Connemarans +are not at home with English. Secondly, and principally, the +Connemarans had nothing to give away. They cannot pay for first-class +patriotism like that of Davitt, Dillon, O'Brien, and Tim Healy, who +latterly have never performed out of London.</p> + +<p>And so the Galway folks went on with their railway discussions, and +the poor Connemarans went on with their starving. Suddenly Mr. Balfour +took the thing up, and the turf began to fly. The Midland and Western +Railway Company, in consideration of a grant of £264,000, agreed to +make the line, and to afterwards run it, whether it paid or not. The +contractors were not allowed to import unskilled labour. The +Connemarans were to make the line whether they knew the work or not. +They had never seen navvy labour. They knew nothing outside the +management of small farms. They had never done regular work. Their +usual form is to plant their bit of ground and then to sit down till +the crops come up, on which they live till next season. A failure of +crops means starvation. This was their normal condition. They enjoyed +what Mr. Gladstone would call a "chronic plethora" of hunger. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>The +liverish tourist who adventured himself into these barbarous regions +in hopeless quest of appetite for his breakfast, would see the +Connemarans in hopeless quest of breakfast for their appetites. The +region is healthy enough. As Justice Shallow would say, "Beggars all, +beggars all. Marry, good air."</p> + +<p>The first thing you see is a twenty-thousand-pound bridge across the +Corrib, not very far from the salmon weir, where are more fish than +you can count splashing up the salmon stairs, which are arranged to +save the salmon the effort of a long jump. Then the line running along +the Corrib Valley on a high embankment, past the ruins of what was +first a convent, then a whiskey distillery, now a timekeeper's office. +An entire field is being dug up and carted away, the soil being +excavated to a depth of eight or ten feet, over an area of several +acres required for sidings and railway buildings. A strolling Galway +man of Home Rule tendencies imparts information. He is eminently +discontented, and thinks the way in which the work is conducted +another injustice to Ireland. "The people are working and getting +wages, but what wages! Thirteen and sixpence a week! Would English +navvies work for that? You are getting the labour at starvation +prices, and even then you bully the men. They work in gangs, each with +a ganger swearing at them in the most offensive and outrageous way. +See that gang over there. You can hear the ganger shouting and +swearing even at this distance. The poor men are treated like dogs, +and even then they can hardly keep body and soul together. They have +to come miles and miles to the work, and some live so far away that +they can only return home once a week. So they have to camp out in +hovels. You are going down the line? Then you will be shocked at the +slave-driving you'll see. It reminds me of Legree in 'Uncle Tom's +Cabin.' I am surprised that the men do not drop dead over the work. +Not a moment's rest or relaxation. Work, work, work from morning to +night, for next to nothing. It ought not to be allowed in a civilised +country. And on the top of all this slavery we are expected to be very +much obliged for the opportunity of working at all. You chuck us a +crust just as you would chuck a bone to a dog, and then you want us to +go down on our knees and pour blessings on Balfour's head. We're tired +of such stuff; but, thank God, we shall soon have things in our own +hands. All these men are small farmers, or small farmers' sons. They +can't get a living out of the land, and they are obliged to come to +this. Bullied and driven from week's end to week's end, they are the +very picture of starvation. A shame and disgrace to the English +Government."</p> + +<p>I may as well say at once that all this proved to be untrue. No doubt +the Galway Home Rulers invent and circulate these falsehoods to +discount the effect of the good work of a Conservative Government, and +it is, therefore, well that the facts should be placed on record. I +pushed on to a cutting where fifty men were busily engaged in loading +earth into trucks, having first dug it from a great bank of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>gravelly +soil. An Irish ganger walked to and fro along the top, keeping his eye +on the men, and occasionally shouting in an excited tone. But he was +not swearing at, or otherwise abusing, the men, who were as fine a +company of peasants as you could see anywhere, well-built, well-grown, +and muscular. Not a trace of starvation, but, on the contrary, a +well-fed, well-nourished look. The ganger, Sullivan, seemed +good-tempered enough, only shouting to let off his superfluous +vitality. He used no bad language. "Cheer up, my lads," he cried. "In +wid the dirt. Look alive, look alive, look alive. Whirroo! Shove it +up, my lads, shove it up. Away ye go. Look out for that fall of earth. +There she goes. Whirroo!" English navvies would have preferred +silence, would have requested him to hold his condemned jaw, would +have spent some breath in applying an explosive mining term to his +eyes, but these Irish labourers seemed to understand their superior +officer, and to cheerfully accept the situation. Mr. Sullivan was +civil and good-humoured. "These are a picked lot. Splendid set of +fellows, and good workers. No, they do not walk for miles before they +reach their work. The engine runs along the line to pick them up in +the morning, and to drop them again in the evening. They have +half-an-hour for dinner, and half-an-hour for tea. They get about +fifteen shillings a week. Boys get less, but thirteen shillings and +sixpence is the very bottom. Rubbish about low wages. Nine bob a week +is the regular farmer's wage, and these men would have been glad to +work for six bob. All have some land, every man of them. They have +just come back from planting it. We have been very short of men. They +went away at the beginning of April, and they were away for a +fortnight or three weeks. Small blame to them. Half or three-quarters +of them went to look after their bits of ground. But, barrin' that, +they turn up very regularly. They get fifteen shillings a week, where +they got nothing. And every man knows the convenience the line will be +to him to get his bit of stuff to Galway market, and also that it will +bring money into a country where there was none. They are as contented +as can be, and we never hear a word of complaint. We have not heard a +grumble since the line was started a year or two ago. These Home +Rulers will say anything but their prayers, and them they whistle. +Since the work came from the Tories it must be bad. There must be a +curse on it. Now, my lads, shove it up, shove it up! (Excuse me, Sir.) +Whirroo, my boys. Look out! In wid it, thin! Whirroo!"</p> + +<p>A big tank for engine water was being filled by an old man in shirt +and trousers, his naked chest shining a hundred yards away. Luke +Whelan was his name; a vigorous pumper, he. "'Tis hard work it is, ye +may say it. I have another tank or two to fill, an' keep filled, but I +have long rests, and time for a grain o' baccy, glory be to God! +Thirteen-an'-sixpence it is, but I lost my place at Palmer's flour +mills, the work gave out, an' but for this I'd have nothin' at all. +Was in the Fifth Fusiliers, but lost me sight (partly) in Injee. Was +in the army long enough to get a pension <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>of ninepence a day. Me rint +is two pounds a year, and I've only the owld woman to kape. Ah, but +Balfour was a blessin' to us altogether! They talk about Home Rule, +but what good will that do us? Can we ate it, can we dhrink it, can we +shmoke it? The small farmers thinks they'll have the land for nothin', +but what about the labourers? Everything that's done is done for the +farmers, an' the workin' men gets nothin' at all. In England 'tis the +workin' men gets all the consideration; but in this counthry 'tis the +farmers, an' the workin' men that have no land may hang themselves. +When the big farms is all done away who'll employ the labourers? The +gintry that spint money an' made things a bit better is all driven out +of the counthry by the Land League. Ye see all around ye the chimneys +of places that once was bits of manufactories. All tumblin' down, all +tumblin' down. Nobody dares invest money for fear he'd be robbed of +his property, the same as the landlords was robbed, an' will be +robbed, till the end of the chapther. 'Tis nothin' but robbery ye hear +of, an' gettin' other people's property for nothin'. The Home Rule +Bill would dhrive all the workin' men out of the counthry to England +and America. They must have employment, an' they must go where it is +to be had. Engineers have been threatenin' this line for forty years, +first one route an' then another, but divil a spade was put in it. +England found us the money to build the line, an' the labourers get +work. Where will we get work whin nobody would lend us money to build +lines? An Irish Parlimint wouldn't build a line in a thousand years. +For nobody would thrust thim wid the cash. Yes, wid ninepence a day +and thirteen shillings and sixpence a week, I'm comfortable enough. +But begorra, the pump leaks, an' I have to pump a quarther more than I +should. Av the pump worked right 'tis little grumblin' ye'd hear from +Luke Whelan."</p> + +<p>Mr. George William Wood, contractors' agent, said:—"The men work as +well as they can, but they do not get over the ground like English +navvies. They are very regular, very quiet, very sober, and never give +the least trouble. Of course, they had to be taught, and they did not +like the big navvy shovels. They were used to the six-foot spades with +no cross-bar. Yes, you might think it harder work with such tools, but +then the Irish labourer dislikes to bend his back. The long handle +lets him keep his back straight, there's the difference. However, we +insist on the big, short shovels, and they have taken to them all +right. These men are not so strong as they seem, and they are not +worth nearly so much as English navvies. They may be willing, but they +have not the same stamina. The English navvy eats about two pounds of +beef for his dinner and washes it down with about two quarts of ale. +These men never see meat from one year's end to another. They live on +potatoes, and bits of dry bread and water. At three in the afternoon +they are not worth much, clean pumped out—might almost as well go +home. No, they don't live in hovels. Those who go home <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>but once a +week are housed in good wooden sheds, or corrugated iron buildings, +with good beds and bedclothes. There are about forty of them in a hut, +with a hut-keeper to look after them and to keep order. For this +excellent lodging they are charged sixpence a week, and all their prog +is supplied at wholesale prices. We buy largely in Dublin, bring it +down, of course, carriage free, and both the men and their wives and +families are supplied to any amount. They effect a saving of at least +twenty per cent., but probably much more, as village stores are +terribly dear. The whole district has found out this advantage, and +they flock to the hut-store from all parts. So Balfour is a boon to +the country at large."</p> + +<p>Next day I went down sixteen miles of line to a spot about a mile from +Oughterard. It was pay-day, and I clung to the engine along with the +engineer, Mr. Wood, and a pay-clerk, armed with several yards of +pay-sheet, and a couple of black tin cash-boxes. A wild and stony +country, a range of high mountains on the left, wide, flat plains on +the right, through which the Corrib serpentined, with big rocks rising +from the channel brilliantly white. "They whitewash the rocks, so that +they can be seen by the boats and the Cong steamer. Englishmen would +blow them up and have done with them, but Irishmen prefer to whitewash +them and sail round them. More exciting I suppose, matter of taste." +This from the engineer, a Saxon of the usual type. On through bogs, +past nameless lakes, and a chaos of limestone rocks and huge granite +boulders, lakes, bogs, rocks, in endless succession, with the long +mountain reek beside us, and a still higher range in the purple +distance. Now and then a green patch sternly walled in, a few cows +grazing, a lonely donkey, a few long-tailed black sheep, or a couple +of goats. Here and there acres of white blossom, looking like a +snowfall. This was the bog bean, growing on a stem a foot high, a +silvery tuft of silky bloom hanging downward, two inches long and the +bigness of a finger. Sometimes we dashed past walled enclosures so +full of stone that they looked like abandoned graveyards, and the only +use of the fences, so far as I could see, was to keep thoughtless +cattle out. Very little tillage. Just a few ridges of potatoes, but +the people who had planted them seemed to have vanished for ever. At +long intervals a diminutive white cot, but nothing else to break the +succession of lake, rock, and bog. Moycullen, six miles from Galway, +is to have a station; another will be built at Ross, ten miles, a +third at Oughterard, sixteen and a half miles. Not a stone laid as +yet. At Ross a great excavation. The men had just laid bare a huge +boulder of granite, weighing some thirty tons, and Mr. Wood, observing +my interest in this relic of the ice-age, gave it to me on the spot. +"No granite <i>in situ</i> hereabouts, the living rock is mountain +limestone, but no end of granite boulders, which are blasted to the +tune of half-a-ton of tonite per week." Ten miles from Galway a +cutting was being regularly quarried for building purposes, and most +of the sixteen or seventeen miles of line I saw was fenced with a +Galway wall of uncemented <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>stone four feet six inches high and +eighteen inches thick. "The men build stone walls with great skill," +said Mr. Wood, "but half the number of English navvies would do more +excavating."</p> + +<p>The pay-clerk stopped the engine at every gang, and the men came +forward for their money. All had the same well-nourished sturdy look, +and all seemed well satisfied with their wages. They conversed in +Irish, but they mostly understood English, even if they could not +speak it themselves. Whole villages were there seemingly of the same +name, and strange were the distinctive appellations. There was John +Toole and John Toole Pat, John Pat Toole and Pat Toole John. +Permutation was the order of the day. There was Tom Joyce Pat and Pat +Tom Joyce, Tom Joyce Sally and Tom Joyce boy. Besides this change +ringing a little colour was thrown in, and we had Pat Tom Joyce Red +and Pat Tom Joyce Black, Red Pat Tom Joyce and Black Tom Joyce Pat. +This is called Joyce's country, before Balfour's time depopulating to +desolation, now thriving and filling up, re-Joyceing in fact. Nearly +seventeen hundred men are at work here and at the other end, and in +1894 the great civiliser will steam from Galway to Clifden, +inaugurating (let us hope) a new era of prosperity.</p> + +<p>In Oughterard I met an American tourist who said, "I should think Home +Rule would about settle Old England. The Irish people show a most +unfriendly spirit, and I have come to the conclusion that there is no +such word as gratitude in the Irish language. There is some change in +this district, and the people seem willing to work, but wherever the +agitators have been everything is going to the bad. Nothing but +distrust and suspicion. No Irishman would invest in Irish securities. +They prefer South Americans! That startled me. I am told that Tim +Healy is worth £30,000, all got out of Home Rule, and my informant +says that Tim would not risk a penny in his own country. Tim is a +blackguardly kind of politician, but he is mighty cute, and shirks +Irish securities. Where are the business managers of the Irish nation +coming from? That's what I want to know."</p> + +<p>I told him of the Galway Harbour Commissioners, who, having been +forgiven a Government debt of nearly £10,000, conceived the idea of +building a new, grand, splindid, iligant, deep dock, which should +increase the trade of the place by allowing ships of great draught to +unload in the harbour. Let me repeat the story for the readers of the +<i>Gazette</i>.</p> + +<p>The Harbour Board consulted an eminent engineer, who said the right +thing would cost £80,000. They sent him to the right about, and called +in another man. "Now," said they, "we can only raise £30,000 by loans +from the Board of Works. Will not that suffice? We give you 5 per +cent. on the outlay, &c., &c., &c." The new man said £30,000 was +ample, took the job, and the work was commenced. Ultimately they +borrowed £40,000, which they spent, along with the £10,000 in hand. +Then it was found that big ships could not get to the dock at all! No +use in a deep dock unless <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>you can swim up to it. To get the big +vessels in you required to hoist them out of the water, carry them a +few hundred yards, and drop them into the dock. As the Galway men +still groan beneath the cruel English yoke, this operation was found +impracticable. During some blasting operations a big rock was tumbled +out of the dock in process of manufacture, dropping in front of +another dock in full working order. The stone was just in the way of +the vessels, but as there was no Parliament in College Green, the +Harbour Board had not the heart to fish it up. So it crashed through +the bottom of a Henderson collier, the owner of which sued the Harbour +Board for damages, and was awarded a thousand pounds. The money never +was paid, and never will be. The fortunate winner of the suit will +sell his claim for £5 in English gold. He was thought to have done +well in winning, and my informant, a typical Irishman, admired the +complainant's successful attack on the Harbour Board. "But what good +come of it at last," I ventured to put in. "Nay, that I cannot tell," +said he, "But 'twas a glorious victory."</p> + +<p>The Galway Harbour Board spent £50,000 or so on a deep dock which they +have not got, and the harbour is in pawn to the Board of Works, which +collects the tolls, and otherwise endeavours to indemnify itself. The +Harbour Board meets as usual, but it has no powers, no money, no +credit, no anything. This is a fair specimen of the business +management which characterises the breed of Irishmen who favour Home +Rule. The party paper, once a fine property, has in their hands sunk +below zero, and they built New Tipperary on land to which they had no +title; so that the money was completely thrown away. Almost every +Board of Guardians in the country is insolvent, except in those cases +where the Government has kicked out the Poor Law Guardians elected by +the Parish, and restored solvency by sending down paid men to run the +concern for a couple of years. This has been done in several +instances, and in every case the paid men, drawing salaries of several +hundred a year, have in two years paid off debts, leaving all in good +working order, with a balance in the bank. The inference is obvious. +Would the Belfast folks have made such a fiasco of a dock? Would +Englishmen have exposed themselves to the ridicule of a story which is +curiously remindful of Robinson Crusoe and his big canoe? Would the +Galway folks ever have built the railway they wanted so badly; or sans +England and Mr. Balfour, would not the Connemara men have proceeded to +starve until the end of time? A keen old railway man who had +thravelled, and who had done railway work in California, said to me, +"Whin we get an Oirish Parlimint the labourers may jist put on their +hats and go over to England. Thank God, we'll know something besides +farm work now, the whole of us. We can get railroad work in England. +There'll be none in Oireland, for every mother's son that has money +will cut the country. I could take ye fourteen Oirish miles from +Galway, along a road that was spotted wid great jintlemen's houses, +an' ivery one of thim's in ruins. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>The owners that used to live in +them, and be a blessin' to the counthry, is all ruined by the land +agitation. All are gone, an' their foin, splindid houses tumblin' +down, an' the people worse off than iver. If the Bill becomes law the +young men will all be off to England and America. There'll be no work, +no money in the counthry. Did ye hear what the cyar-dhriver said to +Mr. Morley?"</p> + +<p>I confessed that the incident escaped my recollection.</p> + +<p>"Why the cyar-man was a dacent boy, an Mister Morley axed him how was +thrade, an' av he was busy."</p> + +<p>"No," says the dhriver, "things is quite, very quite," says he.</p> + +<p>"Ye'll be busy when ye get Home Rule," says Mister Morley.</p> + +<p>"But that'll only last a week," says the cyar-man.</p> + +<p>"An' why so?" says the Irish Secretary, bein' curious an' lookin' +round at the dhriver.</p> + +<p>"Och," says Pat; "'twill only take a week to dhrive thim to the +boats."</p> + +<p>"Who d'ye mane, wid yer dhrivin' to the boats?" says owld Morley.</p> + +<p>"All the dacent folks that has any money to pay for dhrivin'," says +Pat, "for bedad they'll be lavin' the counthry."</p> + +<p>"That was a thriminjus rap for owld Morley, but 'twas thrue, an' the +Divil himself couldn't deny it."</p> + +<p>"An' can ye tell me why the farmers should have all the land an' not +the labourers? An' could ye say why them murdherin' Land Leaguers in +Parliament wasn't hung up, the rampagious ruffians?"</p> + +<p>I could throw no light on these points. My friend had much to say +about the Land League M.P.'s, and a score of times asked me why they +had not been hanged.</p> + +<p>A hard question to answer, when you come to think of it. Does anybody +know?</p> + +<p class="date">Oughterard (Connemara), May 23rd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_27_CULTIVATING_IRISH_INDUSTRY" id="No_27_CULTIVATING_IRISH_INDUSTRY"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 27.—CULTIVATING IRISH INDUSTRY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he city of kings. Pronounced Athen-rye, with a bang on the last +syllable. A squalid town, standing amid splendid ruins of a bygone +time. "Look what English rule has brought us to," said a village +politician, waving his hand from the ivy-covered gateway by which you +enter the town to the mean-looking houses around. "That's what we +could build when we were left to ourselves, an' this is what we can do +afther sivin hundhred years of the Saxon." The ruins in question are +the remains of fortifications erected after the Norman Conquest of +Ireland by the Normans, a great entrance gate, and a strong, oblong +keep. The ruins of the Dominican Friary, founded in 1241 by Meyler, of +Birmingham, have a thrilling interest of their own, which has its +pendant in the story of a Mayence verger, who holds British visitors +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>to the cathedral of that city in breathless rapture as he tells how it +is said that a Mayence bishop of eight hundred years ago was said to +be of English extraction, or like the Stratford mulberry tree, which +is said to be a cutting of a tree said to have grown on the spot where +a tree is said to have stood which is said to have been planted by +Shakespeare. Galway abounds in ruined fortalices, tumble-down abbeys, +ivied towers and castles, none of which were built by the Irish race. +The round towers which dot the country here and there, with a few +ruined churches, are all that the native Irish can claim in the way of +architecture.</p> + +<p>The people here are full of interest. The fair at Athenry is something +to remember. A very good time it was, cattle selling higher than of +yore. The men were queerly, quaintly dressed, speaking Irish, getting +extremely drunk on vilest whiskey, leaving the town in twos and +threes, tumbling in groups by the roadside, reeking heaps of imbruted +humanity. The women were numerous, tall, decent, and modest. All wore +the shawl as a hood, the shawls of strange pattern unknown in England. +All tucked up the dress nearly to the waist, showing the invariable +red kirtle. All, or nearly all, were shod with serviceable shoes, such +as would astonish the Parisian makers of bottines. But these shoes +were only for show. The ladies walked painfully about in the +unaccustomed leather. They seemed to have innumerable corns, to +wrestle with bunions huge and dire, to suffer from unknown pedal +infirmities. Outside the town the ladies put on their shoes. Outside +the town, after the fair, they took them off again, sitting on the +roadside, stripping their shapely feet, bundling the obnoxious, +crippling abominations into Isabella-colour handkerchiefs, which they +tucked under their arms as they bounded away like deer. It was +pleasant to watch their joy, their freedom, their long springy step as +their feet once more struck their native heath. They do not spare +their shoes by reason of economy, but because they walk better without +them. Donned for propriety, doffed for convenience. The young lady who +is "on the market" is expected to wear leather on high days and +holidays, and she submits—another martyr to fashion. Yet even as the +hart panteth for the water-brooks, so longeth her sole after her +native turf.</p> + +<p>It was at Athenry that I first obtained a precise legal definition of +the term Congested District, to the effect that wherever the land +valuation amounts to less than 30s. per head of the population the +district is held to be congested, and may receive assistance under the +Act of 1891. The chief item of the Board's income is the sum of +£41,250 a year, being interest at 2¾ per cent. per annum on the sum +of £1,500,000 referred to in the Act as the Church Surplus Grant. The +Board may, under certain conditions, use the principal, if needful. +Two other smaller sums are also available, and the unexpended balance +of the Irish Distress Fund has been applied to the completion of the +Bealdangan Causeway in Connemara. This was Mr. Balfour's suggestion. +There is a widespread idea that only the sea-board is touched, and +that only fishermen have reaped <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>the benefit of the Act. This is +entirely erroneous. The Board works unceasingly at the development of +agriculture, the planting of trees, the breeding of live stock and +poultry, the sale of seed potatoes and seed oats, the amalgamation of +small holdings, migration, emigration, weaving and spinning, and any +other suitable industries, as well as in aid of fishing and fishermen. +Besides the innumerable direct and indirect methods by which +agriculture and industries are assisted in production, the Board has +laboured successfully in the establishment of such means of +communication, by railway, steamship, or otherwise, as will enable +goods to be imported and exported at rates sufficiently low to make +trade possible and profitable to producers and consumers in remote +congested districts. Another popular error arises from regarding the +work of the Board as merely a means of relief during periods of +exceptional distress. Mr. Balfour would be the first to deprecate this +notion. His scheme was constructed with a view to bringing about a +gradual and lasting improvement in the poor districts of Ireland, by +putting the people in a way to help themselves, and not by doling out +large sums in charity. The works, which are wrongly called "relief +works," are in every instance a well-considered effort to permanently +and materially improve the trade and resources of a given area in +connection with agriculture and miscellaneous industries. Such was the +invariable principle of every action of the Board while under Mr. +Balfour's administration. The people have been taught better methods, +and helped to carry out the instruction they had received. The Royal +Dublin Society has in some instances employed an instructor, whose +duty it has been to teach the people the best system of cultivating +portions or plots of their holdings, and to encourage them by gifts of +seed and by giving prizes to those who were most successful in +carrying out the instructions of their teacher. It is conceded that by +proper management, by the adoption of modern methods of farming such +as are well within the grasp of the smallest landowner, the produce of +Irish farms might be increased from one-third to one-half. Consider +the effect of this unassailable proposition on the eternal question of +rent. The question can hardly be over-estimated. Compare the solidity, +the practicability, the substantial usefulness of this kind of help, +with the weak pandering to sentiment displayed by the present +government. The Board admits that no matter how vigorously and +constantly agricultural improvements are inculcated, the tenants of +Ireland are tardy in their adoption. The small farmers dislike change, +and at the present moment they are rapidly slipping back into their +old grooves. They believe that the old system will pay when they have +no rent-days to meet. The Balfour Administration encouraged honesty, +industry, self-reliance. The Morley Government puts a premium on +idleness, unthrift, retrogression, and dishonesty. It is easier to +half-till the land, paying small rents or none at all, than to get the +utmost out of the land with the object of paying the landlord his +due.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>The Board is carrying on the afforestation of Ireland, which in many +parts is almost without trees. When the potato crop failed in 1890 Mr. +Balfour commenced to plant trees on the western sea-board. In 1891 a +sum of £1,970 was spent in draining, fencing, and roadmaking, and in +planting 90 acres of 960 acquired by the Tory Government for the +purpose. In 1892 a further sum of £1,427 was spent in carrying on the +work. It is said that a previous Liberal Government had rejected the +scheme on the ground that trees would not grow in a situation exposed +to the salt gales of the Atlantic, but Mr. Balfour's trees have +thriven remarkably well. He tried all sorts, convinced that something +should be done, and that an ounce of experiment was worth a pound of +theory. Sycamore, ash, elm, beech, birch, poplar, alder, larch, Scotch +fir, spruce, silver fir, sea buckthorn, elder, and willow—he gave +them all a chance, some as main plantations, some as shelter belts. +All proved successful except the silver fir. Besides this, three +hundred and fifty holdings have been planted with shelter belts, and +about six hundred and fifty more were being planted when Mr. Balfour +loosed the reins.</p> + +<p>An eminent Irishman, a great authority on this subject, assures me +that he could dictate similar facts for a week without stopping to +search his memory. Mr. Gladstone proposes to place the poor people of +Ireland under a Government utterly inexperienced in the administration +of great matters, utterly unreliable where the handling of money is +concerned, utterly ignorant of business methods and business routine. +The fate of the destitute poor and the fortunes of the well-to-do +classes are to be at the mercy of men whose business ventures have +been absurdly unsuccessful, who believe that to aid the poor you must +rob the rich, and that the No-rent Manifesto, the Plan of Campaign, +and the Land League, with its story of outrage and murder, were the +perfection of modern statesmanship. The Balfour system teaches men to +help themselves. The Morley system teaches men to help themselves to +their neighbour's goods.</p> + +<p>My friend gave a few more instances of useful assistance rendered by +what the poor folks call the Blessed Board. Special arrangements have +been made to enable the farmers to improve the breed of horses. The +Queen presented an Arabian horse named Tirassan to the County Donegal. +Bulls of superior breed have been sold to decent, honest farmers at +one-third of their cost, and this small figure was payable in two +yearly instalments. About two hundred black-faced Scotch rams and +Cheviot rams have been located in Donegal and Galway free of charge, +and young boars of the pure Yorkshire breed are sold to certain +selected farmers at a nominal charge on certain conditions calculated +to prove useful to the neighbourhood. The breeding and rearing of +poultry has received a world of attention, and the poor folks who make +a little money by the sale of eggs have been supplied with the best +information and substantial assistance.</p> + +<p>In a former letter I described the Aran sea-fisheries, and before that +I adverted to the fact that the Shetland fishermen came to the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>Irish +Coast, caught ling, and brought it back salted to sell to Irish +fishermen. The Board has engaged an experienced fish-curer from Norway +to show Irishmen how the thing is done, and English and Scotch +fish-curers have been sent to several stations to give instruction in +mackerel and herring-curing. Fifteen fish-curing stations are now in +full swing, and the poor Irish fishermen, instead of buying salt ling +at 2d. a pound, are now selling it at £18 to £20 per ton. A big +steamer has been chartered to carry the salt, the fish, and for other +useful purposes.</p> + +<p>Contrast this work and these results with the work of the Irish +agitators and with that of Messrs. Gladstone, Morley, and Co. +Sentiment and starvation versus salt fish and satiety. A red-faced +Yorkshireman who knows all about fish-curing, said:—"When first I +came here I'm blest if the men wasn't transparent. You could see +through 'em like lookin' through the rungs of a ladder. Now the +beggars are growin' double chins. Now they're a-gettin' cheeky. +They're like a hoss as has had a feed of corn. They was meek an' mild +enough when I come over. Now they're a-gettin' perky, an' a-talkin' +politics. They usen't to see no agitators. They never had no meetin's; +why? there was no chance of a collection. Sometimes I gets down on 'em +proper. 'Tother day I says, 'You chaps, wi' yer Home Rule, I says, +reminds me of a character in the Bible, I says.' Bein' Catholics, they +don't read the Bible for theirselves. The priests read it for 'em. But +one of 'em cocks up his nose, an' he says, 'We're like a character in +the Bible, are we? Well,' he says, 'who was he?'</p> + +<p>"'You're like the wild ass that sniffed up the wind instead of goin' +in for sommat more substantial,' I says. That's what I told 'em. They +did look down their noses, I tell you. An' they fell to talkin' i' +Irish. They couldn't answer me, do what they would."</p> + +<p>Before leaving the Connemara district I paid a second visit to +Oughterard in order that I might see the progress made by Irishmen in +the art of railway making. A gang or two were engaged in the +comparatively skilled work of rail-laying, and the way they got over +the ground was truly surprising. Two trucks stood on the line already +laid, one bearing sleepers, the other loaded with steel rails. Four or +five couples of men shouldered sleepers and laid them on the track at +spots marked by a club-footed Irishman, who swore at everything with a +vigour which spoke well for his wind. Several men lifted a thirty feet +length of rail, weighing nearly six hundred-weight, and laid it on the +sleepers, when it was instantly bolted and secured. The same having +been done on the other side, the trucks were pushed along the +newly-laid ten yards, and the process was repeated, the Irish ganger +above-mentioned swearing till the surrounding bogs seemed to quake. An +unhappy Connemaran having dropped his end of the sleeper a few inches +from the right spot, was cursed through the entire dictionary, the +ganger winding up a solemn declaration that he had not seen anything +so Blankly and Double-Blankly and forty times Blankly idiotic since +"the owld <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>goat died." An English ganger hard by never spoke at all, +but no doubt his men felt lonely. A labourer who had hurt his foot, +and was awaiting a friendly truck to take him home, said of the +swearer:—</p> + +<p>"He manes no harm, an' the Boys doesn't care a rap for his swearin'. +These men want no elbowin' on, for they are paid by the piece, so that +the harder they work the more they get. All Irish gangers swear like +that. An' Irish farm bailiffs is jist the same. Onless they're cussin' +an' rippin' an' tearin' they don't think they're doin' the work for +which they're paid, an' they don't think their masthers would be +contint wid thim. Av an Irish landlord that kept a bailiff didn't hear +him swearin' three miles away, he'd discharge him for not workin'. +English gangers an' bailiffs says very little, an' ye wouldn't think +they wor doin' anythin'. 'Tis quare at first, but ye get used to it in +time."</p> + +<p>Travelling in any country is always instructive, no matter how much +about that country you previously knew. My lame friend may have +unconsciously suggested an explanation of the speeches and conduct of +the Irish Nationalist Parliamentary contingent. Unless they kept up +the cursin' an' swearin', an' rippin' an' tearin', so that they can be +heard across the Atlantic, their American paymasters might not be +contint wid thim, and might withhold the sinews of war. Once it is +understood that the Irish patriots must revile all and sundry to earn +their pay, the situation is to some extent explained. Few of them are +likely to fail in this supreme requirement. Six pounds a week for +abusing the brutal Saxon is far better than the pound or thirty +shillings of their pre-political days. They have no inducement to earn +an honest living.</p> + +<p>The story of the Galway Bag Factory may serve as a pendant to the +story of Mr. McMaster's effort to benefit the Catholic peasantry of +the counties of Galway and Donegal. The concern had stopped for lack +of funds, and Father Peter Dooley went round the town endeavouring to +induce people to take shares in the concern, in order that the poor +folks of the district might have employment. The mills were reopened, +and at first, just at first, the people attended work with tolerable +regularity. They then fell off, coming for half a day, coming not at +all. The management actually instituted prizes for regularity of +attendance. The people, who professed to be dying for employment, had +to be bribed to come to work. Even this was ineffectual, and as a +certain number of people were required to work a loom, the absence of +one or two made the loom and the other workpeople idle, and as, in +order to pay expenses, every loom required to be constantly worked, +this skulking was not only annoying, but also a ruinous loss. Mr. +Miller, the manager, was compelled to get people over from Scotland, +after having long placarded the walls of Galway with notices of +vacancies which no Galway girls attempted to fill up. Father Peter +remonstrated, and pointed out that as he had been instrumental in +reopening the factory, he thought Mr. Miller should <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>oblige him by +engaging Galway girls. The manager showed him the placards, and said +that if Father Peter would bring the people he would find them +employment. Father Peter Dooley went into the highways and hedges, but +not a soul could he bring in, although Mr. Miller seems to have been +so desperately beset that he would have jumped at the blind, the +maimed, the halt, and the lame. The good Father was beaten, but then +he had a reason—an excellent reason. When things go wrong in Ireland, +it is always some other fellow's fault, just as when the French are +beaten in battle they always scream <i>Nous sommes trahis</i>! Bad +characters had been admitted to the looms. Manager was surprised. Let +Father Peter point them out, and away they go—if Father Peter did not +hesitate to cast them again on the streets of Galway. Two girls were +dismissed. Some of the old workpeople returned to work intermittently, +as before. Father Peter wanted the two girls reinstated. The manager +declined to see-saw in this way, and sacrilegious Scotsman as he was, +dared to say that nothing went well when bossed by priests! From that +moment that manager was blighted. His sight grew dim, his hearing +became dull, his liver got out of order, his corns grew more numerous +and more painful, and a bald spot was seen on his crown. The people +worked as before, by fits and starts, but more fitty and starty than +ever. The factory was closed, and the manager died. They buried him +about a week ago, a sort of human jackdaw of Rheims without the curse +taken off. Protestants say the Galway workpeople wore him down, broke +his spirit and broke his heart, but Catholics know better. The only +wonder was that instead of being instantly consumed by fire from +heaven, Miller was permitted to waste away by slow degrees. But that +was Father Dooley's good nature.</p> + +<p>The Galwegians say that a Belfast firm has taken the mill, and that +therefore its future success is assured. The cutest citizens say that +this entirely depends on the manager's theory as to workpeople. If he +brings them with him, well and good. The work will be done although +the workpeople may be boycotted. And then the Irish will have another +grievance. They will be able to point to the fact that of a large +number of workpeople only a small proportion of Catholics are +employed. This is the trick of Nationalists when speaking of the +intolerance of Belfast. The officials of that city, and indeed, of +every city in Ireland, are mostly Protestants, not because of this, +but because they are better men. The Belfast merchants and the Belfast +Corporation have a keen eye to the main chance, as is abundantly +proved by their success, and in business matters they will have the +best men, whether Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Turks, or Infidels. +Whatever the cause, it is certain that Protestantism turns out a far +larger proportion of able men, and in Ulster, at any rate, you rarely +meet a Catholic who is worth his salt. The Catholics of Ulster lack, +not toleration, but brains, industry, and business capacity. Anyone +who compares the harbours of Cork and Galway with Belfast will at once +appreciate the situation. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>Wherefore let not the Keltic Irish waste +their time in clamouring for the redress of non-existent grievances, +but buckle to and make their own prosperity. The destinies of nations, +like those of individuals, are in their own hands. Honest work is +never wasted work. Selah.</p> + +<p class="date">Athenry, May 27th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_28_COULD_WE_RECONQUER_IRELAND" id="No_28_COULD_WE_RECONQUER_IRELAND"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 28.—COULD WE RECONQUER IRELAND?<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he country people call this place "the back of God-speed," "the back +of the world," and "the divil's own hunting ground," but why they do +it nobody seems to know. The village is on the road to nowhere, and I +dropped on it, as it were, accidentally, during a long drive to the +remotest end of Galway Bay. Yet even here I found civilised people who +regard the proposed College Green Parliament with undisguised +aversion. Not the inhabitants, but Irish tourists, bent on exploring +the wildest and remotest nooks of their native land, among them a +Dublin barrister, whose critical analysis of the powers proposed to be +entrusted to the unscrupulous and self-seeking promoters of the Land +League may prove useful and interesting to non-legal English readers. +A Galway gentleman having during the drive pointed out a large number +of desolate mansions rapidly falling into ruin, the conversation +turned on the universal subject, and my legal friend embarked on a +dissertation on the iniquity of the Gladstone land laws, which have +had the effect of ruining a large number of the country gentry of +Ireland, driving them from their native shores, impoverishing the +landlords without any perceptible benefit to the tenants, who appear +to be no better off than ever. What surprised him most was the arrant +nonsense talked by the English Gladstonians, and the blindness and +apathy of the English people generally, who in his opinion were being +gradually led to the brink of a frightful abyss, which threatened to +swallow up the prestige and prosperity of the British people. He +said:—</p> + +<p>"Have Englishmen forgotten the previous history of the men she is now +on the point of entrusting with her future? Are Englishmen +unacquainted with the traditional hatred of the Irish malcontents? Do +they not know the aspirations of the Catholic clergy, and are they +ignorant of their immense influence with the masses? Surely they are, +or they would rise in their might and instantly trample out the +present agitation, which has for its aim and end, not the benefit of +Ireland, not the pacification of the people, who are perfectly +peaceful if left alone, not the convenience of Ireland in matters +which should be managed by local self-government, but the absolute +independence of the country, the creation of a national army, and the +affiliation of Ireland with some foreign Power hostile to England, +such as either America or France, as occasion <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>might serve. America is +largely in the hands of the Irish electorate, and American politicians +would not be particularly scrupulous how they purchased Irish support. +No need to point out the embarrassing complications likely to result +from giving large powers to men who are essentially inimical to +England. You can do justice without putting your own head on the +block. It has been my business to analyse the bill, in conjunction +with other lawyers, Home Rule and otherwise in political colour, and +we are all agreed that the so-called safeguards amount to nothing, and +it would be incomparably safer for England to throw over the country +altogether. Because that is what it must ultimately come to, and we +think it would be better to avoid the inevitable agitation, the +terrible difficulties foreshadowed by the measure, difficulties which +would assuredly lead to the reconquest or the attempted reconquest of +the country.</p> + +<p>"Gladstonians say this is an absurd idea, that Ireland could offer no +resistance worth mentioning, that the British arms would prove +instantly victorious over any show of resistance. But would you have +Ireland alone to reckon with? Once give her the prestige of a spurious +independence, once give to your enemies control over the resources of +the country, and you would find the task of reconquest much more +arduous than you think. The fact that England's distress would be +Ireland's opportunity has been so often insisted upon, both by +Unionists and the Nationalists themselves, that I need say nothing on +this point, which, besides, is so obvious as to be in itself a +sufficient answer to the Home Rule agitation under present +circumstances. But even supposing that you had no Eastern and European +difficulty—and we know not from one moment to another when war may +break out—supposing you only had Ireland to reconquer, do you think +this an agreeable prospect? Do you think that reconquest would settle +the Irish question? Do you believe that the shooting of a few hundred +patriots by the British Grenadiers would further what they call the +Union of Hearts?</p> + +<p>"These followers of Mr. Gladstone who say, 'Let them have Home Rule to +quiet the country, to relieve the House from the endless discussion of +the Irish Question so that we can proceed with the disestablishment of +the Church, the Local Option Bill, and the thousand-and-one other fads +for which English Home Rulers have sold themselves'—the men who say +this, and who also say 'If they kick over the traces we can instantly +tighten the reins and reduce them to order,' surely these folks cannot +be aware that the Gladstone-Morley Government is unable to give +Strachan, of Tuam, the land which he has bought and paid for in the +Land Courts. The British Government cannot collect the rents of +Colonel O'Callaghan, of Bodyke; nor can it prevent the daily cases of +moonlighting and outrage which are so carefully hushed up, and which +hardly ever get into Irish newspapers. When the British Government +cannot make a few farmers either pay their rent or leave the land, the +said Government having control over the police and civil <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>officers of +the law, how is it going to collect the purchase money of the farms, +in the form of rent, when it has not this control?</p> + +<p>"The new police will be in the hands of a Parliament, elected by these +very farmers, who, so to speak, have tasted blood, have ceased to make +efforts to pay rent, have been encouraged in their refusal to pay by +the very men Mr. Gladstone proposes to entrust with the whole concern! +Will these farmers suddenly turn round and say, 'We declined to pay +when English rule would have forced payment, we shall be delighted to +pay when nothing could make us do so?' I have been connected with +Irish farmers and landowners for thirty years as a land specialist, +and I tell you that the thing will work exactly as I have said. Put +the Rebel party in power, and see what will happen to you. It is hard +to believe that Englishmen will act so stupidly in a matter so vitally +affecting their own interests. That is why educated people both in +Ireland and England do not believe the bill will ever become law. They +cannot conceive the final acceptance of anything so utterly +preposterous. But call on me to-morrow, and I will go into the legal +possibilities of the question."</p> + +<p>So I gathered posies of bog-bean bloom and walked round the big +boulders with which this sterile region is thickly strewn. The natives +know nothing of Home or any other Rule, and you might as well speak to +them of the Darwinian theory, or the philosophy of Herbert Spencer, or +the Homeric studies of the Grand Old Man, or the origin of the +Sanskrit language. The only opinion I could glean was the leading idea +of simple Irish agriculturists everywhere. A young fellow who appeared +to be in a state of intellectual advancement so far beyond that of the +other Barnans as to be almost out of sight, said:—</p> + +<p>"I'm towld that there's to be a Parlimint in Galway city that's to +find imploymint for the people, an' that ivery man is to have five +acres of good land for nothin', and that if it isn't good land he is +to have ten acres, and that there's to be an Oirish King in Dublin, +an' that all the sojers an' pleecemen is to be put out o' the +counthry, an' all Protestants is to go to England, an' that's all very +good, but the Protestants might be allowed to stay, for they're dacent +folks, but thin they say that nobody's to howld land but the +Catholics."</p> + +<p>I met an old lady clad in the short skirt of the Connaught peasantry, +walking bare-headed, bare-footed, and almost bare-legged from chapel, +carrying a bottle of holy water, probably destined for some important +purpose within the sacred precincts of the domestic circle. Perhaps +the old man was rheumatic, or it may be that the fairies had spoilt +the butther, or that the cow was bewitched, or that the shadow of a +black Protestant had fallen across the threshold. She was a promising +subject for original conversation, but unhappily she could speak no +English. My Galway friend explained the bottle, and said "Here we have +true religion. If you want the genuine, unadulterated article you must +come to Galway, and especially to Barna. Look how she clings to it, +how <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>she holds it to her breast, how reverentially she looks down on +it. Suppose she caught her foot on a stone, stumbled, and broke the +bottle! Horrid thought, involving (perhaps) eternal damnation, (unless +she were quickly absolved by the priest). There is piety for you! As a +good Catholic I am ashamed of myself when I think how little religion +(comparatively) there is in me. Education has been a curse. How happy +I should be if I had that old woman's simple, strong belief in the +virtues of holy water, especially when carried home in a well-washed +whiskey bottle. But, somehow, the more we Catholics know the less we +believe. We go regularly to mass, at any rate I do (my wife is very +devout), but I fear that Catholics have less and less faith in +proportion to their culture. But for the women Catholicism would not +hold its ground among the higher classes of Irishmen for so much as +five-and-twenty minutes."</p> + +<p>It seems to me that the belief of uncultured Irishmen as to the +immense benefits to be derived from Home Rule is exactly on a par with +the belief of uncultured Irishwomen as to the immense benefits to be +derived from the sprinkling of holy water. No reasonable man, who has +carefully examined the subject, will for one moment assert that there +is a pin to choose between the two. The votes of these poor folks, +admitted by thousands to the electorate, have sent to Westminster the +hireling orators whose persistent clamour has turned a slippery +statesmen from the paths of patriotism and propriety, and whose +subterranean machinations—aided and abetted by men versed in +Jesuistic and Machiavellian strategy, and who believe that the end +justifies the means—threaten to undermine the British Empire, and to +involve the citizens of England in political and financial ruin. A +pretty pass for a respectable individual like John Bull. England to be +worked by the wire-pulling of a few under-bred, half-educated priests! +whose tincture of learning John himself has paid for—poor Bull, who +seems to pay for everything, and who would gladly have paid for +gentility, too, if the Maynooth professors could have injected the +commodity by means of a hypodermic syringe, or even by hydraulic +pressure. No use in attempting impossibilities. As well endeavour to +communicate good manners or gratitude to a Nationalist M.P.</p> + +<p>My legal friend was full of matter, but many of his points were too +technical for the general reader. He said:—"Absurd to ask what an +Irish Parliament <i>will</i> do, because we know the tendencies of the +present men. We must ask what it <i>can</i> do, for it is certain that its +members will from time to time be replaced by men of more 'advanced' +opinions. Appetite grows by what it feeds on, and the Irish people +want to pose as an independent nation. Englishmen and Scotchmen say +Ireland would never be so foolish, and I am not surprised that they +should say this. But when did Irishmen act on the lines of Englishmen +or Scotchmen? They never did; they never will. The peoples are +actuated by entirely different motives. Englishmen look at what is +going to pay. They <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>act on whatever basis promises the most +substantial return. Irishmen are swayed by sentiment."</p> + +<p>Here I remembered a remark of Father McPhilpin, parish priest of +Kilronane, Aran Isles. He said:—"The Irish people act more for fancy +and less for money than any nation on earth. The poorest classes have +less sentiment than the middle classes. They are too closely engaged +in securing a livelihood. But the great difficulty of the English in +managing the Irish lies in the fact that the English people work on +strictly business principles, and that the Irish do not. The English +people do not at all understand the Irish; and the reason is perfectly +clear to me. They do not appreciate the extent to which mere sentiment +will move the Irish race, mere sentiment, as opposed to what you would +call business principles."</p> + +<p>Returning to my barrister. He continued:—"The Dublin bar has +decided—has formally decided—that so far as the action of the +Executive is concerned the Irish Parliament will be a supreme and +irresponsible body. The action of its officers will not be in any way +subject to the review of the English Government. What does this mean? +Simply that the life, the liberty, the property of every citizen will +be entirely in the hands of the Irish Government. Do the English +people know this? I think not. For if they did know, surely they would +think twice before they committed decent people to the tender mercies +of the inventors and supporters of the Land League, with its ten +thousand stories of outrage and murder."</p> + +<p>"Give instances of what they can do, say you? They can refuse police +protection to persons whose lives are in danger from the National +League. And, as you know, scores of persons are at this moment under +protection in Ireland. Mr. Blood, of Ennis, would be shot on sight; +Mr. Strachan, of Tuam, would be torn to pieces, if without the three, +or four policemen who watch over him day and night; the caretakers on +the Bodyke estate would get very short shrift, once the sixteen +policemen who guard the two men were removed. Blood discharged a +labourer, Strachan bought a farm. If, under the now <i>régime</i>, a farmer +paid rent against the orders of the National League; if a man +persisted in holding land from which someone had been evicted years +ago; if a man worked for a boycotted person or in any way supported +him, although it were his own father, he would be in danger of his +life. Would the new Government give police protection to such people? +To do so would be to stultify themselves.</p> + +<p>"Then again the Irish Executive can refuse police protection to +Sheriffs' officers who desire to execute writs for non-payment of +rent. No, I do <i>not</i> think they would refuse a police escort to +Sheriffs' officers proceeding to distrain on the Belfast +manufacturers. I think they would order a strong force to proceed, +fully armed, and I am of opinion that the police would require all the +weapons they could carry. Not a stiver would they get in Belfast, +until backed by the Queen's troops. Then the Ulstermen would pay—to +refuse next year. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>So the process will go on and on, with bloodshed +and slaughter every time, the British army enforcing the demands of +rebels, against loyalists who sing 'God save the Queen,' Quite in the +opera bouffe style of Gilbert and Sullivan, isn't it? Can't you get +Gilbert to do a Home Rule opera comique? The absurdities of the +situation are already there. No invention required. Immense hit. Wish +I knew Gilbert. Money in it. English people might see the thing in the +true light, if presented in comic songs, with a rattling chorus. +Friend of mine bringing out a Gladstone Suppression Company Unlimited, +forty million shares at twopence-halfpenny each. At a premium already. +Money subscribed ten times over."</p> + +<p>"And won't the new Parliament have a high old time with the new Land +Commission. Messrs. Healy and Co. will have the appointment of the +Land Commissioners, whose function will be to fix rent. Wouldn't you +like to be a landlord under such conditions? Don't you think that the +rents will be reduced until the landlords are used up? Remember that +the total extinction of the landlords and their expulsion from the +country have been over and over again promised by the very men in +whose hands you, or rather Mr. Gladstone will place them. No; I +exculpate the English people from returning him to power, I know that +the brains of England as well as those of Ireland are against him. But +the English people stand by and see the thing pressed forward, hoping +for the best. They rely on their immense wealth and energy to get them +out of any hole they may get into. I am reminded of Captain Webb, who +said, 'I am bound to have a go at the Niagara rapids. I know it's +infernal risky and therefore infernally foolish, but I must have cash, +and I expect I shall pull through somehow.' And I once met a sailor +who said that his skipper had not his equal for getting the ship out +of a scrape, nor yet his equal for getting into one. Same with +England. Webb did not come up again. Might be the same with Bull. +England is risking all for peace, just as Webb risked all for money.</p> + +<p>"The Irish Parliament may, after three years, break every contract +having regard to land, no matter when or how made. Think of the +ferment during that three years of waiting. Think of the situation of +farmers as well as that of landowners. Who will work the land and do +the best for the country without security? Then the College Green +folks will have power to establish an armed and disciplined force. The +Irish Army of Independence is already recruiting all over the country. +For what? Is it to assist England? Is it friendly to England? Why, the +very foundation of its sentiment is undying animosity to England. And +your English Home Rulers say, 'Quite right, too, the Irish have good +reason for their hatred!' Gladstonians come over here, mingle with +haters of their native land, and earn a little cheap popularity by +slanging John Bull. They get excellent receptions when they speak in +that vein, especially if they have any money to spend. But what do the +Irish think of them? The poor fools make me sick, splashing their cash +about and vilifying England for the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>cheers of Fenians and the +patronage of Maynooth priests. A lady from Wolverhampton, a good, kind +lady, was woefully imposed upon somewhere in Connemara. A priest told +me; a priest you have met." Here the name was given. "He laughed at +the simplicity of this well-meaning benefactor, who was shown nineteen +processes for rent, and who shelled out very liberally at the sight."</p> + +<p>"Seventeen of them were old ones! The rent had already been paid. But +whenever an English <i>gobemouche</i> called around out came the old writs +until they were clean worn out. They were a splendid source of income +while they lasted."</p> + +<p>This reminded me of a Bodyker, who said:—"A man named Lancashire came +here from Manchester or Birmingham—I think it was Birmingham—and +said he was going into the next Parliament, and that he was a great +friend of Mr. Gladstone. He was very kind, and seemed made of money, +and said he'd make England ring with our wrongs. My son had his name +on a card, but a lawyer in Limerick said the name hadn't got in. I +forget it now. D'ye know anybody, Sorr, of the name of Lancashire +that's a great friend o' Misther Gladstone, an' that lives in +Birmingham, an' that didn't get in?"</p> + +<p>These Irish peasants ask more questions than anybody can answer. They +have a keen scent for cash, especially when the coin is in the keeping +of English Gladstonians. They believe with the Claimant that "Sum +folks has branes, and sum folks has money, and them what has money is +made for them what has branes." The Bodyke farmers and the peasantry +of Connemara believe that English Home Rulers have money. Impossible +to escape the natural inference.</p> + +<p class="date">Barna (Co. Galway), May 30th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_29_WHAT_RACK-RENT_MEANS" id="No_29_WHAT_RACK-RENT_MEANS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 29.—WHAT RACK-RENT MEANS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letteri.png" alt="I" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> am disposed to call this quiet inland place a fishing village. The +people not only sell fish and eat fish, but they talk fish, read fish, +think fish, dream fish. The fishing industry keeps the place going. +Anglers swarm hither from every part of the three kingdoms. Last year +there were five fishing Colonels at the Greville Arms all at once. +Brown-faced people who live in the open air, and who are deeply versed +in the mysteries of tackle, cunning in the ways of trout, pike, perch, +and salmon, walk the streets clad in tweed suits, with strong shoes +and knickerbockers. The Mullingar folks despise the dictum of the +American economist who said that every town without a river should buy +one, as they are handy things to have. They boast of three magnificent +lakes, and they look down on the Athlone people, thirty miles away, +with their trumpery Shannon, of which they are so proud, but which the +Mullingar folks will tell you is not worth the paper it is written +on. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>Lough Owel, five miles long by two or three wide; Lough +Derravarra, six miles by three or four; and Lough Belvidere, eight +miles by three, all of which are in the immediate vicinity, may be +considered a tolerable allowance of fishing water for one country +town. Lough Belvidere, formerly called Lough Ennell, with its +thousands of acres of water, would perhaps meet with the approval of +the Yankee who called the Mediterranean "a nice pond," not for its +size, but for its exceeding beauty. And the most remarkable feature +about the fisher-enthusiasts of Mullingar, is the fact, the undoubted, +well-attested fact, that they actually catch fish. English anglers, +who in response to the inquiries of new arrivals at any Anglican +fishing resort state that they have caught nothing yet, having only +been fishing for a fortnight, will hardly believe that at Mullingar +their countrymen catch fish every day, and big fish too. The lake +trout vary from five to twenty pounds in weight, but the latter are +not often seen. Nine-pounders are reckoned fairly good, but this +weight excites no remark. How big the pike may be I know not, but Mr. +Herring, of London, on Monday last, fishing in Lough Derravarra, +hauled out a specimen which looked more like a shark than a pike. He +weighed over thirty-six pounds, and measured four feet three inches +over all. <i>Hoc egomet oculis meis vidi.</i> Birmingham anglers who win +prizes with takes of four-and-a-half ounces would have recoiled in +affright from the monster, even as he lay dead in the entrance hall of +the Greville Arms. Old women stand at the street corners with silver +eels like boa-constrictors, for which they wish to smite the Saxon to +the tune of sixpence each. I vouch for the pike and eels, but confess +to some dubiety <i>re</i> the story of a fat old English gentleman, who +said, "I don't care for fishing for the sake of catching fish. I go +out in a boat, hook a big pike, lash the line to the bow, and let the +beggar tow me about all day. Boating is my delight. Towards evening I +cut my charger loose, and we part with mutual regret. Inexpensive +amusement; more humane than ordinary fishing."</p> + +<p>Mullingar is a thriving town situate in a fertile district. The land +is very rich, and the rents are reasonable. The farmers are well off, +and admit the soft impeachment. They are Home Rulers to a man, and +they boldly give their reasons. "Did ye ever know a man who was +contint wid a good bargain when he has a prospect of a better bargain +still?" said a prosperous agriculturist residing a mile outside the +town. The country around has a decidedly English appearance. Fat land, +good roads, high hedges, daisied meadows, and decent houses +everywhere. The main street is long, wide, clean, well-paved, +well-built. The shopkeepers who live in the surrounding district make +money, and when they "go before," cut up for surprising sums. Said Mr. +Gordon, "Everybody here has money. The people are downright well off. +Living in constant communication with Dublin, fifty miles away on the +main line of the Midland and Western Railway, they have adopted the +prevailing politics of the metropolis. They do not understand what +Home Rule means, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>and they blindly believe that they will do better +still under a Dublin Parliament. I am quite certain of the contrary. +Suppose we want £500 for some improvement, who will lend us the money? +I am satisfied that the prosperity of the place would immediately +decline. The priests influence the people to an extent Englishmen can +never understand. The Protestant clergy do not intervene in mundane +matters, but the Catholic clergy consider it their duty to guide the +people in politics as well as in religion. Given Home Rule, +Protestantism and Protestants would be nowhere. There is no doubt in +my mind on this point."</p> + +<p>Mr. Mason said:—"The whole agitation would be knocked on the head by +the introduction of a severe land measure, which would have the effect +of further reducing the rents. No doubt all previous land legislation +has been very severe, and I do not say that a further measure would be +just and equitable. I merely say that the people do not want Home +Rule, but they want the advantages which they are told will accrue +from Home Rule. If the measure is not to benefit them in a pecuniary +sense, then they do not care two straws about it. Do the English +people grasp the present position of landowner and tenant +respectively? Let me state it in a very few words.—</p> + +<p>"Formerly the landowner was regarded as the owner of the land. At the +present moment, and without a line of further legislation, the tenant +is the real owner, and not the nominal landlord at all. For owing to +reduction of rent, fixity of tenure, free sale, and the tenant-right, +the tenant is actually more than two-thirds owner. This is a matter of +cash and not of theory, for the tenants' rights are at this moment +worth more than double the fee-simple of the land itself. What will +the Gladstonian party who prate about Rack-rents say to this?"</p> + +<p>This seems a suitable opportunity for calling attention to the term +Rack-rents, which in England is almost universally misunderstood. +Separatist speakers invariably use the term as denoting an excessive +rent, an impossible rent—a rent, which is, as it were, extorted by +means of the Rack. The term is purely legal, and denotes a rent paid +by <span class="fakesc">ALL</span> yearly tenants, whether their rent, as a whole, be +high or low. The lowest-rented yearly tenant in the country is paying +Rack-rent. The whole case for the farmers has been obscured and a +false issue raised by the constant use of this term, to which a new +meaning has been given. Another common term is found in the word +Head-rent, of which Gladstonians know no more than of Rack-rent. When +Head-rent comes to be discussed in England we shall have Home Rulers +explaining that the term refers to decapitation of tenants for +non-payment of Rack-rent. This explanation will not present any +appreciable departure from their usual vein. An English Home Ruler who +supports Mr. Gladstone "because his father did," and who first landed +in Ireland yesterday, said, "I do not approve of ascendency. Hang the +rights of property! Give me the rights of intellect. Let us have +equality. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>Treat the Irish fairly, even generously. They should have +equal rights with Englishmen. Why keep them down by force of bayonets? +Live and let live, that's what I say. Equal laws and equal rights for +all."</p> + +<p>That is the usual patter of the self-satisfied Separatist, who, having +delivered himself, looks around him with an air which seems to +say—"What a fine fellow I am, how generous, fair, disinterested. Have +I not a noble soul? Did you ever see such magnanimity? Can anybody say +anything against such sentiments? Thank heaven that I am not as other +men, nor even as this Unionist." He is plausible, but no more. The mob +which applauds the hero and hisses the villain of a melodrama pats him +on the back, while he looks upward with his hand on his heart and a +heaven-is-my-home expression in his eye. Put him under the +microscope—he needs it, and you will see him as he is. The platitudes +in which he lives, and moves, and has his being have no foundation in +fact. His talk is grand, but it lacks substance. It is magnificent, +but it is not sense. Listen to what a statesman has said:—</p> + +<p>"I have looked in vain for the setting forth of any practical scheme +of policy which the Imperial Parliament is not equal to deal with, and +which it refuses to deal with, and which is to be brought about by +Home Rule."</p> + +<p>"There is nothing Ireland has asked, and which this country and this +Parliament has refused. This Parliament has done for Ireland what it +would have scrupled to do for England or Scotland."</p> + +<p>"What are the inequalities of England and Ireland? I declare that I +know none, except that there are certain taxes still remaining, which +are levied over Englishmen and Scotchmen, and which are not levied +over Irishmen; and, likewise, that there are certain purposes for +which public money is freely and largely given in Ireland, and for +which it is not given in England and Scotland."</p> + +<p>I read this deliverance to my Gladstonian friend, who was staggered to +learn upon incontrovertible evidence, to wit, the printed report of +his speech, that these were the publicly expressed opinions of the +Grand Old Man, whose pandering to Irish opinion as expressed by +outrage dates from the time of the Clerkenwell explosion. That his +conversion to Home Rule is entirely attributable to the endless +murders and atrocities of the Land League, the Invincibles, and other +Fenian organisations, is universally admitted in Ireland by Unionists +and Nationalists alike. And once an Irish Parliament is granted, how +will he resist the demand for Irish independence, for the Irish +Republic affiliated with America? Query—if a given number of murders +were required to bring about Home Rule, how many murders will be +required to effect complete separation? A mere question in arithmetic.</p> + +<p>Concurrently with the compulsory withdrawal of the Union Jack +displayed by my friend Mrs. Gibson, of Northern Hotel, Londonderry, +another occurrence, this time in the South, will serve <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>to attest the +progress made by the inventor and patentee of the Union of Hearts. +During the progress of a cricket match on the Killarney Athletic +Grounds, between the clubs of Limerick and Kerry, on Whit-Monday, a +Union Jack was hoisted, not as a political banner, but as an ornament, +and the only banner available for the purpose. It was left flying when +the cricketers went home, but in the morning it lay prone and +dishonoured. The forty-foot spar had been sawn through, and in falling +had smashed the palings. Let a chorus of musical Gladstonians march +through Ireland bearing the Union Jack and singing "God save the +Queen," let them do it, with or without police protection, and I will +gladly watch their progress, record their prowess, and will have great +pleasure in writing their obituary notice. The people, as a whole, are +enemies to England. They are filled with a blind, unreasoning, +implacable resentment for injuries they have never received, their +dislike engendered and sustained by lying priests and selfish +agitators, who are hastening to achieve their ends, alarmed at the +prospect of popular enlightenment, which would for ever hurl them from +power. The opinions of Cardinal Logue have been quoted by Lord +Randolph Churchill. The <i>Freeman's Journal</i> is still more absolute. +Does this sound like the Union of Hearts? Does this give earnest of +final settlement, of unbroken peace and contentment, of eternal +fraternity and friendship? The <i>Freeman</i> says, "We contend that the +good government of Ireland by England is <i>impossible</i>, not so much by +reason of natural obstacles, but because of the radical, essential +difference in the public order of the two countries. This, considered +in the abstract, makes a gulf profound, impassible—<i>an obstacle no +human ingenuity can remove or overcome</i>."</p> + +<p>This promises well for the success of the Home Rule Bill; but why is +the thing "impossible"? Why is the gulf not only profound but also +"impassible"? Why is the good government of Ireland by England +prevented by an obstacle beyond human ability to remove, and which, as +Mr. Gladstone would say, "passes the wit of man." The <i>Freeman</i> has no +objection to tell us. The writer assumes a high moral standpoint, +addressing the eminently respectable and religious Mr. Bull more in +sorrow than in anger, but notwithstanding this, in a style to which +that highly moral and Twenty-shillings-in-the-pound-paying person is +not at all accustomed. The <i>Freeman</i> goes on—</p> + +<p>"We find ourselves bound by reason and logic to deny to English +civilisation the glorious title of Christian."</p> + +<p>This is distinctly surprising. John always believed himself a +Christian. The natural pain he may be expected to undergo after this +disagreeable discovery is luckily to some extent mitigated by the +information that although England is not Christian, Ireland is +extremely so. The one people (the Irish) "has not only accepted but +retained with inviolable constancy the Christian civilisation;" the +other (the English) "has not only rejected it, but has been for three +centuries the leader of the great apostacy, and is at this day <i>the +principal obstacle to the conversion of the world</i>."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>Do the English Separatists see daylight now? Will they any longer deny +what all intelligent Irishmen of whatever creed readily admit, namely, +that religion is at the bottom of the Home Rule question? And is not +Mr. Bull surprised to find that after all his missionary collections, +he is without the right balm of Gilead, that his civilisation is not +Christian, and that he is the principal obstacle to the salvation of +the world? Is he not surprised to find that Ireland, with its thousand +and ten thousand tales of horror, its brutal outrages on helpless +women, its chronic incendiarism, its myriads of indecent anonymous +letters addressed to young girls, such as I have seen filed by the +ream in Irish police-stations—Ireland with its moonlighting +atrocities, its barbarous boycotting of helpless children, its +poisoning of wells and water supply, its mutilation of cattle, its +unnumbered foul and cowardly murders, its habitual sheltering and +protection of unspeakable felons—Ireland, one of the few remaining +strongholds of the Catholic faith, has the true Christianity? Ireland +would convert the world, but England stops her. The No-rent manifesto, +the Plan of Campaign, and the Land League were sample productions of +the genuine faith, to say nothing of Horsewhipped Healy, Breeches +O'Brien, and T.D. Sullivan, who composed a eulogy on the murderers of +Police-sergeant Brett, of Manchester (Allen, Larkin, and O'Brien),</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">High upon the gallows tree<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swung the noble-hearted three.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noin">That is all I can remember, but it may serve to show that Irish +Christianity is the real stingo, and no mistake.</p> + +<p>A Mullingaringian who wishes to be nameless desires to know +particulars of the gorging capacity of the average Gladstonian +elector. The particular item that excites his wonder is the letter of +Mr. J.W. Logan, M.P., on Irish rents. Briefly stated, Mr. Logan's +point is this: That notwithstanding the complaints of Irish landlords +they are getting more rent than ever! And he proceeds to adduce +testimony thus: Income-tax valuation in Ireland, on land, in three +years selected by himself stands as follows:—</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="40%" summary="Income-tax valuation in Ireland"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="40%">1861</td> + <td class="tdl" width="60%">£8,990,830</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1877</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,937,681</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1891</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,941,368</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noin">Then, after showing the amount of increase, he says:—"Rents continue +to rise in Ireland as far as is indicated by the income-tax."</p> + +<p>My friend says:—"Mr. Logan is both culpably ignorant and flagrantly +dishonest. He seems incapable of understanding the difference between +an assessment, a mere valuation, and the actual payment of income-tax. +He is dishonest, because he deliberately suppresses the explanation of +the difference between the first and second row of figures. When I saw +the curiously-selected years, I said, why 1861, 1877, and 1891? I knew +there was some thimble-rigging. I looked at the twenty-eighth annual +report of her Majesty's Commissioners, that for 1885, the latest I +have, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>behold, the year 1877 had an asterisk! It was the only +starred number on the page. It referred to a foot-note, and that +foot-note read as follows:—</p> + +<p>"'<i>The large difference as compared with prior years is due to the +value of farmhouses having been previously included under the head of +messuages.</i>'</p> + +<p>"The land up to '77 was called land, and the farm buildings were +called messuages. But in '77 they began to reckon the buildings as +land, shifting an amount from one column of figures to another. A mere +matter of book-keeping. Mr. Logan writes to the papers for an +explanation which is given in a footnote. He carries his point, for +hundreds of people will follow his figures. Give a lie twenty-four +hours' start and you can never overtake it. Thrice is he armed who +hath his quarrel just, But four times he who gets his blow in fust. I +suppose the Gladstonians claim that the Land Commission reduced rents +by 25 to 30 per cent. But here Mr. Logan is proving that the landlords +are drawing more money than ever! They wish they could believe it. +Valuation is a queer thing. It fluctuates in the most unaccountable +way. What an increase shows is the prosperity of the tenant who is +putting up buildings and making other improvements. Mr. Logan's third +figures show a further increase. Look at the figures in the authorised +Report, not for '77 and '91, but between the two. What do you see +there?"</p> + +<p>I looked, and this is what I saw:—</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="40%" summary="Income-tax valuation in Ireland 2"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="40%">1880</td> + <td class="tdl" width="60%">£9,980,543</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1881</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,980,650</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1882</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,980,215</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1883</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,981,156</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1884</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,982,072</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1885</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,982,031</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">1886</td> + <td class="tdl">£9,954,535</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noin">So that Mr. Logan might have shown from these figures that during the +No-Rent Campaign the landlords were enjoying an untold period of +prosperity, for his chosen year, 1891, shows a <i>decrease</i> as compared +with any one of the seven years above-mentioned. The truth is that the +figures prove nothing in support of Mr. Logan's case, which is based +on fallacy and suppression of material facts. His comparison of 1861 +with 1877, without reference to the explanatory footnote, is of itself +sufficient to shoulder him out of court, and stamps him as little more +scrupulous than Father Humphreys, of venerated memory. Mr. Logan's +belief that assessment and tax-paying are one and the same thing is +here regarded as ridiculous, and my friend thinks that if Mr. +Gladstone should impose a tax on Brains, the Grand Old Man's followers +will escape with an easy assessment.</p> + +<p class="date">Mullingar (Co. Westmeath), June 1st.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_30_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS" id="No_30_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 30.—THE "UNION OF HEARTS."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letteri.png" alt="I" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />t was strange to hear the tune of "Rule Britannia" in the streets of +Mullingar. The Irish madden at "God Save the Queen," and would make +short work of the performer. It was market day, and the singer was +selling printed sheets of poesy. The old tune was fairly correct, but +the words were strange and sad. "When Britain first at Hell's command +Prepared to cross the Irish main, Thus spake a prophet in our land, +'Mid traitors' scoff and fools' disdain, 'If Britannia cross the +waves, Irish ever shall be slaves.' In vain the warning patriot spoke, +In treach'rous guise Britannia came—Divided, bent us to her yoke, +Till Ireland rose, in Freedom's name, and Britannia boldly braves! +Irish are no longer slaves." The people were too busily engaged in +selling pigs to pay much attention to the minstrel who, however, was +plainly depending on disloyalty for custom. Westmeath was once the +home of Whiteboyism, Ribbonism, Fenianism, and all the other isms +which have successively ruined the country by banishing security; and +a spice of the old leaven still flavours the popular sentiment. "They +may swear as they often did our wretchedness to cure, But we'll never +trust John Bull again nor let his lies allure. No we won't Bull, we +won't Bull, for now nor ever more; For we've hopes on the ocean, we've +trust on the shore. Oh! remember the days when their reign we did +disturb, At Limerick and Thurles, Blackwater and Benburb. And ask this +proud Saxon if our blows he did enjoy When we met him on the +battlefield of France, at Fontenoy. Then we'll up for the green, boys, +and up for the green! Oh! 'tis still in the dust and a shame to be +seen! But we've hearts and we've hands, boys, full strong enough, I +ween, To rescue and to raise again our own unsullied green." A group +of farmers standing hard by paid some attention to this chant, and one +of them, in answer to my inquiry as to how the Union of Hearts was +getting on, chuckled vociferously and said, "Aye, aye, Union iv +Hearts, how are ye? How are ye, Union iv Hearts?" The group joined in +the laugh, and I saw that the joke was an old one.</p> + +<p>The Invincibles had a few recruits in Mullingar and district, and the +Land Leaguers also made their mark. The stationmaster sued somebody +for travelling without a ticket. He was shot dead in the street +immediately afterwards. Miss Croughan did not meet popular opinion in +the matter of farm management. She was shot as she walked to church +one fine Sunday morning. Patrick Farrelly took land which somebody +else wanted. Shot as he walked home from work. Mr. Dolan, of a flour +mill in the neighbourhood, had some misunderstanding with his workmen. +Shot, on the chance that his successor would take warning, and +accommodate himself to the public sentiment. Miss Ann Murphy, who with +her two brothers lives at a small farm a mile or two <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>away, supplied a +jug of milk, and said that things were quiet for the moment, but there +was no telling what might happen. The house was roofed with corrugated +iron. "Ah," said Miss Murphy, "we were nearly burned to death, myself +an' my two brothers. An' this was the way iv it. Tramps and ruffians +would call here at nightfall, an' would ask for a shelter an' a lie +down, an' I would lay a few bags or something on the flure over +beyant, an' they would sthretch themselves out till mornin', an' often +and often I would wash their cheeks an' heads where they had been +fightin', an' would be all cut an' hacked. One fellow was often here, +an' my brothers had reason to refuse him free lodgin's, an' so the +next mornin' we found the gate lifted off the hinges an' carried away +down the lane. My brothers spoke to the police-sergeant about this, +an' the very next thing was to try to burn us alive in our beds. Some +ruffian came in the night an' put a match in the thatch, an' I woke +almost suffocated. I ran out, an' there was the house on fire, and the +cow-house, with a beautiful, lovely cow, all a solid piece of blazin' +flames, till ye could see nothin' else. We saved the four walls an' +some of the furniture, an' we got £50 from the County. That's the sort +of people the Land League brought out all over the country."</p> + +<p>A sturdy farmer living near said:—"An' that's what we'll have to +suffer again, once ye let Home Rulers have the upper hand. The only +way ye can manage these scamps is to make them feel the lash. No good +tomfooling with these murdherin' ruffians. With Home Rule they expect +to do as they like. If I go into a whiskey shop on a market day, what +do I hear? Ever an' always the same things. There is to be no +landlords, no policemen, no means of enforcing the law. There ye have +it, now. The respectable people who work and make money will be a mark +for every robber in the country. An' in Ireland ye can rob and murther +widout fear of consequences. See that hill there? Mrs. Smith had her +brains blown out as she drove by the foot of it. They meant the shot +for her husband, who was with her. They don't make many mistakes. They +bide their time, avoid hurry, and do the work both nately an' +complately. They track down their victims like sleuth hounds, an' +there's one thing they never go in for,—that's executions. Mrs. +Smith, Farrelly, Dolan, Miss Croughan, and the stationmaster, were all +comfortably shot without anyone incurring evil consequences. It's +devilish hard to catch an Irishman, an' when ye've caught him it's +harder still to convict him. They're improvin' in their plannin', but +they are not so sure o' their shootin' as they used to be. They fired +at Moloney from both sides of the road at once. That was a good idea. +But they failed to kill him, and seven of them are arrested. Of +course, we'll have no convictions, but it looks better to arrest them, +an' it ensures the man that's arrested a brass band an' a collection. +So everybody's pleased an' nobody hurt. An' what would ye ask for +more?"</p> + +<p>On Thursday last, at eleven in the morning, Mr. Weldon C. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>Moloney, +solicitor, of Dublin, was driving near Milltown, on the Bodyke +property, when he was wounded from the ankle to the thigh by several +simultaneous shots from both sides of the road, and the horse so badly +injured that it must probably be destroyed. Mr. Moloney believes that +he will be able to identify his assailants, and the police are sure +they have the right men. Nothing, therefore, is now wanting to the +formalities accompanying the Morley administration of Justice but the +march to Court, the cheers of the crowd, the twelve good men and +true—who, having sworn to return a verdict in accordance with the +evidence, will assuredly say Not Guilty—and the brass band to +accompany the marksmen home. If the heroes of this adventure be +liberated in the evening a torchlight procession will make the thing +complete, and will be handy for burning the haystacks of anyone who +may not have joined the promenade.</p> + +<p>Athlone is well built and beautifully situated. The Shannon winds +round the town, and also cuts it in two, so that one-half is in County +Westmeath, province of Leinster, the other in County Roscommon, +province of Connaught. The people are fairly well clad, but dirt and +squalor such as can hardly be conceived are plentiful enough. The +Shannon Saw Mills, which for twenty years have given employment to two +hundred men, will shortly be removed to Liverpool, and the Athloners +are sad at heart and refuse to be comforted. The concern belongs to +Wilson, of Todmorden, Lancashire; and the manager, Mr. Lewis Jones, +says that all the timber within reasonable distance is used up, +besides which the place is not well fixed for business purposes. The +workpeople are manageable enough, but somewhat uncertain in their +attendance. They require a half-hour extra at breakfast time every now +and then, perhaps twenty times a year or more, that they may attend +mass, on the saints' days and such like occasions.</p> + +<p>This reminded me of my first entrance to Galway. All the bridges and +other lounging places were covered with men who looked as if they +ought to be at work. It was Ascension Day, and nobody struck a stroke. +My invasion of Athlone afforded a similar experience. There were +sixty-five able-bodied men lounging on the Shannon bridge at three in +the afternoon—all deeply anxious to know whence I came and whither I +was going, all with an intense desire to learn my particular business. +Other pauper factories were in full swing, and at the first blush it +seemed that the Athloners lived by looking at the river and discussing +the affairs of other people. It was Corpus Christi Day, and none but +heathen would work. The brutal Saxon with his ding-dong persistency +may be making money, but how about his future interests? When the last +trump shall sound and the dead shall be raised, where will be the +workers on saints' days? Among the goats. But the men who spend these +holy seasons in smoking thick twist, with the Shannon for a spittoon, +will reap the reward of their self-denial.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>Mr. Lewis Jones has always taken a strong interest in politics, and +his present opinion is remarkable. "I came to Ireland a Gladstonian, a +Home Ruler, and, what is more, a bigoted Home Ruler. How the change to +my present opinion was brought about I hardly know. It was not +revolution, but rather evolution. No-one can remain a Home Ruler when +he understands the subject. The change in myself came about through +much travelling all over the country and mixing with the people. I do +not blame the English Home Rulers a bit. How can I do so, when I +myself was just as ignorant? Had I remained in Liverpool I should have +remained a Home Ruler. I am certain of that. Unless you actually live +in the country you cannot gauge its feeling, and the Irish people are +very difficult to understand. I have always got along with them +famously, and I shall take ninety per cent. of our workmen with me to +England. No, Home Rule has nothing to do with the removal of the +works.</p> + +<p>"My cousin and I worked like horses to get in Mr. Neville for the +Exchange Division of Liverpool. We actually won, for by a piece of +adroit management we polled a number of votes which would certainly +have remained unpolled, and we polled them all for our man, who won by +a very small majority, eleven, I think. I would willingly go to +Liverpool to undo that work, as I now see how completely I was +mistaken in my views of the Irish question. I was always a great +Radical, and such I shall always remain; but as a Radical I am bound +to support what is best for the masses of the people, and I am +convinced that Home Rule would reduce the country to beggary. +Bankruptcy must and will ensue, and with the flight of the landowners +and the destruction of confidence, employment will be unobtainable. +Who will embark capital in Ireland under present circumstances?"</p> + +<p>A financial authority told me that poor Ireland has thirty-six +millions of uninvested money lying idle in the banks. The Irish not +only lack enterprise, but they will not trust each other. Great +opportunities are lying thickly around, but they seem unable to avail +themselves of the finest openings. Mr. Smith, of Athlone, makes twelve +and a half miles of Irish tweed every week, and sells it rather faster +than he can make it. He commenced with two shillings a week wages, and +now he owns a factory and employs five hundred people. A Black +Protestant, of course. Mr. Samuel Heaton, of Bradford, is about to go +and do likewise. I went over his place an hour ago, and this is what +he said:—"This was a flour mill which cost £10,000 to build. The +machinery would cost £10,000 more, I should think. It did well for +many years, and then it was left to three brothers, who disputed about +it until the concern was ruined as a paying business, and the place +was allowed to lie derelict. The water power alone cost them £100 a +year, and goodness knows what these splendid buildings would be worth. +The Board of Works had got hold of it, and it was understood that +anybody might have it a bargain, but nobody came forward. I offered +them £30 a year for the whole of the buildings, the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>waterpower, and +the dwelling house hard by, also that other immense building yonder, +which might prove handy for a store-house; and my offer was accepted. +I took all at that rent for sixty years, with six months' free tenancy +to start with, and I was also to have a free gift of all machinery and +fittings in the place. Here we are going nicely, only in a small way, +but we shall do. We make blankets, tweeds for men's suits and ladies' +dresses. When the Athlone people saw us knocking about they were +surprised they had never thought of it before. There are hundreds of +derelict flour mills going to ruin all over the country, and the +owners would gladly let anyone have them and grand water power for +nothing for two or three years, just to get a chance of obtaining rent +at some future day. We work from morning till night, and neither I nor +my sons have ever tasted a spot of intoxicating liquor. Now there are +many small mills going in the country, the proprietors of which go on +the spree three days a week. If they can do, we can do. This is going +to be a big thing. The only difficulty I have is to turn out the +stuff. Irish tweeds have such a reputation that we simply cannot meet +the demand. Mills and water power may be had for next to nothing, but +the Irish have no enterprise, and the English are afraid to put any +money in the country under present circumstances."</p> + +<p>The Lock Mills above mentioned are three or four stories high, with +perhaps a hundred yards of front elevation, a grandly built series of +stone buildings close to the Shannon, which is here about a hundred +and twenty yards wide, and carries tolerably large steamers and +lighters. Six months' occupancy for nothing, the old machinery a free +gift, water power and buildings for sixty years at £30 a year. I have +previously mentioned the twelve big mills abandoned on the Boyne. +Twelve openings for small capitalists—but Irishmen put their money in +stockings, under the flure, in the thatch. <i>They</i> will not trust +Irishmen, although they have no objection to John Bull's doing so. A +bank manager of this district said:—</p> + +<p>"Poor Connaught, as they call the province, is a great hoarder. And +when Irishmen invest they invest outside Ireland. Seventy-eight +thousand pounds in the Post Office savings bank in Mayo, the most +poverty-stricken district—as they will tell you. There is Connaught +money in Australia, in America, in England, and in all kinds of +foreign bonds. Irishmen want to keep their hoardings secret. They like +to walk about barefoot and have money in their stocking. An old woman +who puts on and takes off her shoes outside the town has three sons +high up in the Civil Service, and could lend you eight hundred pounds. +You would take her for a beggar and might offer her a penny, and she'd +take it. Have you noticed the appalling mendicancy of Ireland? Have +you reflected on the 'high spirit' of the Irish people? Have you +remembered their pride, their repugnance to the Saxon? And have you +noticed the everlastingly outstretched hands which meet you at every +corner? Beggary, lying, dirt, and laziness invariably accompany +priestly rule, and are never seen in Ireland in conjunction with +Protestantism? I wish somebody would explain this. The Irish <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>masses +are the dirtiest and laziest in the world, but there are no dirty, +lazy Protestants. Nobody ever heard of such a thing. And yet because +there are more dirty, lazy Catholics than clean, industrious +Protestants Mr. Gladstone would give the Catholic party the mastery, +and England in future would be ruled from Rome.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Gladstone is not responsible for his actions. The Civil Service +will not employ a man after sixty-five. The British Government forbids +a man to work in its service after that time. The consensus of +scientific opinion has fixed sixty-five as the limit at which the +control of an office or the execution of routine office work should +cease. Slips of memory occur, and the brain has lost its keen edge, +its firm grip, its rapid grasp of detail. At sixty-five you are not +good enough for the Civil Service, but at eighty-four, when you are +nineteen years older, you may govern a vast empire. It is an anomaly. +Even the Nationalists think Mr. Gladstone past his work."</p> + +<p>This statement was fully borne out by a strong anti-Parnellite of +Athlone. He said:—"The bill is a hoax, but it is better than nothing. +We'll take what we can get, an' we'll get what we can take—afterwards. +Ye wouldn't be surprised that the people's bitter about the bill. Sure, +'tis no Home Rule it is at all, even if we got it as it first stood. +'Tis an insult to offer such a bill to the Irish nation. We want +complete independence. We have a sort of a yoke on us, an' we'll never +rest till we get it off. Ye say 'This'll happen ye, and That'll happen +ye,' an' ye care the divil an' all about it. We don't care what +happens, once we get rid of that yoke. A friend of mine said yesterday, +'I never see an Englishman but I think I'd like to have him under my +feet, an' meself stickin' somethin' into him.' There's murther in their +hearts, an' ye can't wonder at it. An' owld Gladstone's a madman, no +less. I'm towld he ordhers a dozen top hats at once, an' his wife gets +the shop-keeper to take thim back. An' I'm towld he stales the spoons +whin he goes out to dine wid his frinds, an' that his wife takes thim +back in a little basket nixt mornin'. And I thought that was all +nonsinse till I seen the bill. An' thin I felt I could believe it; for, +bedad, nobody but a madman could have drawn up sich a measure, to +offind everybody, an' plaze nobody. 'Tis what ye'd expect from a +lunatic asylum. But, thin, 'tis Home Rule. 'Tis the principle; an' as +the mimber for Roscommon says, ''Tis ourselves will apply it, an' 'tis +ourselves will explain it. That's where we'll rape the advantage,' says +he."</p> + +<p>The Athlone market is "now on," and several hundred cows and calves +are lowing in front of the Royal, Mrs. Haire's excellent caravanserai. +Sheep are bleating, and excited farmers are yelling like pandemonium +or an Irish House of Commons. Athlone is a wonderful place for +donkeys, which swell the nine-fold harmony with incessant cacophonous +braying, so that the town might fairly claim the distinction of being +the chosen home, if not the <i>fons et origo</i>, of Nationalist oratory.</p> + +<p class="date">Athlone, June 3rd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_31_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS" id="No_31_THE_UNION_OF_HEARTS"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 31.—THE "UNION OF HEARTS."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettero.png" alt="O" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />nce again the Atlantic stops me. The eighty-three miles of country +between here and Athlone have brought about no great change in the +appearance of the people, who, on the whole, are better clad than the +Galway folks. The difference in customs, dress, language, manners, and +looks between one part of Ireland and another close by is sometimes +very considerable. There is a lack of homogeneity, a want of fusion, +an obvious need of some mixing process. The people do not travel, and +in the rural districts many of them live and die without journeying +five miles from home. The railways now projected or in process of +construction will shortly change all this, and the tourist, with more +convenience, will no longer be able to see the Ireland of centuries +ago. The language is rapidly dying out. Not a word of Irish did I hear +in Athlone, even on market day. The Westporters know nothing about it. +The tongue of the brutal Saxon is everywhere heard. The degenerate +Irish of these latter days cannot speak their own language. They +preach, teach, quarrel, pray, swear, mourn, sing, bargain, bless, +curse, make love in English. They are sufficiently familiar with the +British vernacular to lie with the easy grace of a person speaking his +mother-tongue. They are a gifted people, and a patriotic—at least +they tell us so, and the Irish, they say, is the queen of languages, +the softest, the sweetest, the most poetical, the most sonorous, the +most soul-satisfying. And yet the patriot members speak it not. +William O'Brien is said to know a little, but only as you know a +foreign language. He could not address the people on the woes of +Ireland, could not lash the brutal Saxon, could not express in his +native tongue the withering outpourings of his patriotic soul. He +always speaks in English, of which he thinks foul scorn. He is the +best Gaelic scholar of the rout, and yet he could not give you the +Irish for breeches.</p> + +<p>Westport is splendidly situated in a lovely valley watered by a +nameless stream which empties itself into Clew Bay. A grand range of +mountains rises around, the pyramidal form of Croagh Patrick +dominating the quay. It was from the summit of this magnificent height +that Saint Patrick sent forth the command which banished from the +Green Isle the whole of the reptile tribe. "The Wicklow Hills are very +high, An' so's the hill of Howth, Sir; But there's a hill much higher +still, Aye, higher than them both, Sir! 'Twas from the top of this +high hill Saint Patrick preached the sarmint, That drove the frogs out +of the bogs An' bothered all the varmint. The toads went hop, the +frogs went flop, Slap-dash into the water, An' the snakes committed +suicide to save themselves from slaughter." Pity there is no modern +successor of Saint Patrick to extirpate the reptilia of the present +day, the moonlighters and their Parliamentary supporters, to wit.</p> + +<p>The Westport people are very pious. As I have previously shown by +quotations from Irish authorities, Ireland has the true <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>Christianity +which England so sadly needs. Unhindered by England, Ireland would +evangelise the world, and that in double-quick time. Every town I +visit is deeply engaged in religious exercises. In Limerick it was a +Triduum with some reference to Saint Monica. In Cork it was something +else, which required much expenditure in blessed candles. In Galway +the Confraternity of the Holy Girdle was making full time, and in +Westport three priests are laying on day and night in a mission. A few +days ago they carried the Corpus Christi round the place, six hundred +children strewing flowers under the sacerdotal feet, and the crowds of +worshippers who flocked into the town necessitated the use of a tent, +from which the money-box was stolen. On Sunday last the bridge +convaynient to the chapel was covered with country folks who could not +get into the building, and a big stall with sacred images in plaster +of Paris and highly-coloured pictures in cheap frames was doing a +roaring trade. Barefooted women were hurrying to chapel to get +pictures blessed, or walking leisurely home with the sanctified +treasure under their shawls. A brace of scoffers on the bridge +explained the surging crowd, and advised instant application, that +evening being the last. "Get inside, wid a candle in yer fist, an' ye +can pray till yer teeth dhrop out iv yer head." This irreverence is +probably one of the accursed fruits of contact with the sacrilegious +Saxon. "The people here are cowardly, knavish, and ignorant," said an +Irishman twenty years resident in Westport. "They believe anything the +priests tell them, and they will do anything the priests may order or +even hint at. They would consider it an honour if the priests told +them to lie down that they might walk over them. Politically they are +entirely in the hands of the Roman Catholic clergy. They are totally +unable to understand or to grasp the meaning of the change now +proposed, which would place the country entirely at the mercy of the +clerical party. We see the result of popular election in the return of +Poor Law Guardians, who spend most of their time in calling each other +beggars and liars. Patronage under the Home Rule Bill would mean the +instalment of the relatives of priests in all the best offices. Once +we have an Irish Parliament, a man of capacity may leave the country +unless he have a priest for his uncle.</p> + +<p>"We want a liberal measure of Local Government, and a final settlement +of the land question. The poor people are becoming poorer and poorer +through this eternal agitation which drives away wealth and capital, +and undermines the value of all Irish securities. Poor as we were, we +were much better off before the agitation commenced. The poor +themselves are becoming alive to the fact that continuous agitation +means continuous poverty. We must now have some sort of Home Rule, but +we shall be ruined if we get it from a Liberal Government. If we get +it from a Tory Government, the English will run to lend us money, but +if from a Morley-Gladstone combination they won't advance us a stiver. +The present Irish Parliamentary representatives have the confidence +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>of no single Irish party. They were well enough for their immediate +purpose, and no better men would come forward. To entrust them with +large powers is the very acme of wild insanity. Admitting their +honesty, which is doubtful, they have had no experience in business +affairs, and their class is demonstratedly devoid of administrative +capacity. The Poor Law Guardians of Cork, Portumna, Ballinasloe, +Swinford, Ballyvaughan, and many other towns and cities, have by their +mismanagement brought their respective districts to insolvency. That +every case was a case of mismanagement is clearly proved by the fact +that the Government having superseded these Boards in each case by two +paid Guardians, a period of two years has sufficed to wipe off all +debts, to reduce expenses, and to leave a balance in hand. They then +begin to drift again into insolvency. And where the guardians have not +been superseded, where they have not yet become bankrupt, they still +have a bank balance against them. You will scarcely hear of a solvent +parish, even if you offer a reward. And that is the class of persons +Mr. Gladstone would entrust with the administration of Irish finance. +The result would be the country's bankruptcy, and England would have +to pay the damage. Serve England right for her stupidity."</p> + +<p>What my friend said anent the class of men who compose the ranks of +the Irish Parliamentary party reminds me of something I heard in +Athlone. A great anti-Parnellite said:—"Poor Mat Harris was the +splindid spaker, in throth! Parnell it was that sent him to the House +of Commons. Many's the time I seen him on the roof of the Royal Hotel, +fixin the tiles, an' puttin things sthraight, that the rain wouldn't +run in. 'Tis a slater he was, an' an iligant slater, at that. An' when +he came down for a big dhrink, the way he'd stand at the bar and +discoorse about Ireland would brake yer heart. Many's the time I seen +the ould waiter listenin' to him till the wather would pour out iv his +two good-lookin' eyes. An, thin, 'twas Mat Harris had the gab, rest +his sowl! Ye haven't anybody could come up to him barrin' owld +Gladstone, divil a one." Another Athloner, speaking of an Irish +Nationalist M.P., who luckily still lives, said:—"Mr. Parnell took +him up because he was a wonderful fellow to talk, and so was popular +with the mob of these parts. I think he was a blacksmith by trade. +Parnell got him made M.P., and set him up with a blue pilot coat, but +forgot to give him a handkerchief. So he used the tail of his coat +alternately with his coat sleeve. He never had a pocket-handkerchief +in his life, but he was a born legislator, and the people believed he +could do much to restore the vaunted ancient prestige and prosperity +of Ireland. He came to Athlone, and went to the Royal, but the waiter, +who did not know he was speaking to a member of Parliament, and +moreover one of his own kidney, declined to take him in, and +recommended a place where he could get a bed for Thruppence! And the +M.P. actually had to take it. This was only inconsistent with his new +dignity, and not with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>his previous experiences. This is the kind of +person who is to direct Irish legislation more efficiently than the +educated class, who unanimously object to Home Rule as detrimental to +the interests of both countries, and as likely to further impoverish +poor Ireland. The men who now represent the 'patriotic' party will +feather their own nests. They care for nothing more."</p> + +<p>The Westport folks may not deserve the strictures of their friend of +twenty years, but two things are plainly visible. They are dirty, and +they have no enterprise. The island-dotted Clew Bay and the sublime +panorama of mountain scenery, the sylvan demesne of the Earl of Sligo, +and the forest-bordered inlets of Westport Bay, form a scene of +surpassing loveliness and magnificence such as England and Wales +together cannot show. The town is well laid out, the streets are broad +and straight, and Lord Sligo's splendid range of lake and woodland, +free to all, adjoins the very centre. And yet the shops are small and +mean, the houses are dirty and uninviting, and dunghills front the +cottages first seen by the visitor. A breezy street leads upward to +the heights, and all along it are dustheaps, with cocks and hens +galore, scratching for buried treasure. At the top a stone railway +bridge, the interstices facing the sea full of parsley fern, wild +maidenhair, hart's-tongue, and a beautiful species unknown to me. The +bracing air of the Atlantic sweeps the town, which is sheltered withal +by miles of well-grown woods. The houses are dazzling white, and like +the Rhine villages look well from a distance. Beware the interiors, or +at least look before you leap. Then you will probably leap like the +stricken hart, and in the opposite direction. You will be surprised at +your own agility. Flee from the "Lodgings and Entertainment" announced +in the windows. Your "Entertainment" is likely to be livelier than you +expected, and you will wish that your Lodgings were on the cold, cold +ground. The Westporters are too pious to wash themselves or their +houses. "They wash the middle of their faces once a month," said a +Black Methodist. For there are Methodists here, likewise Presbyterians +and Plymouth Brethren—besides the Church of Ireland folks, who only +are called Protestants. All these must be exempted from the charge of +dirtiness. Cleanliness, neatness, prosperity, and Protestantism seem +to go together. Father Humphreys himself would not deny this dictum.</p> + +<p>For the other clause of the indictment—lack of enterprise—the +Westporters are no worse and no better than their neighbours. The +Corkers make nothing of their harbour, spending most of their time in +talking politics and cursing England. Commercial men speak of the +difficulty of doing business at Cork, which does not keep its +appointments, is slippery, and requires much spirituous lubrication. +Cork ruins more young commercial men than any city in Britain, and +owing to the unreliability of its citizens, is more difficult to work. +Galway has scores of ruined warehouses and factories, and has been +discussing the advisability of building a Town Hall for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>forty years +at least. Limerick has a noble river, with an elaborate system of +quays, on which no business is done. The estuary of the Shannon, some +ten miles wide, lies just below, opening on the Atlantic; and a little +enterprise would make the city the Irish head-quarters for grain. The +quays are peopled by loafers, barefooted gossiping women, and dirty, +ragged children playing at marbles. Great buildings erected to hold +the stores that never come, or to manufacture Irish productions which +nobody makes, are falling into ruin. I saw the wild birds of the air +flying through them, while the people were emigrating or complaining, +and nothing seemed to flourish but religious services and +fowl-stealing. It was during my sojourn in Limerick that somebody +complained to the Town Council of poultry depredations, which +complaint drew from that august body a counter-complaint to the effect +that the same complainant had complained before, and that he always +did it during a Retreat, that is, when the town was full of people +engaged in special religious services—so that the heretic observer, +and especially the representative of the <i>Gazette</i>, referred to by +name, might couple the salvation of souls with the perdition of hens, +to the great discredit of the faith. But this is a digression.</p> + +<p>Westport should brush itself up, cleanse its streets, tidy up its +shops, sanitate its surroundings, and offer decent accommodation to +tourists. The latter does exist, but is scarce and hard to find. The +people of Cork, Limerick, and Galway blame England and English rule +for the poverty which is their own fault alone. They hate the +Northerners as idle unsuccessful men hate successful industrious men. +Belfast is a standing reproach. The people of Leinster, Munster, and +Connaught have had the same government under which Ulster has +flourished, with incomparably greater advantages of soil and climate +than Ulster, with better harbours and a better trading position. But +instead of working they stand with folded hands complaining. Instead +of putting their own shoulders to the wheel they wait for somebody to +lift them out of the rut. Instead of modern methods of agriculture, +fishing, or what not, they cling to the ancient ways, and resent +advice. The women will not take service; the men will not dig, chop, +hammer. They are essentially bone-idle—laziness is in their blood. +They will not exert themselves. As Father McPhilpin says, "They will +not move. You cannot stir them if you take them by the shoulders and +haul at them." What will Home Rule do for such people? Will it serve +them instead of work? Will it content the grumblers? Will it silence +the agitators? Will it convert the people to industry? Will it imbue +them with enterprise? Will it make them dig, chop, fish, hammer? Will +it make the factory hands regular day by day? Will it cause the women +to wash themselves and cleanse their houses? Will it change their +ingrained sluttishness to tidiness and neatness and decency? Father +Mahony, of Cork, said that the Irish fisherman turned his back on the +teeming treasures of the deep, because he groaned beneath the cruel +English yoke. Since then I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>have seen him fishing, but I did not hear +him groan. He wanted boats, nets, and to be taught their use. Mr. +Balfour supplied him with plant and instructions. Father Mahony and +his tribe of wind-bags feed the people on empty air. The starving poor +ask for bread, and they get a speech. They are told to go on +grumbling, and things will come all right. Nobody ever tells them to +work. Murder and robbery, outrage and spoliation, landlord-shooting +and moonlighting, are easier ways of getting what they want. The Plan +of Campaign, the No Rent combination, the Land League brotherhood when +rightly considered, were just so many substitutes for honest work. +Ireland will be happy when Ireland is industrious, and not a moment +before.</p> + +<p>No need to say that the Westporters are Home Rulers. The clean and +tidy folks, the Protestant minority, are heart and soul against the +bill, but the respectable voters are swamped all over Ireland, by +devotees of the priests. "We think the franchise much too low," said a +Presbyterian. "We think illiterate Ireland, with its abject servility +to the Catholic clergy, quite unfit to exercise the privilege of +sending men to Parliament. We think the intelligent minority should +rule, and that the principles which obtain in other matters might well +be applied to Parliamentary elections. These ignorant people are no +more fit to elect M.P.'s than to elect the President of the Royal +Society or the President of the Royal Academy. And yet if mere numbers +must decide, if the counting of heads is to make things right or +wrong, why not let the people decide these distinctions? The West of +Ireland folks know quite as much of art or science as of Home Rule, or +any other political question. They have returned, and will in future +return, the nominees of the priests."</p> + +<p>One of the highest legal authorities in Ireland, himself a Roman +Catholic, said to me:—</p> + +<p>"You saw the elections voided by reason of undue priestly influence. +That was because, in the cases so examined, money was available to pay +the costs of appeal. If there had been money enough to contest every +case where a Nationalist was returned, you would have seen every such +election proved equally illegal, and every one would have been +adjudicated void."</p> + +<p>The Westport folks are looking for great things from the great +Parliament in College Green. A Sligo man who has lived in Dublin was +yesterday holding forth on these prospective benefits, his only +auditor being one Michael, an ancient waiter of the finest Irish +brand. Michael is both pious and excitable, and must have an abnormal +bump of wonder. He is a small man with a big head, and is very +demonstrative with his hands. He abounds with pious (and other) +ejaculations, and belongs to that popular class which is profuse in +expressions of surprise and admiration. The most commonplace +observation evokes a "D'ye see that, now?" a "D'ye tell me so, thin?" +or a "Whillaloo! but that bates all!" As will be seen, Michael +artistically suits his exclamations to the tone and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>matter of the +principal narrator, mixing up Christianity and Paganism in a quaintly +composite style, but always keeping in harmony with the subject. The +Sligo man said:—</p> + +<p>"I seen the mails go on the boat at Kingstown, an' there was hundhreds +of bags, no less."</p> + +<p>"Heavenly Fa-a-ther!" said Michael, throwing up eyes and hands.</p> + +<p>"Divil a lie in it. 'Twas six hundhred, I believe."</p> + +<p>"Holy Moses preserve us!"</p> + +<p>"An' the rivinue is millions an' millions o' pounds."</p> + +<p>"The saints in glory!"</p> + +<p>"An' wid Home Rule we'd have all that for Oireland."</p> + +<p>"Julius Saysar an' Nibuchadnizzar!"</p> + +<p>"Forty millions o' goolden sovereigns, divil a less."</p> + +<p>"Thunder an' ouns, but ye startle me!"</p> + +<p>"An' we're losin' all that"—</p> + +<p>"Save <i>an'</i> deliver us!"</p> + +<p>"Becase the English takes it"—</p> + +<p>"Holy Virgin undefiled!"</p> + +<p>"To pay peelers an' sojers"—</p> + +<p>"Bloody end to thim!"</p> + +<p>"To murther and evict us"—</p> + +<p>"Lord help us!"</p> + +<p>"An' collect taxes an' rint."</p> + +<p>"Hell's blazes!"</p> + +<p>Ten minutes after this conversation under my window Michael adroitly +introduced the subject of postal profits in Ireland. I told him there +was an ascertained loss of £50,000 a year, which the new Legislature +would have to make up somehow. Michael bore the change with fortitude. +The loss of forty millions plus fifty thousand would have upset many a +man, but Michael only threw up his eyes and said very softly—</p> + +<p>"Heavenly Fa-a-ther!"</p> + +<p class="date">Westport, June 6th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_32_HOME_RULE_AND_IRISH_IMMIGRATION" id="No_32_HOME_RULE_AND_IRISH_IMMIGRATION"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 32.—HOME RULE AND IRISH IMMIGRATION.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> bright country town with a big green square called The Mall, +bordered by rows of great elm trees and brilliantly whitewashed +houses. The town is about a mile from the station, and the way is +pleasant enough. Plenty of trees and pleasant pastures with thriving +cattle, mansions with umbrageous carriage-drives, and the immense mass +of Croagh Patrick fifteen miles away towering over all. The famous +mountain when seen from Castlebar, is as exactly triangular as an +Egyptian pyramid, or the famous mound of Waterloo. Few British heights +have the striking outline of Croagh Patrick, which may be called <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>the +Matterhorn of Ireland. Castlebar is always dotted with soldiers, The +Buffs are now marching through the town, on their way to the exercise +ground, but the sight is so familiar that the street urchins hardly +turn their heads. The Protestant Church, square-towered, fills a +corner of The Mall, and there stands a statue of General O'Malley, +with a drawn sword of white marble. Lord Lucan, of the Balaklava +Charge, hailed from Castlebar. The town and its precincts belong to +the Lucans. There is a convent with a big statue of the Virgin Mary, +and the usual high wall. The shops are better than those of Westport, +and the streets are far above the Irish average in order and +cleanliness. The country around is rich in antiquities. Burrishoole +Abbey and Aughnagower Tower, with the splendid Round Tower of +Turlough, are within easy distance, the last a brisk hour's walk from +Castlebar. There in the graveyard I met a Catholic priest of more than +average breadth and culture, who discussed Home Rule with apparent +sincerity, and with a keener insight than is possessed by most of his +profession. He said:—</p> + +<p>"When the last explosion took place at Dublin, the first to apprise me +of the affair was the Bishop of my diocese, whose comment was summed +up in the two words 'Castle job!' Now that riled me. I am tired of +that kind of criticism."</p> + +<p>Here I may interpolate the critique of Colonel Nolan, who was the +first to apprise me of the occurrence.—"I do not say that the Irish +Government officials are responsible for the explosion. That would not +be fair, as there is no evidence against them. But I do say that if +they did arrange the blow-up they could not have selected a better +time, and if some mistaken Irish Nationalist be the guilty person he +could not have selected a worse time from a patriotic point of view." +Thus spake the Colonel, who has an excellent reputation in his own +district. The stoutest Conservatives of Tuam speak well of him. "All +the Nolans are good," said a staunch Unionist; and another said, "The +Nolans are a good breed. The Colonel is good, and Sebastian Nolan is +just as good. Nobody can find fault with the Nolans apart from +politics." The Colonel is one of the nine Parnellites accursed of the +priests. Perhaps he was present at the Parnellite meeting at Athenry, +regarding which Canon Canton, parish priest of Athenry, declared from +the altar that every person attending it would be guilty of mortal +sin. English readers will note that the Parnellites resent priestly +dictation.</p> + +<p>Another interpolation anent "the Castle job." I thought to corner a +great Athlone politician by questions <i>re</i> the recent moonlighting, +incendiarism, and attempted murders in Limerick and Clare. He said—</p> + +<p>"All these things are concocted and paid for by the Tories of England. +The reason Balfour seemed to be so successful was simple enough when +you know the explanation. Balfour and his friends kept the +moonlighters and such like people going. They paid regular gangs of +marauders to disturb the country while the L<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>iberals were in power. +When the Tories get in, these same gangs are paid to be quiet. Then +the Tories go about saying, 'Look at the order we can keep.' Every +shot fired in County Clare is paid for by the English Tories. Sure, I +have it from them that knows. Ye might talk for a month an' ye'd never +change my opinion. There's betther heads than mine to undershtand +these things, men that has the larnin', an' is the thrue frinds of +Ireland. When I hear them spake from the altar 'tis enough for me. I +lave it to them. Ye couldn't turn me in politics or religion, an' I +wouldn't listen to anybody but my insthructors since I was twelve +inches high." Well might Colonel Winter, who knows the speaker +above-mentioned, say to me, "He has read a good deal, but his reading +seems to have done him no good."</p> + +<p>It is time I went back to Turlough's Tower and my phœnix priest who +was riled to hear his Bishop speak of the Dublin explosion as a +"Castle job." He claimed that "the clergy are unwilling instruments in +the hands of the Irish people, who are unconquerable even after seven +hundred years of English rule. The Irish priesthood is so powerful an +element of Irish life, not because it leads, but because it follows. +Powerful popular movements coerce the clergy, who are bound to join +the stream, or be for ever left behind. No doubt at all that, being +once in, they endeavour to direct the current of opinion in the course +most favourable to the Catholic religion. To do otherwise would be to +deny their profession, to be traitors to the Church. They did not +commence the agitation. The Church instinctively sticks to what is +established, and opposes violent revolutionary action. History will +bear me out. The clergy stamped out the Smith-O'Brien insurrection. +The Catholic clergy of the present day, mostly the sons of farmers, +are perhaps more ardently political than the clergy of a former day, a +little less broad in view, a little more hot-headed; yet in the main +are subject to the invariable law I laid down at first—that is, they +only follow and direct, they do not lead, or at any rate they only +place themselves in the front when the safety of the Church demands +it. The bulk of the clergy believe that the time to lead has now come. +My own opinion, in which I am supported by a very few,—but I am happy +to say a very distinguished few,—is this: The Roman Catholic Church +is making immense progress in England; a closer and closer connection +with England will ultimately do far more for the Church than can be +hoped from revolutionary and republican Ireland. We should by a Home +Rule Bill gain much ground at first, but we should as rapidly lose it, +while our hold on England would be altogether gone. Many of the +so-called Catholic Nationalists are atheists at heart, and the +tendency of modern education is decidedly materialistic. So that +instead of progressive conquest the Church would experience +progressive decline, which would be all the more striking after the +great but momentary accession of prestige conferred by the Home Rule +Bill. My theory <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>is—Let well alone. The popular idea is to achieve +commanding and lasting success at a blow."</p> + +<p>The Castlebar folks have diverse opinions, the decent minority, the +intelligence of the place, being Unionist, as in every other Irish +town. A steady, well-clad yeoman said:—"I've looked at the thing in a +hundred ways, and although I confess that I voted for Home Rule, yet +when we have time to consider it, and to watch the debate on every +point, we may be excused if we become doubtful as to the good it will +do. The people round here are so ignorant, that talking sense to them +is waste of time. They will put their trust in coal mines and the like +of that. Now, I have gone into the subject of Irish mines. I have read +the subject up from beginning to end. Wicklow gold would cost us a +pound for ten shillings' worth. The silver mines wouldn't pay, and the +lead mines are a fraud; while the copper mines would ruin anybody who +put their money into them. I know something about Irish coal. Lord +Ranfurly did his best for Irish coal at Dungannon. Mines were sunk and +coal was found, but it was worthless. Well, it fetched half a crown a +ton, and people on the spot went on paying a guinea a ton for +Newcastle coal because it was cheaper in the end. We may have iron, +but what's the good when we have no coal to smelt it? The Irish +forests which formerly were used for this purpose are all gone. Then +the people put their trust in wool and cotton manufactures. They may +do something with the wool, because England is waking up to the +superior quality of Irish woollen productions; but in the cotton +England is here, there and everywhere before us. 'Oh,' say some who +should know better, 'put a duty on English goods, and make the Irish +buy their own productions.' What rubbish! when England buys almost +every yard of Irish woollen stuff, and could choke us off in a moment +by counter-tariffs. Without English custom the Irish tweed mills would +not run a single day.</p> + +<p>"As an Irishman, I should like to have a Parliament of my own. I +suppose that is a respectable ambition. At the same time, I cannot see +where it would do us any substantial good. No, I do not think the +present Nationalist members loyal to the English Crown. Nor are they +traitors. A priest explained that very well. There's a distinction. 'A +man may not be loyal and yet not be a traitor, for how can a man be a +traitor to a foreign government?' said he. That sounded like the +truth. I thought that a reasonable statement. For, after all, we <i>are</i> +under foreign rule, and we have a perfect right to revolt against it +and throw off the English yoke if we could do it, and if it suited us +to do it. How to do it has been the talk since my childhood, and many +a year before. It is the leading idea of all secret societies, and +hardly any young man in Kerry and Clare but belongs to one or other of +them. The idea is to get rid of the landlords who hold the country for +England. There it is, now. We'll never be a contented conquered +province like Scotland. We'd be all right if <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>we could only make +ourselves content. But the Divil is in us. That's what ye'll say. The +Divil himself is in Irishmen."</p> + +<p>The Mayo folks are great temporary migrants. From the County Mayo and +its neighbour Roscommon come the bands of Irish harvesters which +annually invade England. Latterly they are going more than ever, and +the women also are joining in large numbers. The unsettled state of +the country and the threat of a College Green Parliament have made +work scarcer and scarcer, and the prevailing belief among the better +classes that the bill is too absurd to become law, is not sufficient +to counteract the chronic want of confidence inspired by the presence +of Mr. Gladstone at the helm of state. Five hundred workers went from +Westport Quay to Glasgow the other evening. More than two-thirds were +women from Achil Island, sturdy and sun-burnt, quaintly dressed in +short red kirtle, brilliant striped shawl, and enormous lace-up boots, +of fearful crushing power. Though not forbidding, the women were very +plain, ethnologically of low type, with small turn-up noses, small +eyes, large jaws, and large flat cheekbones. The men were ugly as sin +and coarse as young bulls, of which their movements were remindful. A +piper struck up a jig and couples of men danced wildly about, the +women looking on. Five shillings only for forty hours' sea-sickness, +with permission to stand about the deck all the time. Berths were, of +course, out of the question, and the boat moved slowly into the +Atlantic with hundreds of bareheaded women leaning over the sides. +Another boat-load will land at Liverpool, to return in September and +October. The best-informed people of these parts think that under the +proposed change the young female population of Mayo would be compelled +to stay in England altogether, and that their competition in the +English labour market would materially lower the rate of factory wage. +"They live hard and work like slaves when away from Ireland," said an +experienced sergeant of the Royal Irish Constabulary. "And yet they +are lazy, for on their return they will live somehow on the money they +bring back until the time comes to go again, and during the interval +they will hardly wash themselves. They will not work in their own +districts, nor for their friends, the small farmers. Partly pride, +partly laziness; you cannot understand them. The man who attempts to +explain the inconsistencies of the Irish character will have all his +work before him. Make the country a peasant-proprietary to suit the +small farmers, and the labouring class will go to England and Scotland +to live. The abolition of the big farmers will cut the ground from +under their feet. You will have Ireland bossing your elections, as in +America, and cutting the legs from under your artisans. For let me +tell you that once Paddy learns mechanical work he is a heap smarter +than any Englishman."</p> + +<p>If Home Rule should become law, and if England should be over-run by +the charming people of Connaught, the brutal Saxon will be interested +to observe some of the ancient customs to which they cling with a +touching tenacity. Marriage with the Connaught folks <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>is entirely a +matter of pecuniary bargain. The young folks have no act or part in +the arrangements. The seniors meet and form a committee of ways and +means. How much money has your son? How much has your daughter? The +details once understood, the parties agree or disagree, or leave the +matter pending while they respectively look about for a better +bargain. And even if the bargain be ostensibly agreed to, either party +is at liberty to at once break the match, on hearing of something +better. The prospective bride and bridegroom have nothing to say in +the negotiations, and may never have seen each other in their lives. +Previous acquaintance is not considered necessary, and the high +contracting parties are frequently married without having met before +they meet at the altar. This was hard to believe, but careful inquiry +established the fact. Never was a case of rebellion recorded. The lady +takes the goods the gods provide her, and the gentleman believes that +the custom yields all prizes and no blanks. Marriage is indeed a +lottery in Connaught. The system works well, for unfaithfulness is +said to be unknown. The Connaught funerals are impressive. One of +these I have seen, and one contents me well. The coffin arrived on a +country cart, the wife and family of the deceased sitting on the body, +after the fashion attributed to English juries. To sit elsewhere than +on the coffin would in Connaught be considered a mark of disrespect. +The children sit on the head and feet, the wife jumps on the chest of +the dear departed, and away goes the donkey. The party dismount at the +churchyard gates, and as the coffin enters they raise the Irish cry, a +blood-curdling wail that makes your muscles creep, while a cold chill +runs down your spine, and you sternly make for home. You may as well +see it out, for you can hear the "Keen" two miles away against the +wind. The mourners clasp their hands and move them quickly up and +down, recounting the deceased's good deeds, and exclaiming, in Irish +and English, "Why did ye die? Ah, thin, why did ye die?" To which very +reasonable query no satisfactory answer is obtainable. The widow is +expected to tear her hair, if any, and to be perfectly inconsolable +until the churchyard wall is cleared on leaving. Then, and not before, +she may address herself to mundane things. Good "Keeners" are in much +request, and a really efficient howler is sure of regular employment. +The Connaught folks are somewhat rough-and-ready with their dead. +Colonel Winter, of the Buffs, told me that he came across a +donkey-cart in charge of two men, who were waiting at a cross-road. A +coffin had been removed from the cart, and stood on its end hard by. +"I thought it was an empty coffin," said the Colonel, "but it wasn't. +The men were waiting, by appointment, for the mourners, and meanwhile +the old lady in the coffin was standing on her head. Wonderful country +is Ireland.</p> + +<p>"An old woman died in the workhouse of typhus fever, or some other +contagious disorder. The corpse was placed in a parish <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>coffin, and +was about to be buried, when a relative came forward and offered to +take charge of the funeral, declining to accept the workhouse coffin. +The authorities consented, on condition that the proposed coffin +should be large enough to enclose the first one, explaining that the +body was dangerously contagious. The relative, a stout farmer, duly +arrived at the workhouse with the new coffin, which was found to be +too small to include the first one, and the authorities thereupon +refused to have the coffins changed. So the mourner knocked down two +men, and, making his way into the dead-room, burst open the receptacle +containing his revered grandmother, whipped her out of the parochial +box, planked her into the family coffin, and triumphantly walked her +off on his shoulder. There was filial piety for you! They arrested +that man, locked him up, and, for aught I know, left the old lady to +bury herself, which must have been a great hardship. What Englishman +would have done as much for his grandmother? And yet they say that +Connaught men have no enterprise!"</p> + +<p>A Protestant of Castlebar said:—"If the English people fail to +correctly estimate the supreme importance of the present crisis it is +all over with us, and, I think, with England. If the Unionist party +persevere they must ultimately win. The facts are all with them. +Enlightenment is spreading, and if time to spread the truth can be +gained Home Rule will be as dead as a door-nail. If, on the other +hand, the English people fail to see the true meaning of Home Rule, +which is revolution and disintegration, England, from the moment an +Irish Parliament is established, must be classed with those countries +from which power has dwindled away; her glory will have commenced to +wane, her enemies will rejoice, and she will present to the world the +aspect of a nation in its decadence. The Irish leaders and the Irish +people alike, who support Home Rule, are ninety-nine hundredths +disloyal. Already the leaders are cursing England more deeply than +before, this time for deceiving them about the Home Rule Bill. Their +most respectable paper is already preparing the ground for further +agitation. The <i>Irish Independent</i> says that the Irish people are +being marched from one prison to another, and told that is their +liberty. Such is the latest criticism of the Home Rule Bill, as +pronounced by the Nationalist party. The same paper ordered the Lord +Mayor of Dublin and the City Council to refuse an address of +congratulation on the marriage of the Duke of York and Princess May, +and they refused by more than four to one. They refused when it was +the Duke of Clarence. We could understand that, but why refuse now, +when Home Rule is adopted as the principal measure of the Government +whose only aim is the Union of Hearts? The English people must indeed +be fools if they cannot gauge the feeling that dictated a vote so mean +as this. Surely the English will at the eleventh hour draw back and +save us and our country, and themselves and their country from unknown +disaster. If they allow this ruinous measure to become law I shall +almost doubt the Bible <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>where it says, 'Surely the net is set in vain +in the sight of any bird.'"</p> + +<p>I met a very savage Separatist in Castlebar. They are numerous in Mayo +and Galway. The more uncivilised the district, the more ignorant the +people, the more decided the leaning to Home Rule. My friend was not +of the peasant class, but rather of the small commercial traveller +breed, such as, with the clerks and counterskippers of the country +stores, make up the membership of the Gaelic clubs by which the +expulsion of the Saxon is confidently expected. He said, "I am for +complete Independence, and I do not believe in what is called +constitutional agitation. Who would be free, themselves must strike +the blow. Every country that has its freedom has fought for it. I +would not waste a word with England, which has always deceived us and +is about to deceive us once again. England has always wronged us, +always robbed us. England has used her vast resources to ruin our +trade that her own might flourish. The weakest must go to the +wall—that is the doctrine of England—which thrives by our beggary +and lives by our death. You have heaps of speakers in England who +admit this. Gladstone knows it is true. The Irish people have let the +English eat their bread for generations. The Irish people have seen +the English spending their money for centuries. This must be stopped +as soon as possible, and Ireland grows stronger every day. Every +concession we have obtained has been the result of compulsion, and I +am for armed combination. Every Irishman should be armed, and know the +use of arms. The day will come when we shall dictate to England, and +when we may, if we choose, retaliate on her. We shall have an army and +navy of our own; all that will come with time. We must creep before we +walk, and walk before we run. The clubs already know their comrades; +each man knows his right and left shoulder man, and the man whose +orders he is to obey. Merely a question of athletic sports, at +present. But when we get Home Rule the enthusiasm of the people will +be whetted to such an extent that we shall soon enroll the whole of +the able-bodied population, and after then, when we get the +<span class="sc">Word</span>, you will see what will happen. Where would be your +isolated handfuls of soldiery and police, with roads torn up, bridges +destroyed, and an entire population rising against them? Yes, you +might put us down, but we'd first have some fun. In a week we'd not +leave a red coat in the island."</p> + +<p>The gratitude, the warm generosity of the Irish people is very +beautiful. The Union of Hearts, however, as a paying investment seems +to have fallen considerably below par.</p> + +<p class="date">Castlebar, June 8th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_33_TUAMS_INDIGNATION_MEETING" id="No_33_TUAMS_INDIGNATION_MEETING"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 33.—TUAM'S INDIGNATION MEETING.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterh.png" alt="H" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ere I am, after two hours' journey by the Midland and Great Western +Railway, which leads to most of the good things in Ireland, and is +uncommonly well managed, and with much enterprise. By the Midland and +Great Western Railway you may cover the best tourist districts in +quick time and with great comfort. By it you may tackle Connemara +either from Galway or Westport, and the company, subsidised by Mr. +Balfour, will shortly open fifty miles of line between Galway and +Clifden. Then we want a thirty-mile continuation from Clifden by +Letterfrack and Leenane to Westport, and the circle will be complete. +For that, Paddy must wait until the Tories are again in office. As he +will tell you, the Liberals spend their strength in sympathetic talk. +Mr. Hastings, of Westport, said:—"I care not who hears me say that +the Tories have instituted the public works which have so much +benefited the country. The Liberals have always been illiberal in this +respect. Mr. Balfour did Ireland more good than any Liberal Irish +Secretary." Mr. Hastings is as good a Catholic Home Ruler as Father +McPhilpin, who said substantially the same thing. Ballina is on the +Moy—every self-respecting town in Ireland has a salmon river—and the +Midland and Great Western Railway gives fishing tickets to tourists, +who anywhere on this line should find themselves in Paradise. From the +three lakes of Mullingar to the Shannon at Athlone, from the Moy at +Ballina to the Corrib at Galway, the waters swarm with fish. The +salmon weir at Galway is worth a long journey to see. The fish +literally jostle each other in the water. They positively elbow each +other about. Sometimes you may stand against the salmon ladder in the +middle of the town, and although the water is clear as crystal you +cannot see the bottom for fish—great, silvery salmon, upon whose +backs you think you might walk across the river. The Moy at Ballina is +perhaps fifty yards wide, and the town boasts two fine bridges, one of +which is flanked by a big Catholic church. The streets are not +handsome, nor yet mean. Whiskey shops abound, though they are not +quite so numerous as in some parts of Ennis, where, in Mill Street, +about three-fourths of the shops sell liquor. Castleisland in Kerry +would also beat Ballina. Mr. Reid, of Aldershot, said:—"The +population of Castleisland is only one thousand two hundred, but I +counted forty-eight whiskey-shops on one side of the street." Of a row +of eleven houses near the main bridge of Ballina I counted seven +whiskey-shops, and one of the remaining four was void. There were +several drink-shops opposite, so that the people are adequately +supplied with the means of festivity. The place has no striking +features, and seems to vegetate in the way common to Irish country +towns. It probably lives on the markets, waking up once a week, and +immediately going to sleep again. The Post Office counter <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>had two +bottles of ink and no pen, and the young man in charge was whistling +"The Minstrel Boy." The shop-keepers were mostly standing at their +doors, congratulating each other on the fine weather. A long, long +street leading uphill promised a view of the surrounding country, but +the result was not worth the trouble. It led in the direction of +Ardnaree, which my Irish scholarship translates "King's Hill," but I +stopped short at the ruins of the old workhouse, and after a glance +over the domain of Captain Jones went back through the double row of +fairly good cottages, and the numerous clans of cocks and hens which +scratched for a precarious living on the King's highway. The people +turned out <i>en masse</i> to look at me, and to discuss my country, race, +business, appearance, and probable income. The Connaught folks have so +little change, are so wedded to one dull round, that when I observe +the interest my passage evokes I feel like a public benefactor. A bell +rings at the Catholic church. Three strokes and a pause. Then three +more and another pause. A lounger on the bridge reverently raises his +hat, and seeing himself observed starts like a guilty wretch upon a +fearful summons. I ask him what the ringing means, and with a +deprecatory wag of his head he says:—</p> + +<p>"Deed an' deed thin, I couldn't tell ye."</p> + +<p>The Town Crier unconsciously launched me into business, and soon I was +floating on a high tide of political declamation. What the crier cried +I could not at all make out, for the accent of the Ballina folks is +exceedingly full-flavoured. When he stopped I turned to a well-dressed +young man near me and said, "He does not finish, as in England, with +God save the Queen."</p> + +<p>"No," said my friend with a laugh, "he has too much regard for his +skin."</p> + +<p>"What would happen if he expressed his loyalty?"</p> + +<p>"He would be instantly rolled in the gutter. The people would be on +him in a moment. He'd be like a daisy in a bull's mouth. He might say +"God save Ireland," just to round the thing off, but "God save the +Queen"!</p> + +<p>My friend was a Home Ruler, and yet unlike the rest. He said: "I am a +Home Ruler because I think Home Rule inevitable now the English people +have given way so far. Give Paddy an inch and you may trust him to +take an ell. We must have something like Home Rule to put an end to +the agitation which is destroying the country. It is now our only +chance, and in my opinion a very poor chance, but we are reduced so +low that we think the bottom is touched. The various political +agencies which have frightened away capital and entirely abolished +enterprise will continue their work until some measure of Home Rule is +given to the country, and then things will come to a head at once. It +is barely possible that good might ultimately result, but young men +would be gray-headed before things would work smoothly. The posture of +the poorer classes is simply absurd. They will have a dreadful +awakening, and that will also do <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>good. They are doing nothing now +except waiting for the wonderful things they have been told will take +place when Irishmen get into power. You must have heard the +extraordinary things they say about the mines and factories that will +be everywhere opened. Some of their popular orators tell them of the +prosperity of Ireland before the Union. That is true enough, but the +conditions are totally changed. We did something in the way of +manufacturing, but we could not do it now. We had no Germany, no +America to compete against. Those who tell us to revive that period of +prosperity by the same means might just as well tell us to revive the +system of tribal lands or the chieftainship of Brian Boru.</p> + +<p>"The people need some tremendous shock to bring them to their senses. +They used to work much better, to stand, as it were, on their own +feet. Now they make little or no exertion. They know they will never +be allowed to starve. They know that at the cry of their distress +England and America will rush to their succour. And they have tasted +the delights of not paying. First it was the rent, the impossible +rent. In this they had a world-wide sympathy, and a very large number +of undeserving persons well able to pay chummed in with the deserving +people who were really unable to meet their engagements. And at the +meetings of farmers to decide on united action, the men who could pay +but would not were always the most resolute in their opposition to the +landlord. This was natural enough, for they had most to gain by +withholding payment. The landlords always knew which was which, and +would issue ejectment processes against those able to pay, but what +could be done against a whole county of No-rent folks? And never have +these people been without aid and sympathy from English politicians. +We have had them in Ireland by the dozen, going round the farmers and +encouraging them to persevere.</p> + +<p>"The great advantage of Home Rule in the eyes of the farmers is this +and this only—that an Irish House would settle the land question for +ever. The people would take a good bill from the House of Commons at +Westminster if they could get it, but they can't. They believe that +their only hope is with an Irish Parliament. The most intelligent are +now somewhat doubtful as to the substantial benefits to come. They +fear heavy taxation. They say that everything must come out of the +land, and they wonder whether the change would pay them after all. On +the whole, they will risk it, and under the advice of the clergy, who +have their own little ideas, they will continue to vote for Home Rule. +Throw out this bill, let Mr. Balfour settle the land question, and the +agitators will not have a leg left to stand on."</p> + +<p>All this I steadfastly believe. No farmer wants Home Rule for anything +beyond his personal interests. Mr. Patrick Gibbons, of Carnalurgan, is +one of the smartest small farmers I have met, and he confirms the +statements of his fellows. "Give the farmers the land for a reasonable +rent," said he, "and they would not care two <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>straws for Home Rule." +The small traders admit that they would like it, as a mere matter of +fancy, and because they have been from time to time assured that the +English Parliament is the sole cause of Ireland's decadence. They are +assured that an Irish Parliament by instituting immense public works +would prevent emigration, and that the people staying at home and +earning money would bring custom to their shops. Nearly everybody +insists on an exclusive system of protective tariffs. England, they +say, competes too strongly. Ireland cannot stand up to her. She must +be kept out at any cost.</p> + +<p>According to a Ballina Nationalist this is where the "shock" will come +in. He said:—</p> + +<p>"The bill is being whittled down to nothing. Gladstone is betraying +us. It is doubtful if he ever was in earnest. 'Twould be no Home Rule +Bill at all, if even it was passed. An' what d'ye mane by refusing us +the right to put on whatever harbour dues we choose? An' what d'ye +mane by sayin' we're not to impose protective tariffs to help Irish +industries? Ye wish to say, 'Here's yer Parlimint. Ye're responsible +for the government of the counthry, for the advancement of the +counthry, for the prosperity of the counthry; but ye mustn't do what +ye think best to bring about all this. When we have a Parlimint we'll +do as <i>we</i> choose, an' not as <i>you</i> choose, Ye have no right to +dictate what we shall do, nor what we shan't do. We'll do what we +think proper, an' England must make the best of it. England has always +considered herself: now we'll consider ourselves. If we're not to +govern the counthry in every way that <i>we</i> think best, why on earth +would we want a Parlimint at all? Tell me that, now. If Ireland is to +be governed from England, if we are to have any interference, what +betther off will we be? An' Protection is the very first cry we shall +raise."</p> + +<p>The good folks at Tuam have held an indignation meeting to protest +against the statements contained in my Tuam letter, which they +characterise as "vile slanders" which they wish to "hurl back in my +teeth" (if any). The meeting took place in the Town Hall on Sunday, +which day is usually selected by the Tuamites to protest against the +brutal Saxon, and to hold meetings of the National League, a +colourable successor to the Land League. All these meetings are +convened by priests, addressed by priests, governed by priests. The +Tuamites are among the most priest-ridden people in Ireland, and, +after having seen Galway and Limerick, this is saying a good deal. The +meeting was from beginning to end a screaming farce, wherein language +was used fit only for an Irish House of Commons. The vocabulary of +Irish Town Commissioners and Irish Poor Law Guardians was laid under +heavy contribution. The speakers hurled at the <i>Gazette</i> the pet terms +they usually and properly reserve for each other. The too flattering +terms which in a moment of weakness I applied to Tuam and its people +are described as "lying, hellish, mendacious misrepresentations." +Misther MacCormack said the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>English people would know there was "not +a wurrud of thruth in these miserable lies." The report of the <i>Tuam +Herald</i> reads like a faction fight in a whiskey-shop. You can hear the +trailing of coats, the crack of shillelaghs on thick Irish skulls, the +yells of hurroosh, whirroo, and O'Donnell aboo! Towards the end your +high-wrought imagination can almost smell the sticking plaister, so +vivid is the picture. "The bare-faced slanders of this hireling scribe +from the slums of Birmingham" were hotly denounced, but nobody said +what they were. The clergy and their serfs were equally silent on this +point. I steadfastly adhere to every syllable of my Tuam letter. I +challenge the clergy and laity combined to put their fingers on a +single assertion which is untrue, or even overstated. Let them point +out a single inaccuracy, if they can. To make sweeping statements, to +say that this "gutter-snipe," this "hireling calumniator," this +"blackguard Birmingham man" has made a series of "reckless calumnies," +"devoid of one particle of truth," is not sufficiently precise. I +stand by every word I have uttered; I am prepared to hold my ground on +every single point. Most of my information was obtained from Catholics +who are heart-weary of priestly tyranny and priestly intimidation; who +are sufficiently enlightened to see that priestly power is based on +the ignorance of priestly dupes, that priestly influence is the real +slavery of Ireland, the abject condition of the poor is its +unmistakable result, and that where there are priests in Ireland there +are ignorance and dirt in exact proportion. They have compared the +clean cottages of the North with the filthy hovels of the South, and +they have drawn their own conclusions. But to descend to detail. What +do the Tuamites deny? "Not a particle of truth in the whole letter!" +Father Humphreys said my Tipperary letter was "a pure invention," +without a syllable of truth. Since then Father Humphreys has been +compelled to admit, in writing, that all I said was true, and that he +"could not have believed it possible." That was his apology.</p> + +<p>Turning to the Tuam letter, I find these words—</p> + +<p>"The educated Catholics are excellent people—none better anywhere, +none more tolerant." This is construed into "a gross insult on our +holy priests, and particularly on our Archbishop," who, by the way, +was not mentioned or made the subject of any allusion, however remote. +Do the Tuamites deny that "many of the streets are wretchedly built," +and "the Galway road shows how easily the Catholic poor are +satisfied?" Do they deny that the cabins in this district are +"aboriginal in build, and also indescribably filthy," and that "the +condition of the inmates is not one whit higher than that obtaining in +the wigwams of the native Americans?" Do they deny that "the hooded +women, barefooted, bronzed, and tanned by constant exposure, are +wonderfully like the squaws brought from the Far West by Buffalo +Bill?"</p> + +<p>All this I reiterate and firmly maintain, with the addition of the +statement that the squaws were in a condition of compulsory +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>cleanliness the like of which seems never to be attained by the ladies +of the Galway Road, Tuam. The meeting is called a "monster" meeting. +How many people does the Tuam Town Hall hold? The fact is that the +Town Hall of Tuam, with the entire population of Tuam thrown in, could +be put into the Town Hall of Birmingham. Do the Tuamites deny that Mr. +Strachan, one of their most worthy citizens, is unable to walk the +streets of the town wherein live the people he has benefited, without +a guard of policemen to protect him from the cut-throat emissaries of +the Land League? So it was when I visited Tuam, Mr. Strachan's crimes +being the purchase of a farm in the Land Court and his Protestant +creed. Do they deny the scenes of persecution I described as having +taken place in former days? All this I had from a source more reliable +than the whole Papist hierarchy. The Tuamites can deny nothing of what +I have written. The tumbledown town is there, the filthy cabins and +degraded squaws of the Galway Road are still festering in their own +putridity, and probably the police are still preserving Strachan from +the fate of the poor fellow so brutally murdered near Tuam a few weeks +ago. The priests called a town meeting to protest against insult to +the Church. Great is Diana of the Ephesians! When the tenants refused +to pay their lawful dues the priests called no meeting. When the +country from end to end echoed with the lamentations of widows and the +wailing of helpless children whose natural protectors had been +murdered by the Land League, the Tuamites suppressed their +indignation, the Tuam priests made no protest. When scores of men were +butchered at their own firesides, shot in their beds, battered to +pieces at their own thresholds, these virtuous sacerdotalists never +said a word, called no town's meeting, used no bad language, spoke not +of "hirelings," "calumniators," "blackguards," and "liars." Two of the +speakers threatened personal injury should I again visit the town. +That is their usual form,—kicking, bludgeoning, outraging, or +shooting from behind a wall. When they do not shoot they come on in +herds, like wild buffaloes, to trample on and mutilate their victim. +From the strong or armed they run like hares. Their fleetness of foot +is astonishing. The <i>Tuam News</i>, owned and edited by the brother of a +priest, exhibits the intellectual status of the Tuam people. Let us +quote it once again:—</p> + +<div class="block"><h4>TO THE EDITOR OF THE "TUAM NEWS."</h4> + +<p>Sir—Permit me a little space in the next issue of the <i>Tuam +News</i>, relative to my father being killed by the fairies which +appeared in the <i>Tuam News</i> of the 8th of April last. I beg to say +that he was not killed by the fairies, but I say he was killed by +some person or persons unknown as yet. Hoping very soon that the +perpetrators of this dastardly outrage will be soon brought to +light, I am, Mr. Editor, yours obediently,</p> + +<p class="right sc">David Redington.</p> + +<p style="padding-bottom: .5em;">Kilcreevanty, May 8th, '93.</p></div> + +<p>After this I need add nothing to what I have said except a +pronouncement of Father Curran, who said that "Tuam could boast as +fine schools as Birmingham, and that he would then and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>there throw +out a challenge that they boast more intelligence in Tuam than +Birmingham could afford." Poor Father Curran! Poor Tuam! Poor Tuamites +with their rags, pigs, filth, priests, fairies, and Intelligence! I +shall visit them once more. A few photographs from the Galway Road +would settle the dispute, and render null and void all future Town's +meetings. They have sworn to slay me, but in visiting their town I +fear nothing but vermin and typhoid fever. Their threats affect me +not. As one of their own townsmen remarked,—</p> + +<p>"You cannot believe a word they say. They never speak the truth except +when they call each other liars. And when they are in fear, although +too lazy to work, they are never too lazy to run. They have no +independence of thought or action. Their religion crushes all manhood +out of them. They are the obedient servants of the priests, and no man +dare say his soul's his own. Any one who did not attend that meeting +would be a marked man, but if it had been limited to people who know +the use of soap it would necessarily have been small, even for the +Tuam Town Hall."</p> + +<p>Everywhere in Connaught I hear the people saying, "When you want to +roast an Irishman you can always find another Irishman to turn the +spit."</p> + +<p>Thrue for ye, ma bouchal!</p> + +<p class="date">Ballina, June 10th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_34_WHY_IRELAND_DOES_NOT_PROSPER" id="No_34_WHY_IRELAND_DOES_NOT_PROSPER"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 34.—WHY IRELAND DOES NOT PROSPER.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> community of small farmers with a sprinkling of resident gentry. All +sorts of land within a small compass, rock, bog, tillage, and +excellent grazing. The churchyard is a striking feature. A ruined +oratory covered with ivy is surrounded by tombstones and other +mortuary memorials strange to the Saxon eye. The graves are dug east +and west on a rugged mound hardly deserving to be called a hill, +although here and there steep enough. Huge masses of sterile mountain +form the background, and from the ruin the Atlantic is seen, gleaming +in the sun. Patches of bog with diggers of turf, are close by the +untouched portions covered with white bog-bean blooms, which at a +short distance look like a snowfall. On a neighbouring hill is a fine +old Danish earthwork, a fort, called by the natives "The Rath," fifty +yards in diameter, the grassy walls, some ten feet high and four yards +thick, reared in a perfect circle, on which grow gorse and brambles. +The graveyard is sadly neglected. Costly Irish crosses with elaborate +carving stand in a wilderness of nettles and long grass. Not a +semblance of a path anywhere. To walk about is positively dangerous. +Ruined tombstones, and broken slabs which appear to cover family +vaults, trip you up at every step. Every yard of progress is made with +difficulty, and you move nervously among the tall rank nettles in +momentary fear of dislocating your ankle, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>or of being suddenly +precipitated into the reeking charnel house of some defunct Mayo +family. The Connaught dead seem to be very exclusive. Most of the +ground is enclosed in small squares, each having a low stone wall, +half-a-yard thick, with what looks like the gable-end of a stone +cottage at the west end. Seen from a distance the churchyard looks +like a ruined village. At first sight you think the place a relic of +some former age, tenanted by the long-forgotten dead, but a closer +inspection proves interments almost up to date. Weird memorials of the +olden time stand cheek by jowl with modern monuments of marble; and +two of suspiciously Black Country physiognomy are of cast-iron, with +I.H.S. and a crucifix all correctly moulded, the outlines painted +vermilion, with an invitation to pray for the souls of the dead in the +same effective colour. The graveyard shows no end of prayer, but +absolutely no work. No tidiness, order, reverence, decency, or +convenience. Nothing but ruin, neglect, disorder, untidiness, +irreverence, and inconvenience. <i>Ora et labora</i> is an excellent +proverb which the Irish people have not yet mastered in its entirety. +To pray <i>and</i> work is as yet a little too much for them. They stop at +the first word, look round, and think they have done all. This +graveyard displays the national character. Heaps of piety, but no +exertion. Any amount of talk, but no work. More than any people, the +Irish affect respect for their dead. You leave the graveyard of +Oughewall smarting with nettle stings, and thankful that you have not +broken your neck. The place will doubtless be tidied, the nettles +mowed down and pathways made, when the people get Home Rule. They are +clearly waiting for something. They wish to be freed from the cruel +English yoke. When this operation is happily effected, they will clean +their houses, move the dunghills from their doors, wash themselves, +and go to work in earnest. The Spanish Queen vowed she would never +wash herself till Gibraltar was retaken from the English. Seven +hundred years ago the Irish nation must have made a similar vow—and +kept it.</p> + +<p>A passing shower drove me to the shelter of a neighbouring farmhouse, +where lived a farmer, his wife, and their son and daughter. The place +was poor but tolerable, the wife being far above the Irish average. The +living room, about ten feet square, was paved with irregularly-shaped +stones of all sizes, not particularly flat, but in places decidedly +humpy; the interstices were of earth, the whole swept fairly clean, but +certainly not scrubbed. The rafters, of rough wood, were painted black, +and a rough ladder-like stair, open at the sides, led to the upper +regions. To have an upstairs is to be an aristocrat. The standard of +luxury is much lower than in England, for almost any English +agricultural labourer would have better furniture than that possessed +by this well-to-do but discontented farmer. An oak cupboard like a +wardrobe, a round deal table, and four rough rush-bottomed chairs of +unstained wood comprised the paraphernalia. The kitchen dresser, that +indispensable requisite of English farm kitchens, with its rows of +plates and dishes, was nowhere to be seen. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>The turf fire on the hearth +needed no stove nor grate, nor was there any in the house. A second +room on the ground floor, used as a bed room, had a boarded floor, and +although to English notions bare and bald, having no carpet, pictures, +dressing table, or washstand, it was clean and inoffensive. The +churning and dairy operations are carried on in the room first +described, where also the ducks and hens do feed. The farmer holds +fifty acres of good land, for which he pays fifty pounds a year. His +father, who died thirty years ago, paid twenty-four pounds, which he +thinks a fair rent to-day. Has not made application to the Court, +although he <i>might</i> benefit by twenty-five to thirty-five per cent. Is +aware that the Judicial Rent is sometimes fixed at a sum above what the +tenant had been paying, and admits that this might happen to him. "Yes, +the land round the house is very good, very good indeed, but what can +be seen from here is by far the best of it. That is always the way in +this world, the best at the front."</p> + +<p>From this and other remarks of like tendency I gather that the noble +landlord is in the habit of placing all the best land of his estate +along the high read, concealing the boggy, rocky portions in the +remote interior, fraudulently imposing on the public, and alienating +sympathy from the tenant, thereby inflicting another injustice on +Ireland.</p> + +<p>"The English laws are right enough, as far as they go," said the +farmer, "but the English will not do the right thing about the land. +Now we know that an Irish Parliament will settle the matter +forth-with. That's why we support Home Rule. We know the opinions of +the men who now represent us, and we can trust them in this matter if +in no other. The land is the whole of it. If that were once put on an +unchangeable bottom I would rather be without Home Rule. Some say that +even if our rents are reduced by one-half, the increased taxes we must +pay would make us nearly as poor as ever, and that all this bother and +disturbance would not really save us a penny piece. And I think this +might be true. So that if something could be done by the English +Parliament I should prefer it to come that way. And so would we all, a +hundred times. For with the English Parliament we know where we are, +and what we're doing. I'm not one to believe that the land will be +handed over to us without payment. Plenty of them are ignorant enough +to believe even that. My view is just this: If the English Parliament +would settle the land question, I would prefer to do without an Irish +Parliament. That's what all the best farmers say, and nothing else. +No, I wouldn't invest money in Ireland. No, I wouldn't trust the bulk +of the present members for Ireland. Yes, I would prefer a more +respectable class of men who had a stake in the country. But we had to +take what we could catch, for people who have a stake in the country +are all against Home Rule. What could we do? We had no choice. We sent +Home Rulers because an Irish Parliament is pledged to meet our views +about the land. We <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>know they will fulfil their pledges, not because +they have promised, nor because they wish to benefit us, but because +they wish to abolish landlordism and landlords from the country. The +landlord interest is English interest, and that they want to get rid +of. Their reasons for settling the land question are not the farmers' +reasons, but so long as it <i>is</i> settled the farmer will reap the +benefit, and will not care <i>why</i> it was settled. Give us compulsory +sale and compulsory purchase, at a fair price, and you will find the +farmers nearly all voting against Home Rule. No, the priests would not +be able to stir us once we were comfortably settled. Why, we'd all +become Conservatives at once. Sure anybody with half-an-eye could see +that in a pitch-dark night in a bog-hole."</p> + +<p>My friend assured me that secret societies are unknown in Mayo, or at +any rate, in the Westport district. The young men of Clare, he +thought, were Fenians to a man. "They are queer, blood-thirsty folks, +enemies to Ireland. Why, they object to other Irishmen. They will not +allow a poor fellow from another county to work among them as a +harvest-man. They would warn him off, and if he would not go, they'd +beat him with sticks, and when once they begin, you never know where +they'll stop. They should be put down with a strong hand."</p> + +<p>But where is the strong hand? Mr. Morley, recently replying to Mr. +Arnold Forster, said that "it was admitted that the police were +working as faithfully and as energetically under the present as under +the late Government, and added that the authorities concerned were +taking all the steps which experience and responsibility suggested." +Mr. Morley is right in attributing faithfulness to the police, and +their energy is doubtless all that can be reasonably expected under +very discouraging auspices. Mr. Morley speaks more highly of the +police than the police speak of Mr. Morley. From Donegal to Bantry +Bay, from Dublin to Galway and Westport, north, south, east, west, +right, left, and centre, the police of Ireland condemn Mr. Morley's +administration as feeble, vacillating, and as likely to encourage +crime. They speak of their duties in despondent tones. I have from +time to time given their sentiments, which are unvarying. They know +not what to do, and complain that while they continue to be held +responsible they dare not follow up their duties with the requisite +energy. Only yesterday an experienced officer said:—"The men are +disheartened because they do not know how their action will be taken, +and because they feel that anything in the nature of enterprise is +very likely to injure themselves individually. They feel that in the +matter of arrests it is better to be on the safe side, and then they +know how unavailing all their efforts must be in the disturbed +districts of Kerry, Clare, and Limerick, where the arm of the law has +been paralysed by Mr. Morley's rescision of the salutary provisions so +necessary in those counties. Outrages and shooting are every-day +occurrences, for many cases are never reported to the police at all. +If the police caught the criminals in the act there would be no +result, for the juries of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>those three counties would not convict, and +the venue cannot now be changed to Cork.</p> + +<p>"Some of the Nationalist members were the other day asking in the +House whether the Cork magistrates had not been presented with white +gloves, and so on, to bring out the fact that there was no crime to +punish on a recent occasion; but what does this prove? Merely that Mr. +Balfour's action in changing the venue of three counties to the city +of Cork, where moonlighters are tried by a jury of independent traders +of Patrick Street was wise and sagacious. The white gloves of Cork +were a tribute to Tory administration. The Cork juries convicted their +men, and stood by the consequences. They have escaped so far, as all +bold men escape. If the Limerick moonlighters must have been tried in +Cork there would have been no moonlighting. The police can always +catch them, when there is any use in catching them. In country +districts the movements of people are pretty well known, and these +fellows are always ready to betray each other. Mr. Morley may talk +fine, and may mean well, but the people who have been riddled with +shot have Mr. Morley to thank. Of course he is under compulsion. He +has to please the Irish Separatists. Old women and children are +outraged and shot in the legs because of Mr. Morley's political +necessities."</p> + +<p>I think my friend was right as to the effect of boldness in action. +There is too much truckling to the ruffian element, not only by Mr. +Morley, but by most Unionists resident in Ireland. Opinions on this +point vary with varying circumstances. Several shopkeepers in a Mayo +town were utterly ruined for expressing their political opinions, or +for being suspected of harbouring opinions contrary to the feeling of +the majority. They were boycotted, and had to shut up shop. Others, +older-established, or in possession of a monopoly, weathered the +storm, but their opinions cost them something. These are the milder +cases. Yet shooting or bludgeoning are likely enough to follow overt +political action, such as refusing to join a procession or to +illuminate.</p> + +<p>It was hard to find a Protestant farmer in this district, but I +succeeded at last. His notions were strange, very strange indeed. He +thought his rent fair enough, and was of opinion that the tenant must +be prepared to take the good years with the bad years. "These +countrymen of mine, like somebody I've read of, never learn anything +and never forget anything. They do not half farm the land. They don't +understand any but the most elementary methods. They do not put the +land to its best use. When they had prosperous years, and many a one +they had, they put nothing by for a rainy day. They are very +improvident. I have been in both England and Scotland, and I know the +difference in the people. They have more self-reliance, and they are +keen after improvements. They are not satisfied to have just enough, +to live from hand to mouth. They must have comfort, and they like to +be independent. Now, Paddy is content to just scrape along. If he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>can +barely exist he's quite satisfied. He's always on the edge of the +nest, but he feels sure that when the worst comes to the worst, +somebody or something will step in and save him from starvation.</p> + +<p>"Nearly every man in this county has been in England, many of them +twenty times or more, working for months and months in the best farmed +districts. Have they got any wrinkles? Divil a one. They have not +planted a gooseberry or currant tree, they have no pot-herbs, no +carrots or parsnips—nothing at all but potatoes and turnips. The +farmers have no system of winter feeding, and they won't learn one. +There is a great and growing demand in England for Irish butter, +which, properly put up in a tasty way, would fetch fine figures, but +the lack of system in winter feeding and winter calving prevents the +supply from being kept up. The farmers will make no change in their +habits, and they don't work as if they meant it. They lounge about all +day, waiting for the crops to grow and the cattle to get fat, and then +they wonder they are so poor. The only hope of the Irish people is +their absorption in America. They work well enough when surrounded by +new influences. Once get them away from the priests, and away they go; +you can't stop them. They have great natural abilities, but somehow +they won't bloom in Ireland. If they put forth the same energy in +Ireland as in America they would do well. But they never will. Their +religion keeps them down, and they can't get out of their old habits."</p> + +<p>I observed that the Earl of Sligo had obtained eighty-two decrees of +possession against tenants for non-payment of rent, and that the <i>Mayo +News</i>, while censuring his action, admitted that most of the tenants +owed two years' rent at least. My Black Protestant friend might tell +me whether the heading "Another Batch of Death Sentences" was a fair +description of this legal action, and whether the tenants were, in his +opinion, totally unable to pay the rent.</p> + +<p>"To call them sentences of death is absurd, The people are not evicted +and left homeless, but merely deprived of their rights as tenants. In +England, if a man does not pay his rent, he is thrown out, and nobody +says Nay. In Ireland a man may pay no rent for seven years, and yet, +when he is evicted, the people cry Shame on the landlord, who, in most +cases, has been patient to the limit of human endurance. The landlord +has watched the tenant neglecting the land, and living more +expensively on the money he ought to have paid as rent. Now, let me +submit a point which never seems to strike the English Unionist +speakers. And yet it is plain enough. The Separatists say evictions +are cruel and tyrannical because the people cannot pay the awful, +exorbitant rents. Now notice my point!</p> + +<p>"A rent may be too high, but the land must be worth <i>something</i>. Now +these people have paid <i>nothing at all for two years or more</i>.</p> + +<p>"Talk to these defaulters, and they will usually say 'The land is +worth just one-half.'</p> + +<p>"Why don't they pay that half?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>"Then they would be only one year behind, instead of two, and they +would get no notice to quit.</p> + +<p>"But instead of paying the one-half which they themselves say the land +is worth, they pay nothing at all. Does that look honest? Does it look +genuine? Don't you think anybody could see that they are taking +advantage of the unsettled state of things to avoid any payment +whatever? They await Home Rule, which is to give them the land, and +they are anticipating its advantages.</p> + +<p>"They all know Hennessy's brandy, and can tell you the difference +between the one-star and the three-star brands.</p> + +<p>"In England everybody is at work. In Ireland most are at play. A man +who has been taught to work in England feels inclined to follow them +up here with a whip, they look so idle even when at work. They move +about as if half-dead. They are as lazy as Lambert's dog, that leaned +his head against the wall to bark. The young women won't work either. +My sister in Athlone is obliged to give her servants three nights a +week off from five to ten, or she could have nobody. Then they are +always going to mass or keeping some festival of the Church. Speak a +word of reproof and away they go. They are as proud as Lambert's other +dog, that took the wall of a muck-cart and got squelched for his +pains.</p> + +<p>"Home Rule would never do Ireland any good. Quite the contrary. What +can do a man good who tries to get his dinner by standing about and +saying how hungry he is?</p> + +<p>"As to the agitators, they will always agitate. When one source is +dried up they'll invent another. They have their living to get, and +agitation is their trade. And a paying trade it is. Are they disloyal +to England? I believe them Fenians at heart—that is, Fenians in the +matter of loyalty. They would use any power they might get to damage +England, and if England gives them power she'll bitterly rue the day. +Paddy may be lazy, but put your finger in his mouth and he'll bite. +The English Separatists don't see this, but when I see the fox in the +hen-roost I can guess what brought him there. If I put the cat in the +dairy I should expect her to taste the cream. Trust the Irish +Nationalist members! I'd as soon trust a pack of wolves with my +lambs."</p> + +<p>My friend is a scientific gardener, and descanted on the wonderful +climate of Ireland, where plants that will not grow in England nourish +luxuriously. I told him I had seen bamboo growing in the open air at +Dundalk, and asked him if the Bonds of Brotherhood (<i>Humbugis +Morleyensis</i>) or the Union of Hearts (<i>Gladstonia gammonica +gigantica</i>) would come to perfection in Hibernia. He thought the soil +and climate unsuitable, and was sure they would never take root. The +<i>gammonica</i> had been tried, but it withered and died. It could not be +"budded" for want of an Irish "stock."</p> + +<p>A scrap-book, fifty years old, revealed a condition of things so +strangely like that of the present day that I obtained permission to +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>copy the following skit, which, but for the mention of the old convict +colony, might have been written last week. It is headed "Extract from +the forthcoming history of the Irish Parliament." The Home Rule +project is therefore ancient enough:—</p> + +<div class="block3"><p class="hang">One blow and Ireland sprang from the head of her Saxon +enslaver like a new Minerva!</p> + +<p class="hang">Proudly and solemnly she then sat down to frame a Republic +worthy of Plato and Pat. Her first</p> + +<p class="hang">President had been a workhouse porter, who was also a night +watchman. He was, therefore, eminently fitted for both civil +and military administration. The speech of President Pat on +opening Congress developes his policy and his well-digested +plans of legislative reform. Here are a few quotations:—</p> + +<p class="hang">The Key-stone of Government is the Blarney-stone.</p> + +<p class="hang">Political progress may always be accelerated by a bludgeon.</p> + +<p class="hang">Our institutions must be consolidated by soft-soap and whacks.</p> + +<p class="hang">The People's will is made known by manifesto, and by many +fists too.</p> + +<p class="hang">Every man shall be qualified to sit in Congress that is a +ten-pound pig-holder, provided that the pig and the member +sleep under the same roof.</p> + +<p class="hang">Members of Congress will be paid for their services. Gentlemen +wearing gloves only to have the privilege of shaking the +President's hand. The unwashed members to be paid at the door.</p> + +<p class="hang">Pipes will not be allowed on the Opposition benches, nor may +any member take whiskey until challenged by the President.</p> + +<p class="hang">Under no circumstances will a member be suffered to sit with +his blunderbuss at full cock, nor pointed at the President's +ear.</p> + +<p class="hang">Our Ambassadors will be chosen from our most meritorious +postmen, so that they may have no difficulty in reading their +letters.</p> + +<p class="hang">The Foreign Office will be presided over by a patriotic editor +who has travelled in New South Wales and is thoroughly +conversant with the language.</p> + +<p class="hang">Instead of bulwarks, the island will be fortified with Irish +Bulls, our engineers being of opinion that no other horn-works +are so efficient.</p> + +<p class="hang">To prevent heartburnings between Landlord and Tenant, a +Government collector of rents shall be appointed, and +Tenant-right shall include a power to shoot over the land and +at anyone on it.</p> + +<p class="hang">And this was written half-a-century ago. It reads like +yesterday!</p></div> + +<p class="date">Oughewall, June 10th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_35_IN_A_CONGESTED_DISTRICT" id="No_35_IN_A_CONGESTED_DISTRICT"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 35.—IN A CONGESTED DISTRICT.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his is the first station on the Balfour line which is to run from +Westport to Achil Sound—now in process of construction by Mr. Robert +Worthington, the great Dublin contractor, who has built about a +million pounds' worth of Irish railway, and who is of opinion that +Home Rule means the bankruptcy of Ireland, and that the labouring +population of the country would by it be compelled to emigrate to +England, bringing their newly-acquired skill as railway workers into +competition with the navvies and general working population. The seven +miles of line between here and Westport are not yet packed and +ballasted, and the ride hither on an engine kindly placed at the +disposal of the <i>Gazette</i>, was not lacking in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>pleasurable excitement. +The bogey engine kicked and winced and bucked and cavorted in a +fashion unique in my experience. She seemed to be exhilarated by the +pure mountain air, charged with ozone from the Atlantic main. Watching +her little eccentricities, it was hard to believe her not endued with +animal vitality. She walked the railway like a thing of life. She +ducked and dived and plunged and snorted and reared and jibbed like a +veritable cocktailed nag of the true old Irish breed. Sometimes she +seemed to go from under you as she suddenly dipped into a slight +depression. Sometimes she rolled like a ship at sea, and you began to +wonder if sea-sickness were possible on land. The scenery is not +striking, and the surrounding country, though poor and desolate, is by +no means sterile. No tracts of black bog, no impassable morasses, no +miles of rocks and boulders, but a fairly good grazing country, with +here and there, at long intervals, a white cottage. The engine slows +at one point, where the rails are twisted into serpentine convolutions +by yesterday's tropical heat. Both sides are considerably displaced, +but they still bear the right relation to each other, and the faithful +machine, sniffing and picking her way carefully, glides safely over +the contorted path. A short tunnel, with sides of solid masonry and +roof-arch of brick, again demands extra care, and it is well that the +pace is slowed, for half-way through, a man becomes dimly visible +running a trolley off the line. Mountains arise on the left and in +front, and my old friend Croagh Patrick puts in his Nationalist +appearance. Then Newport heaves in sight, a cemetery on high ground +opposite the site of the station, and overhanging the line, kept in +its place by an immense retaining wall, without which the "rude +forefathers of the hamlet" would fall from their narrow cells and +block the progress of the civilising train. A handsome viaduct ends +the run, <i>finis coronat opus</i>, and I walk a hundred yards to see the +awkward spot which at first seemed to have no bottom, but which energy +and industry have conquered, as they conquer everything. The line was +going on happily until this point was reached, when a soft bog was +broached, which threatened to swallow everything, opening its +cavernous jaws with appetite which long seemed insatiable. The +engineer choked it off with a hundred thousand cubic yards of earth, a +quantity which to the untechnical ear sounds like a little kingdom, or +at least like a decent farm, and the bog cried, Hold! enough. The +total length of the line will be twenty-six-and-a-half miles, the +cost, exclusive of the permanent way, which is an extra of some £1,800 +a mile, being £110,000, most of which is dispensed among the labourers +of the district, who thank the Balfour Administration for a great work +which would never have been undertaken as a merely commercial +speculation. The congested areas here, as elsewhere, have been +powerfully assisted and benefited by the sagacity which at once +afforded relief, improved the country, and opened the way to great +markets. Temporary assistance is succeeded by a solid and permanent +benefaction.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>And still the people are not happy. Most of them are rather below the +Irish average. Their isolated position in the extreme west, and their +want of means of communication, may partly account for this. Few ever +see a newspaper, and when they do they only read stuff concocted for +them by unscrupulous people who write down to their level, and +deliberately endeavour to keep them in total darkness. The men +employed on the line work well, and Mr. William Ross, civil engineer, +tells me they are even better workers than the Galway men, to whom I +gave due credit for industry. The townsfolk are great politicians. +That is, they echo the absurdities they hear, and are ready to believe +anything, provided it is unlikely enough. The country papers of +Ireland are poor and illiterate beyond belief, but their assumption of +knowledge and superior information is amazing. One of the Galway rags +recently treated its readers to a confidential communication having +reference to the real sentiments of Lord Salisbury and Mr. Balfour as +opposed to those ostensibly affected by those statesmen and to those +with which they are popularly credited. Lord Salisbury is really dying +for Home Rule, and Mr. Balfour would depart in peace if he could once +behold a Dublin Parliament bossed by Tim Healy and William O'Brien. +Lord Salisbury is not so bad as he seems, nor is Balfour altogether +beyond hope of salvation. Both are under a kind of Tory terrorism +which makes them say the thing that is not, compels them against their +wishes to fight, forces them reluctantly to make a show of opposition. +But both of them wink the other eye and have doubtless unbosomed +themselves—in strict confidence—to the editor of the Galway paper. +The poor folks of Ireland swallow this stuff, and will quote it +gravely in argument. The <i>Irish Catholic</i> has a large circulation, and +a glance over its columns, particularly its advertising columns, is +highly suggestive at the present juncture. People offer to swop +prayers, just as in <i>Exchange and Mart</i> people wish to barter a pet +hedgehog for a lop-eared rabbit, or a cracked china cup for a gold +watch and chain. Gentleman wishes someone to say fifteen Hail Marys +every morning at eight o'clock for a week, while he, in return, will +knock off a similar number of some other good things. The trade in +masses is surprising. For a certain sum you get one mass a week for a +year, for a higher figure you get two masses a week <i>and</i> an +oleograph, for a trifle more you get mentioned in special prayers for +benefactors, with a rosary that has touched the relics of +Thomas-a-Becket or has been laid on the shrine of Blessed Thomas More. +One advertisement sets forth the proviso that unless the payment is +regular the supplications will be stopped. No pay, no prayer. <i>Point +d'argent, point de prêtre.</i> Prayers and advice, political or +otherwise, at lowest terms for cash. No discount allowed. A reduction +on taking a quantity.</p> + +<p>A very knowing Newport man explained the present political position. +"'Tis as simple as Ah, Bay, Say. Parnell wint over to France an' +Amerikay, an' explained to thim how the English was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>oppressin' and +ruinin' the poor Irish people; an' whin the Saxon seen he was found +out, an' whin the Americans sent thousands an' thousands of pounds to +pay the cliverist men in Ireland to fight the English in Parlimint, +thin the English begun to give us back part of what they robbed us of. +Every bite ye get in England manes that much less in an Irish mouth, +an' the counthry is all starvin' becase England is fattenin'. All the +young folks is gone out of the counthry; an' why did they go? Becase +England makes the laws, an' becase she makes the laws to suit herself, +an' to ruin us. Sure nine-tenths of the land is owned by Englishmen, +who make us pay twice, aye, an' four times the rint the land is worth; +an' that's what England thinks us good for, an' nothin' else. We're +just slaves to the Saxon, as many's the time I heard the priest sayin' +it. An' it was thrue for him. Sure, the counthry is full of coal, an' +if we wor allowed to get it we'd be as rich as England in five years. +Sure, Lord Sligo's estate is made of coal, an' although he's a +Conservative, an' a Unionist, an' a Protestant, the English Parlimint +wouldn't allow him to get it because it was in Ireland, an' they wor +afraid the Irish would get betther off. An' sure they want to keep us +paupers, so that we'll be compelled to 'list for sojers, an' fight for +England against Rooshia and Prooshia, an' Injy, an' foreign parts, +that the English is afraid to do for themselves."</p> + +<p>His opinions are not below the intellectual average of those held by +the majority of the Irish electorate. The ignorance of the rank and +file of the Irish voters is exasperating to Englishmen, who are quite +unable to understand their credulity, to combat their bitter +prejudices, or to make headway against their preconceived notions. +English Gladstonians who believe that Home Rule ought to be a good +thing will stagger with dismay when confronted with the people who +will rule the roost. For the intelligent are nowhere in point of +numbers. The thick-witted believers in charms, in fairies, in the +curative and preservative virtues of holy water, will have the country +in their hands. The poor benighted peasants, who firmly believe that +Mr. Balfour has the moonlighters in his pay, and that the murders of +the Land League were ordered by Lord Salisbury to cast discredit on +the national cause—these are the people who, voting as they are told +by the priests, would govern the action of the Irish Parliament. They +believe that Home Rule by some magic process will supply the place of +industry and enterprise, will open up innumerable sources of boundless +wealth, and will bring about Mr. Gladstone's "chronic plethora" of +money. But, above all, the people are to be for ever delivered from +the "English yoke." What the phrase means they know not. They only +repeat what they have heard. The dogs around Newport are muzzled. It +would be well for the people if their advisers were muzzled too.</p> + +<p>Public feeling is well organised in Ireland. Although the people are +not readers of daily news, the kind of sentiment ordered at +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>head-quarters is immediately entertained. How it spreads nobody knows, +unless it is spread from the altar. A change has come over the public +sentiment. Among the more intelligent farmers there is a revolt +against Home Rule. At a Unionist meeting held the other day at +Athenry, all the speakers agreed on this point. One said that the +change might be inoperative, because the farmers dare not avow their +true opinions, because they have little or no faith in the secrecy of +the ballot, and because they dread the unknown consequences of ruffian +vengeance. The ignorant masses have also experienced a change. They +have been undergoing a process of preparation for the next agitation. +The poor folks at first believed that when they got Home Rule all +would be well. That consummation devoutly to be wished, was to enrich +them all. The agitators have to guard against the resentment of the +disappointed people. They are hedging industriously. If Home Rule +should come it will do no good, because it is not the right brand. +John Bull has spoilt it all, as he spoils everything. Home Rule would +have done all they promised, but this is not the Home Rule they meant! +They took it at first as a small instalment of what they would +afterwards kick out of the Saxon, but those outrageous Unionists have +shaved it down to almost nothing. It is not worth having, and the only +thing to do, say some Newport politicians, is for the Irish +Nationalist party to rise in a body an' lave the House, an' not put a +fut back into it till they get what they want. I wish my Newport +friends could make their counsel prevail.</p> + +<p>The latest phase of feeling, then, is an affected indignation at this +supreme treachery of the English people. Over and over again I have +quoted the opinions of people who said Mr. Gladstone meant to hoax +Ireland again. This was when all seemed to be going quite smoothly. +The Government concessions and the moderate use of the closure have +convinced the doubters that they were right, and they breathe battle +and slaughter. Irishmen like fighting debates, decided measures, +tremendously hard hitting. As a people they do not believe in +constitutional agitation. They would prefer sudden revolutions, +cannons roaring, blood and thunder. They openly avow their preference, +and say that this would have been their method, but that England has +elaborately disarmed the country, which declaration clashes with the +popular opinion, often exultantly expressed, that Ireland is full of +arms. The truth is with the revolutionaries, who would certainly +prefer battle but for its well-known danger. If Ireland could be freed +by moonlighters firing at long ranges from behind stone walls, with an +inaccessible retreat within easy reach, the English yoke would have +but a short shrift.</p> + +<p>A frantic Newporter said:—"We never got anything by love, but always +by fear, and compulsion should be our motto. I've no patience wid thim +that'll stand hat in hand, or be going down on their knees to England +for every bit an' sup. John Mitchel an' James Stephens was the only +men of modern times who properly understood how to manage the English. +Of coorse, Parnell did something <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>to advance the cause, an' 'tis thrue +that he had no revolution nor insurrection of the old sort. But the +Land League was arranged to include all the secret associations and to +make use of thim all. Ye had Whiteboys, an' Fenians an' Ribbonmen agin +ye, an' ye can't say but what the secret societies did the business, +an' not what they call the constitutional agitation. Ye might have +talked to the English Parlimint till doomsday an' ye'd not make it +move a hair's-breadth for Ireland. But follow up yer talk wid a bit of +shootin' an' then ye'll see what ye will see. 'Twas very bad, an' no +man could agree wid it; but it did what no talkin' would ever have +done. Compulsion is the right idea. An' what about dynamite? If ye +look properly at the thing, why wouldn't we use dynamite? Haven't we a +right to do as <i>we</i> choose in Ireland? Ought not the Irish people to +be masters of Ireland? We say clear out—lave us to ourselves, take +away yer landlords, yer sojers, yer police, an' <i>thin</i> we'll not have +recoorse to dynamite. We have a right to free ourselves by any means +that comes handy. All's fair in love an' war. No, I'm not sayin' that +I'd do it meself personally. But whin ye come to look into it, why +wouldn't we be justified in usin' dynamite? Ye pitched shells into +Alexandria whin it suited ye. Why wouldn't we blow up London wid +dynamite, if it suited us?"</p> + +<p>The Newport people have not heard of the Union of Hearts. A decent old +man who was trying to sell home-spun tweed of his own making, +said:—"The English has been hittin' us for many a year, but whin we +git Home Rule we'll be able to hit thim back. God spare me to see that +day!" And he raised his hat, just as the people mentioned by Mr. A.M. +Sullivan, M.P., "raised their hats reverentially" when they heard that +a landlord or agent was shot. Whenever I hear a friendly sentiment, a +friendly wish, a friendly aspiration in connection with England from +the lips of any Nationalist I will gladly record it, if possible, in +letters of gold. I do not expect this to happen. Speakers who attack +England are most popular. The more unscrupulous and violent they are, +the better their reception. Nationalist M.P.'s who in England have +spoken well of Mr. Gladstone or of the English people are sharply +hauled over the coals. The fighting men are the patriot's glory. The +Irish people believe that the introduction of a Home Rule Bill is due +to the action of their bullies, rather than to the persuasive argument +of their civilised men. A very small minority desire to give John Bull +some credit for fair play, an opinion hotly resented by the mob.</p> + +<p>"Ah, now, listen to me, thin."</p> + +<p>"Sure, I'm lookin' at ye."</p> + +<p>"Don't I know we bate the Bill out of Bull."</p> + +<p>"An' how would ye know, at all, at all?"</p> + +<p>"How would I know, is it? D'ye take me for a fool?"</p> + +<p>"Arrah, thin, sure I would not judge ye by yer looks!"</p> + +<p>That is a model bar spar, the combatants drinking dog's-nose, +sometimes called "powdher an' ball"—a drink of neat whiskey <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>washed +down by a pot of porter. The Connaught folk drink whiskey neat, but +usually follow the spirit with water. They take up both glasses at +once, and after a loving sniff at the poteen they pour it slowly down, +the shebeen stuff tasting like a torchlight procession. Then they +hastily toss off the water, making a wry face, and mostly addressing +to the despised fluid the remark—</p> + +<p>"Ye'll find <span class="fakesc">IT</span> gone on before!"</p> + +<p>The desperate appeal of the Parnellite party for funds has evoked much +merriment among Irish Unionists, and much burning scorn from +anti-Parnellites—who themselves have much need of the money. A young +friend has sent me the following parody, adapted from an old and +well-known, melody:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The patriot came down like a wolf on the fold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all that he asked was their silver and gold;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he pocketed all that he got, as his fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the shores of the Liffey to rocky Tralee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho' Pat looked as naked and bleak as his soil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet there stood the patriot to sack up the spoil.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from parish to parish the box went its rounds—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If we give you our speeches you must give us your pounds.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The coming golden time is neatly hinted at. Home Rule will pay for +all:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When it comes, you no longer shall lie in a ditch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Every beggar among you at once shall be rich;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hedger and ditcher shall have an estate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drive his four horses, and dine off his plate.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What! you won't? And your champion in want of a meal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With his coat out at elbows, his shoes down at heel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With his heart all as black as his speeches in print!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Boys, I know what you'll do: you'll just keep back the Rint.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now down with your cash, never think of the jail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Erin's true patriots the Virgin is bail;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She'll rain down bank notes till the bailiff is blind—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still you're slack! Then I'll tell you a piece of my mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The priest is invoked to compel unwilling subscribers:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Would you like to be sent, in the shape of a ghost,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To be pokered by demons and browned like a toast?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or be hung in a blaze with a hook in your backs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till you all melt away like a cake of bees'-wax?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would you like to be pitchforked down headlong to Limbo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the Pope standing by with his two arms akimbo?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No matter who starves, plank down on the spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pounds, shillings, and pence; we'll take all that you've got.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The poem breathes the true spirit of Separatism-cum-Sacerdotalism.</p> + +<p class="date">Newport (Co. Mayo), June 15th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_36_IRISH_IMPROVIDENCE_THE_STUMBLING_BLOCK" id="No_36_IRISH_IMPROVIDENCE_THE_STUMBLING_BLOCK"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 36.—IRISH IMPROVIDENCE THE STUMBLING BLOCK.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he further journey from Newport to Mulranney on the <i>Gazette</i> special +engine was yesterday delayed for a few hours by the announcement that +during the night part of the line had sunk into a bog—a circumstance +which might have seemed unusual and ominous to English engineers, but +which Mr. Lionel Vaughan Bennett regarded as a mere matter of daily +routine, hardly worth more than a passing mention. There was nothing +for it but to take another walk round Newport, and after further +admiring the great wall holding up the embankment opposite the +station—a colossal work executed under great difficulties—to look at +the surrounding landscape. Those who are interested in engineering may +like to know the dimensions of this wall, which is two hundred feet +long, thirty-five feet high, and ten feet thick at the base, tapering +off to a thickness of five feet at the top, and is built of a fine +limestone quarried from the railway cutting a little further out. The +view from either of the ridges between which the town is built, is +magnificent, mountain, valley, sea, and river contributing to the +effect. From one ridge you see Clew Bay and the Croagh Patrick range, +with an immense tract of country of varied appearance. From the other, +immediately above the station, an enormous valley stretches away to +the Bogagh mountain in front and the peaked summit of Lettermoughra on +the left. At the latter point of view are some wooden cabins which the +Saxon might mistake for pigsties or small cowsheds until he discovered +they were inhabited by patriots, keen on Home Rule and charitable +coppers. Beware of civility in these parts. From casual passers-by it +nearly always means an appeal for alms, and after a few days' +experience you are apt to fall into misanthropy. Some of these beggars +have a fine dramatic way of opening the conversation. A hale and +seemingly able-bodied man of fifty or thereabouts came up carrying a +wheel, which he dropped when about ten yards away with the fervently +uttered exclamation—</p> + +<p>"God help the poor—owld—man!"</p> + +<p>This adjuration falling short of its aim, he came up and asked for "a +few coppers," at the same time invoking about sixpennyworth of +blessings in advance, a sort of sprat to catch a mackerel.</p> + +<p>"Got no coppers," I said, rather impatiently.</p> + +<p>"May ye never have one till the day of yer death," said the good old +man, this time with an unmistakable accent of sincerity. He hobbled +off with the wheel, muttering something which may have been blessings, +and a fine healthy young fellow came up. "Good mornin', an' 'tis a +foin bit of scenery, but we can't ate it, an' we'd die afore we'd go +into the poorhouse, an' a thrifle of money for a dhraw at the pipe +would be as welkim as the flowers of May, an' 'tis England is the +grate counthry, and thim that was in it says that Englishmen is tin +per cint. betther than Irishmen, aye, twinty per cint."—and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>so +forth, and so forth. There were six more applications in a hundred +yards, one of them from a well-dressed boy of fourteen or fifteen, who +gracefully reclined on a bank with his legs crossed, his arms under +his head. Begging to the Irish race is as natural as breathing. They +have an innate affinity for blessing and begging, and they beg without +need. Anything to avoid work. They are for the most part entirely +destitute of a spirit of independence. They will not dig, and to beg +they are not ashamed. According to a Newport authority they are +growing worse than ever. While I awaited the fishing up of the line he +said:—</p> + +<p>"The conduct of the poorer classes is becoming more and more a +disgrace to the country. There is poverty, of course, but not so much, +nor in so great a proportion, as in England. This line has been in +progress for two years and a half, and the people of this district +have received many thousands of pounds without any perceptible +improvement of position, either as to solvency or personal appearance. +They are as ragged as ever, as dirty as ever, and decidedly more +dishonest than ever. They are more extravagant in their eating and +drinking, and the women spend more in ridiculous finery; but in spite +of the wages they have earned, they have not paid their way one bit +better than before. They usually sow the land and live on the crops, +selling the surplus to pay the rent, which is usually very moderate, +and well within what the land will pay. For thirty months many +hundreds of them, thanks to Mr. Balfour, have enjoyed an additional +income of fifteen shillings a week, but they have not paid their rents +any better than before. They have so many people agitating for them, +both here and in England, that whatever they do or fail to do, they +know they are sure of substantial support. While Irishmen only were +working for them, they felt less secure, but now Mr. Gladstone and his +following have taken their cause in hand, they feel more sure of their +ground, and accordingly they have lapsed into confirmed laziness and +dishonesty. They have found out the strength of combination, and the +possibility of withholding payment of rent, and year by year they are +falling lower and lower. Their morality is sapped at the root. They +have the utmost confidence in their clergy, and their conduct being +supported, and even advised from the altar, they spend all their money +quite comfortably, sure that in case of eviction the country will be +up in arms for their assistance, and that weak but well-meaning +English tourists, seeing their apparent condition, will help them +liberally. The English tourist has much to answer for. He couples dirt +and nakedness with misfortune and poverty, and nine times out of ten +he is altogether wrong. People with five hundred pounds in the bank +will go about barefoot, unwashed, and in rags. No Englishman can +possibly know his way about until he has lived for some time in the +country, remaining in one spot long enough to find out the real state +of things. He runs about hurriedly from place to place, observing +certain symptoms which in England mean undeserved poverty and +suffering. His diagnosis <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>would be right for England, but for Ireland +it is hopelessly wrong. What he sees is not so often symptomatic of +undeserved misfortune, as of laziness, improvidence, and rank +dishonesty. The Irish are a complaining people. Self-help is +practically unknown among them, at any rate, among the Catholic +population. They have reduced complaining to a system, or, if you +will, they have elevated it to the level of a fine art. The recent +agitations have demolished any rudimentary backbone they ever had, and +the No-rent Campaign, with its pleas of poverty and financial +inability, has done more to pauperise the people than all the famines +Ireland ever saw.</p> + +<p>"You can do nothing for them. One great argument for Home Rule is the +fact that the people are leaving the country. Best thing they can do. +Let them get to some country where they must work or starve. Then they +will do well enough. They work like horses in America, and their +native cuteness conies out in trade with surprising results. The Irish +race make a splendid mixture, but you must not take them neat. I am +looked upon as a monster when I say, Let them go. I think it would be +best. Let them clear out of the country, and leave it to people who +can make it pay. Let Ireland be populated by Englishmen or Scotsmen, +or both, and in twenty years the country would be one of the most +prosperous in the world. Those are my opinions, and few Irishmen will +gainsay them. They think them cruel, but their truth is generally +admitted. Mr. Balfour has helped the people, and in a way which was +best calculated to put them permanently on their feet. All to no +purpose. You can't go on making lines that will not pay. You can't go +on doling out charity for ever. Take the boats, nets, and so on, given +to the congested districts. When those are gone you may give them +more. The people will be exactly where they were. A few have been +taught fishing, you say. But it will not spread. Those who have +learned the art have been taught almost by compulsion, and at the +first opportunity they will fall back into their own ways. The farmers +will not change their methods. If one among them did so he would be a +mark for derision. No Irish villager has the pluck to say, I will do +this or that because it is the best thing to do. He must do as the +others do, even to planting his farm, selling the produce, and also in +disposing of the proceeds. Nowhere is public opinion so powerful, so +tyrannical, or so injuriously conservative as in Ireland. I challenge +contradiction. Any intelligent Irishman who has lived in an +agricultural and Roman Catholic neighbourhood will admit every +statement I have made."</p> + +<p>Later in the day I laid these observations before three Irish +gentlemen dining at the Mulranney Hotel. All three readily and fully +concurred, and there can be no doubt that these sentiments will be +unanimously confirmed by any competent tribunal in or out of Ireland, +Such being the case, the absurdity of the Home Rule agitation becomes +evident at once.</p> + +<p>At last the sportive young engine whose playfulness and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>prankishness +were mentioned in my last, came whinnying up, harnessed to an empty +truck in which was a bench with a green cloth, emblematic of Ireland. +This was better than convulsively clinging to the engine while she +madly careered along narrow and dizzy precipices, every kick +threatening to be your last, and emerging from the fiery ordeal, +begrimed and swarthy, your knees half cooked by the engine fire. All +this happened on my journey from Westport to Newport, but now the +truck promised Sybaritic luxury, and if the rail should again give +way, if the bog-hole, "still gaping to devour me, opened wide," I +should at least disappear with dignity, should take my <i>holium cum +dignitatis</i> in a truck, on a green-covered seat, and with the +consciousness that I was doing something to fill up the gap, to solace +the aching void in Ireland's bosom. Away we went, thundering along +between the quivering bogs, as through a land of brown-black +calves'-foot jelly. The line itself is sound, well-made and firm. I +had this from Mr. Hare, engineer of the Board of Works, who said that +Mr. Worthington's railways have an excellent name for solidity and +thorough, conscientious work. Mr. Hare was formally taking over the +last bit of line, that between Mulranney and Achil Sound, with which +the Midland and Great Western Company will at present have nought to +do. The company will work from Westport to Mulranney, although some +portions of the line have a gradient of one in sixty, and the +directors are shy of anything steeper than one in a hundred by reason +of the wear and tear involved to rolling stock and permanent way by +gradients requiring so much brake power. But the last seven miles they +decline to touch on the terms offered by the Government at present. No +doubt the line will be worked, and by the company aforesaid, but the +contracting parties are for the moment at a deadlock. No line between +Mulranney and the Sound could possibly pay. England is building Irish +railways to give the people a chance, as the splendid quays of +Newport, Limerick, and Galway were built.</p> + +<p>Nothing, or next to nothing, is done on these quays. The Channel, as +it is called at Newport, is a fine expanse of water about one hundred +and twenty yards wide, leading through Newport Bay directly into the +Atlantic. Only one boat, I was told, comes into the port. I saw it +there, unloading a hundred and eighty tons of Indian corn—a Glasgow +vessel, the Harmony, a sailer, which had taken three weeks to the +voyage, which a steamer easily runs in thirty six to forty hours. +Galway was busier, but not by Irish enterprise, and Limerick was +mostly fast asleep. The people cry aloud and shout for quays, +harbours, piers, and railways; and when they are built they ask for +something else. They are without the faculty of industrial enterprise. +They are always waiting for weather, wind, and tide. They lack +resourcefulness, energy, invention. When the flour mills ceased to pay +they had no notion of using the buildings and water-power for some +other purpose. When the Coventry ribbon trade went to the dogs <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>the +people found salvation in bicycles. If Coventry had been in Ireland +the people would have starved and murmured to the end of time.</p> + +<p>Two miles out we came to Deradda, where eighty men were at work. Next +came Shellogah and the squeamish bit of bog. A number of men were busy +on the line, and right in front of us was a gap in the rails, the +platelayers laying the steel for dear life while the engine came up. +We slackened speed, but made no stop, and the last rail was finally +bolted as we ran upon it. Carefully and gingerly we pushed along, my +triumphal chariot in front of the engine, over the shivering +embankment, on each side of which were deep-cut channels which seemed +to have been hewn through acres of Day and Martin's blacking, so jetty +and oily seemed this Irish bog. The subsidence of yesterday had forced +the boundary walls of the line into wide semicircles, and it seemed +likely to be touch-and-go with the engine, truck, and your humble +commissioner. I took a last look at the landscape, and made a final +note, but, while inly wondering whether I should be ultimately +consumed in the form of peat or dug up and exhibited to future ages as +a bog-preserved brutal Saxon, with a concluding squash we passed the +rotten spot, and it was permissible to breathe again. "We prefer it to +sink at once," said Mr. Bennett. "Then we know the 'hard' is not far +off, and we can fill up till the line becomes solid as a rock. When it +goes down by degrees, sinking a foot to-day and a foot to-morrow, we +find our work more difficult. We never leave a bad bit till we are +assured, by careful examination and severe and repeated tests, that +all is solid and secure." He told me how much earth had been dumped on +this spot, which, like the soft place mentioned in my last, has given +Mr. Balfour's <i>protégés</i> a world of employment. I forget the quantity, +but it sounded like an island or a small range of mountains. Soon on +the left we saw the great expanse of Clew Bay, with its three hundred +and sixty-five considerable islands, nearly all with cottages, cattle, +and pasture, but without a tree. The Yankee breezes blew refreshingly, +and the scenery around became of wildest grandeur. High mountains +hemmed us in on every side, rising one over another, huge masses of +rock impending over untrodden passes, unknown to any guide-book, and +leading no man knows whither. Some mountain sheep on the line scaled +the embankment and leaped the five-foot wall like squirrels. Then a +group of obstinate black cattle, one of which narrowly escaped sudden +transformation into beef. Then the station of Mulranney, or rather its +site, for the foundations are not yet dug out. Some neat wooden +cottages attested the contractor's care for his workmen, and the +beautiful bay with its extensive sands and lovely surroundings came +into view far below. A steep descent brought us to the hotel, an +unlicensed house kept by a Northern Protestant. A quaint and charming +place, known and prized by a select few. The Board of Works gave +Mulrannoy a pier, but the whole bay boasted <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>only a single boat. The +people make no use of their pier. It stretches into the sea in a +lonely, melancholy way, and, so far as I could see, without a boat +near it, without a soul upon it or within half-a-mile. The Mulranians +cannot do anything with the pier until they get Home Rule. In Limerick +one day I saw a dead cat before a cottage door, in a crowded part of +Irishtown. A week later pussy was diffusing an aromatic fragrance from +the self-same spot. The denizens of this locality are waiting for Home +Rule. They cannot move their dead cats while smarting 'neath the cruel +English yoke.</p> + +<p>The Home Rulers of Mulranney are not original. They say the same +things over and over again, merely echoing what they have been told by +others. They believe that their country has unlimited good coal, and +that the English Parliament prevents the mines being sunk for fear of +losing Irish custom. "We wish it were trap," said Mr. Bennett. "We are +always looking for it, but although we have made a million's worth of +railway, we have never seen a vestige of coal. It is safe to say that +there is no coal in Ireland, except in one or two well-known spots, +where it exists, and is mined, in small quantities." Another +enlightened Irishman, of wide experience in many lands, expressed the +conviction of the majority of his countrymen that the proposed +Parliamentary change will never take place.</p> + +<p>"The thing is too ridiculous to be possible. The respectable portion +of the community were alarmed at first, as well they might be, knowing +as they do precisely what it means. But as time went on that alarm has +to a great extent subsided, not, as some will say, because the people +are in any degree reconciled to the idea, but purely and simply +because they see that the bill must perish when exposed to the light +of criticism. The people as a whole do not want the bill. The poorer +classes do not know in the least what it means, nor what all the +bother is about. They are told that they will be hugely benefited, but +nobody can tell them how. Of course they vote for Home Rule, because +in these parts the priest stands at the door of the polling booth and +tells them as they go in how they are to vote. He also questions them +as they come out, and they know beforehand that he will do so, and act +accordingly. They dare not tell him a lie, for fear of spiritual +trouble. They believe that the priest has their eternal future in his +hands, and this belief is encouraged by the well-known argument used +by the Roman Catholic clergy, a very familiar phrase in Ireland, "You +must do as I tell you, for <i>I</i> am responsible. God will require your +soul of <i>me</i> at the day of judgement!" What can the poor folks do? +Even the higher classes are not exempt from this superstitious fear. +They may be more or less freethinkers—freethinking is common among +educated Catholics who are yet compelled by custom to conform to the +outward observances of their faith—but yet, when the pinch comes, +they are influenced by the prepossessions of their childhood and +environments, and they mostly vote as they are told. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>They dread to +offend the priest, though not to the same extent as the poor +peasantry, who believe that confession of a wrong vote would entail +the refusal of extreme unction, and that this would mean untold and +endless torture in the world to come. And the priests preach politics +every Sunday. The people like it better than the old style of +Instruction. They call their sermons Instructions, you know, and they +instruct the people to some tune. No doubt they have a right to +persuade their flocks to follow a certain course. The temptation to +preach something which at once catches the people's attention and +furthers their own views is very great, and perhaps excusable. But is +their teaching designed or calculated to suit England? The English may +not understand the Irish question, but they may be sure that whatever +suits the Papal power does not suit them. The modern Irish priest is a +sworn foe to England. It cannot be otherwise. He springs from the +small farmer class, which has sworn to extirpate landlordism, which, +to their minds, is synonymous with British rule. The English +Parliament, hoping to win over the farmers, who are the strength of +Ireland, has made one concession after another, with what result? +Absolutely none. The property of the landlord has been sacrificed bit +by bit, in fruitless endeavour to please these people, who are more +discontented than ever. And so they will continue to be as long as +discontent pays. In Ireland the landlord is nothing, the tenant is +everything. The policy of England with regard to Irish landlords +reminds me of the man who, having to dock a dog's tail, cut off +half-an-inch every day to gradually accustom him to the loss, and to +minimise the 'suffering of the baste.'"</p> + +<p>You can go nowhere in Ireland without meeting an Ulsterman. There was +one at Mulranney. You may know them by their accent, by their size, by +a general effect of weight, decision, and determination. They are +mostly big men, large-boned and large-limbed, of ruthless energy, of +inexhaustible vitality. They are demons in argument, tenacious and +crushing. They bowl straight over-hand and dead on the middle stump. +The lithe and sinuous Celt is no match for them. No matter how he +twists and turns they grab him up, and, will he, nill he, fix him in +front of the argument. They are adepts in cornering an opponent by +keeping him to the point. You cannot catch them napping, and you +cannot turn their flank. They are contented enough, except that they +sigh for more worlds to conquer. They delight in difficulties, and +demolish Home Rulers with a kind of contempt as if the work were only +fit for children. They seem to be fighting with one hand, with great +reserve of power, and, after doubling up an opponent, they chuck him +over the ropes, and look around, as if, like Oliver, asking for +"more." My Mulranney friend said:—</p> + +<p>"Bull confessedly does not know what to do, and he calls in two sets +of Irish experts (we'll say) and asks for their opinions. One set of +Irishmen never quarrel with anybody and always pay their debts. The +other set quarrel with everybody and don't pay what <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>they owe. One set +are successful in everything, the other set are successful in nothing. +One set have always been friendly and helpful to Bull, the other set +have always been unfriendly and obstructive to him. He proposes to +reject the advice of the successful, amicable, helpful men, who have +always stuck up for him, and to follow the advice of the quarrelsome, +unsuccessful, unfriendly men, who have always spoken ill of him and +have spent their energies in trying to damage him. Bull must be a +fool—or rather he would be if he meant to act in this foolish way. He +will not do so; that can never be. But why waste so much time?"</p> + +<p>I submitted that this waste was due to Mr. Gladstone, and not to +England at all. He said—</p> + +<p>"There is no England now. There's nothing left but Gladstone."</p> + +<p>Of course he was wrong, but the mistake is one that under present +circumstances any loyal Irishman might easily make.</p> + +<p class="date">Mulranney (Co. Mayo), June 17th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_37_ON_ACHIL_ISLAND" id="No_37_ON_ACHIL_ISLAND"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 37.—ON ACHIL ISLAND.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he final spurt from Mulranney to Achil Sound was pleasant, but devoid +of striking incident. This part of the line is packed and ballasted, +and the <i>Gazette</i> engine sobered down to the merely commonplace, +dropping her prancing and curveting, with other deplorable excesses of +the first two runs, and pushing my comfortable truck with the +steadiness of a well-broken steed. No holding on was required, as we +ran between the two ranges of mountains which guard the Sound, and +along the edge of a salt-water creek, which seemed to be pushing its +investigations inland. Barring the scenery the ride became +uninteresting by its very safety. The line for the most part is based +upon the living rock, and there were no exciting skims over +treacherous bogs, no reasonable chance of running off the line, no ups +and downs such as on our first flight were remindful of the switchback +railway, no hopping, jumping, or skipping. Anybody could have ridden +from Mulranney to Achil. There was no merit in the achievement. All +you had to do was to sit still and look about. You could no longer +witch the world with noble truckmanship. We ran over a bridge built to +replace one washed away by a mountain torrent. The engineer who +constructed the first had failed to realise that the tinkling rivulet +of summer became in winter a fiercely surging cataract. The Achil +Mountains loomed in full view, Croaghaun to the left, Sliebhmor +(pronounced Slievemore) the Great Mountain, in front, with many others +stranger still of name. Then the Sound came in sight, with the iron +viaduct-bridge which has turned the island into a peninsula. Then the +final dismount, and a scramble among rusty rails, embankments, +sleepers, and big boulders strewn about in hopeless chaos. Then the +little <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>inn, with a stuffed fox and a swan in the porch. A glance at +the day-before-yesterday's paper, which has just arrived, and is +considered to serve up news red-hot; and then invasion of the island. +A few hookers are anchored near the swivel-bridge of the viaduct, in +readiness for their cargoes of harvesters for England and Scotland, +and now and then big trout and salmon throw themselves in air to see +what is going on in the world around them. A group of men who are +busily engaged in doing nothing, with a grace and ease which tells of +long experience, manifest great interest in the stranger, whom they +greet civilly and with much politeness. Men, women, and children are +digging turf in a bog beside the road. All suspend operations and look +earnestly in my direction. This is one of the amenities of Irish life. +Driving along a country road you see men at work in a field. They stop +at the first rumble of the car, and leaning on their spades they watch +you out of sight. Then they resume in leisurely style, for work they +will tell you is scarce, and, to their credit be it observed, they +show no disposition to make it scarcer still. They husband it, hoard +it up, are not too greedy, leave some for another day. They dig +easily, with a straight back, and take a long time to turn round. The +savage energy of the Saxon is to them unknown. Why wear themselves +out? "Sweet bad luck to the man that would bur-rst himself as if the +wuruld wouldn't be afther him. Divil sweep the omadhaun that would +make his two elbows into a windmill that niver shtops, but is always +going. Fair an' aisy goes far in a day. Walkin' is betther than +runnin', an' standin' is betther than walkin', an' sittin' is betther +than standin', an' lyin' is betther than any o' thim. Twas me owld +father said it, an' a thrue wurud he shpoke, rest his sowl in glory."</p> + +<p>The Achil folks are ardent politicians. They have been visited by +Michael Davitt, Dr. Tanner, and others, and most of the population, +all the Catholics in fact, became members of the Land League. The area +of the island is about forty thousand acres, a vast moorland, with +miles of bog, and hills and mountains in every direction. There are +also several large lakes, which abound with white trout. The +cultivated portions of the land only seem to dot the great waste, +which nevertheless supports a population of some five thousand +persons. The houses are mostly filthy, the people having cattle which +live with the family. I approached a house to make inquiries, and was +driven from the open door by the smell issuing from the interior. The +next was sweeter, having perhaps been more recently cleaned out. Only +one room, with a big turf fire, creating an intolerable atmosphere. A +bed filled one-third of the floor, most of the remainder being +occupied by two cows. A rough deal table near the bed comprised the +furniture, and visitors, therefore, must sit on the sleeping +arrangement. A civilised Irishman said:—"Two cows, two clean cows +only, and you're surprised at that! Where have you been? Where have +you been brought up? Let me tell you something, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>and when you get to +Dugort ask the doctor there whether I am correct. A family not far +away were stricken down with typhus fever. The people are mostly +healthy and strong, although living under circumstances which would +soon kill people not used to them, or not enjoying the same splendidly +pure air. Well, the poor folks, eight of them, were all down at once, +and no wonder, for when I visited them I never saw such a sight in my +life. There were three in one bed in one corner, three in one bed in +another corner, and two in shake-down beds on the floor. In the same +room were a mare and foal, three cows, one pig under a bed, and a +henroost above, on the ceiling. What would the sanitary authorities of +Birmingham say to that menagerie in a sick room? Somebody wrote to the +Local Government Board, and the Board referred the matter to the Poor +Law Guardians. But the Guardians themselves kept cattle in their +houses. It is the prevailing custom. Wherever you go in Achil, you +will find cattle in the houses, along with the family, sharing the +same room. The people cannot be moved from this custom. A large +landowner built some good cottages for them, and offered them rent +free, on condition that they would not live with the cattle. The +people would not accept, so they got the houses at last on their own +terms, and took the cows with them as before. They say that the cows +enjoy the warmth and give better milk. They also say that the big turf +fire stands them in lieu of feed to some extent. The Achil folks are +hopeless in the direction of improvements. They have had the +Protestant Colony at Dugort before them for more than sixty years—a +well-housed, well-clad community, living clearly and respectably, +paying their way, and keeping at peace with all men, but they have not +moved an inch in the same direction. They bury their dead in the old +savage way, without any funeral rites, except such as the relatives +may have in their minds. The priest says no prayer, reads no service, +does not attend in his official character, unless specially engaged +and paid. Usually he does not attend funerals at all, although he may +sometimes join the procession as a mark of respect. And the weddings +are arranged in a way you might think barbarous. A young man fancies a +girl he sees at mass, or at a funeral. He gets a bottle of whiskey and +goes to see the father, who nearly always wishes to get the daughter +off his hands, without any regard whatever for the poor girl's +feelings. I was present at one of these negotiations. 'What will you +give with her?' said the young fellow, a boy of eighteen or so. 'Three +cows and a calf,' said the father. 'So-and-so got three cows and a +calf and a sheep.' said the suitor. The father pondered a bit, but +eventually, not to be behind, conceded the sheep. The lover tried a +bit further. Somebody else had three cows and a calf and a sheep and a +lamb, but the old man stood firm, and the bargain was struck, with +mutual esteem, after several hours' haggling and a second bottle of +whiskey. I called in the evening to learn the girl's fate. She had +been two years in service and had got unorthodox <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>notions. She +screamed with affright when the father brought the fellow forward and +told her what was arranged. She had seen him before, but had never +spoken to him, and the sight of him had always been most repugnant to +her. She ran away into the bogs, but the country was up, and she was +soon found. Then after a sound beating she was handed over to the +ardent swain along with the cows, and so forth, nominated in the bond.</p> + +<p>"They marry early or go to America. The boy is usually seventeen or +eighteen, the girl fifteen or sixteen. I have known girls marry at +thirteen. Not long ago a boy I knew well, a mere weakling, unable to +do even a boy's work, got married. He was seventeen, or nearly +seventeen, but he didn't look it. They believe that their poverty, +such as it is, is due to the predominance of England. Their hatred of +the English is very pronounced, but a casual visitor will not see it. +He has money to spend, and they flock round him in a friendly way. But +let him live among them! They tried to boycott the Protestant +settlement, and if their priests had ruled on that occasion they would +have starved us out or would have made things so unpleasant that we +must have left the field. That was during the Land League agitation. +The Protestants declined to join and vengeance was declared, but +Bonaventure, head of the monastery, forbade it. He is a splendid +fellow, not like the ordinary priests at all. So they were saved. But +let this change come about, once let that bill become law, and all +Protestants must leave the island, must give up the land they have +tilled and tended until it is like a garden, and seek their fortunes +elsewhere. That is a certainty. Ask everyone you meet, and you will +find that each will say just the same thing."</p> + +<p>A smart car driver, named Matthew Henay, was dubious as to the +benefits accruing from Home Rule. His driving was a study, and his +conversations with Maggie, his little mare, were both varied and +vigorous. "Now me little daughter, away ye go. That's the girl now. Me +little duck, ye go sweetly. There's the beauty, now. Maggie me love, +me darlint, me pride; ye know ivery word I spake. Yes, she does, Sorr. +She ondhershtands both English an' Irish. I can dhrive her in both, +but I have an owld woman o' me own that can only dhrive her in Irish. +Home Rule will do no good at all. Twinty years I wint to England to +harvest, an' eighteen iv it to the same masther an' on the same farm. +An' ye don't get me to belave all I hear widout thinkin' a bit. An' I +say, get out o' that wid yer talk o' mines an' factories, an' rubbish. +Where's the money to come from? says I. That's what nobody knows. +Sure, we'd be nothin' widout England. A thousand goes from this part +every year, an' even the girls brings back ten to fifteen pounds each. +That's all the circulation of money we have. An' as all we get's from +England, I say, let us stick to England, but nobody agrees wid me. +There's the girl, now. Away ye go, me little duck, me daughter, me +beauty, me—bad luck to ye, <i>will</i> ye go? What are ye standin' there +for? Will ye get <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>out o' that, ye lazy brute? Take that, an' that, an' +<i>that</i>, ye idle, good-for-nothin', desavin', durty daughter of a pig. +<i>Now</i> d'ye ondhershtand who's masther, ye idle, skulkin', schamin', +disrespictable baste?"</p> + +<p>Misther Henay was favourably disposed towards the Protestant settlers +of Dugort, but another Sounder was very bitter indeed. "A set of +Soupers an' Jumpers an' Double-Jumpers. What's the manin' iv it ye +ask? Soupers is Catholics that's turned Protestants for the sake of +small pickin's sich as soup. That's what they are at Dugort. An' +Jumpers is worse than Soupers. For Soupers only changed once, but +Jumpers is thim that turned once an' then turned back again, jumpin' +about from one religion to another. Ye can have Jumpers in anythin'. +Ye can have thim in politics. Owld Gladstone is a Jumper and a +Double-Jumper an' a Double-Thribble Jumper. An' if we get a Parlimint +for ourselves, 'tis because he daren't for the life of him say No—an' +divil thank him. Yes, we'll take the bill; what else will we do? We +can amend it whin once we get it. But afther so much jumpin', owld +Gladstone's a man I wouldn't thrust. A man that would make so many +changes isn't to be thrusted. I wouldn't be surprised if he wouldn't +bring in a coercion bill at any minute. Ah, the thricks an' the dodges +iv him! An' the silver tongue he has in his head! Begorra, I wouldn't +lave him out o' me sight. 'Tis himself would stale the cross off a +donkey's back."</p> + +<p>The Achil ditches are full of ferns, and a hundred yards from the sea +are clumps of <i>Osmunda regalis</i>—otherwise known as the Royal +fern—spreading out palm-like fronds four feet long. Other ferns, +usually regarded as rare, abound in every direction, and potatoes and +cabbages grow at the very water's edge. The vast plains are treeless +save for the plantations round the house of Major Pike, who has shown +what can be done to reclaim the land, but his excellent example has +attracted no imitators. Except in the Major's grounds there is not a +tree on the island, unless we count the hedges of fuchsias, twelve to +fifteen feet high, which fence in some of the gardens. The Post +Office, engineered by Mr. Robins, of Devonshire, an old +coastguardsman, is surrounded by fuchsia bloom, and every evidence of +careful culture. Here I met some Achil folks who did not understand +English, and a mainland man who does not believe in the future of the +race. He said:—</p> + +<p>"I think their civilisation has stood still for at least five +centuries. They are so wedded to their ancient customs that nothing +can be done for them. They are not so poor as they look, and the +starvation of which you hear in England is totally unknown. As an +object of charity Achil is a gigantic swindle. When the seed potatoes +were brought here in Her Majesty's gunboats the people were too lazy +to fetch them ashore. I was there and heard an Irish bluejacket +cursing them as a disgrace to his country. They do just what the +priests tell them from week to week. Every Sunday they get their +instructions. They keep up the cry of distress when there <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>is no +distress, for fear of breaking through the custom. They have been +helped on all sides, but they will not utilise their advantages. The +sea is before them, swarming with fish, which they will not catch. +They said, we have no pier, no quay. They were set up with these and +everything they needed. What did they do with them? Nothing at all. +The work is falling to pieces and they let it go. They sometimes go +out in coraghs, and catch enough fish for the day's food, but that is +all. They don't pay their rents, and their rents would amuse you. +Twenty-five shillings a year for a decent house and a good piece of +land is reckoned a heavy responsibility. One man I know named McGreal +has twenty acres of good land and a house for seventeen shillings and +sixpence a year. They will not sell you butter, they will not sell you +milk. They say they want it for themselves. None of them has ever paid +a cent for fuel. All have turf for the digging, and much of the Achil +turf is equal to coal. The sea is in front of them, and all round +them, and the lakes are full of fish. And yet the hat is sent round +every other year.</p> + +<p>"They used to pay their debts. Now they will pay nothing, and their +audacity is something wonderful. A gentleman over there has bought +some land, and the people turn their cattle on it to graze. He +remonstrates, and they say, 'What business have you here? Keep in your +own country.' He sued them for damages. They had nothing but the +cattle aforesaid, and, as he could not find heart to seize, he had no +remedy. They keep their cattle on his land, although he has, since +then, processed them for trespass. They have already divided the +spoils of the Protestants; that is, in theory. They are anticipating +the Home Rule Bill in their disposal of the land. They have marked out +the patches they will severally claim, and are already disputing the +future possession of certain desirable fields.</p> + +<p>"English Gladstonians ridicule the fears of Irish Protestants, who +declare unanimously their conviction that Home Rule means oppression. +This ridicule is absurd in face of the fact that every Protestant +sect, without exception, has publicly and formally announced its +adherence to this opinion. The Church of Ireland believes in Catholic +intolerance; the Methodists believe it; the Baptists believe it; the +Plymouth Brethren believe it; the Presbyterians believe it; the +Unitarians, the most radical of all the sects, believe it; the +Quakers, who never before made a public deliverance of opinion in any +political matter, believe it; and all these have issued printed +declarations of their belief. The Roman Catholic laity, the best of +them, believe it; but the Catholic Bishops say No, they will not admit +the soft impeachment. And Englishmen who are Gladstonians believe +these Bishops in preference to all the sects I have enumerated. Could +anything be more unreasonable? But it is of a piece with the whole +conception of the bill, which seems to contain every possible +absurdity, and is based on extravagant <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>assumptions of amity on the +part of Irish Catholics, of which there is not one particle of +evidence in existence. All the evidence points the other way, and +Irish Protestants know that under Home Rule their fate is sealed. +There would be no open persecution, but we should be gently elbowed +out of the country. All who could leave Ireland would do so at once, +and England would lose her most powerful allies in the enemy's camp. +For it is the enemy's camp, and this fact should be borne in mind. Mr. +Gladstone and his followers would be horrified to hear such a +statement, which they would regard as rank blasphemy. But every +Irishman knows it, and every Englishman knows it who lives here long +enough to know anything. Irish Nationalists have two leading ideas—to +get as much out of England as possible, and to damage her as much as +possible by way of repayment. Mr. Gladstone wants to put England's +head on the block, to hand an axe to her sworn enemy, and to say, 'I'm +sure you won't chop.' People who have common sense stand amazed, +dumbfounded at so much stupidity."</p> + +<p>A pious Catholic bore out the statements of my first Achil friend with +reference to the comparative comfort of the Islanders. He said:—"We +live mostly on bread and tea. Of course we have plenty of butter and +eggs, and now and then we go out and get some fish. I had a go at a +five-pound white trout to-day, with plenty of butter and potatoes. At +Dugort people who live in cabins have money in the bank, aye, some of +them have several hundred pounds. And yet they took the seed potatoes +sent by England. Well, they wanted a change of seed, and they must do +the same as their neighbours. It would not do to pretend to be any +better off than the rest. They are compelled to do as the majority do +in everything, or they would be boycotted at once. They cease work +when a death occurs in the parish. If an infant three days old should +give up the ghost, every man shoulders his spade and leaves the field. +And he does not return till after the funeral. If another death +occurred on the funeral day, he would leave off again, and so on. No +matter how urgent the state of the crop, he must leave it to its fate, +or leave the country, for no one would know a person who would work +while a corpse lay in the parish. They would look upon him as an +infidel, and, if possible, worse than a Protestant. Luckily we don't +often die hereabouts, or we'd never get the praties set or the turf +cut. Sometimes they won't go to work because someone is expected to +die, and they say it isn't worth while to begin. I have known a +lingering case to throw the crops back a fortnight or more. Oh, they +don't grumble; any excuse for laziness is warmly welcomed. They +complain when people die at inconvenient times, and will say the act +might have been delayed till a more convenient season, or might have +been done a little earlier. The whole population turn out for the +funeral, but they don't dig the grave until the procession reaches the +graveyard. Then the mourners sit around smoking, both men and women, +while a couple <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>of young chaps make a shallow hole, and cover the +coffin with four to six inches of earth. No, it is not severely +sanitary, but we are not too particular in Achil."</p> + +<p>These unsophisticated islanders are decidedly interesting. Their +customs, politics, manners, morals, odours seem to be strongly +marked—to have character, originality, individuality. I fear they are +mostly Home Rulers, for in Ireland Home Rule and strong smells nearly +always go together.</p> + +<p class="date">Achil Sound, June 20th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_38_THE_ACHIL_ISLANDERS" id="No_38_THE_ACHIL_ISLANDERS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 38.—THE ACHIL ISLANDERS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterd.png" alt="D" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ugort, the capital city of Achil, is twelve miles from the Sound, a +terrible drive in winter, when the Atlantic storms blow with such +violence as to stop a horse and cart, and to render pedestrianism +well-nigh impossible; but pleasant enough in fine weather, +notwithstanding the seemingly interminable wastes of bog and rocky +mountain, dotted at infrequent intervals with white cottages, single +or in small clusters of three or four. After Major Pike's plantations, +near the Sound, not a tree is visible all the way to Dugort, although +at some points you can see for ten miles or more. Here and there where +the turf has been cut away for fuel, great gnarled roots of oak and +fir trees are visible, bleached by exposure to a ghastly white, +showing against the jetty soil like the bones of extinct giants, which +indeed they are. The inhabitants say that the island was once covered +by a great forest, which perished by fire, and Misther Patrick Toolis, +with that love of fine words which marks the Irish peasant, said that +the charred interior of the scattered remains proves that the trees +were "desthroyed intirely by a grate confiscation." The heather, of +two kinds, is brilliantly purple, and the Royal fern grows everywhere +in profusion, its terra-cotta bloom often towering six feet high. The +mountains are effectively arranged, and imposing by their massiveness, +height, and rugged grandeur. Some of the roads are tolerable, those +made by Mr. Balfour being by far the best. Others are execrable and +dangerous in the extreme, and in winter must be almost impassable. +Sometimes they run along a narrow ridge which in its normal condition +was of barely sufficient width to carry the car, and it often happens +that part of this has fallen away, so that the gap must be passed by +leading the horse while the car scrapes along with one wheel on the +top and one clinging to the side of the abyss. The natives make light +of such small inconveniences, and for the most part ride on horseback +with saddles and crupper-bands of plaited rye-straw. Every householder +has a horse or an ass, mostly a horse, and young girls career adown +the mountain sides in what seems the maddest, most reckless way, +guiding their half-broken, mustard-coloured steeds with a single rein +of plaited straw, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>adjusted in an artful way which is beyond me to +describe. Very quaint they look, on their yellow horses, which remind +you of D'Artagnan's orange-coloured charger, immortalised by Dumas in +the "Three Musketeers;" their red robes floating in the breeze, their +bare feet hanging over the horse's right flank. When they fall off +they simply get on again. They seldom or never are hurt. They are hard +as nails and lissom as cats. Dr. Croly, of Dugort, saw a girl thrown +heels over head, turning a complete somersault from the horse's back. +She alighted on her feet, grabbed the rein, bounded up again, and +gaily galloped away. During my hundred miles riding and walking over +the island I saw many riderless horses, fully accoutred in the Achil +style, plodding patiently along the moorland roads, climbing the steep +mountain paths. At first I thought an accident had occurred, and spent +some time in looking for the corpse. There was no occasion for fear. +The Achil harvesters going to England and Scotland ride over to the +Sound, where lie the fishing smacks which bear them to Westport, and +then turn their horses loose. The faithful beasts go home, however +long or devious the road, sometimes alone, sometimes in company, only +staying a moment at the parting of the ways to bid each other +good-bye, then going forward at a brisker pace to make up for lost +time.</p> + +<p>The hamlet of Cashel, not to be confused with Cashel of the Rock, is +the first sign of life after leaving the Sound. A ravine, with white +cabins, green crops, and huge boulders, on one of which seven small +children were sitting in a row, unwashed, unkempt, with little calico +and no leather. Bunnacurragh has a post-office run by a pensioner who +grows roses, and keeps his place like a picture, the straw ropes which +secure the thatch against the western gales taut and trig, each loose +end terminated by a loop holding a large stone. The stones are used in +place of pegs, and very queer they look dangling all round over the +eaves. Not far from here is an immense basin-like depression of dry +bog. Then a monastery, in the precincts of which the ground is +reclaimed and admirably tilled, the drainage being carried over +ingenious turf conduits, the soil lacking firmness to hold stone or +brick. The vast bulk of Slievemore soon looms full in front, and after +a long stretch of smooth Balfour road and a sharp turn on the edge of +a deep ravine on the right with a high ridge beyond it, the Great +mountain on the left, Dugort, with Blacksod Bay, heaves in sight. A +final spurt up the hilly road and the weary, jolted traveller, or what +is left of him, may (metaphorically) fall into the arms of Mr. Robert +Sheridan, of the Sea View Hotel, or of Mrs. Sheridan, if he likes it +better.</p> + +<p>There are two Dugorts, or one Dugort divided against itself. The line +of demarcation is sharp and decided. The two sections stand but a +short distance apart, each on an opposite horn of the little bay, but +the moral distance is great enough for forty thousand leagues. The +Dugort under Slievemore is Protestant, the Dugort of the opposite +cliff is intensely Roman Catholic. The one is the perfection of +neatness, sweetness, cleanliness, prettiness, and order. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>The other is +dirty, frowsy, disorderly, and of evil odour. The Papists deny the +right of the Protestants to be in the island at all, speak of them +with acerbity, call them the Colonists, the perverts, the Soupers, the +Jumpers, the heretics; and look forward to the time when a Dublin +Parliament will banish law and order, so that these interlopers may be +for ever swept away, and their fields and houses become the property +of the Faithful. They complain that the Protestants have all the best +land, and that the Papist population were wrongfully driven from the +ground now occupied by the colony. Like other Catholic poor all over +Ireland they will tell you that they have been ground down, harried, +oppressed, grievously ill-used, habitually ill-treated by the English +Government, which has never given them a chance. They explain the +prosperity of their Protestant neighbours by knowing winks and nods, +and by plain intimations that all Irish Protestants are secretly +subsidised by England, that they have privileges, that they are +favoured, petted, kept in pocket money. To affect to doubt this is to +prove yourself a dissembler, an impostor, a black-hearted enemy of the +people. Your Achil friend will drop the conversation in disgust, and +by round-about ways will call you a liar. He is sure of his facts, as +sure as he is that a sprinkling of holy water will cure rheumatism, +will keep away the fairies from the cow, will put a fine edge on his +razor, will keep the donkey from being bewitched. He knows who has had +money and how much, having reasoned out the matter by inference. He +could sell himself to-morrow, but is incorruptible, and will remain a +strong rock to the faith, will still buttress up the true hierarchy of +heaven. He cannot be bought, and this is strange, for he never looks +worth twopence.</p> + +<p>It was during a famine that one Mr. Nangle, a Protestant parson from +the North, went to Achil and found the people in deepest distress. +They were dying of starvation, and their priests had all fled. Mr. +Nangle had no money, but he was prompt in action. He sent a thousand +pounds' worth of meal to the island on his own responsibility, and +weighed down by a sense of the debt he had incurred, went to London to +beg the money. He was successful, and afterwards founded the Achil +mission at Dugort, now called the Colony. Needless to say that all the +land belonging to the mission was duly bought and paid for, and that +the Protestants have been the benefactors of Achil. The stories of +wrong-doing, robbery, and spoliation, which the peasantry repeat, are +of course totally untrue. The example of a decently-housed community +has produced no perceptible effect on the habits of the Achilese. The +villages of Cabawn, Avon (also known by its Anglicised name of River), +Ballyknock, Slievemore, and Ducanella are dirty beyond description. +Some of the houses I saw in a drive which included the coastguard +station of Bull's Mouth were mere heaps of stones, with turf sods for +tiles, whereon was growing long grass which looked like a small +instalment of the three acres and a cow. Some had no windows and no +chimney, the turf reek filling the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>hovel, but partly escaping by a +hole in the roof. The people who live in this look as it painted in +umber by old Dutch masters. These huts are small, but there is always +room for a pig or two, which stalk about or stretch themselves before +the fire like privileged members of the family. This was very well for +the Gintleman that paid the Rint. But he merits the title no longer. +His occupation's gone.</p> + +<p>A sturdy Protestant said:—"Suppose Home Rule became law, then we must +go away. We are only here on sufferance, and every person in the +Colony knows it and feels it only too well. Our lives would not be +endangered: those times are over, but we could not possibly stay in +the island. Remove the direct support of England, and we should be +subject to insult and wrong, for which we should have no earthly +remedy. What could they do? Why, to begin with, they could pasture +their cattle on our fields. If we turned them out they could be turned +in again; if we sue them we have a day's journey to take to get the +cause heard, and if we get the verdict we can recover nothing. Shoot a +cow or two! Then we should ourselves be shot, or our children. No, +there has been no landlord-shooting on the island. This kind of large +game has always been very scarce on Achil. Just over the Sound we had +a little sport—a really merry little turn it was—but the wrong man +was shot.</p> + +<p>"A Mr. Smith came down to collect rents. The Land League was ruling +the country, and its desperadoes were everywhere. It was decided to +shoot Mr. Smith, after duly warning him to keep away. Smith was not to +be deterred from what he thought his duty (he was a Black Protestant), +and away he went, with his son, a neat strip of a lad about seventeen +or so. When they got half-way to the house which Smith had appointed +as a meeting-place a man in the bog which bordered the road called +out, and waved a paper, which he then placed on a heap of turf. Young +Smith went for it, and it read. <span class="sc">You'll not go home alive this +night</span>. 'Drive on, Tom,' said the father. 'We'll do our work, +whether we go home alive or dead.' Coming back the same evening the +father was driving, the son, this young lad, sitting at the side of +the car, which was furnished with a couple of repeating rifles and a +revolver. Suddenly three men spring up from behind a fence and fire a +volley at the two Smiths, but as they rose the horse shied and plunged +forward, and hang me! if they didn't all miss. The elder Smith still +struggled with the frightened horse, which the shooting had made +ungovernable, but the boy slipped off the car, and, seizing one of the +rifles, looked out for a shot in return. It was growing dusk, and the +bog was full of trenches and ups and downs, of which the three +fugitives cleverly availed themselves. Besides, to be shot at from a +point-blank range of three or four yards, scrambling down afterwards +from behind a frantic horse, is not the best Wimbledon method of +steadying the nerves. The boy put the rifle to his shoulder, and bided +his time. Presently up came one of the running <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>heroes, and young +Smith shot him through the heart, as neat a kill as ever you saw. The +dead man was identified as a militiaman from Crossmolina, up Sligo +way. The League always brought its marksmen from a distance, and it is +known that most of them were persons who had received some military +training. Then the youngster covered another, but missed, and was +about to fire again when his father shouted, 'Hold hard, Tom, that's +enough sport for one day.'"</p> + +<p>My friend was wrong. The second shot lacerated the man's shoulder, and +laid him up for many a long week. I had the fact, which is now first +recorded, on <i>undoubted authority</i>. Young Smith may be gratified to +learn, for the first time, that his second bullet was not altogether +thrown away. This may console him for the loss of the third reprobate, +whom he had got "exactly between the shoulders," when the elder Smith +ordered him to desist. The occurrence was such a lesson to the Land +League assassins that they for ever after forswore Achil and its +immediate surroundings. As Dennis Mulcahy remarked, "The ruffians only +want shtandin' up to, an' they'll not come nixt or near ye." Mr. +Morley would do well to apply this moral to the County Clare.</p> + +<p>The best authority in Achil said:—"The hat is always going round for +the islanders, who are much better off than the poor of great English +cities. They have the reputation of being in a state of chronic +famine. This has no foundation in fact. They all have land, one, two, +or three cows, and the sea to draw upon. For their land and houses +they pay nothing, or next to nothing; for good land in some cases is +to be had for a shilling an acre. The lakes also abound with fish. +They glory in their poverty, and hail a partial failure of crops with +delight. They know they will be cared for, and that provisions will be +showered upon them from all sides. They say, 'Please God, we'll have a +famine this year,' and when the contributions pour in they laugh and +sing, and say, 'The distress for ever! Long live the famine!' The word +goes round at stated intervals that they are to 'have a famine.' They +jump at the suggestion, act well together, and carry out the idea +perfectly. The Protestants never have any distress which calls for +charitable aid. They live on the same soil, under the same laws, but +they never beg. They pay their rents, too, much more regularly than +the others, who of late years can hardly be got to pay either rent or +anything else. The Protestants are all strong Unionists. The Catholics +are all strong Home Rulers. Their notions of Home Rule are as +follows:—No rent, no police, a poteen still at every door, and +possession of the land now held by Protestants, which is so much +better than their own because so much more labour has been expended on +it, and for no other reason. Who tells them to 'have a famine'? Why, +the same people who arouse and keep alive their enmity to the +Protestants; the same people who tell them lies about the early +history of the Colony—lies which the tellers know to be lies, such as +the stories of oppression, spoliation, and of how the mission took the +property of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>islanders with the strong hand, aided by England, the +home of robbery, tyranny, and heresy. The people would be friendly +enough but for their priests. Yet they have marched in procession +before our houses, blowing defiance by means of a drum and fife band, +because we would not join one or other of their dishonest and illegal +combinations. They opened a man's head with a stone, producing a +dreadful scalp wound, and when Doctor Croly, the greatest favourite in +the whole island, went to dress the wound, five or six of them stopped +his horse, with the object of giving him a 'bating,' which would have +ended nobody knows how. The doctor produced a revolver, and the heroes +vanished like smoke."</p> + +<p>The good doctor is himself a Unionist, but more of a philanthropist +than a politician. He is the parish doctor, with eight thousand people +to look after, the whole being scattered over an immense area. I +accompanied him on a twenty-mile drive to see a girl down with +influenza, much of the road being almost impracticable. Some of his +experiences, coming out incidentally, were strange and startling. He +told me of a night when the storm was so wild that a man seeking him +approached the surgery on all-fours, and once housed, would not again +stir out, though the patient was his own wife. The doctor went alone +and in the storm and blackness narrowly escaped drowning, emerging +from the Jawun, usually called the Jordan, after an hour's struggle +with the flood, to sit up all night in his wet clothes, tending the +patient. On another occasion a mountain sheep frightened his horse +just as the doctor was filling his pipe. The next passer-by found him +insensible. Nobody might have passed for a month. A similar +misadventure resulted in a broken leg. Then on a pitchy night he +walked over the cliffs, and was caught near the brink by two rocks +which held him wedged tightly until someone found him and pulled him +up, with the bag of instruments, which he thinks had saved him. And it +was as well to pause in his flight, for the Menawn Cliffs, with their +thousand feet of clean drop, might have given the doctor an ugly fall. +Two girls, whose male relations had gone to England, had not been seen +for three days. Nobody would go near the house. The doctor found them +both on the floor insensible, down with typhus fever, shut up with the +pigs and cows, the room and its odour defying description. The +neighbours kept strictly aloof. Dr. Croly swept and garnished, made +fires, and pulled the patients through. "Sure, you couldn't expect us +to go near whin 'twas the faver," said the neighbourly Achilese. Mr. +Salt, the Brum-born mission agent, was obliged to remain all night on +one of the neighbouring islands—islands are a drug hereabouts—and +next morning he found an egg in his hat. Fowls are in nearly all the +houses. Sometimes they have a roost on the ceiling, but they mostly +perch on the family bed, when that full-flavoured Elysium is not on +the floor. I saw an interior which contained one black cow, one black +calf, some hens, some ducks, two black-and-white pigs, a mother, and +eleven children. Where they all slept was a puzzle, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>as only one bed +was visible. The hens went whir-r-r-up, and perched on the bedstead, +when the lady smiled and wished me Good Evening. She looked strong and +in good going order. The Achilese say Good Evening all day long. A +young girl was grinning in the next doorway, a child of fourteen or +fifteen she seemed. "Ye wouldn't think that was a married woman, would +ye now," said a neighbour, with pardonable pride. "Aye, but she is, +though, an' a foin lump iv a son ye have, haven't ye, Maureen." Mr. +Peter Griffin, once a land commissioner, told me that a boy having +applied for the fixing of a judicial rent, the commissioners expressed +their surprise upon learning that he was married. "Arrah, now," said +the applicant, "sure 'tis not for the sake of the bit that the crathur +would ate that a boy need be widout one o' thim!"</p> + +<p>In Achil, as elsewhere, the better people are certain that the Home +Rule Bill will never become law. From their point of view, the thing +seems too absurd to be possible. They are face to face with a class of +Irishmen, among whom civilisation seems to have made no perceptible +progress for centuries, who scorn every improvement, and are so tied +and bound down by aboriginal ignorance and superstition as to be +insensible to everything but their ancient prejudices. It cannot be +possible, they argue, that Ireland should be given over to the +dominion of these people, who, after all, are in the matter of +advancement and enlightenment fairly representative of the bulk of the +voters for Home Rule all over the country. The civilised community of +Achil are unable to realise the possibility of such a surrender. They +do not discuss the measure, but rather laugh at it. An able business +man said:—</p> + +<p>"We get the daily papers a little old, no doubt, but we follow them +very closely, and we concur in believing that Mr. Gladstone will in +the long run drop the bill. We think he will turn round and say, +'There now. That's all I can do. Haven't I done my best? Haven't I +kept my promise? Now, you can't blame me. The Irishmen see it coming, +and they will get out of it as much dramatic effect as possible. The +party organs are already urging them to open rupture with the +Government. Compulsion is their game, and no doubt, with Gladstone, it +is the most likely game to pay. But he might rebel. He might grow +tired of eating Irish dirt; he might pluck up spirit enough to tell +these bullies who are jockeying him, and through him the British +Empire, to go to the Divil. Then we'd have a fine flare-up. Virtuous +indignation and patriotic virtue to the fore! The Irish members will +rush over to Ireland, and great demonstrations will be the order of +the day. The Irish love demonstrations, or indeed anything else which +gives a further excuse for laziness. The priests will orate, the +members will prate, the ruffians elate will shoot or otherwise murder +a few people, who will have Mr. Gladstone to thank for their death. +For what we wanted was twenty years of resolute government, just as +Lord Salisbury said, and if Mr. Balfour had been left to carry it out +Ireland would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>have come her nearest possible to prosperity and +contentment. But with steady rule one day, and vacillation, wobbling, +and surrender the next, what can you expect? The Irish are very smart, +cute people, and they soon know where they can take advantage of +weakness. The way these poor Achil folks, those who have been to +England, can reckon up Mr. Gladstone! They call him a traitor now. And +yet he promises to let the Irish members arrange their own finance! +'Here, my boys,' says he, 'take five millions and spend it your own +way.' Will John Bull stand that? Will he pay for the rope that is to +hang himself? Will he buy the razor to cut his own throat? Where are +his wits? Why does he stand by to witness this unending farce, when he +ought to be minding serious business? This Irish idiocy is stopping +the progress of the Empire. Why does not Bull put his foot on it at +once? He must do so in the end. Where are the working men of England? +Surely they know enough to perceive that their own personal interests +are involved.</p> + +<p>"In Achil we have practically peasant proprietary and nothing else. +Eleven hundred men and women are at this moment in England and +Scotland from Achil alone. They will return in October, each bringing +back ten, fifteen, or twenty pounds, on which they will live till next +season. The Irish Legislature would begin by establishing peasant +proprietary all over Ireland. The large farmers would disappear, and +men without capital, unable to employ labour, would take their place. +Instead of Mayo, you would have the unemployed of the whole thirty-two +counties upon you. Ireland would be pauperised from end to end, for +everybody who could leave it would do so—that is, every person of +means—and as for capital and enterprise, what little we have would +leave us. Which of the Irish Nationalist party would start factories, +and what would they make? Can anybody tell me that?"</p> + +<p>I submitted that Mr. William O'Brien, the member for Cork, might open +a concern for the making of breeches, or that Mr. Timothy Healy, the +member for Louth, who was reared in a tripe shop, might embark his +untold gold in the cowheel and trotter business, or might even prove a +keen competitor with Walsall in the manufacture of horsewhips, a +product of industry of which he has had an altogether exceptional +experience. "Is not this true?" I enquired.</p> + +<p>My friend admitted the fact, but declined to believe in the factory.</p> + +<p class="date">Dugort (Achil Island), June 22nd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_39_IRISH_UNFITNESS_FOR_SELF-GOVERNMENT" id="No_39_IRISH_UNFITNESS_FOR_SELF-GOVERNMENT"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 39.—IRISH UNFITNESS FOR SELF-GOVERNMENT.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />here stands a city neither large nor small, Its air and situation +sweet and pretty. It matters very little if at all. Whether its +denizens are dull or witty. Whether the ladies there are short or +tall, Brunettes or blondes—only there stands a city. Perhaps 'tis +also requisite to minute, That there's a castle and a cobbler in it. +It is not big enough to boast a barber. These indispensable adjuncts +of civilisation exist in Connaught, but only at rare intervals. +Roughly speaking, there is a space of about a hundred miles between +them. From Athlone to Dugort, a hundred and thirty miles, there is +only one, both towns inclusive. Castlereagh is a deadly-lively place +for business, but keenly awake to politics. The distressful science +absorbs the faculties of the people, who care for little else. Like +all the Keltic Irish, they are great talkers, and, surely, if talking +were working the Irish would be the richest nation in the world. +"Words, words, words," and no deeds. The Castlereagh folks are growing +despondent. The Irish Parliament that was to remit taxation, present +every able-bodied man with a farm, do away with landlords and police, +and reduce the necessity for work to a minimum, seems to them further +off than ever. They complain that once again the people of Ireland +have been betrayed. Mr. Gladstone has done it all. To be sure they +never trusted him, but they thought him an instrument in the hands of +Fate and the Irish Parliamentary party. Spite of all he is supposed to +have done for the Irish, Mr. Gladstone is not popular in Ireland, and, +as I pointed out months ago, they from the first declined to believe +in his sincerity. They rightly regarded his action anent Home Rule as +the result of compulsion, and, rightly or wrongly, believed that he +would take the first opportunity of throwing over the whole scheme. +That he should act thus treacherously (they say) is precisely what +might be expected from an impartial review of his whole career, which +presents an unequalled record of in-and-out running—consistent only +in its inconsistency. Having apparently ridden straight for awhile, it +is now time to expect some "pulling." His shameful concessions to the +Unionist party may be taken as a clear indication of his congenital +crookedness, and the refusal of the Nationalists at Killybegs, on the +visit of Lord Houghton, the other day, to give a single shout for the +Grand Old Man, bears out my previous statement as to the popular +feeling. Amid the carefully organised show of enthusiasm and mock +loyalty which greeted the visit of the Viceroy, not a cheer could be +raised for Mr. Gladstone. The local wirepullers did their best, but +the priests who for weeks have been arranging their automata, at the +last moment found that the dummies would not work. There were rounds +of cheering for this, that, and the other, and when the mob were in +full cry, someone shouted, "Three cheers for Mr. Gladstone." Dead +silence. The Gladstonian <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>Viceroy and his following were left high and +dry. The flood of enthusiasm instantly receded, and the beating of +their own hearts was the only sound they heard. Mr. Morley's name +would have obtained a like reception. The people were doubtless +willing to obey their leaders, and to make some slight sacrifice to +expediency, but every man left that particular cheer to his neighbour. +Hence the fiasco for which the people have already been severely +reprimanded. Someone should have called for cheers for Balfour. Anyone +who knows the West of Ireland knows there would have been an outburst +of hurrahs, hearty and spontaneous. The Irish are delightfully +illogical.</p> + +<p>A respectable old Fenian had a poor opinion of the present Home Rule +agitation. He said:—"I am of the school of Stephens and Mitchel. When +a people or nation is radically discontented with its rulers it should +throw them off by force. If the Irish could hold together long enough +to maintain an armed insurrection for two weeks only, help would be +forthcoming from all quarters. When a young man I cherished the hope +that this would be accomplished, but I have long abandoned the notion +that anything of the kind will be possible in my time. For individual +Englishmen I have as much friendship as anybody, not being himself an +Englishman, can entertain. What I dislike is English rule, and the +present movement does not interest me, because its leaders profess +allegiance—for the present, anyhow. No doubt the general idea is to +obtain as much advantage as possible, and to gradually increase the +strength of Ireland; but, in my opinion, the Fenian movement was the +true and legitimate method, and the one best suited to the genius of +the Irish nation. Notwithstanding all that has been said and written +by English speakers and writers, the movement was worthy of honour, +and had it been successful, would have received high praise and +commendation from every country except England. To be respectable, +revolutions or insurrections must be successful, or at any rate, must +have a certain amount of success to commence with. The English people +never properly understood the Fenian movement. To begin with, the name +of Fenians was not assumed by the Irish body of conspirators. The +Fenians proper were entirely confined to America, where they acted +under the instructions of John O'Mahony, with Michael and Colonel +Corcoran as lieutenants. The Colonel commanded the Irish brigade of +the American army, and was pledged to bring over a strong contingent +at the right moment. The Irish party in Ireland under Stephens was +called the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood, to which I am proud to say +I belonged. That is all over now, and I am content to be loyal, under +compulsion. There is nothing else for it. The young men are all gone +to America, and the failure of the enterprise has damaged the prestige +of the cause. The organisation was very good, and you might say that +the able-bodied population belonged to it, almost to a man. England +never knew, does not know even now, how universal was the movement. +The escape of James Stephens, the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>great Number One, from Richmond +Bridewell, was something of an eye-opener, but not half so astonishing +as some things that would have happened if the general movement had +been successful. It was Daniel Byrne and James Breslin, who let him +out. Byrne was a turnkey, Breslin was hospital superintendent, and +both held their posts on account of their well-known loyalty. Byrne +was found out, or rather it was discovered that he was a Fenian, but +they could not prove his guilt in the Stephens affair, and he never +rounded on Breslin, who went on drawing his screw from the British +Government for many a long day, until he took a trip to America, where +his services to the cause landed him in a good situation. So he stayed +there, and told everything, and that was the first the British +Government knew about it, beyond suspicion of Byrne.</p> + +<p>"If Stephens had made up his mind for an outbreak the funeral of +MacManus was the right occasion. He missed his tip then, and no +mistake. There never was another chance like that. He said the +arrangements were not complete, and from that moment the thing +dwindled away, and we who were working it up in the rural districts +began to think he did not really mean business. We were short of arms, +but a small success would have improved our condition in that respect. +Lots of the country organisers went to Dublin to see his funeral, and +when we saw the crowds and the enthusiasm we all agreed that such a +chance was not likely to occur again. MacManus had been a chief of the +insurrectionary movement of 1848, and had been transported for life to +Botany Bay, I think. He escaped to America, and died there in 1861. +Mahony, the Fenian commander-in-chief, proposed to spend some of the +revolutionary funds in bringing the body to Ireland, there to give it +a public funeral. This was a great idea, and as the Government did not +interfere, it turned out a greater success than anyone had +anticipated. There were delegates from every city in America, and from +every town in Ireland. It took about a month to lug MacManus from the +Far West to Dublin, and the excitement increased every day. In my +little place we collared all the timid fellows who had been holding +back before, until there was not a single man of the peasant class +outside the circle. MacManus was worth more dead than alive.</p> + +<p>"A hundred thousand men followed the hearse through the streets of +Dublin. At the critical moment Number One held back. If the streets +had been barricaded on the evening of the funeral the country would +have stood an excellent chance of obtaining its independence. The +moment was missed, and such chances never come twice. The French would +have made a big thing of that affair. Stephens was great at +organisation, but he had not the pluck to carry out the enterprise. He +had not the military training required, nor the decision to act at the +right moment. So here we are and here we shall remain, and I am your +humble, obedient, loyal servant to command.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>"No, I do <i>not</i> believe in the present leaders at all. I think they +want to be paid big salaries as Irish statesmen, and that they are +unfit to clean the boots of the men with whom I acted thirty years +ago. The Fenians, or rather the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood, had +no wish to make money by their patriotism, and what is more, they were +ready to risk their skins, whenever called upon to do so. They were +willing to fight. These chaps do nothing but spout. The I.R.B. agreed +among themselves, and obeyed orders. These fellows can't agree for +five minutes together, and their principal subject of quarrel is—Who +shall be master? Gladstone is fooling them now, and good enough for +them. A pretty set of men to attempt to govern a country! They don't +know what they want. We did. We swore every man to obedience to the +Irish Republic. That was straightforward enough. The young 'uns round +here have the same aspirations, but they dislike the idea of fighting. +They expect to get round it some other way.</p> + +<p>"John Kennedy, of Westport, damaged the cause in Mayo more than any +man in Ireland. He was a young fellow of about five-and-twenty, only a +few years in the constabulary, but somehow he got into sworn meetings +in disguise, and burst the whole thing up. The queerest feature about +this business is the fact that although everybody knew the man not a +shot was ever fired at him. That shows the fairness of the Fenians. A +member of the Brotherhood would have been promptly dealt with, you +bet. But Kennedy was an open enemy, and had a right to circumvent us +if he could. Give us credit for some chivalrous feeling. We certainly +deserved it, as this case amply proves.</p> + +<p>"The Land League? The Ruffian League, the Burglar League, the +Pickpocket League, the Murder League—that's what I always called it. +A hole-and-corner way of carrying on the fight, which had been begun +by <span class="fakesc">MEN</span>, but which the latest fashion of Irishmen have not the +courage to canduct as men. The Fenian conception was high-souled, and +had some romance about it. We had a green flag with a rising sun on +it, along with the harp of Erin. Our idea was an open fight against +the British Empire. There's as much difference between the Fenians and +their successors as between the ancient Romans and the Italian +organ-grinders with monkeys. Good morning, Sir, and—God save the +Queen."</p> + +<p>This was a jocosity if not a mockery, but it was the first time I had +heard the words in Ireland. The tune is almost unknown, and the +current issue of <i>United Ireland</i> ridicules the notion that the Irish +are going to learn it. The band of the Royal Irish Constabulary, +playing in front of their barracks in the Phœnix Park, Dublin, on +Friday evenings, sometimes include the tune in their programme, but +when I heard them it was led up to and preceded by "St. Patrick's Day +in the Mornin'," to which it was conjoined by one intervening chord. A +Castlereagh Protestant said:—</p> + +<p>"The children here are taught to curse the Queen in their cradles. +Don't know how it is, but hatred to England seems bred in the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>bone of +the Catholic Irish. They make no secret of their hopes of vengeance. +The Protestants will have to levant in double-quick time. The people +here hate Protestants, whether English or Irish, likewise anybody who +holds a Government appointment. Some few days ago I was at Westport, +and while in the post office there, a beggar asked Mr. Hildebrand for +alms. You know that every western town swarms with beggars. He said +No, and this tramp immediately turned round and said:—</p> + +<p>"'We'll very soon have ye out o' that, <i>now</i>.'</p> + +<p>"A relative of mine, who holds a sub-office, has been told the same +thing fifty times. There you have the spirit of the poorer people. And +don't forget that the illiterates have the power in their hands. Just +think what this means.</p> + +<p>"In England, with all your agricultural districts, with all your back +slums of cities, there was only one person in each hundred and seventy +who could not write his name, or at all events, one in a hundred and +seventy who was unable to manage his voting paper.</p> + +<p>"In Ireland the figures were one in every five, and of the remainder +two at least were barely able to perform so simple an operation as +making a cross against the right name. Are these people fit to govern +themselves?</p> + +<p>"There were two polling booths in Westport. There were three priests +at each door. Tell the English people that, and see what they think of +it.</p> + +<p>"A Scotch gentleman staying in Westport during the late 'mission' was +stopped at the door of the Roman Catholic Church. He was not permitted +to enter, because the priests are ashamed to show civilised people the +credulity and crass ignorance of their congregation. At one of these +services everybody held a lighted candle, and at a given signal, Puff! +out went out the lights, and with them away went the sins of the +people.</p> + +<p>"A priest was sent for in Achil. The case was urgent. A man was dying, +and without Extreme Unction his chances in the next world were +reckoned shady. The priest was enjoying himself in some festivity, and +the man died before his salvation arrived. A relative declared he +would tell the bishop. The priest reassured him with a scrap of paper, +whereon were written these words, signed by himself, 'Saint Peter. +Admit bearer.' 'Stick that in the dead man's fist,' said he. The man +went away delighted. These are the intelligent voters whose influence +is now paramount in the Parliament of England. It is by these poor +untutored savages, manipulated by their priests, that the British +Empire is now worked. The semi-civilised peasants of Connaught, with +the ignorant herds of Leinster and Munster, at the bidding of their +clergy have completely stopped the course of legislation, and left the +long-suffering and industrious working men of England and Scotland to +wait indefinitely for all the good things they want. The cry is, +Ireland stops the way. Why doesn't England kick it out of the way?</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>"Turn about is fair play. Let England have a turn now. Fair play is a +jewel, and Ireland has fair play. Ireland has privileges of which +neither England nor Scotland can boast. The Protestants of Ireland are +everywhere prosperous and content. The Catholics of Ireland are +everywhere impoverished and discontented. Wherever you go you find +this an invariable rule. The two sects may hold their farms from the +same landlord, on precisely similar terms, and you will find that the +Protestants pay their rent, and get on, while the Catholics don't pay, +and go from bad to worse."</p> + +<p>"Is this extraordinary difference the result of British rule?"</p> + +<p>Many a time I have asked Catholics this question. They cannot explain +the marked difference on the ground of alien government, as both are +subject to the same. They will say, 'Oh, Protestants are always well +off,' as if the thing were a matter of course, and must be looked upon +as inevitable. But why? I ask. That they can never tell.</p> + +<p>Stand on a big hill near Tipperary and you will see four Roman +Catholic churches of modern build, costing nearly a hundred thousand +pounds. Father Humphreys will tell you how the money was raised, will +show you over Tipperary Cathedral, and will let you see the pig-styes +in which the people are housed. That is the man of God who wrote to +the papers and complained that it had been reported that the Catholic +clergy of Tipperary had done all they could to stop boycotting. Father +Humphreys said:—"I protest against this libel on me. <i>I am doing +nothing to stop boycotting.</i>"</p> + +<p>A neighbour of my friend spoke of many changes he had witnessed in the +political opinions of people who had become resident in Ireland, +having previously been Gladstonians in England. He said:—"When the +Achil Sound viaduct was opened, chiefly by the efforts of a Northern +Protestant who gave £1,500 towards the cost, a Scotchman named Cowan +was chief engineer. He came over a rabid Home Ruler, and such a +worshipper of Mr. Gladstone as cannot be found out of Scotland. In six +months he was Unionist to the backbone, and not only Unionist but +Conservative. The Achil folks, when once the bridge was built and +given to them, decided to call it Michael Davitt Bridge. It had not +cost them a penny, nor had they any part in it. At the priest's orders +they rushed forward to christen it; it was all they were good for. +They put up a big board with the name. Cowan went down alone, he could +not get a soul with pluck to go with him, and chopped the thing down, +the Achil Nationalists looking on. In the night they put up another +board, a big affair on the trunk of a tree, all well secured. Cowan +went down and felled it as before, watching it drift away with tide. +Then they gave it up. They wouldn't go Three! Carnegie, the Customs +man, came here a strong Home Ruler. Looking back, he says he cannot +conceive how he could be such an ass. A very cute Scotchman, too. Some +of the Gladstonians mean well. I don't condemn them wholesale, like +father does. You <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>should hear him drop on English Home Rulers. He +understands the Irish agitator, but the English Separatist beats him. +I have been in England, and several times in Birmingham, and I have +heard them talk. Father is very peppery, but I moderate his +transports. Speaking of the English Home Rulers he'll say—</p> + +<p>"'Pack o' rogues.'</p> + +<p>"'No, no,' says I, 'only fools.'</p> + +<p>"'Infernal idiots,' says he.</p> + +<p>"'No, no,' says I, 'only ignorant.'</p> + +<p>"As I said, I have been in England, and have heard them talk, so I +know."</p> + +<p>He asked me if I had noticed the external difference between Irish +communities which support Home Rule and those which support the Union. +I said that a contrast so striking must impress the most casual +observer, for that, on the one hand, Unionism is always coupled with +cleanliness and decency, while on the other the intimate relationship +apparently existing between Home Rule and dunghills is most suggestive +and surprising.</p> + +<p>Unionism and order: Separatism and ordure—that is about the sum.</p> + +<p class="date">Castlereagh, June 24th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_40_OBJECT_LESSONS_IN_IRISH_SELF-GOVERNMENT" id="No_40_OBJECT_LESSONS_IN_IRISH_SELF-GOVERNMENT"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 40.—OBJECT LESSONS IN IRISH SELF-GOVERNMENT.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettera.png" alt="A" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" /> small town with a great name, about one hundred miles west of +Dublin. There is a ruined castle, and one or two ruined abbeys, but +nothing else of interest, unless it be the herons which stalk about +the streams in its environs, and the Royston crows with white or gray +breast and back, which seem to be fairly numerous in these parts. +Ireland is a wonderful country for crows and ravens, which hop about +the village streets as tame as barndoor fowls. A King of Connaught is +buried in Saint Coenan's Abbey, but dead kings are almost as common as +crows, and Phelim O'Connor seems to have done nothing worthy of +mention beyond dying in 1265. I had hardly landed when I met a very +pronounced anti-Home Ruler, a grazier, apparently a smart business +man, and seemingly well up in the controversy. He said:—"I have +argued the question all over Ireland, and believe I have made as many +converts as anybody. Many of my countrymen have been carried away by +the popular cry, but when once they have the thing put to them from +the other side, and have time to think, they begin to have their +doubts. Naturally they first lean to the idea of an Irish Parliament. +It flatters Irish feeling, and when men look around and see the +country so poor and so backward they want to try some change or other. +The agitators see their opportunity, and say, 'All this results from +English interference. If we managed our own affairs we should be +better off all round.' This sounds <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>plausible, and agrees with the +traditional distrust of England which the people have inherited from +past ages. Men who are fairly intelligent, and fairly reasonable, will +say, 'We can't be worse off than we are at present.' That is a stock +argument all over the country. The people who use it think it settles +the business. The general poverty of the people is the strength of the +Home Rule position. The priests tell them that a Government composed +of Irishmen would see them right, and would devote itself to looking +after their interests; and really the people have nobody to tell them +anything else. Nor are they likely to hear the other side, for they +are only allowed to read certain papers, and if Englishmen of +character and ability were to attempt to stump the country they would +not get a hearing. The clergy would make it warm for anybody who dared +to attend a Unionist meeting. So <i>that</i> process is altogether out of +the question. Isolated Roman Catholic Unionists like myself need to be +in a very strong and independent position before they dare to express +their views. Roman Catholics of position are nearly all Unionists at +heart, but comparatively few of them dare avow their real convictions. +To do so is to couple yourself with the obnoxious land question. The +people, as a whole, detest landlords and England, and they think that +an opponent of Home Rule is necessarily a sympathiser with British +rule and landlordism, and therefore a foe to his country and a traitor +to his countrymen. Few men have the moral courage to face this +indictment. That is why the educated Catholic party, as a whole, hang +back. And then, they dislike to put themselves in direct opposition to +their clergy. Englishmen do not care one jot what the parson thinks of +their political opinions, but in Ireland things are very different. I +am against Home Rule because I am sure it would be bad for Ireland. +The prosperity of the country is of some importance to me, and for my +own sake and apart from sentimental considerations, and for the credit +of Ireland, I am against Home Rule. We should be poorer than ever. I +would not trust the present Irish party to manage anything that +required management. They have not the training, nor the business +capacity, nor sufficient consistency to work together for a single +week. They cannot agree even at this critical moment, when by their +own showing, the greatest harmony of action is required in the +interests of Ireland. I say nothing about their honesty, for the most +scrupulously honest men could not succeed without business ability and +united action. They are a set of talkers, good for quibbling and +squabbling and nothing more.</p> + +<p>"They are M.P.'s because they can talk. Paddy loves a glib talker, and +a fellow with a good jaw on him would always beat the best business +man, even if Paddy were allowed his own choice. Of course he has no +choice—he votes as the priest tells him; but then the selected men +were all good rattling talkers, not in the House, perhaps, but in +their own country district in Ireland. Paddy thinks talking means +ability, and when a fellow rattles off <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>plenty of crack-jaw words and +red-hot abuse of England, Paddy believes him able to regenerate the +world. These men are not allowed to speak in the House. They only +vote. But let me tell you they are kings in their own country.</p> + +<p>"Since Parnell ordered his followers to contest all the elective +Boards in Ireland, the Nationalist party have almost monopolised the +Poor Law Boards, with the result that nearly every one has been openly +bankrupt, or else is in a state of present insolvency. Mr. Morley has +been asked for particulars but has declined to give them. He knows +that the list of insolvent Poor Law Boards in Ireland, if once given +with particulars, to the British public, would show up the prospects +of Home Rule in such a damaging way that 'the cause' would never +survive the shock. Why does not the Unionist party bring about this +exposure? Surely the information is obtainable, if not from Mr. +Morley, then from some other source.</p> + +<p>"Why are they bankrupt? you ask. Partly through incompetence; partly +through corruption. In every case of declared bankruptcy Government +has sent down vice-Guardians receiving three hundred pounds to five +hundred pounds a year, and notwithstanding this additional burden to +the rates the vice-Guardians in every case have paid off all debts and +left a balance in hand inside of two years. Then they retire, and the +honorary Guardians come back to scuttle the ship again. Tell the +English people that. Mr. Morley cannot deny it. You have told them? +Then tell them again, and again.</p> + +<p>"In the Killarney Union the Nationalists ran up the rates from one +thousand seven hundred pounds to three thousand six hundred pounds. +More distress? Not a bit of it. But even admitting this, how would you +account for the fact that the cost ran up from sixteen shillings a +head to twenty-five shillings a head for every person relieved?</p> + +<p>"The Listowel Union was perhaps the biggest scandal in the country. +The Unionist Guardians relieved the people at a cost of five shillings +a head. The Nationalists got in and relieved them at a cost of fifteen +shillings a head. And there wasn't a reduction on taking a quantity, +for the Unionists only had two hundred on the books, while the +Nationalists had two thousand or more.</p> + +<p>"At the same period exactly those Unions which remained under the old +rule showed little or no increase in the rates. Kenmare remained +Unionist, and when the great rise in poor-law expenses followed the +election of Nationalist Guardians Kenmare spent less money than ever.</p> + +<p>"The Nationalist Guardians have been vising the poor rates to reward +their friends and to punish the landlords. They have been fighting the +landlords with money raised from the landlords by means of poor rates. +Evicted tenants generally received a pound or twenty-five shillings a +week out-door relief. This punishes the landlords, and saves the funds +of the Land League, now called the National League. Ingenious, isn't +it? These are the men who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>form the class furnishing the Irish +Parliamentary party. These bankrupt, incompetent, and fraudulent +Guardians are the men with whom English Gladstonians are closely +allied. The Board meetings are usually blackguardly beyond +description. You have no idea to what extremes they go. No Irishman +who loves his country would trust her to the tender mercies of these +fellows."</p> + +<p>I have not yet been present at any meeting of an Irish Poor Law Board, +and probably, as my friend remarked, I "do not know to what extremes +they go." The <i>Mayo News</i> of a week or two ago reported an ordinary +meeting of the Westport Board, and I noticed that one Guardian accused +his colleagues of stealing the potatoes provided out of the rates for +the paupers. This was reported in a Nationalist print edited by a +gentleman who has had the honour of being imprisoned for Land League +business. The report was evidently verbatim, and has not been +contradicted. The Westport folks took no notice of the affair, which +may therefore be assumed as representing the dead level of an Irish +Poor Law debate. To what sublime altitudes they may occasionally rise, +to "what extremes" they sometimes go, I know not. The College Green +Parliament, manned by such members, would have a peculiar interest. +The Speaker might be expected to complain that his umbrella (recently +re-covered) had mysteriously disappeared. The Chancellor of the +Exchequer might accuse the President of the Board of Trade of having +appropriated the National stationery, and the Master of the Rolls +might rise to declare that a sanguinary ruffian from Ulster had +"pinched his wipe." The sane inhabitants of the Emerald Isle affirm +that Home Rule would be ruinous to trade, but the vendors of +shillelaghs and sticking-plaster would certainly have a high old time.</p> + +<p>An Englishman who has had exceptional opportunities of examining the +matter said:—"I don't care so much for Irish interests as for English +interests, and I am of opinion that no Englishman in a position to +form a correct judgment would for one moment support the bill. The +tension is off us now, because we feel that the danger to a great +extent is over. The bill could not be expected to survive a public +examination. The Gladstonians themselves must now see that the scheme +was not only absurd and impossible, but iniquitous. Under a Home Rule +Bill their native land would cut a sorry figure, such as would almost +shame the milk-sop Radical party, 'friends of every country but their +own.' A Government with a sufficient majority to carry a British +measure might at any time be turned out of office by the eighty Irish +members, who could at any time make their votes the price of some +further concession. And you know the character of the men, how +thoroughly unscrupulous they are. All are enemies of England, and yet +we who know them and the feeling of their constituencies are asked to +believe that they would never abuse their powers. Why give them the +temptation? Then, whatever debts Ireland might incur England would +have to pay, should Ireland repudiate <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>them? The bill provides that +England shall be ultimately responsible for three-quarters of a +million annually for the servants of the Crown in Ireland, such +servants being at the orders of the Irish Legislature. It is a divorce +case, wherein the husband is to be responsible for the wife's debts +incurred after separation. This is Mr. Gladstone's fine proposition. +And then England will have no police under her control to make +defaulters pay up. You can't make the people pay rent and taxes with +all your present force. How are you going to collect the two or three +millions of Ireland's share in Imperial expenditure without any force +at all? The police will be at the orders of the Irish Parliament, +which will be returned by the very men who will owe the money. 'Oh +yes!' say Dillon, Healy, O'Brien, and all the rest of the No Rent and +Land League men. 'We'll see that the money is paid.' The previous +history of these men ought to be enough for Englishmen. But if Tim +Healy and Co. wished the money to be paid, they would have no power. +They must take their orders from the people. How would you collect the +interest on the eighteen or twenty millions Ireland now owes? The +police and civil officers would, under a Home Rule Bill, be the +servants of the Irish Government, and would have no sympathy with +England. A hitch would very soon arise between the two Parliaments +either on the interpretation of this or that clause, or else because +the Irish Parliament fell short of its duty in collecting the tribute. +The Irish Government would stand firm, and would be supported by +priests and people. The British Grenadiers would then come in, and +where would be the Union of Hearts? Irishmen are fond of a catch-word. +Like the French, they will go to death for a phrase. But the Union of +Hearts never tickled them. The words never fell from Irish lips except +in mockery.</p> + +<p>"Protection would be the great rallying cry of a Home Rule Government. +The bill refuses power to impose protective duties, but Ireland would +commence by conceding bounties to Irish manufacturers, who would there +and then be able to undersell English traders. No use going further +into the thing, there is not a good point in it for either country. No +use flogging a dead horse. There never will be any Home Rule, and +there's no use in discussing it. A liberal measure of Local +Self-Government will be the upshot of this agitation, nothing more. +And that will come from the Tory party, the only friends of poor +Ireland."</p> + +<p>The Parnellites are strong in Roscommon, and to hear them revile the +priests is both strange and sad. These are the only Catholics who +resent clerical dictation. They seem in a quandary. Their action seems +inconsistent with their expressed sentiments. They plainly see that +Home Rule means Rome Rule, and, while deprecating priestly influence, +they do their best to put the country into priestly hands. They speak +of the Anti-Parnellites with contempt and aversion, calling them +rogues and vagabonds, liars and traitors, outside the pale of +civilisation, and yet they work for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>Home Rule, which would put their +beloved Ireland in the power of the very men whose baseness and crass +incompetence they cannot characterise in terms sufficiently strong. +For the Anti-Parnellites outnumber the Parnellites by eight to one; so +that the smaller party, although monopolising all virtue, grace and +intellect, would have no show at all, unless, indeed, the Nationalists +were further subdivided, on which contingency the Parnellites probably +count with certainty. I interviewed a champagny little man whose views +were very decided. He said:—</p> + +<p>"I think the seventy-three Federationists, as they want to be called, +are not only traitors to the greatest Irishmen of the age, but also +mean-spirited tools of the Catholic bishops. A man may have proper +respect for his faith, and may yet resent the dictation of his family +priest. I admit his superior knowledge of spiritual matters, but I +think I know what politics suit me best, and I send him to the +rightabout. Let him look after the world to come. That's his business. +I'm going to look after this world for myself. The main difference +between the Parnellites and the Anti-Parnellites is just this—the +Parnellites keep themselves independent of any English party; the +Anti-Parnellites have identified themselves with the English Liberals, +and bargain with them. My view is this, that the English Radicals will +use the Irish party for their own ends, that they want to utilise them +in carrying out the Newcastle programme, and that having so used them +the Irishmen may go and hang themselves. 'We give you Home Rule and +you give us the Newcastle budget'—that's the present arrangement. But +after that? What then? Ireland will want the Home Rule Bill amended. +The first bill (if ever we get it) must be very imperfect, and will +want no end of improvement. It is bound to be a small, mean affair, +and will want expansion and breadth. Then the Radicals will chuck over +the Anti-Parnellites, who will be equally shunted by the Tories, and +we shall be left hanging in the air. The Parnellites aim at getting +everything on its merits, and decline to identify themselves with any +party. They wish to be called Independents. And they one and all +decline to be managed by the priests. The seventy-three +Anti-Parnellites are entirely managed by the Clerical party. They have +no will of their own any more than the pasteboard men you see in the +shop windows, whose legs and arms fly up and down, when you pull a +string. They are just like Gladstonians in that respect."</p> + +<p>The Parnellites are hard up, and their organ asks America for cash. +The dauntless nine want six thousand pounds for pocket-money and hotel +expenses. The cause of Ireland demands this sacrifice. After so many +contributions, surely America will not hold back at the supreme +moment. The Anti-Parnellites are bitterly incensed. To act +independently of their faction was of itself most damnable, but still +it could be borne. To ask for money from America, to put in a claim +for coppers which <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>might have flowed into Anti-Parnellite pockets, +shows a degradation, an unspeakable impudence for which the <i>Freeman</i> +cannot find adequate adjectives. The priest-ridden journal speaks of +its fellow patriots as caluminators and liars, tries to describe their +"baseness," their "inconceivable insolence and inconceivable +stupidity," and breaks down in the effort. A column and a half of +space is devoted to calling the Parnellites ill names such as were +formerly applied by Irish patriots to Mr. Gladstone. And all because +they compete for the cents of Irish-American slaveys and bootblacks. +The Parnellites are not to be deterred by mere idle clamour. Both +parties are accustomed to be called liars and rogues, and both parties +accept the appellations as a matter of course. Nothing can stop them +when on the trail of cash. Is Irish sentiment to be again disappointed +for a paltry six thousand pounds? Is the Sisyphean stone of Home Rule, +so laboriously rolled uphill, to again roll down, crushing in its fall +the faithful rollers? Will not some American millionaire come forward +with noble philanthropy <i>and</i> six thousand pounds to rescue and to +save the most beautiful, the most unfortunate country in the world +from further disappointment? Only six thousand pounds now required for +the great ultimate, or penultimate, or antepenultimate effort. Another +twopence and up goes the donkey!</p> + +<p class="date">Roscommon, June 27th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_41_THE_CHANGED_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL" id="No_41_THE_CHANGED_SPIRIT_OF_THE_CAPITAL"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 41.—THE CHANGED SPIRIT OF THE CAPITAL.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he Dubliners have quite given up the bill. The Unionist party have +regained their calm, and the Nationalists are resigned to the +position. Nobody, of whatever political colour, or however sanguine, +now expects the measure to become law. The Separatist rank and file +never hoped for so much luck, and their disappointment is therefore +anything but unbearable. My first letter indicated this lack of faith +and also its cause. The Dublin folks never really believed a British +Parliament would so stultify itself. The old lady who, on my arrival, +said "We'll get Home Rule when a pair of white wings grows out o' me +shoulders, an' I fly away like a big blackburd," finds her pendant in +the jarvey, who this morning said, "If we'd got the bill I would have +been as much surprised as if one o' me childhren got the moon by +roarin' for it." Distrust of Mr. Gladstone is more prevalent than +ever, and the prophets who all along credited that pious statesman +with rank insincerity are now saying "I towld ye so." The +Lord-Lieutenant is making his Viceregal progress in an ominous +silence. The Limerick people let him go without a cheer. At Foynes +something like a procession was formed, with the parish priest at its +head; but the address read by his Rivirince <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>reads very like a +scolding. It points out that "our rivers are at present without +shipping, our mills and factories are idle, and it is a sad sight to +see our beautiful Shannon, where all her Majesty's fleet could safely +ride on the estuary of its waters, without almost a ship of +merchandise on its surface on account of the general decay of our +trade and commerce." The address further shows that "we enjoy a +combination of natural advantages in the shape of a secure, sheltered +anchorage, together with railway and telegraph in immediate proximity +to the harbour and the pier, and postal service twice daily, both +inwards and outwards, and a first-class quality of pure water laid on +to the pier. The facility for landing or embarking troops, or for +discharging or loading goods or stores is as near perfection as +possible, and having a range of depth of water of twenty-five feet at +low-water spring tide, the harbour can accommodate ships of deep +draught at any state of the tide." These advantages, mostly owing to +British rule, with others, such as the "unique combination of mountain +and river scenery," were not enumerated as subjects for thankfulness, +but rather by way of reproach, the effect of the whole address being a +veiled indictment of British rule. No doubt Lord Houghton's first +impulse would be to exclaim, "Then why on earth don't you use your +advantages? With good quays, piers, storehouses, and a broad deep +river, opening on the Atlantic, why don't you do some business?" But +he promised to do his best to send them a guard-ship, in order that +the crew might spend some money in the district. The Galway folks +asked him to do something for them. My previous letters have shown the +incapacity of the Galwegians to do anything for themselves, and how, +being left to their own devices—having, in fact, a full enjoyment of +local Home Rule—their incompetence has saddled the city with a debt +of fifty thousand pounds for which they have practically nothing to +show, except an additional debt of one thousand pounds decreed against +them for knocking the bottom out of a coaling vessel during their +"improving" operations, which sum they never expect to pay, as the +harbour tolls are collected by the Board of Works, which thus +endeavours to indemnify itself for having lent them the "improvement" +funds. The Killybegs folks showed the poor Viceroy their bay and told +him what wonderful things they could do if they only had a pier, or a +quay, or something. The Achil folks formerly said the same thing. Two +piers were built but no man ever goes near them. The Mulranney folks +pointed out that while Clew Bay, and particularly the nook of it +called Mulranney Bay, was literally alive with fish, the starving +peasants of the neighbourhood could do nothing for want of a pier. The +brutal Saxon built one at once—a fine handsome structure, at once a +pier, a breakwater, and a harbour, with boat-slips and three stages +with steps, so that boats could be used at any tide. I stepped this +massive and costly piece of masonry, and judged it to be a hundred +yards long. There were six great mooring posts, but not a boat in +sight, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>nor any trace of fishing operations. A broad new road to the +pier was cut and metalled, but no one uses it. The fishing village of +Mulranney, with its perfect appointments, would not in twelve months +furnish you with one poor herring. The pier of Killybegs would +probably be just as useful to the neighbourhood.</p> + +<p>The Dublin Nationalist prints make some show of fight, but the people +heed them not. They know too well that their inward conviction that +Home Rule is for the present defunct is founded on rock. In vain the +party writers use the whip. Your Irishman is cute enough to know when +he is beaten. The new-born regard of the Irish press for Parliamentary +purity is comical enough. Obstruction is the thing they hate. +Ungentlemanly conduct in the House stinks in their nostrils. Fair play +is their delight, and underhand dealing they particularly abhor. Mr. +Gladstone is too lenient, and although his failings lean to virtue's +side, his action is too oily altogether. He is old and weak, and +lubricates too much. They in effect accuse him of fatty degeneration +of the brain. Something heroic must be done. Those low-bred ruffians, +the Unionists, must be swept from the path of Erin, while her eloquent +sons, actuated by patriotism and six pounds a week, and spurred on by +the hope of even a larger salary, obtain after seven centuries some +show of justice to Ireland. The Irish wire-pullers demand decisive +action. They declare that they will no longer submit to the +"happy-go-lucky policy of the gentlemen who survey life from the +Ministerial benches." They must "put themselves in fighting form and +show their supporters that they mean business." "Unless the Ministry +mean to throw up the sponge they had better begin the fighting at +once." The Irish party "are looking for the action of the Government +which is to make it evident to the Opposition that the majority mean +to rule in the House of Commons, for unless this be done Parliamentary +government becomes a farce." If Mr. Gladstone continues the policy of +hesitation and waiting on Providence, the fate of Home Rule, and with +it the fate of the Liberal party, are sealed. "Obstruction" (says the +Parnellite paper) cannot be permitted!" It is the revelation of the +impotency of Parliament, and Parliamentary procedure must be replaced +by some quicker means of effecting reform. Mr. Gladstone's feebleness +is an incitement to revolution. The Dublin press would manage these +things better. An autumn session must not be adventured. If the House +should rise before the bill has passed the Commons such a confession +of weakness would fatally damage the Government prestige. The House +must "be kept in permanent session, and not kept too long," which +sounds like a bull, but the next sentence is plain enough.</p> + +<p>"The obvious policy is to at once take the Opposition by the throat. +That will excite enthusiasm, and convince the people that a Liberal +Government is good for something."</p> + +<p>The Nationalist prints are assuming the office of candid friend, a +part which suits them admirably, and in the performance <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>of which they +make wonderful guesses at truth. The Gladstonian Ministry "are +helpless and impotent in the hands of their opponents. The reforms so +ardently desired by the people are seen to be mere mirages, called up +to win the votes of the people for men who, once in office, make no +real effort to enforce the mandate given to them by the country." The +Liberal Ministry will be "swept out of existence because the people +will come to recognise that their promises and programmes are so many +hollow phrases, incapable of ministering to the needs or satisfying +the aspirations of the multitude." "The real tug of war," says this +Home Rule sheet, "will come in the next election." If Irish +Separatists talk like this, what do Irish Unionists say?</p> + +<p>Very little, indeed. They are disposed to rest and be thankful. They +only want to be let alone. They are quiet and reserved, and thank +their stars that the worst is over. The nervousness, the high-strung +tension of three months ago, is conspicuous by its absence. They +feared that the thing would be rushed, and that Mr. Bull would stamp +the measure without looking at it, would be glad to get rid of it at +any price, would say to Ireland, "Take it, get out of my sight, and be +hanged to ye!" Thanks to the Unionist leaders, whose ability and +devotion are here warmly recognised, the Dubliners know no fear. The +ridiculous abortion has been dragged into the sunlight, and ruthlessly +dissected. John's commonsense can be trusted, once he examines for +himself, and worthy Irishmen lie down in peace. The graver Dubliners +prefer to speak of something else. The young bloods still make fun of +the "patriots," and conjure up illimitable vistas of absurd +possibilities under an Irish Government. They invariably place the +hypothetic Cabinet under the direct orders of Archbishop Walsh, and +continue to make fun of that great hierarch's famous malediction on +Freemasonry. The good Archbishop, they say, takes a large size in +curses. They declare that his curse on the Masonic bazaar for orphans +was a marvel of comprehensive detail; that it cursed the +stall-holders, the purchasers, the tea-pot cosies and fender-stools, +the five-o'clock tea-tables and antimacassars, the china ornaments, +and embroidered slippers, with every individual bead; the dolls, both +large and small; the bran that stuffed the dolls, and the very squeaks +which resulted from a squeeze on the doll's ribs. Never was heard such +a terrible curse. But what gave rise to no little surprise, nobody +seemed one penny the worse. These scoffers propose to discontinue the +habit of swearing. When the Archbishop produces no effect, what's the +good of a plain layman's cursing? They declare that the dentists of +Dublin are all Home Rulers, and that the selfishness of their +political faith is disgustingly obvious. These mocking Unionists +discuss probable points of etiquette likely to arise in the +Legislature of College Green, and dispute as to whether members will +be allowed to attend with decidedly black eyes, or whether they will +be excluded until the skin around their orbs has arrived at the pale +yellow stage. Some are of opinion <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>that no Cabinet Minister should be +allowed to sit while wearing raw beefsteak, and a story is going the +rounds to the effect that some of the Irish members recently wished to +cross the Channel for half-a-crown each, and to that end called on a +boat agent, a Tory, who knew them, when the following conversation +took place:—</p> + +<p>"Can we go across for half-a-crown each?"</p> + +<p>"No, ye can't, thin."</p> + +<p>"An' why not?"</p> + +<p>"Because 'tis a cattle boat."</p> + +<p>"Never mind that, sure we're not particular."</p> + +<p>"No, but the cattle are."</p> + +<p>There was a great rush for Dynamitard Daly's letter, and some of his +sentences were made subjects of leading articles in the Nationalist +press. One paragraph seems to have been neglected. He writes—"Friend +Jack, you amazed me when you mentioned the names of ex-felons now +honourable members of the Imperial Parliament. And so they seem to +forget the days when <i>they</i> were felons? Ah, well, thank God, the +people did not forget them in their hour of need, and though some of +them may try to palm off their own selfish ambitions on the people to +whom they owe everything as genuine patriotism—oh, it won't do!" John +Daly holds the same opinion of his fellow patriots as is expressed in +a remarkable letter to the Separatist <i>Dublin Evening Herald</i>, wherein +the writer says that his party is "disgusted with the duplicity of Mr. +Gladstone," and goes on to say that "No one now believes that the bill +will pass, and almost everyone believes it was never intended to pass. +I have not yet met anybody who expressed themselves as even remotely +satisfied with it. Peace to its ashes." I quote this as proving two +points I have always endeavoured to urge—first, that the Irish +distrust Mr. Gladstone, and are not grateful to him or his party; and, +second, that no bill short of complete independence will ever satisfy +the Irish people. It is what they expect and look forward to as the +direct outcome of Home Rule, which they only want as a stepping-stone. +This cannot fail to impress itself on any unbiassed person who rubs +against them for long. The teaching of the priests is eminently +disloyal, and although the utmost care is taken to prevent their +disloyalty becoming public, instances are not lacking to show the +general trend. Father Sheehy, an especial friend of the Archbishop +Walsh aforesaid, thus delivered himself anent a proposed visit of the +Prince and Princess of Wales to Ireland:—"There is no need for a +foreign prince to come to Ireland. The Irish people have nothing to +say to the Prince of Wales. He has no connection with Ireland except +that link of the Crown that has been formed for the country, which is +the symbol of Ireland's slavery." This priest said he hated +landgrabbers; all except one. "There is but one landgrabber I like, +and that is the Tsar of Russia, who threatens to take territory on the +Afghan border from England." Father Arthur Ryan, of Thurles, the seat +of Archbishop Croke, has printed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>a manifesto, in which he +says:—"Ever since the Union the best and most honourable of Irishmen +have looked on rebellion as a sacred duty, provided there were a +reasonable chance of success. It has never occurred to me to consider +acquiescence to the Government of England as a moral obligation or as +other than a dire necessity. We have never, thank God, lied to our +oppressors by saying we were loyal to them. And when we have condemned +the rebels whose heroism and self-sacrifice we have loved and wept +over, we condemned not their want of loyalty, but their want of +prudence. We thought it wrong to plunge the land into the horrors of +war with no hope of success."</p> + +<p>So much for our trusty and well-beloved fellow-subjects of this realm +of England. Father Ryan is candid, truthful, and outspoken, and +commands respect. Better an open enemy than a false friend. His +summing-up of Irish feeling to England is both concise and accurate, +but one of his sentences is hardly up to date. He thanks God that the +Irish have never lied by saying they were loyal. How many Irish +members can make this their boast? Compared with them, the Ribbonmen +were heroes. The glorious prototypes of the modern member murdered +their foes themselves, did their slaughtering in person, and took the +risk like men. They hated Englishmen, <i>qua</i> Englishmen, and made no +secret of it. The modern method is easier and more convenient. To +murder by proxy, to have your hints carried out without danger to +yourself, and to draw pay for your hinting, is a triumph of +nineteenth-century ingenuity. To pose as loyal subjects and to disarm +suspicion by protestations of friendship and brotherly love may be a +more effective means of attaining your end, but it smacks too much of +the serpent. The Ribbonmen were rough and rugged, but comparatively +respectable. The Irish Separatists are just as disloyal, and +infinitely more treacherous. The parchment "loyalty to Her Most +Gracious Majesty the Queen," which Lord Houghton is in some places +receiving, is revolting to all who know the truth. The snake has +succeeded the tiger, and most people hate sliminess. Nationalist +Ireland is intensely disloyal from side to side, and from end to end. +Disloyal and inimical she has been from the first, and disloyal and +inimical she remains, and no concessions can change her character. She +is religious with a mediæval faith, and she follows her spiritual +guides, whose sole aim is religious ascendancy. So long as the Roman +Catholic Church is not predominant so long the Irish people will +complain. You may give them the land for nothing; you may stock their +farms—they will expect it; you may indemnify them for the seven +hundred years of robbery by the English people—they say they ought to +be indemnified; you may furnish every yeoman with a gun and +ammunition, with <i>carte blanche</i> as to their use with litigious +neighbours; you may lay on whiskey in pipes, like gas and water, but +without any whiskey rate; you may compel the Queen to do Archbishop +Walsh's washing, and the Prince of Wales to black his sacred <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>boots, +while the English nobility look after the pigs of the foinest pisintry +in the wuruld, and still the Irish would be malcontents. The Church +wants absolute predominance, and she won't be happy till she gets it. +Parnell was Protestant and something of a Pope. Tim Healy tried to +wear the leader's boots, but Bishop Walsh reduced him to a pulp. This +good man rules Dublin, and through Dublin, Ireland. You cannot walk +far without running against his consecrated name. At present the city +is labelled as follows:—</p> + +<p>"By direction of his Grace the Archbishop of Dublin, the annual +collections for our Holy Father the Pope will take place on July the +second." The National League and Our Holy Father the Pope between them +cut very close. No wonder that poor Paddy has hardly a feather left to +fly with.</p> + +<p>"An ardent Nationalist" thus expresses himself in the Separatist +<i>Herald</i>:—"I fear we must reluctantly abandon hope of a Home +Parliament for a few more years. For the present we will have to +content ourselves with Local Government, an ample measure of which +will be given by the <i>Conservatives</i>. On the whole, ardent Nationalist +as I am, I do not look on this as an unmixed evil. What kind of +Government would be possible under six or seven factions?" This should +be a staggerer for the English Home Rule party. The italics are in the +original, and the writer goes on to say, "It is open to doubt that we +should be able to at once manage our own affairs without some +preliminary training." The whole letter is a substantial repetition of +the sentiments emanating from a Home Ruler of Tralee, recounted in my +letter from that town of Kerry.</p> + +<p>Parnell is still worshipped in Dublin. He looks big beside his +successors. His grave in the splendid cemetery of Glasnevin is well +worth a visit, although there is no monument beyond a cast-iron Irish +cross painted green, which serves to hang flowers upon. The grave is +in a rope-enclosed circle, some twenty yards in diameter, and most of +the space is occupied by big glass shades, with flowers and other +tributes of respect and affection. I counted more than a hundred, many +of them elaborate. The Corkmen send the biggest, a small greenhouse +with two brown Irish harps and the legend <span class="sc">Done To Death</span>. An +Irish harp worked in embroidery lies sodden on the earth. Green +shamrock leaves of tin, with the names of all the donors—this is +important—obtrude themselves here and there. A six-foot cross of +white flowers, like a badge of purity, lies on the grave, labelled +Katherine Parnell, in a lady's hand. The place is swamped with Irish +harps, and it occurs to me that the badge would not be so popular if +the patriots knew that the harp was imposed as an emblem of Ireland by +English Henry the Second. The name <span class="sc">Parnell</span> in iron letters is +on the turf, flowers growing through them, a poetical idea. As I walk +past they vibrate with a metallic jingle, which reminds me of the +shirt of mail the living man wore to preserve himself from his +fellow-patriots. Tay Pay's life of the dead leader proves that his +sole <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>secret of success was inflexible purpose, and that his notion of +party management was to treat the patriot members as dirt. Parnell was +an authority in Irish matters, and his example should be useful to +Messrs. Gladstone, Morley, and Co. An eminent Irishmen to-day +said:—"With your wibble-wobble and your shilly-shally, your pooh-pooh +and your pah-pah, you are ruining the country. Put down your foot and +tell the Irish people that they will not now nor at any future time +get Home Rule, and not a word will come out of them." A word (to the +wise) is enough.</p> + +<p class="date">Dublin, June 29th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_42_AT_A_NATIONALIST_MEETING" id="No_42_AT_A_NATIONALIST_MEETING"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 42.—AT A NATIONALIST MEETING.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he most remarkable feature of Dundalk life is the fact that the +people are doing something. Not much, perhaps, but still something. +The port is handy for Liverpool and Glasgow, and a steam packet +company gives a little life to the quays. The barracks, not far from +the shore, indicate one large source of custom, for wherever you find +a British regiment you find the people better off. The Athlone folks +say that but for the soldiers the place would be dead and buried, and +the Galway people are complaining that the garrison, the hated English +garrison, has been withdrawn. This inconsistency at first surprises +you, but you soon grow familiarised with the strange inconsistencies +of this wonderful island. Dundalk has vastly improved during the three +dozen years which have elapsed since first I visited the town. There +is a Catholic church for every hundred yards of street, and on +Thursday last one of them at least was full to overflowing. It was the +festival of Saints Peter and Paul, and England was being solemnly +dedicated to Rome. There was no getting inside to witness the +operation, for the kneeling crowds extended into the street and +flopped down on their marrow-bones on the side walks. The men with the +collection plates could hardly hold their ground in the portals, and +many worshippers were sent empty away, raising their hats as they +reluctantly turned from the sacred precincts. This was between eleven +and twelve in the forenoon, so that the day's work was hopelessly +broken. Ireland has endless customs demanding cessation of labour, but +none demanding the pious to go to work. The Methodist and Presbyterian +churches were closed, and possibly their adherents were stealing a +march on the Catholics in the matter of business. The Church of +Ireland has a bright green spire, which at first puzzles the +unlearned. Its hoisting of the national colour is due to the fact that +the whole structure is covered with copper, which in its turn is +covered with verdigris. The surroundings of the town are pleasant, +and, although thatched cottages abound, they are very superior to the +dirty dens of Tipperary. Nearly all have the half-doors so convenient +for gossiping, and the female population <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>of these cabins spend much +of their time in leaning over the lower half. The superiority of +Dundalk is by most people attributed to the strong mixture of +Northerners there resident, and the favourable position of the port. +Earnest Unionists are by no means scarce, and, as usual, they are the +pick of the population. The Parnellites are also present in strong +force, and this may account for the fact that Mr. Timothy Healy, the +respected member for North Louth, is unable to visit the chief town of +his constituency without a guard of two hundred policemen, paid and +commanded by his life-long foe—the base and brutal Saxon. A prominent +citizen said:—</p> + +<p>"We have a number of Englishmen coming over here, and most of them are +Unionists. But a few birds of passage I have seen have vexed me with +their confident ignorance, and caused me to believe that English +Gladstonians are the densest donkeys under the sun. They are so +self-opiniated, and so full of self-satisfaction, that it is hard to +be patient with them. Not a few say simply that they are content to +leave the matter in the hands of Mr. Gladstone, and that as they +followed him so far, they will follow him to the end. They decline to +examine for themselves, although facilities are offered on the spot. +This must be the ruling temper of the English Home Rule party, for if +they stopped to examine for themselves, or even to hear the evidence +submitted by men of position and integrity they could never tolerate +the insane proposition of an Irish Parliament for a day. They +sometimes say that Irishmen should govern their own land, and that no +one could venture to dispute this proposition. This is their principal +argument, and some are led away by its show of reason. But what is the +truth?</p> + +<p>"Irishmen <i>do</i> govern Ireland. Listen. Is England governed by +Englishmen? Now Ireland has a far greater number of members in +proportion to her population than England has. These men have far more +power in the English Parliament than England herself, for they hold +the balance of parties. In every question, Irish or English, they have +the casting vote. So that they can almost always decide what is to +become law.</p> + +<p>"Dundalk is at this moment placarded with a request that all men +should join in the glorious struggle for freedom. Unless the Irish +people were constantly told they were slaves, they would never know +it. They are fed on lies from their infancy. The current issue of +<i>United Ireland</i> states in a leader that the prison authorities have +three times tried to get rid of John Daly, the dynamitard, by +poisoning him in prison. As if they could not do it if they liked! And +a few weeks ago, at an amnesty meeting at Drumicondra, a speaker +stated, in the presence of two or three members of Parliament, that +five of the thirteen political prisoners still locked up had been +driven mad by horrible tortures. What freedom do the Irish want? Have +they not precisely the same freedom as that enjoyed by England, the +freest country in the world? Have they not the same laws, except where +those laws have been relaxed in favour of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>Ireland? Have they not +religious equality, free trade, a free press, and vote by ballot? And +with all this they are told at every turn that they are the most +down-trodden nation of slaves on earth. Supposed they groaned under +conscription like France and Germany, what then?</p> + +<p>"The English people have seen the results of the influence exercised +by the present Irish leaders. One would think that sensible Britons +would decline to entrust such men with power. Did they not bring about +the rule of the Land League, with its stories of foul murder which +sound like a horrible dream of the tyranny of the Middle Ages? Are +these men not hand and glove with the clerical party, which hates +England as heretic and excommunicate? It is not proposed by Home Rule +to put in office men who are the mere tools of the Catholic church, +the most unyielding and intolerant system in the world!"</p> + +<p>I remembered the leader in the <i>Irish Catholic</i>, which sings a pæan of +triumph over alleged successes against the Freemasons of Italy. +British Masons may be interested to learn that this authority couples +them with Atheists, Fenians, and Ribbonmen, and holds up the craft to +contumely and scorn. The acceptance by Mr. Gladstone of the principle +of Home Rule seems to rejoice the Papist heart. "Never was it more +clear than it now is that the indestructible Papacy exercises an +authority over the hearts and minds of humanity which nothing, neither +fraud, nor oppression, nor misrepresentation, can weaken or destroy. +How near may be the day of its inevitable triumph no man can say, +while that its coming is as certain as the rising of the morning sun +... none will doubt or deny. That in the moment when the Vicar of +Christ is vindicated before the nations, and the reign of right and +truth and justice re-established throughout Christendom, Ireland can +claim to have been faithful when others were untrue, will be the +proudest trophy of an affection which no temptation and no tyranny was +ever able to weaken or destroy." The Freemasons are expressly stated +to lie under "the terrible penalty of excommunication," but they are +afterwards lightly dealt with. They are regarded with an amused +tolerance by Irish Catholics, who only laugh to see them "hung with a +number of trumpery glass and Brummagem metal trinkets about their +persons, and generally indulging in an amount of fantastic and +childish adornment which would turn the King of the Cannibal Islands +green with envy." Their profanation of God's holy name and their +sacrilegious oaths are regretted, but they will never do much harm in +Ireland, where the people laugh at their "fantastic tomfoolery." A +parallel column advises the public to join in the present pilgrimage +to Saint Patrick's Purgatory, where the saint saw, by special favour +of God, the purgatorial fires. Another column advertises prayers at +fixed prices—a reduction on taking a quantity. The men who hold these +beliefs and opinions are the sole governors of Irish action, the sole +creators of Irish opinion. For the lay agitators who from time to time +have dared to oppose the clerics <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>have been mostly suppressed, and the +few still in existence will probably disappear before long. Colonel +Nolan must hold this opinion, for when canvassing in Headford, the +parish priest came up and cut his head open with a bludgeon. The +gallant militarian submitted to this, and would fain have passed the +affair in silence. How many Englishmen would have stood it? This +incident, properly considered, should enlighten Britons on the +dominant influences of Irish Parliamentary action.</p> + +<p>On the way to Dundalk I met Major Studdert, of Corofin, County Clare. +He spoke of the disturbed state of the district, and thought the +present condition of things scandalous and intolerable. He mentioned +the case of Mr. J. Blood, who has been four times fired at for +dismissing a herdsman. He said:—"Mr. Blood is universally admitted to +be one of the most amiable and benevolent of men. His herdsman had a +son who would not work, and who was reckoned one of the greatest +blackguards in the county, which is saying a good deal in County +Clare. Mr. Blood told him to send away this son, or he himself must +leave his situation. He refused, and Mr. Blood discharged his +herdsman, but with an extraordinary liberality gave him one hundred +pounds as consolation money. Since then Mr. Blood is everywhere +protected by four policemen. One of the bullets aimed at him passed +between his back and the back of the chair he was sitting in."</p> + +<p>"I have only one argument for the country folks who talk of Home Rule. +I challenge them to show me a single industrious man in the whole +country who is not well off. They can't do it. What Ireland wants is +not Home Rule but industry. When they are at work they do not go at it +like Englishmen. I go over to Cheshire every year for the hunting +season, and it is a treat to see the English grooms looking after the +horses. They pull off their coats and roll up their sleeves in a way +that would astonish Irishmen. It is worth all they get to see them at +work. They get twice as much as Irish grooms, and they are worth the +difference. The people around me, the working people, do not perform +five months' work in a year."</p> + +<p>And these are the people who are surprised at their own poverty, and +who monopolise the attention of the British Parliament, which toils in +vain to give them an Act which will improve their worldly position. +The Irish farmer is petted and spoiled, and a victim of +over-legislation. Do what you will you can never please him. Mr. +Walter Gibbons, of South Mall, Westport, told me of a case which came +under his own observation, as follows:—Rent, five pounds a year. +<i>None</i> paid for seven years. Tenant refused possession. Landlord paid +tenant twenty pounds in cash, and formally remitted all the rent, +thirty-five pounds to wit.</p> + +<p>"I saw the money paid," said Mr. Gibbons, a fine specimen of the +British sailor, present in the Cornwallis at the bombardment of +Sebastopol.</p> + +<p>"And was the landlord shot?" I inquired.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>"Not that I know of," said the old sailor.</p> + +<p>Most people will agree that if ever a landlord deserved shooting this +was the very man.</p> + +<p>The walls of Dundalk were placarded with a flaming incitement to +Irishmen to meet in the Labourers' Hall at eight o'clock, to "join in +the onward march to freedom." The meeting was to be held under the +auspices of the Irish National Federation—Featheration, as the +Parnellites call it and most of its members pronounce it—and +therefore it was likely to be a big thing, especially considering the +Parliamentary tension existing at the present moment. I determined to +be present, To beard the lion in his den, The Douglas in his hall; to +see the labouring Irish in their thousands marching onward to Freedom. +A friend attempted to dissuade me from the project. "You'll be spotted +in a moment, and as you are very obnoxious to the priests, to be +recognised at such a meeting might be unpleasant." A public official +who pointed out the place followed me up with advice. "Unless you are +connected with the party, it would be better to keep away. These +people are very suspicious." These were fine preliminaries of a public +meeting. The building is poor, but not squalid, and seems to have been +built within the last few years. A gateway leads to the yard and the +Hall blocks the way. All the rooms are small, and I looked in vain for +anything like an assembly chamber. Two roughish-looking men, who +nevertheless had about them a refreshing air of real work, stood at +the gateway, and from them I learned that the meeting would take place +upstairs. Twenty-four steps outside the building almost gave me pause. +At the top was an open landing, whence the Saxon intruder might be +projected with painful results. Trusting in my luck, I entered a +narrow corridor, some fifteen feet long, with doors on each side, and +one at the opposite end. That must open on the assembly room. No, it +only led to another flight of outside steps, and here it was +comforting to observe that the drop might be into the soft soil of a +garden, instead of a bricked yard. But where was the great meeting?</p> + +<p>Once more I left the Hall and spoke my rugged friends. Yes, it was +after eight, but the people wanted a bit of margin. Half-past eight +was the time intended. Half-an-hour's march around, and back again. +The crowd was swelled from two to three persons. Fifteen minutes more, +and further inquiry.</p> + +<p>"When will the meeting begin."</p> + +<p>"When the people comes."</p> + +<p>"But they're an hour late already."</p> + +<p>"Sure ye can't hurry thim."</p> + +<p>At 9.15 I went again.</p> + +<p>"Meeting begun yet?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"Just startin' now. The praste's afther goin' in."</p> + +<p>"You're rather unpunctual."</p> + +<p>"Arrah, how would we begin widout his Rivirince!" This was +unanswerable. Once more into the breach, up the lonely <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>shivery steps. +This time I heard voices, and opening a door found a narrow room with +about twenty people therein. The show was just agoing to begin, for, +as I entered, somebody proposed that the Priest should take the chair. +A short, stout, red faced man, with black coat and white choker, +seemed to expect no less, and moved into the one-and-ninepenny Windsor +with alacrity. He spoke with the vilest, boggiest kind of brogue, and +the hideous accent of vulgar Ulster; calling who "hu" with a French u, +should "shoed," and pronouncing every word beginning with un as if +beginning with on—ontil, onless, ondhersthand, ondhertake. "Ye'll +excuse me makin' a spache, fur av I did I'd make a varry bad one," +said the holy man, and the audience seemed to believe him. Enrolment +was the order of the day, and the thousands were requested to come +forward. A man next me went to the front and paid a shilling, +receiving in return a green ticket, with Ireland a Nation printed at +the top. He twirled it round and round, and seemed disappointed to +find there was nothing on the other side. The secretary encouraged the +meeting by the official statement that the local Featheration now +numbered nearly sixty members, whereat there was great rejoicing, the +masses (to the number of twenty) working off their emotion by thumping +their heels on the floor. The meeting, after this exultant outburst, +got slower and slower, and threatened to expire of inanition. Divil a +mother's son could be got to shpake a single wurud. Some malevolent +influence overhung the masses. His Rivirince sent down a messenger to +me with the request that I would say a few wuruds. Declined, with +thanks, as being no speaker. Uncertainty as to my colour and object +still prevailed; and silence, not loud, but deep, succeeded this +artful feeler. Father O'Murtagh (or words to that effect) to the +rescue! The Rivirind Gintleman arose and delivered a bitter attack on +Parnell, whom he characterised as mean, base, untruthful, treacherous, +and contemptible. The foinest pisintry in the wuruld could not be +soiled by contact with anybody like Parnell, and therefore the +Catholic bishops had been compelled to give him up, and to say, Get +thee behind me, Satanas. The dear Father did not tell the meeting why +the bishops waited sixteen days after the verdict of the Court, and +until Mr. Gladstone had delivered judgment, before deciding to cut +Parnell adrift. Father O'Murtagh (I think that was the name) made some +allusion to the present crisis of public affairs—(he called it +cresses)—and assured his masses that the Tories were about to be for +ever plucked from the pedestal on which they had long been planted by +ascendency and greed! This was not so racy as the mixed metaphor of a +Galway paper, which assures its readers that "the Unionist party will +soon be compelled to disgorge the favouritism which for so long has +been centred in their hands;" but it might pass. His Rivirince made +some feeble jokes, and the audience tried to laugh, but failed. "They +say that whin we luck at ourselves in the lucking lass, we see nothin' +but Whigs," said the funny Father, and the audience sniggered. This +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>was his masterpiece. He finished with "It's wondherful what a spache +ye can make whin ye have nothin' to say;" and the masses sniggered +again. Ten minutes more of silence broken only by whispered +confabulations of the secretary and chairman, and I grew tired of +obstructing the march to Freedom. I left the chair, the only one at my +end of the room, with considerable regret. Part of the back, one +upright, was still remaining, and although the thing had evidently +been used in argument at some previous meeting, it hung together, and +good work might still have been done with the legs. A gentleman with a +complexion like a blast furnace, and a facial expression which looked +like a wholesale infraction of the Ten Commandments, was smoking +moodily on the steps.</p> + +<p>"Did ye injy the matein?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>"Thought it rather dead," I replied.</p> + +<p>"Faix, 'twas yerself that kilt it."</p> + +<p>I feared as much. What happened after I left no man will tell, though +doubtless the resolutions adopted by the twenty men sitting on the +forrums of ellum would vibrate through the Empire, and shake the +British monarchy to its iniquitous base. Irish meetings must be taken +with a grain of salt. A Westport man long drew fees for reports of +mass meetings which never took place. Three or four Nationalists met +in a back parlour, and their speeches, reported verbatim, rang through +Ireland. Gallant Mayo was praised as heading the charge of Connaught, +and Westport was lauded for its public spirit. And all the while the +Westport folks knew nothing about it. The Dundalk folks will doubtless +be equally astonished to learn that the cause is advancing so +powerfully in their midst. This hole-and-corner meeting, waiting for +the priest, addressed by the priest, bossed by the priest, is a fair +sample of the humbug which seems inseparable from the Irish question. +A very short acquaintance with the country and its people is +sufficient to convince any reasonable person that the whole movement +is based on humbug, sustained by humbug, and is itself a humbug from +beginning to end. To see the English Parliament managed and exploited +by these groups of low-bred and ignorant peasants, nose-led by +ignorant and illiterate priests, is enough to make you ashamed of +being an Englishman. The country has come to something when Britons +can be worked like puppets by mean-looking animals such as I saw in +the Dundalk Labourers' Hall, where the only respectable thing was an +iron safe bearing the stamp of Turner, of Dudley. And this meeting, in +status, numbers, and enthusiasm, was quite representative of +Nationalist meetings all over Ireland. The English people are waiting +for their turn while Papal behests are executed. John Bull stands hat +in hand, taking his orders from Father O'Baithershin. The Irish say +that England is in the first stage of her decadence, and they say it +with some reason. England, the land of heroes, sages, statesmen, is +the mere registrar of the parish priest and his poor, benighted dupes. +Raleigh, Cromwell, Burleigh, Pitt, Palmerston, are succeeded by Healy, +Morley, Sexton, Harcourt, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>Gladstone. England is Ireland's lackey, and +must wait till her betters are served, must toil and moil in her +service, receiving in return more kicks than halfpence. Britannia is +the humble, obedient servant of Papal Hibernia. To what base uses we +may return!</p> + +<p class="date">Dundalk, July 1st.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_43_IN_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH" id="No_43_IN_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 43.—IN THE PROSPEROUS NORTH.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his is a blessed change from dirt and poverty to tidiness and +comfort. After the West of Ireland the North looks like another world. +After the bareheaded, barelegged, and barefooted women and children of +Mayo and Galway, the smartly-dressed people of Newry come as a +surprise. You can hardly realise that they belong to the same country. +There are no mud cabins here, no pigs under the bed, no cows tethered +in the living room, no hens roosting on the family bedstead. The +people do not follow the inquiring stranger about, as in Ennis or +Tuam, where they seem to have nothing better to do. The Newry folks +are minding their own business, and they have some business to mind. +Three extensive flax spinning mills, two linen weaving factories, and +an apron factory, give large employment to girls. There are several +flour mills, some of them possessing immense power, and having the +most modern machinery. Two iron foundries of long-established +reputation, two mineral water factories, salt works, stone polishing +mills, seven tanneries, cabinet furniture manufactories, and +coachbuilding works cater for the town and surrounding district. +Granite quarries of high repute, such as the Rostrevor green granite, +exist in the vicinity, and are worked energetically, the products +forming a valuable addition to the exports. The town is beautifully +situated on a continuation of Carlingford Lough, the choicest bit of +sea around Great Britain. Thackeray says that if England possessed +this beautiful inlet it would be reckoned a world's wonder. Twenty +miles of winding sea running inland like a league-wide river, +mountains on both sides, many of them wooded to the furthest height. +Rostrevor is a bijou watering place such as only France here and there +can boast. You walk on the cliff side, steep verdurous heights above +and below, looking through tree-tops on the shimmering sea and the +purple mountains beyond, for ten miles at a stretch, wondering why +nobody else is there. Newry is encompassed by mountains, one range +above another. Even as the hills stand round about Jerusalem, so stand +the hills about Newry. A big trade is done with Liverpool and Glasgow +by means of the Dundalk and Newry Packet Company's fine service of +boats. For this inland place has been made into a thriving seaport, +and these Northerners make the water hum. At low tide the artificial +cutting of the navigation works looks unpromising enough, but the +people <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>of these parts would be doing business if they had to float +the boats on mud. The hills are cultivated to the topmost peak, or +planted with trees where tillage is impossible. The people seem to +have made the most of everything. They are digging, hammering, +chopping, excavating, building, mining, and generally bustling around. +They break up the mountains piece-meal, and sell the fragments in +other lands. To make you buy they show you how it looks when polished, +and they are ready to earn an extra profit by polishing all you want +by steam power. The streets are clean, well-paved, kept in perfect +order. The houses are well-built and far superior to the English +average. A little cockney from 'Ackney, who has sailed the six hundred +and seventeen miles between London and Cork and has explored most of +the South and West, is quite knocked over by Newry. Leaning on the +"halpenstock" with which he was about to tackle Cloughmore, he +confessed that Newry hupset his hideas of Hireland and the Hirish. +"The folks round 'ere," he said, "are hexactly like hus." He would +have accorded higher praise, had he known any.</p> + +<p>Why this great difference? Look around the shop-keepers' signs in +Tipperary or Tuam and note the names. Ruane, Magrath, Maguire, +O'Doherty, O'Brien, O'Flanagan, O'Shaughnessy, and so <i>in sæcula +sæculorum</i>. In Newry you see a striking change. Duncan, Boyd, Wylie, +MacAlister, Campbell, McClelland, McAteer, and so on, greet you in all +directions. You are in one of the colonies. The breed is different. +You are among the men who make railways, construct bridges, invent +engines, bore tunnels, make canals, build ships, and sail them over +unknown seas. You are among a people who have the instincts of +achievement, of enterprise, of invention, of command, who depend upon +themselves, who shift for themselves, and believe in self-help rather +than in querulous complaint. The Newry folk belong to Ulster, where as +a whole the people can take care of themselves. A careful perusal of +the addresses presented to Lord Houghton on his current Viceregal tour +accentuates the difference in the Irish breeds. The aborigines all +want to know what is going to be done for them. We want a pier, we +want a quay, we want a garrison or a gunboat to spend some money in +the district. Will your Excellency use your influence with the powers +that be to get us something for nothing? And let it be something to +enrich us, or at least to keep us alive without work. We can't be +expected to do anything while groaning 'neath the cruel English yoke. +The Newry folks, and all of their breed, abstain from whining and +cadging. The Westport people have endless quarries of hard blue +marble, which they are too lazy, or too ignorant, or both, to cut. The +Ulster breed would have quarried, polished, exported a mountain or two +long since. The universal verdict of employers of labour proves that a +northern Irishman is worth two from any other point of the compass, +will actually perform double the amount of work, and is, besides, +incomparably superior in brains and general reliability. The worthless +hordes who approach the Viceroy with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>snuffling petitions are +invariably headed by Father Somebody, without whose permission they +would not be there, and without whose leave they dare not raise the +feeble and intermittent cheers which here and there have greeted the +Queen's representative. The lying expressions of loyalty referred to +in a previous letter are severely censured by the Nationalist papers. +One of the leading lights says: "Judging from a sentence in the +address presented by the Mullingar Town Commissioners to the +Lord-Lieutenant on Thursday last, it would appear that these gentlemen +are looking forward eagerly to the day when they can write themselves +down West Britons. This is what they said: 'In your presence as the +representative in this island of her Most Gracious Majesty Queen +Victoria, we wish to give expression to our fealty to the throne, +convinced as we are that the day will soon be at hand when we can with +less restraint, and in a more marked manner, testify our admiration +for the Sovereignty of the British Isles.'" The more sincere newspaper +which falls foul of these expressions goes on to say:—</p> + +<p>"It is true that Ireland is described in the map made by Englishmen as +one of the British Isles, but it is not so written in the true +Irishman's heart, <i>and never will be</i>, in spite of the toadyism of +gentlemen like the Town Commissioners of Mullingar."</p> + +<p>This pronouncement embodies the sentiments of every Nationalist +Irishman. The Union of Hearts is not expected to succeed the Home +Rule, or any other bill, and to do Irishmen justice, they never use +the phrase, neither do they profess to look forward to friendliness +with England. I have conversed with hundreds of Home Rulers, and all +looked upon the bill as a means of paying off old scores. The tone of +the Nationalist press should be enough for sensible Englishmen. Nobody +who regularly reads the leading Irish Separatist papers can ever +believe in the friendship supposed to be the inevitable result of the +proposed concession. Once the present agitation is crowned with +success, a tenfold more powerful agitation will at once arise. The +Irish people will have more grievances than ever. Already they are +complaining of insult and betrayal. And their reproaches are directed +against the G.O.M. and his accomplices, or rather against Mr. +Gladstone and Mr. Morley, for they know as well as Englishmen know +that the rest count for nothing; that, in fact, they resemble the +faithful and unsophisticated baa-baa of whom we heard in our early +infancy. "Mary had a little lamb, Whose fleece was white as snow, And +everywhere that Mary went, The lamb was sure to go." This is the +attitude of the English Gladstonian party, and the Irish people know +it. A Home Ruler I met to-day disavowed loyalty except to Ireland, and +asked what was the Queen and the rest of the British Royal pauper +party to him or to Ireland that he should be loyal? He said:—</p> + +<p>"All interest is over here, whether among Nationalists or Unionist. +The fate of the bill affects us no longer. The new financial proposals +are the last straw that breaks the camel's back. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>Where is the +managing of our own affairs? Where does the Nationalism come in? And +Gladstone, in allowing himself to make in the first proposal a mistake +of one thousand pounds a day, damaged his prestige as the framer of +the bill, and fatally damaged the bill itself. Anybody can now say +that if he was so grossly mistaken in an ascertainable matter like +revenue and figures he stands to be equally wrong (at least) in +matters which are not demonstrable, but which are at present only +matters of opinion and argument. I am not sure that he ever intended +to give us any Home Rule at all. We are being fooled because we have +no leader. The bill, as it stood at first, would never have been +prepared for a man like Parnell. Gladstone dare not have done it. The +whole bill is a series of insults. As a reasonable, fair-minded man +you will not deny that. It purports to come from friends who confide +in us, and yet every line bristles with distrust and suspicion. There +is not one spark of generosity in the whole thing from beginning to +end. Better have no bill at all. For as a business man, I foresee that +the passing of any such bill would lead to a complete upset of trade. +We should have a most tremendous row. The safeguards would only invite +to rebellion. Tell a man he must not have something, must not do +something, and that is the very thing he wants to do. He might not +have thought of it if you had not mentioned it; but the moment you +point it out, and particularise the forbidden fruit, from that very +moment he is inspired with a very particular wish for that above all +things. So with a nation. We want our independence. We want to do as +we like. Otherwise, why ask for a Parliament? Gladstone says, Yes, my +pretty dear, it shall have its ickety-pickety Parliament; it shall +have its plaything. And it shall ridy-pidy in the coachy-poachy too; +all round the parky-warky with the cock-a-doodle-doo. But it mustn't +touch! Or if it touches it mustn't be rough, for its plaything will +break so easily. We don't want this tomfoolery, nor to be treated like +children. We want a real Parliament, and not one that can be pulled up +every five minutes by London. For if the English Parliament have the +power to veto our wishes, where's the difference? We might have just +as well stayed as we were. That's perfectly clear.</p> + +<p>"So that I for one will be glad when the farce is over. The present +bill at best was but a fraud, a tampering with the national sentiment. +And I am beginning to think that we have no chance of a National +Legislature until the coming of the next great Irishman. I am not so +disappointed or broken-hearted as you might suppose. For the prospect +of an Irish Parliament under present auspices is not very enticing. +The country might be made to look ridiculous, and the thing, by +bursting up in some absurd way, might make a repetition of the attempt +impossible for a century. I would rather wait for a better bill, and +also for better men to work it. We are not proud of the Irish members. +But we didn't want Tories, and all the propertied men are Tories. What +were we to do? We know the want of standing and breeding <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>which marks +most of our men, but we did the best we could, and came within an ace +of succeeding. Let me tell you the exact feeling of the respectable +Home Rule party of Ireland at this moment.</p> + +<p>"Having exerted ourselves with enthusiasm, and having undergone +considerable pecuniary sacrifice with good chances of success, we now +see clearly that all our efforts are for the present thrown away. It +is the fortune of war. The fates were against us, and we rest content +with the hope that we have furthered the ultimate success of the +movement. For the moment, we make our bow, and hope to call on Mr. +Bull at a more propitious season. Of course we expect to win in the +end."</p> + +<p>The next politician whose opinions I noted was a horse of quite a +different colour. He bore a Scottish name, and had the incisive, +argumentative style of the typical Ulsterman, who unites the cold +common-sense and calculating power of the Scot with the warmth and +impulse of the Irish nature. He said:—</p> + +<p>"The bare existence of Belfast is, or should be, enough to negative +all arguments in favour of Home Rule. The agitators say that Ireland +is decaying from political causes, while all the while this Ulster +town is getting richer and more powerful and influential. While the +people of Cork are begging the Viceroy to please to do something for +their port, to please to be so kind as to ask Mr. Bull to favour the +city with his patronage, the Belfast people, with a far inferior +harbour, an inferior climate, an incomparably inferior position, +surrounded by far worse land, are knocking out the Clyde for +shipbuilding, and running the Continent very close in linen-weaving. +Belfast is actually the third in order of the Customs ports in the +United Kingdom. The Belfast people flourish without Home Rule, and +what is more, they know their neighbours. They've reckoned these +gentry up.</p> + +<p>"How is it that the Catholic population, as a rule, are merely the +hewers of wood and drawers of water? They have precisely the same +opportunities as their Protestant countrymen. Where-ever you go you +will find the Protestants coming to the top. Cork is a very bigoted +Catholic city, and the huge majority of the population are Catholics. +How is it that most of the leading merchants are Protestants? Why do +heretics flourish where the faithful starve? Transfer the populations +of Cork to Belfast and <i>vice versâ</i>, and, as everybody knows perfectly +well, Belfast would at once begin to decay, while Cork would at once +begin to prosper. Therefore it is absurd to say that Home Rule would +cure the poverty existing in Catholic districts. Yes, there is a party +of ascendency. The Protestants are distinctly the party of ascendency. +They have the ascendency which ability and education and industry will +always have over incapacity and ignorance and laziness. Now, I know +something about the linen trade, and also something about the growth +and preparation of flax.</p> + +<p>"Linen has made the North, and flax is grown in the North. B<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span>ut it +would grow much better in the South. If they would grow it we would be +very glad to buy it. But they won't. And why not? Because it needs +care and skill, and a lot of watching and management. The beggars are +too lazy to grow anything that wants tending from day to day. It would +pay them splendidly, and the advantages of flax growing and dressing +have over and over again been drummed into them without effect. The +climate and soil of Southern Ireland are far more suitable for flax +growing than the North, and as about three-quarters of all the flax +woven in Belfast is grown on the Continent, it is clear that the +market is waiting for the stuff. The Belfast merchants have done all +that in them lay to bring about flax cultivation in the South. They +have sent out lecturers and instructors, they have planted patches and +grown the stuff, and shown the pecuniary results, and with what +effect? Absolutely none. The people won't do anything their +grandfathers didn't do. They won't be bothered with flax, which wants +no end of attention. Why, if they grew flax, they'd have to work +almost every day! And nobody who knows Irishmen, real Keltic Irishmen, +ever expects them to do that, or anything like it. I've been in India, +and I deliberately say that I prefer the Hindoo to the Southern +Irishman for industry and reliability.</p> + +<p>"These people, who are too lazy to wash themselves, expect their +condition to be improved by a Home Rule Parliament. Can anything be +more unreasonable or more unlikely? And because there are more of +them, their wishes are to be taken into account, and the opinions and +wishes of men of whom each one is worth a hundred are to be +disregarded. Where is the English sense of the eternal fitness of +things?</p> + +<p>"What the Irish really seek is some effective substitute for work. +They have no idea of developing the resources which lie nearest to +them. Carlyle says a country belongs to the people who can make the +best use of it, and not the people who happen to be found there. +Ireland for the Irish is a favourite cry. Why? Is not England for the +Irish, America, Australia, New Zealand? My ancestors came here in the +time of Henry the Second, and I am told that I have no business in the +country. Wherever English and Scots settlers have been located, there +the country is well worked and the people are thriving. If we can +thrive, why can't they thrive? If we can get on without Home Rule, why +can't they get on without Home Rule? If it were going to be a good +thing for the country we'd all be on it like a shot. If it were good +for them, it ought to be good for us. We have shown by our success +that our judgment is sound. Their failure in everything they +undertake, their dirt, their general habits and character, should +cause their statements and opinions to be looked upon with very great +suspicion. Does it stand to reason that merely by Home Rule, by the +exercise of the privilege of making Irish laws by Irishmen in Dublin, +that these people would gain all we have attained by hard and honest +labour? That is what they expect up here.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>"The Catholics are our servants, and in selecting them we seldom ask +their religion. Our employés in most cases expect by the bill to take +the place of their masters. That is their conception of Home Rule. +They have been told from infancy that the British Government keeps +them down because of their religion. They know that the British +Government is Protestant, and they believe that in some occult way the +superior position held by the Protestants in Ireland is due to +favouritism. Under a Home Rule Parliament, that is, a Catholic +Parliament, this condition of things will be reversed, and they will +at once, and by their own innate force, as faithful believers, spring +to the top of the tree, and exchange positions with their former +masters and mistresses."</p> + +<p>The general effect of my friend's discourse was well summed up by Mr. +James Mack, of Galway, who said:—</p> + +<p>"When I see that the Belfast men who would make fortunes out of river +mud, and who would skin a flea for his hide and tallow, turn their +backs on Home Rule, and declare they will have nothing to do with it, +I feel sure it can be no good. Then my own experience and observation +assure me that, instead of a settlement, it will only be the beginning +of trouble for both countries. Firmness is wanted, and equal laws for +all. At present everything is in favour of Ireland." <i>United Ireland</i> +says:—"It would be better to go on for twenty years in the old +miserable mill-horse round of futile and feverish and wasting +agitation than to accept this bill as a settlement of national claims. +And if the bill passes now it cannot deflect the national agitation by +a hair's breadth, or cause its intermission for a day."</p> + +<p>Nobody who knows the Irish people ever expected anything else. +Agitators who live by agitation will always agitate, and only a few +namby-pamby Radicals ever thought otherwise. Those who would fain have +sold their souls for the Newcastle Programme also stand to be taken +in. This Home Rule Bill will not do. Another must be brought forward +immediately. Where is this dreary business going to end? When will Mr. +Gladstone consider that England has eaten dirt enough?</p> + +<p class="date">Newry, July 4th</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_44_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH" id="No_44_THE_PROSPEROUS_NORTH"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 44.—THE PROSPEROUS NORTH.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his famous historical city must be eminently offensive to Irish +Nationalists. It is so clean and sweet and neat and tidy that you can +at once see the hopelessness of expecting Home Rule patriotism from +the place. There are no dunghills for it to grow in, and my somewhat +extensive experiences have long ago taught me that Home Rule and +Nationalist patriotism will not flourish in Ireland without manure, +and plenty of it. Anyhow, it is mostly associated with heaps of refuse +and pungent odours arising from decomposing <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>matter, and in the south +and west is scarcely ever found flourishing side by side with modern +sanitation. Home Rule not only, like pumpkins and vegetable marrows, +requires a feculent soil, but like them, and indeed like all watery +and vaporous vegetables, it needs the forcing-frame. Left to its own +devices the movement would die at once. There is nothing spontaneous +about it. It is a weedy sort of exotic, thriving only by filth and +forcing. It cannot live an hour in the climate of Armagh. The cold, +keen air of these regions nips it in the bud. The peculative patriots +who are now monopolising Westminster have from time to time made +descents on the district, to sow the good seed, as it were, by the +wayside. But next day came a frost, a killing frost. The Northerners +are too mathematical. They have taken Lord Bacon's advice. They "weigh +and consider." They want logic, and will not be content with mere +rhetoric. They require demonstrations, and have opinions of their own. +Before accepting a theory they turn it round and round, and test it +with the square, the level, and the line. They care nothing for +oratory unless there is sense at the back of it. They know that fine +words butter no parsnips, and they know the antecedents of the +patriotic orators. They do not believe that a paid Parliament-man is +necessarily a self-sacrificing patriot, and they note that Nationalist +members are making their patriotism much more profitable than their +original and legitimate pursuits, if any. The Armagh folks believe in +work, and in keeping things in order. The Scots element is dominant. +Not so much in numbers, as in influence. The Kelts are easily +traceable, but the races are partly amalgamated, and the genuine Irish +are greatly improved. I paraded the streets for many hours, but I saw +no dirt, rags, wretchedness. It was market day, and the country people +came streaming in from all sides, everyone well dressed and +respectable, and in every way equal to the farmers and their wives who +on market days drive into Lichfield or Worcester. It was a pleasure to +see them, and my Cockney friend, quoted in the Newry letter, might +have been tempted to discard his affected superiority, and drawing +himself proudly up, to smite himself on the chest, and to say "And hi, +too, ham a Hirishman."</p> + +<p>The country between Newry and Armagh is very beautiful from a pastoral +point of view. After the savage deserts of the West it "Comes o'er my +soul like the sweet south That breathes upon a bank of violets." Every +yard of ground is going at its best pace. The valleys stand so thick +with corn that they laugh and sing. Immense vistas of highly +cultivated country unroll themselves in every direction. The land is +richly timbered, and tall green hedges spring up everywhere. You are +reminded of Dorsetshire, of Cheshire, of Normandy, of Rhineland. The +people at the wayside stations are all well-dressed and well-shod. +Achil Island seems to be at an immeasurable distance. The semi-savages +who in Mayo demand autonomy have no supporters here. The Ulster <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>folks +eschew them and all their works, and would no more associate with them +than with Hottentots. I use the term because the Irish people have ten +thousand times been told, and told untruthfully, that Lord Salisbury +had applied the term to the nation at large. The people of Mayo and +some other parts of Connaught are for the most part worthy of the +name, if, indeed, it be not a libel on the Africans. The disgusting +savagery of their funeral customs is of itself sufficient to stamp +them as lowest barbarians. I am prepared to prove this to the hilt. +Let their defenders come forward if they dare.</p> + +<p>And so it happens that the inhabitants of Armagh city are mostly +Conservatives. They ought to be religious, too, for they have not only +two cathedrals and an archbishop, but also a cardinal archbishop, Dr. +Logue, to wit. I saw this distinguished ecclesiastic at Newry. He wore +the scarlet robe, the extraordinary hat, the immensely thick gold ring +of the cardinalate, in a railway carriage. An ordinary sort of man, +with the round face and mean features of the typical Keltic farmer. He +holds that the people should take their political faith from their +priests, but the Northerners hardly agree, and are not so proud of +their cardinal as they should be, seeing that he has been raised from +the ranks, his father (so they say) having been Lord Leitrim's +coachman, and the coachman who was driving when Lord Leitrim was shot. +The Roman Catholic Cathedral of Armagh has an imposing position on the +summit of a steep hill. The portal is approached by sixty or seventy +steps in flights of five and ten with steep terraces between, +extending over a great space, so that the flights of steps, seen from +the bottom of the hill, seem continuous, and have a fine Gustave Doré +effect of vastness and majesty. On a neighbouring steep stands the +Protestant Cathedral, with its sturdy square tower, memorial of remote +antiquity. The city is piled up between the two cathedrals, but mostly +around the heretic structure, and away from the Papist pile, which +stands among the fields. The Presbyterians have a very beautiful +church, apparently of the Armagh marble of which the city is built, +the perennial whiteness of the stone making the old place appear +eternally young. The market-place, behind the market-hall, and on the +steep slope to the Protestant Cathedral, was very busy indeed. Market +gardeners were there with young plants, useful and ornamental, for +sale. Home-made chairs with rushen seats were offered by their rural +makers. Wooden churns, troughs for cattle, and agricultural implements +were there galore. Crockery was artfully disposed in strategetical +corners, and gooseberry stalls were likewise to the fore. None of +these features are visible in the Western markets. A vendor of +second-hand clothing stood on a cart well loaded with unconsidered +trifles, and this gentleman was especially interesting. A number of +poor women stood around while the salesman, who knew his clientèle to +their smallest tricks, displayed his wares and recklessly endeavoured +to ruin himself for the good of the country. Holding up an article, he +would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>turn it round and round, expatiating on its excellent +qualities, and then, after naming the very lowest price consistent +with common business principles, would run down the figure to +one-tenth or less, with a pause or two here and there for critical +comment on his audience, of which he professed to entertain the most +unfavourable opinion. Then with a final thump, punching the article +contemptuously, he would offer it, regardless of consequences, for +half his previous offer. Sometimes he refused to accept the money +because the customer was not quick enough. Neither might the people +examine his goods. He was master, and more, and found his account in +it. He took up a frowsy old gown. "There ye are. Ten shillin's worth +of stuff in that. An' ten for the makin'. An' that's twinty. I'll take +ten, an' I couldn't afford to take a penny less. Will ye have it? +Don't all spake at once. Ye won't. But I'll make ye. I'll take five +shillin', four, three, two, one, I'll take sixpence. (Thump.) Take it +away. Here! Have it for thruppence. Ye won't? Sweet bad luck to the +one of ye is worth thruppence. Ye wouldn't raise tuppence in the crowd +of ye. Ye want me to clothe ye for nothin'. An' thin ye'd want me to +give ye lodgin' and washin'. 'Twas a black day on me whin I come among +such a ruinatin' lot. Here now, sure this ought to timpt ye. A lady's +jacket, an' a large, big, roomy jacket at that—fit for a lady that +can ate a stone of praties at a male. Thurty shillin's ye'll be +offerin' me, but I won't take it. Ye can give me ten, av ye're only +quick enough. Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two +shillin's. Eighteenpence. (Thump.) Take it for a shillin'! Ye won't? +Ye didn't sell yer ducks well. Ye didn't get the money for yer eggs. +Will I lind ye a trifle? What d'ye take me for? Am I to stand rammin' +me bargains down yer throats like wagon wheels? Do yez iver buy any +clothes at all, or do yez beg them? Me heart's bruk to pieces wid +blayguardin' and bullyraggin. Luk at this. A boy's coat. An it's lined +wid woollen linin'; that's the only fault wid it. An' here's a bonnet. +A fortin to any young woman. Will ye be plazed to take what ye want +for nothin'? Tis charity ye want, ye poor misguided crathurs. 'Tis a +pack of paupers I'm discoorsin', God help me."</p> + +<p>The Armagh shopkeepers are prosperous and content. "No Home Rule," +they say. They are no longer angry with the Nationalists. The snake is +scotched, if not killed outright, they think. The whole absurdity has +received such a damning exposure that it cannot be revived for another +generation. The Separatist party will be perforce compelled to wait +until the people have forgotten what Home Rule really means. +Therefore, to work again! Useless to waste more time. Ulster will +sleep with one eye open, bearing in mind the favourite Northern saying +which advises men to put their trust in Providence, but to keep their +powder dry. For, like the Achilese, they believe that prayer is +effective in shaving, only the Ulstermen prefer to pray over a keen +razor. A genial citizen of Armagh said:—</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>"We would be as ready for Home Rule as any other Irishmen if it meant +what we are asked to believe it means. But we know better. We are +convinced that it will bring, not prosperity and peace, but bankruptcy +and war, intolerance and social retrogression, robbery and spoliation, +not only of the landlord but also of everybody else who has anything. +The propertied Roman Catholics are just as dead against Home Rule as +any Protestants. Only they dare not say so.</p> + +<p>"England ought to have sense enough to see that instead of freedom +from Irish difficulties, the old grievances will be intensified, and +any bill whatever will at once generate a fresh series of +complications, so that the English Parliament will be crippled in +perpetuity, to the detriment of British interests. The Empire, as a +whole, must be weakened, because the Irish masses are most unfriendly, +and the more England concedes the more unfriendly Ireland becomes. For +Ireland regards all concessions as being wrung from England by +superior force and skill, and as being, in short, the fruits of +compulsion. Therefore, the more Ireland gets the more exacting she +will always become. Ask any Englishman or Scotsman resident in Ireland +if the Irish masses are friendly, and everyone will laugh at you. The +English Home Rule party say, 'Just so. Let us cure this. This is the +principal argument for Home Rule.' They think this sounds very fine. +Just as if in private life, a man to whom you have given his due, and +more than his due, should continue to abuse you, while you strain +every nerve to satisfy him, and go out of your way to obtain peace and +quietness, he all the time becoming more and more exacting and more +and more discontented. And then as if you were to say, 'I must +continue my concessions, my efforts, my sacrifices. I <i>must</i> contrive +to satisfy this amiable person.' What a fool any man would be to adopt +such a course. A sensible man would say 'You have your due, and you'll +get no more.' Treat Ireland so, and all will be well. Be firm and the +trouble will amount to nothing. Paddy will soon drop shouting when he +sees it has no effect. The agitators will soon dry up, or waste their +sweetness on the desert air. But so long as there is a prospect of +success, so long as you have a weak-kneed old lunatic in power, so +long as Paddy sees a prospect of obtaining substantial advantages, +such as reduction of rent or rent-free farms, so long the row will be +kept up. If Englishmen could only realize that, the whole movement +would cease. For Gladstonian Englishmen mistakenly think that they can +settle the thing by further concession and get to their own business. +Few of them care for Home Rule on its own merits. They want Ireland +out of the way. They are going the wrong way about it. To give this is +to give everything. And let me tell you something new. Once the bill +becomes law, and the exactions of a Home Rule Government were enforced +by England a great part of Ulster would in pure self-protection, being +no longer bound to England by the ties of loyalty, sympathy, and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span>mutual dependence—a great part, practically the whole of Ulster, +would box the compass and go in for complete independence, as the best +thing possible under the circumstances. England would then feel +something in her vitals, something serious and something astonishing. +The only rebellion that ever gave England any trouble was worked by +Ulstermen. The most effective agitators have nearly always been +renegade Protestants. Let England think what she is about before she, +at the bidding of a foolish old man, turns her back on her faithful +friends to throw herself into the arms of her sworn enemies."</p> + +<p>Another Conservative, for I met none other in Armagh, said:—"Surely +the minority are worth some consideration. There are one million two +hundred thousand loyal Protestants, and certainly many thousand Roman +Catholics, who are against the Bill. As Sir George Trevelyan said, 'We +must never forget that there are two Irelands,' and as John Bright +said, 'There are more loyal men and women in Ireland than the whole +population of men and women in Wales.' Yet Mr. Gladstone is so very +considerate of Wales. Ireland can point to fully one-third of the +entire population, who view with abhorrence the very name of Home +Rule, and are pledged to resist it to the last. These people have been +and are the friends of England, and England can be proud of them as +having flourished under her rule. They have been and are the English +garrison in Ireland, and England sorely needs a garrison here. Mr. +Gladstone cares nothing for their opinions. On the other hand, he +spends his life in pandering to disloyal Ireland, led by men who have +openly avowed and gloried in their hatred of England, and who have +hundreds of times publicly declared their determination to secure +complete independence; men who have broken the law of the land, and +have incited others to break it; men who turned a peaceful country +into a perfect hell, and have for ever upset the people's notions of +honesty. Parnellites and anti-Parnellites have only one end and aim, +and only one sentiment. They hate British rule and British loyalists, +and aim at the ultimate repeal of the Union, and the absolute +separation of the two countries. And they would always be unfriendly. +The party of lawlessness, outrage, and rebellion would never hold +amicable relations with a law-abiding and peaceful commercial country. +There would be no peace for Ireland either. The factions of the Irish +party are yearly becoming more and more numerous. In all except hatred +to England they are bitterly opposed. All very well to set up Ulster +as being the ugly duckling, as being the one dissentient particle of a +united Ireland. If every Protestant left the country Ireland would +still be divided, and hopelessly divided. Personal reviling, riot, and +blackguardism are already common between the factions, united though +they try to appear, so far as is necessary to deceive the stupid +Saxon. And if the Saxon cannot see the result of trusting the low +blackguards who form the working plant of the Nationalist party he is +stupid indeed, and deserves all that will happen to him.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>"Have you noticed how the Irish people are gulled?"</p> + +<p>Yes, I have noticed it. The <i>Freeman's Journal</i>, as the representative +paper of the party and the chosen organ of the Church, is run on a +pabulum of falsehood. Englishmen would hardly believe such lying +possible, but the <i>Freeman</i>, as a liar, has, by constant practice, +attained virtuosity. What Rubinstein is on the piano, what Blondin was +on the tight-rope, what the Bohee Brothers are on the banjo, what Sims +Reeves was in the ballad world, what Irving is in histrionic art, what +Spurgeon was as a preacher, what Patti is in opera, what Gladstone is +as a word-spinner, what Tim Healy is as a whipping-post, what the +Irish peasant is as a lazybones, what Harcourt is as a humbug, what +the member for Kilanyplace is as a blackguard, so is the <i>Freeman's +Journal</i> as a liar. When quoting great masters examples of their work +are always interesting.</p> + +<p>The late Chamberlain-Dillon episode is fresh in the minds of all +newspaper readers. Dillon wanted the date. The date was given him. He +promised to answer the charge, but anybody can see that no answer was +possible. He failed to come up to time. Being lugged to the front by +the scurf of the neck, he explained that he <i>had</i> used the words, +namely, that when the Irish party got power they would remember their +enemies, but—much virtue in But—he used the words under the +influence of exasperation arising from the Mitchelstown affair—which +took place a year later!</p> + +<p>Mr. Chamberlain pointed this out, and referring to this incident the +<i>Freeman</i> says:—</p> + +<p>"Mr. Chamberlain literally grew pale under the succession of +exposures, and wriggled in his seat, while he attempted to meet them, +now by wriggling equivocations, now by reckless denial." "Mr. Goschen, +prompted by Mr. Bolton," horrified the <i>Freeman's</i> delicate taste by +"jocose allusions to watertight compartments and to the vessel's +toppling over, which grated horribly on the members of the House, with +the memory of the recent terrible calamity fresh in their minds." I +was in Dublin when the news of the Victoria disaster arrived, and I +heard a typical Nationalist express a wish that the whole fleet had +perished. Such sentiments are the natural result of the lying +literature provided by the "patriot" press of Dublin and the +provinces. Well may Home Rule opinion in Ireland be rotten through and +through! Mirabeau said of a very fat man that his only use was to show +how far the skin would stretch without bursting. The <i>Freeman</i> exists +to show to what lengths human fatuity can go. Lying and slander and +all uncleanness, envy and hatred and malice and all uncharitableness, +are its daily bread. With Home Rule in Ireland, this sheet would be +the ruling power. To support Home Rule is for the <i>Freeman</i> to breathe +its native air. Under an Irish Parliament, nutriment "thick and slab" +would abound, and the patriot print would wax in strength and stature +day by day. Enlighten the popular mind, and the <i>Freeman's</i> hours are +numbered. It would vanish as a dream, forgotten by all <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>except some +old diver into the history of the past, who having read its pages, +will shake his head sadly when he hears of Liars, and remembering its +Parliamentary notes will say—</p> + +<p>"There were Giants in those days."</p> + +<p class="date">Armagh, July 6th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_45_A_PICTURE_OF_ROMISH_TOLERATION" id="No_45_A_PICTURE_OF_ROMISH_TOLERATION"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 45.—A PICTURE OF ROMISH "TOLERATION."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he country from Armagh to Monaghan is a very garden of Eden, +undulating, well wooded, well watered, and in a high state of +cultivation. The intervening towns and villages are neat and sweet, +and the people seem to be hard workers. Monaghan itself, during the +last generation, has wonderfully improved. It suffers by reason of its +position on an almost inaccessible branch line, and the complete +absence of manufactories, but it has no appearance of poverty. The +Diamond is a well-built square, and the whole town, mostly built of +stone, some of the streets on terraces, many of them thickly planted +with trees, has a shady and sylvan look. The gaol, an enormous +building crowning a steep hill, looks like the capitol of a fortress, +and appears to have exercised a salutary effect on the neighbourhood, +for it has long been disused. The district did not furnish malefactors +enough to make the establishment pay. The gaol officials stood about +with folded hands wishing for something to do, and probably locked up +each other in turn by way of keeping up a pretence of work. The +governor had nothing to govern, and the turnkeys sighed as they +thought of old times. The thing was growing scandalous, and the +ever-diminishing output of convicts marked the decadence of the +country. Day by day the officials climbed to the topmost battlement in +the hope that rural crime-hunters might be descried bringing in some +turnip-stealer, some poacher, some blacker of his neighbour's eye, and +day by day these faithful prison-keepers sadly descended to renew the +weary round of mutual incarceration, so necessary if they wished to +keep their hands in, and to apply somebody's patent rust-preventer to +the darling locks, which formerly in better times they had snapped +with honest pride. At last the authorities intervened, discharged the +turnkeys, and locked up the place. It was a case of <i>Ichabod</i>. The +fine gold had become dim and the weapons of war had perished. The +officials departed in peace, each vowing that the country was going to +the Divil, and each convinced that such a state of things would never +come to pass under Home Rule. All became earnest Nationalists in the +sure and certain hope that under an Irish Parliament business would +revive, that the old place would be re-opened, that its venerable +walls would again re-echo the songs of happy criminals, that the +oakum-picking industry would revive and flourish, and that the +treadwheel (which they identify with the weal of the country) would +continuously <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span>revolve. Meanwhile, Armagh extends hospitality to stray +wrong-doers and Monaghan boards them out to the manifest injury of the +local turnkey industry.</p> + +<p>The new Roman Catholic Cathedral is said to be the finest in Ireland. +It was over thirty years in building, and although the stone of the +main fabric cost nothing, the structure cost more than a hundred +thousand pounds. The interior is more gorgeous than beautiful, and the +money seems to have been expended with execrable taste. The marble +mosaic of the chancel floor is beautifully done, the work having been +entrusted to Italian workmen, who were engaged on it for several +years. The numerous statues of Carrara marble are well executed, and +other items are also of the best. But the effect of the whole is +inharmonious, and the great lines are obscured by over-ornamentation. +You are reminded of an over-dressed woman. The pulpit, surmounted by a +lofty conical canopy richly gilt, is supported on four lofty pillars +of coffee-coloured marble highly polished. The baldacchino is a +glittering affair, forty or fifty feet high, and big enough for a +mission church. This also rests on marble columns. The sacristy, +chapter-house and other offices are splendidly furnished, and the +furniture of the doors, brass branches spreading all over them, +massive as mediæval work, were remindful of Birmingham. The oak +drawers of the robing room contain sacerdotal raiment to the tune of +two thousand pounds, and the banners, many in number, and of richest +work, must also represent a small fortune. Beautiful oil paintings +from Italy hang around, and the bishop's throne is a marvel of gold +lace and luxury. A queer-looking utensil, like a low seat, but with +round brass bosses at each corner, proved to be merely a sort of +crinoline whereon the bishop might extend his robes, so as to look +inflated and imposing. So does the noble turkey-cock extend himself +when bent on conquest of his trustful mate, gobbling the while +strange-sounding incantations. To describe in detail would require a +book. The confessionals are snug, with rich external carving. Plenty +of accommodation for penitents here. Amid such surroundings to be a +miserable sinner must be indeed a pleasure. The spire is two hundred +and fifty feet high. I mounted and saw the great bell, over three tons +in weight. I also saw the bishop's robes of wondrous richness and +penetrative virtue, the consecrated slippers which the acolytes wear, +with their scarlet robes, remindful of Egyptian flamens and African +flamingoes; the blessed candle-box and the seven-times blessed +candles, which at once drop tallow on the holder's clothes and benison +on his sin-struck soul. All this expense in poor Ireland, all these +advantages for poor Ireland. And still the Irish are not happy. With +Roman Catholic cathedrals on every hand, with monasteries, nunneries, +seminaries, confraternities, colleges, convents, Carmelites, Christian +brothers, and collections whichever way they turn, the Irish people +should be content. What could they wish for more?</p> + +<p>The principal shopkeepers of Monaghan have unpatriotic names. +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span>Crawford, Jenkins, Henry, Campbell, Kerr, McEntee, Macdonald, and +their like must in some way be accountable for the smartness of the +town and for the emptiness of the prison on the hill. And you soon see +that the Cathedral was needed, for besides the Protestant church, the +town is polluted by two Presbyterian churches, to say nothing of a +schism-shop used by the Wesleyan Methodists. A Monaghan man said:—</p> + +<p>"The respectable people are nearly all Protestants, and all the +Protestants, and most of the respectable Catholics, if not all, are +Unionists. In point of numbers the Catholics have the pull, and in the +event of a Home Rule Parliament, which, God forbid, our position as +Protestants would be no longer tenable. We should have to knock under, +and to become persons of no consideration. The small farmers among the +Protestant population would have an especially hard time of it. They +mostly held aloof from the Land League and such-like associations; and +when the other party get the upper hand they will have to smart for +it. What Mr. Dillon said about remembering in the day of their power +who had been their enemies, is always present to the minds of the +lower classes of the Irish people. It is that they may have the power +of punishing all sympathisers with England that some of them say they +want Home Rule. No doubt they have other temptations, but certainly +that is one great incentive. So keenly are they bent on getting power +that they in some cases quite disregard any possible disadvantages +accruing from the success of the movement. 'Let us get the power,' +they say, 'never mind the money.' I have heard the remark made more +than once, and it represents the dominant feeling in the minds of +many. Rubbish about struggling for equal rights. Where are the +disabilities of Irish Catholics?</p> + +<p>"Ascendency is their game. Would they be tolerant? Why ask such a +question? When was Roman Catholicism tolerant, and where? Is not the +whole system of Popery based on intolerance, on infallibility, on +strict exclusiveness? Let me give you a few local facts to show their +'tolerance.'</p> + +<p>"In the old times the Monaghan Town Commissioners were a mixed body. +Catholics and Protestants met together in friendly converse, and the +voting went anyhow, both religions on both sides, according to each +man's opinion of the business. Nowadays, wherever in Ireland the two +sects are represented the thing is worked differently, and you may +know the voting beforehand by reference to the members' religion. We +are not troubled with this in Monaghan, and for the very best of +reasons—all the members but one are Roman Catholics, and the solitary +Protestant is a lawyer who has always been identified with them, and +has always managed their legal business. He is practically one of +themselves, having always acted with them.</p> + +<p>"When the modern political agitation became rife, the Romans of +Monaghan, under the orders of their priests, at once ousted all +Protestants, except the one I have mentioned, who does not count, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>and +monopolised the Town Council ever since. They forgot something—Lord +Rossmore has a claim on the market-tolls and other similar payments +which amount to about three hundred pounds a year, but so long as the +Town Council was worked by a mixed body of Catholics and Protestants +he consented to forego this claim, and made the town a present of the +money, which was expended in various improvements. Three hundred a +year is a large sum in a small country town where labour is cheap, and +in fifty years this sum, carefully laid out in ornamental and sanitary +arrangements, quite changed the aspect of the place. When, however, +the priests came on the scene and determined to have things +exclusively in their own hands, Lord Rossmore did not quite see why he +should any longer give the money to the town. And let it be understood +that his agent had always been a prominent figure on the Monaghan Town +Council, which was very right, having regard to the three hundred +pounds given by Lord Rossmore, and to the agent's superior knowledge +and business experience. He had been kicked out with the rest, and so +it was made known that in future my lord would keep the money in his +own pocket. They were astonished and suddenly cast down. 'Fear came +upon them, and sorrow even as upon a woman,' &c.—you know the text. +They said the money belonged to them, and really they had had it so +long that they might be excused for believing this. Lord Rossmore was +firm. They fought the thing out; but where was the good? They were +beaten at every point. They had no case. So the town is three hundred +pounds a year worse off, and Lord Rossmore three hundred pounds +better. And still they will not allow a Protestant on the Council, +although nearly all the best business men are of that persuasion. +How's that for tolerance? And if such a thing be done in the green +tree what will be done in the dry? If they flog us now with whips, +won't they flog us then with scorpions?"</p> + +<p>Another thraitor to his counthry's cause, said:—"A great idea with +the priests is this—to get hold of the education of the country. They +do not like the present system of National education. They do not +approve of their youthful adherents growing up side by side with +Protestant children. At first the Catholic bishops welcomed the scheme +of National education, but now they are averse to it. They have seen +how it works. It goes against them. It has been weighed in the balance +and found wanting. The Catholic children grew up in amity with their +neighbours, and got dangerously liberal ideas on the subject of +religion. They were getting to believe that it mattered little whether +Catholic or Protestant so long as a man's life was right. I went to +school with Catholics, grew up with them, was always friendly with +them, and we keep up the friendship to this day. The Catholic bishops +disapprove of this. They want the line of cleavage sharp and distinct. +Fifty years ago mixed marriages were common enough. Such a thing never +happens now-a-days. It is most stringently forbidden by the Catholic +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>Church. A priest told me that emigrants to America, such as had been +educated in Irish National schools, along with Protestant children, +were very apt to drop their Romanism when once separated from their +native parish, and to become Protestants. I suppose he meant to say +that long familiarity with the unclean thing had undermined the +wholesome dislike of heresy which every Catholic should feel, and that +therefore such familiarity should be, if possible, avoided. Years ago +the priest would be friendly with his Protestant neighbours. We all +lived together pretty comfortably. Of late a great change has taken +place. The clergy as far as possible leave us, and cause us to be +left, out in the cold. The question of Home Rule is entirely a +religious question. Parnell was actuated by what might fairly be +called patriotism; that is, comparatively speaking. The clergy saw in +his fall a grand opportunity to use the movement he had created for +the furtherance of their own ends. Home Rule is a purely Roman +Catholic movement, and has had the most regrettable results on the +amity of neighbours everywhere. Formerly the question of religion +never arose. Now nothing else is considered. The Papists are almost +unbearable, while they as yet have only the hope of power. What they +would become if once they grasped the reality God only knows. I am not +prepared to stand it, whatever it be. My arrangements to leave the +country have long been made. At my age it will be a great grief, but I +have always lived in a free country, and I will die in a free country. +I was born in the town, and hoped to end my days at my birthplace. But +I shall go, if it almost broke my heart, rather than see myself and +the worthy men who have made the place domineered over and patronised +by Maynooth priests. <i>Ubi bene, ibi patria.</i> Where I'm most happy, +that will be my country."</p> + +<p>The road to Kilmore is through a beautiful park-like country heavily +timbered with oak, ash, beech, chestnut, and fir. Tall hedgerows +twenty feet high line most of the way, which in many parts is +completely overhung with trees in green arches impervious to rain. The +country is undulating, with sharp descents and long clumps of beeches +and imposing pine woods, bosky entrances to country seats and grassy +hills, covered with thriving kine. From the church itself an extensive +landscape is seen on every side. A deep valley intervenes between the +church and a pretty farmhouse. I find a narrow lane with high hedges, +covered with honeysuckles, which seems to lead thitherward. A man is +toiling in a field hard by, digging for dear life, bare-armed and +swarthy. I mount the gate and make for him. He remains unconscious, +and goes on digging like mad. His brow is wet with honest sweat, and +he seems bent on earning whate'er he can. Perhaps he wishes to look +the whole world in the face, having an ambition to owe no rent to any +man. I woke him and asked why the flags were flying on Kilmore +steeple.</p> + +<p>"To the pious, glorious, and immortal memory of William of Orange, who +gave us an open Bible, and delivered us from Popery <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span>brass money, and +wooden shoes. We put them up on the first of July and fly them till +the twelfth, when we walk in procession through Monaghan."</p> + +<p>"An Orangeman, and a black Protestant, I fear?"</p> + +<p>He laughed merrily, and said he was proud and thankful to be both. "If +we didn't hold together, and associate in some way, we might quit the +country at once. By banding together we hold our ground, and we will +do so until Home Rule comes on us. Then we'll have to give in, about +here. We're in a minority."</p> + +<p>"Don't you think the Papists would be tolerant?"</p> + +<p>"Aye, aye! Toleration indeed. As tolerant as a cat to a mouse. As +tolerant as I am to this thistle, bad scran to it," said my friend, +fetching up the obnoxious weed with a vigorous stroke, and chopping it +to pieces with the spade, after which he shovelled it to the bottom of +the trench. "Why, sir, the Papists are beginning to assume mastership +already. Before this Government had been a fortnight in office the +dirty scum began to give themselves airs. I mean, of course, the +lowest of them. They were not so civil as before. Tolerant, ye say! +Sure anybody that heard ye say the like of that would know ye were a +stranger in the counthry."</p> + +<p>The farm house was a model of cleanliness and neatness, James Hanna a +model of a hard-working, debt-paying, honourable farmer. The living +rooms had every accommodation required for the decent bringing-up of a +family; and the parlour, with its carpets, knick-knacks, and +highly-polished solid furniture, showed both taste and luxury. Mrs. +Hanna, a buxom lady of middle age, was hard at work, but for all that, +the picture of comeliness and neatness. The children were just coming +in from school, well clad and good-looking, the boys ruddy and strong, +the girls modest and lady-like. Mr. Hanna was hard at it in some +contiguous field, but he came round and told me that he held twenty +acres of land, that the rent was £24 10s., that his father had the +farm for more than fifty years, that he was a Protestant, a Unionist, +and a strong opponent of Home Rule. I have visited two other farms of +the same size in Mayo and Achil, both held by Catholic Home Rulers. +The rent of the Achil farm described by its holder, Mr. McGreal, as +"very good land," was seventeen-and-sixpence for the whole twenty +acres. McGreal was very poor, and looked it. His house was of the type +described in my previous letters. Mr. James Hanna pays more for each +acre than McGreal for his whole farm, and yet the Kilmore man is +prosperous, his house, his family, all his belongings suggestive of +the most enviable lot. A gun was hanging over the fire-place, which +was a grate, not a turf-stone. I asked him if he used the +shooting-iron to keep his landlord in order. He said No, he was no +hunter of big game. I may be accused of too favourable an account of +this farmhouse and its inmates, but I have (perhaps somewhat +indiscreetly) given the name and address, and Monaghan people will +agree with me. A more delightful picture of Arcadia I certainly never +saw. Cannot Englishmen reckon up the Home Rule <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>agitation from such +facts as these, the accuracy of which is easily ascertainable by +anybody? Everywhere the same thing in endless repetition. Everywhere +laziness, ignorance, uncleanliness, dishonesty, disloyalty, ask for +Home Rule. Everywhere industry, intelligence, cleanliness, honesty, +loyalty, declare that to sanction Home Rule is to open the floodgates +to an inrush of barbarism, to put back the clock for centuries, to put +a premium on fetichism, superstition, crime of all kinds, to say +nothing of roguery and rank laziness. What are Englishmen going to do? +Which party will they prefer to believe? When will John Bull put on +his biggest boots and kick the rascal faction to the moon?</p> + +<p class="date">Monaghan, July 8th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_46_A_BIT_OF_FOREIGN_OPINION" id="No_46_A_BIT_OF_FOREIGN_OPINION"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 46.—A BIT OF FOREIGN OPINION.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he military call and spell the name Inniskilling, which corruption is +probably due to the proverbial stupidity of the brutal Saxon, and is +undoubtedly another injustice to Ireland. The Inniskilling Dragoons +have won their fame on many a stricken field, and to them the town +owes any celebrity it may possess. From a tourist's point of view it +deserves to be better known. It is a veritable town amidst the waters, +and almost encircled by the meandering channels that connect Upper and +Lower Lough Erne. It consists almost entirely of one long, irregular, +but tolerably-built street, at both ends of which you cross the river +Erne. A wooded knoll, crowned by a monument to Sir Lowry Cole, who did +good service under Wellington, is a conspicuous object, and through +openings purposely cut through the trees, affords some very pleasing +views. A hundred steps lead to the top, and the ascent repays the +climb. The Cuilgach range, source of the Shannon, the Blue Stack +mountains of Donegal, the ancient church and round tower of Devenish, +an island in the Great Lough Erne, and due west the Benbulben hills, +are easily visible. Devenish island is about two miles away, and, +although without a tree, is very interesting. Some of the Priory still +remains, and I have found a Latin inscription in Lombardic characters +which, being interpreted, reads Mathew O'Dughagan built this, +Bartholomew O'Flauragan being Prior, <span class="fakesc">A.D.</span> 1449. There is a +graveyard next the ruins, and a restored Round Tower, eighty-five feet +high, not far away, the door of which is ten feet from the ground. +These towers are sprinkled all over the country, and in nearly all the +door is eight feet to twenty feet from the ground. The process of +eviction seems to have been present to the minds of the builders. The +sheriffs' officers of a thousand years ago must have been absolutely +powerless in presence of a No Rent manifesto. Steamers are running on +the Lower Lough from Enniskillen to Belleek, about twenty-two miles. +You can sail there and back for eighteen-pence. The Upper Lough is +said to be still <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>more beautiful, the tourist agents have recently +been trying to open up this lovely island-studded lake. The beauties +of Ireland are as unspeakable as they are unknown. The strip of sea +holds some tourists back, and others seek the prestige of holiday on +the Continong. A German traveller, hight Bröcker, declares that +Ireland beats his previous record, and that the awful grandeur of the +Antrim coast has not its equal in Europe, while the wild west with its +heavy Atlantic seas, is finer far than Switzerland. Germans are +everywhere. The Westenra Arms of Monaghan boasted a waiter from the +Lake of Constanz, and I met a German philologist at Enniskillen who +had his own notions about Irish politics. He ridiculed the attitude of +England, or rather of Gladstonian England, and rated Home Rulers +generally in good set terms.</p> + +<p>"The business of England is to rule Ireland. Justly, of course, but to +rule. That is if England has any regard for her own reputation. A +colonel must rule his regiment, a teacher must rule his class, the +captain must rule his crew, or disorder and damage to all parties will +be the inevitable result. England stands to her acquisitions, whether +conquered or peacefully colonised, in the relationship of head of the +family. She has one member who is troublesome. There is always one +black sheep in the flock. There was a Judas among the twelve. England +has one, only one, at present, of her numerous family who gives +extraordinary anxiety. And why?</p> + +<p>"Difference of race and difference of religion. The double difference +is too much. The races would amalgamate but for the religious +difference. They would intermarry, and in time a sufficient mixture +would take place; would have taken place long since but for the action +of Rome. Rome keeps open the old wound, Rome irritates the old sores. +Rome holds the two nations apart. We in Germany see all this quite +plainly. We have no interests at stake, and then, you know, lookers-on +see better than players. Rome keeps Ireland in hand as a drag on the +most influential disseminator of Protestantism in the world. Ireland +suits her purpose as a backward nation. We have quite snuffed out the +Pope in Germany. Education is fatal to the political power of Rome. +Ireland is not educated, and suits her purpose admirably. You will not +succeed in satisfying Ireland, because Rome will not allow the Irish +to remain quiescent. Rome will not permit Ireland to rest and be +thankful, to fraternise with England, to take the hand of friendship, +and to work together for good. This would not do for the Church. Any +Romish priest will tell you that his Church is destined to overspread +and conquer every country in the world, and that of all possible +events that is a thousand times the most desirable. An independent +Ireland, whose resources would be in the hands of the Romish Clergy, +and whose strategetical position would be the means of aiding some +Catholic power to crush the prestige of England—that is not a +possibility too remote for the imagination of Romish wirepullers. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>Are +Englishmen acquainted with the history of Papal Rome? Have they +adequate knowledge of the subtlety, the craft, the dissimulation, the +foresight of this most wonderful religious system? I think not, or +they would be more on their guard against her Jesuitical advances. The +idea of your Gladstone going to your Parliament to hand over this +country to Rome under the specious pretence of remedying Irish +grievances, is too ridiculous. I ask myself where is the English +commonsense of which we have heard so much in Germany?</p> + +<p>"England must be master. Not with tyranny; of that there is no danger, +but with a judicial firmness. Your system of party government has good +points, but it has weak points, and the Irish make you feel them. You +pay too much attention to Irish clamour. I have been partly living in +England for twenty-two years, and I have seen your Gladstone 'finally' +contenting the Irish three or four times. Now, if he understood the +subject at all, he ought to know that for the reason I have stated +satisfaction is impossible. No use healing and dressing a wound which +is constantly re-opened. No use in dressing a sore which is +deliberately irritated. Rome will keep England going. With your Home +Rule Bills, your Irish Church Bills, your successive Land Bills, how +much have you done? How far have you succeeded in pacifying Ireland? +Are you any nearer success now than ever you were? On the other hand, +does not appetite grow with what it feeds on? The more you give, the +more they want. They are far more discontented than they were before +the passage of the three Land Bills, by each of which your Gladstone, +your amusing Gladstone, declared he would pacify and content the +Irish. And now your Gladstone is at it again. Funny fellow! He is like +the Auctioneer with his Last time, for the Last time, for the very +Last time, for the very <i>very</i> Last time. And the grave English nation +allows itself to be made a sport. It is mocked, derided, by a number +of lawyers' clerks and nonentities from third-rate Irish towns. It is +bullied by a handful of professional politicians, paid by your +American enemies, and governed by the flabby-looking priests you see +skulking about the Irish railway stations and parks and pleasure +resorts. As I said before, England must be master, as the captain is +of his crew, as the tutor of his class, as the colonel of his +regiment; or she will go down, and down, and down, until she has no +place nor influence among the nations. And she will deserve none, for +she knew not how to rule.</p> + +<p>"England is at present like a ship's captain, who in his futile +endeavours to please one of his crew first neglects the management of +the ship, and, then (if she grants Home Rule) allows the discontented +person to steer the course. And all to please one silly old man, who +should long ago have retired from public life. What man at eighty-four +would be reckoned competent to manage a complicated business +enterprise such as a bank, or an insurance business, or a big +manufacturing affair, or a newspaper office? Yet you allow Gladstone +to manage an Empire! Where, I ask is the English sense, of which we +hear so much in Germany? You want <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>a Bismarck to make short work of +these Popish preachers of sedition. You want a Bismarck to rid your +country of the Irish vermin that torment her. The best Irishmen are +the most brilliant, polite, scholarly men I ever met. None of them are +Home Rulers. That should be enough for England without further +argument. Your House of Lords has sense. That will be your salvation +against Gladstone and Rome."</p> + +<p>At the <i>Imperial</i> was a warm discussion anent the propriety of keeping +alive the memory of the Battle of the Boyne, which the Orangemen +celebrate with great pomp on July 12. "The counthry's heart-sick of +Orange William an' his black-mouths," said a dark-visaged farmer. By +black-mouths he meant Protestants.</p> + +<p>"The blayguards are not allowed to shout To Hell wid the Pope +now-a-days. In Belfast they'd be fined forty shillin's. An' they know +that, and they daren't shout To Hell wid the Pope, so they roar To +Hell wid the Forty Shillin's. That's what I call a colourable evasion. +But the law favours them."</p> + +<p>A man of mighty beard looked on the speaker with contempt. "Sure, 'tis +as raisonable to celebrate King William, who <i>did</i> live as a Saint +like Patrick, Phadrig as ye call him, who never existed at all. At +laste, that's what some of them say. Ye mix the life an' work of +half-a-dozen men, an' ye say 'twas all Saint Patrick. Sure, most of +him is a myth, a sort of a fog, jist. Ye can't agree among yerselves +as to whin he was born." Turning to me, the bearded man said, "Did ye +ever hear the pome about Saint Patrick's birthday?"</p> + +<p>I regretfully admitted that the masterpiece in question had escaped my +research, but pleaded in extenuation that I came from England, where +the rudiments of polite larnin' and the iliments of Oirish litherature +have not yet permeated the barbarian population. Barbatus then recited +as follows:—</p> + +<div style="margin-left: 25%;"> +"On the eighth day iv March, as sum people say,<br /> +St. Patrick at midnight he furst saw the day.<br /> +While others declare on the ninth he was born,<br /> +Sure, 'tis all a mistake between midnight and morn!<br /> +Now, the furst faction fight in Oireland, they say,<br /> +Was all on account of St. Patrick's birthday.<br /> +Some fought for the eighth, for the ninth more would die—<br /> +Who didn't say right, they would blacken his eye.<br /> +At length both the parties so positive grew,<br /> +They each kept a birthday, so Patrick got two.<br /> +Till Father Mulcahy (who showed them their sins)<br /> +Said, No man can have two birthdays (barrin' he was twins).<br /> +An' boys, don't be fightin' for eight or for nine;<br /> +Don't be always disputin', but sumtimes combine.<br /> +Combine eight wid nine, seventeen is the mark,<br /> +Let that be his birthday." "<span class="sc">Amen</span>," said the clerk.<br /> +"Tho' he wasn't a twin, as history does show—<br /> +Yet he's worth any other two saints that we know.<br /> +So they all got blind drunk, which complated their bliss,<br /> +An' they kept up the custom from that day to this."<br /> +</div> + +<p>"An' why wouldn't we remimber King William? An' why wouldn't we +remimber that the Enniskillen Protestants went out <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>an' smashed up the +Papists under Lord Mountcashel, at Newtownbutler, on August 1, 1689? +The very day of the relief of Derry—so it was. An' more than ever now +we need to keep our heads above wather. Ye've an old fule over there +that's thryin' to upset the counthry wid his fulery an' his Home Rule. +But we'll not have it! Never will we bow the neck to Rome. In the name +of God, we'll resist to the last moment. Every man will stand to his +arms. Leave us to settle with the Papists, and we'd hunt them like +flies. Thim an' their Army of Independence! 'Twas an' Army of +Independence they levied to help the French invasion. The poor +parleyvoos landed at Killala (ye can see where they entrenched their +camp), and marched with the Irish Army of Independence to Castlebar, +where the English smashed them up, the Irish Catholic levies bolting +at first fire or before it." Four or five nameless stones mark the +graves of French officers killed in this engagement. I saw them on my +way from Castlebar to Turlough's Tower. My Orange friend went +on:—"We'll send a hundred Orangemen to fight their Army of +Independence. They shall be armed with dog-whips, to bring the brutes +to heel. No, we'll not send a hundred, either. We'll send thirty-two, +one for each county of Ireland. 'Twould be a trate to see the Army of +Independence hidin' thimsilves in the bogs, an' callin' on the rocks +an' hills to fall down an' cover thim, an' the airth to swallow them +up."</p> + +<p>A political tradesman recommended to me as a perfect encyclopædia of +argument on the Home Rule question, said:—"The great difficulty is to +get the English people to understand the duplicity of this sacerdotal +movement. Of course, you understand that the agitation is really +religious, and not, strictly speaking, political at all. In England +the Romish priests are a better class of men, and no doubt they are +loyal enough for practical purposes. And then they have neither +numbers nor influence. You look upon the Catholic laity of England +very much as we look upon the Plymouth Brethren of Ireland—that is, +as a well-meaning, well-conducted body of people with whom you don't +agree. The Catholic laity of Ireland would be all right if they were +left alone, if they were allowed to follow the dictates of their +natural humanity. My Catholic neighbours were very good, none better, +until this accursed agitation began. Left to themselves the Irish +people would agree better and better every year. But that would not +suit Rome. The Church, which is very astute, too much so for England, +sees in agrarian agitation a means of influence and the acquisition of +power; and once an Irish Parliament became dominant, intolerance would +make itself felt. Not as of old by the fires and tortures of the +Inquisition, for nineteenth-century public opinion would not stand +that; and not by manifestly illegal means either, but by boycotting, +by every species of rascality. How can you expect tolerance from a +church the very essence of whose doctrine is intolerance? When +everybody outside the pale of that Church is outside the pale of +salvation, condemned beforehand to eternal <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>damnation, anything and +everything is permissible to compel them to come in. That is their +doctrine, and they, of course, call it benevolence.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Gladstone has said,—'My firm belief is that the influence of +Great Britain in every Irish difficulty is not a domineering and +tyrannising, but a softening and mitigating influence, and that were +Ireland detached from her political connection with this country and +left to her own unaided agencies, it might be that the strife of +parties would then burst forth in a form calculated to strike horror +through the land.' There is the passage, in my scrap-book. The speech +was made in the House. The English Home Rulers believe that their +troubles will be over when once Irishmen rule from College Green, and +they trust the Irish Catholic members, who from childhood have been +taught that it is not necessary to keep faith with heretics. That is a +fundamental tenet of the Church of Rome. Still, England will have no +excuse for being so grossly deceived, for these men have at one time +or other been pretty candid. William O'Brien said that the country +would in the end 'own no flag but the Green Flag of an independent +Irish nation,' and J.E. Redmond in March last said that it was the +utmost folly to talk of finality in connection with the Home Rule +Bill. Then you must remember what Parnell said about taking off his +coat. He would not have done it for anything short of independence. +Mr. Gladstone himself saw through this, and with all other Liberals +consistently and determinedly opposed every demand for Home Rule until +his desire for power compelled him to surrender unconditionally to +Parnell. At Aberdeen the G.O.M. said,—'Can any sensible man, can any +rational man, suppose that at this time of day we are going to +disintegrate the great capital institutions of the country for the +purpose of making ourselves ridiculous in the eyes of all mankind?' No +sane man ever supposed it, no honest man ever believed that Mr. +Gladstone would ever sell himself to Irish traitors for a short period +of power. The thing was incredible. In another speech Mr. Gladstone +said he would never consent to give Ireland any principle which could +not be given on equal terms to Scotland or any other part of the +Kingdom. So we may expect Scotch and Welsh Home Rule bills after this, +and then a separate Parliament for every country that wants it. +There's the speech, you can copy the reference.</p> + +<p>"England is like an old-established business with a shop over the way +which only just pays, and is an awful lot of trouble; in fact, more +trouble than it's worth. You might say, let it go then. But if you let +it go somebody else will take it, and run in opposition. Home Rule +means the immediate return of the Irish-American ruffians who were +here during the Fenian agitation, or their successors. Home Rule means +that armed rebellion can be organised with much more reasonable +chances of success. The police will be under the control of traitors, +and it took you all your time to keep the country in order when the +police were in your own hands. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span>Whatever happens to John Bull will be +the proper reward of his asinine stupidity. He'll have his hands full, +with an Irish Parliament against him. And if he gets a big quarrel on +his hands with Russia or France, or any other powerful military +nation, that is the time he'll feel it. Are you going to put into the +hands of your enemies the power to ruin you merely by biding their +time?"</p> + +<p>I saw several other Enniskilleners, but they added nothing to the +disquisitions of those already quoted. A feeling of deep disgust was +the prevailing sentiment. Encamped in the enemy's country, from +childhood conversant with the tortuous windings of Papal policy, and +the windy hollowness of the popular cries, they stand amazed that +Englishmen can be deceived by such obvious imposture, that they will +listen to such self-convicted charlatans, that they will repose +confidence in such ten-times-exposed deceivers. The history of the +Home Rule movement will in future ages be quoted as the most +extraordinary combination of knavery, slavery, and credulity the world +has ever seen. And yet some Englishmen believe in it. After all, this +is not so wonderful. There were people who believed in Cagliostro, +Mormon Smith, Joanna Southcote of Exeter, Mrs. Girling, the Tichborne +Claimant, General Boulanger, electric sugar, the South Sea Bubble, and +a thousand other exploded humbugs. No doctrine could be invented too +absurd for human belief. No impostor would fail to attract adherents, +except through lack of audacity. Thousands of people believe in the +winking virgin of Loretto, and tens of thousands, a few months ago, +went to worship the holy coat of Tièves. So people are found who vote +for Home Rule as a means of settling the Irish Question, and rendering +justice to Ireland. <i>Populus decipi vult.</i> Doubtless the pleasure is +as great, In being cheated as to cheat.</p> + +<p class="date">Enniskillen, July 11th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_47_THE_LOYALISTS_AND_THE_LAWLESS" id="No_47_THE_LOYALISTS_AND_THE_LAWLESS"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 47.—THE LOYALISTS AND THE LAWLESS.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterc.png" alt="C" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />lones, which must be pronounced as a dissyllable, is a city set upon +a hill which cannot be hid. Viewed from the railway the clustered +houses surround the church spire like an enormous beehive. Like other +ancient Irish towns, it possesses the ancient cross, the ancient round +tower, and the ancient abbey, without which none is genuine. It has +not the sylvan, terraced, Cheltenham-cum-Bath appearance of its +neighbour Monaghan, though it somewhat resembles Bath in its general +outline. The ruins want tidying up, and no doubt they will be looked +after when the demand is greater. Ruins are a drug in Ireland, and as +Mark Twain would say—most of them are dreadfully out of repair. The +Irish have no notion of making them attractive, of exploiting them, of +turning an honest penny by their exhibition. The inhabitants of any +given neighbourhood can never give information <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>as to their date, use, +decay, general history, beyond the stereotyped "They were built by the +owld ancient folks long ago." The Clones people are no exception to +the general rule. The town is on the main line from Dublin to +Londonderry, but is little troubled by tourists. The place is quiet +and tidy enough, and like many other Irish country towns seems to live +on the surrounding country, which sends in a strong contingent on +market days. The people are also quiet, civil, and decent, and the +land in the neighbourhood seems fertile and well cultivated. Industry +is evident on every side. Everybody has something to do. A farmer +living just outside the town said he experienced the greatest +difficulty in getting extra hands for harvest time. In his opinion the +people were incomparably better off than in the days of his youth, +some thirty years ago. He said "The labouring classes are far better +housed, better clothed, and better fed, than in old times. They live +far better than the well-to-do farmers of a generation ago. And the +queerest thing about it is the fact that the better off they are, the +more discontented they seem; and during the last few months they are +becoming unbearable. They are giving themselves airs in advance. And +no wonder, when they see the British Parliament entirely occupied with +their affairs, to the exclusion of all English business. They may well +feel important. They boast that they have compelled this attention, +and that they shortly will have their own way in everything. Last +Sunday a drunken fellow was making a row near my house. I told him to +go away, and he said, 'Before long you'll have to go away and every +Blackface in the country. We'll be masters in another month.' He was +alluding to Mr. Gladstone's gagging motion, which the poor folks here +in their ignorance believe to mean that Home Rule will set in about +the beginning of August. They are acting accordingly, and they expect +to have the land which the Protestant farmers now hold—at once. It is +to be divided amongst them by ballot. We feel very anxious about here, +for we feel that we are only staying on sufferance, and we have no +confidence in the support of the present Government. We have expended +our labour and our substance on the land, and if we lose these we lose +all. You may say there is no fear of that, as such a piece of iniquity +would never be tolerated by the English people. But when I see them +tolerating so much, I think we have good reason to feel uneasy and +unsettled. For my part, I have no heart for hard work, when I feel +that somebody else may reap the reward. And with a Catholic Parliament +in Dublin we should very soon have to give up. They can get at the +farming class in so many ways. We Protestants are pretty strong about +here, and all the way to Monaghan, but still we are in a considerable +minority. The mountain folks are Catholics, every one, and that is +where we are outnumbered. We could hold our own if the country were +like the town. We should be bound under Home Rule to suffer a large +increase of taxation, because all grants from Imperial sources are to +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span>cease upon the passing of the bill. Then the country will be more +disturbed than over, because the bill is only valued as a +stepping-stone to an Irish Republic, and the success of the agitators +in obtaining the bill will encourage them and their supporters to +persevere. Instead of the end of the trouble it would only be the +beginning. It is a black look-out for both Ireland and England.</p> + +<p>"Most of the Protestant farmers think that land purchase would be +stopped. If that could go steadily on, there would be in time +prosperity and contentment. The people would like this well enough, +and would be quiet enough, if they were let alone. But where is the +money to come from to purchase land? Who would lend money on Irish +securities? Who would trust an Irish Parliament with millions? Then +the better classes, who have money to spend, would leave the country, +and we should be poorer all round.</p> + +<p>"The loyal party in an Irish Parliament would always be in a minority, +and for any good they could do, might as well stay away. For no matter +how the Nationalist factions might quarrel among themselves, the +priestly party would always have the pull. The English Protestants +ought to believe that we know the reality of the danger that threatens +us better than they can possibly do. There are nearly three thousand +Protestant ministers in Ireland, and only six or seven are in favour +of Home Rule. Are these men all infatuated? Are they all liars? Are +they in a position to know the facts? Of course they are truthful men, +and they understand if anybody does. Then why not take their advice? +The Meath election petitions ought to have settled Home Rule. +Englishmen cannot have read the reports of these trials. Mr. Gladstone +is fooling the people on both sides the water. He is satisfying +nobody, whether Home Rulers or not. The Nationalists round here say +the bill is an insult, but that they will take it as an instalment. +The end will be that both loyalists and traitors will be more +discontented than ever—a poor result after so much fuss and waste of +precious time."</p> + +<p>If my friend had known of it he might have quoted Mr. William Heath, +an Englishman resident for six months in Tyrone. He arrived in Ireland +a bigoted Home Ruler, but six months in the country knocked his +nonsense out of him. He said:—"I have seen enough of Romanism to +convince me that Protestantism would be crushed if Home Rule became +law. I have seen the men who demand it, and I have seen the men who +are determined to oppose Home Rule—the one set idle, dissolute, +poverty-stricken, disloyal, and priest-ridden; the other industrious, +thrifty, comfortable, and loyal to England. I go back to England a +Unionist, and will do all I can to spread the light on the true state +of affairs in this unhappy country. If the people of England and +Scotland saw Nationalists as I have seen them they would not force +Home Rule on the Loyalists of Ulster so as to leave them at the mercy +of such a party." A Primitive Methodist Minister, the Rev. J. +Angliss, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span>who came to Ireland a faithful follower of Mr. Gladstone, +changed his mind when acquainted with the facts, and confessed himself +a convert to Unionism. He said that he had used his influence against +the return of Sir Richard Webster, the late Attorney-General, but +since his visit to Ireland he had come to the conclusion that the Bill +would be a tremendous evil. He was "prepared to go back to the very +platform in the Isle of Wight from which he had supported Home Rule +and to tell the people he was converted. English people who come here +to investigate for themselves must be forced to the conclusion that +the Bill means confiscation and robbery."</p> + +<p>A thriving tradesman of Clones said:—"I am surprised that any +Englishmen can be found to pin their faith to Mr. Gladstone, or to any +man with such an extraordinary record of change. Mr. Bright used to +say he could not turn his back on himself, but Mr. Gladstone spins +round and round like a teetotum. I should think that such an instance +has never been known since that good old parson who sung, 'Whatsoever +king may reign, Still I'll be Vicar of Bray, Sir.' Downing Street is +the Grand Old Man's vicarage, and he endeavours to cling to it at all +costs. In 1886 he said, 'I will not be a party to giving Ireland a +legislative body to manage Irish concerns and at the same time have +Irish members in London acting and voting on English and Scottish +concerns.' In seven years and one month he insists on that very thing, +and votes for it, with his crowd of noughts behind him. For I reckon +all his Parliamentary supporters as noughts, to which a value is given +by the figure 1 at their head. Isn't that true? What would the rest be +without him? The bulk of his adherents are precisely the kind of men +nobody ever pays any attention to. There's Morley, a good writer, but +not a man of business. Then there's Harcourt. How can Englishmen stand +such a hollow humbug? He'll say anything, any blessed thing. I prefer +Tim Healy, even, to Harcourt. Tim was roughly brought up, and, as he +gets his living by politics, he is to some extent excusable. The way +that Harcourt attacked the Irish party, so long as Mr. Gladstone +attacked them! The things he said, the strong language he used so long +as that course pleased Mr. Gladstone! Now he turns round and calls +them beauties; and for that matter so they are. It's what I mostly +call them myself. Beauties.</p> + +<p>"The arrangement to keep the Irish Nationalists at Westminster is +something for Englishmen to consider. If they can swallow that they +can swallow anything. They can have no pride about them, or else they +are taking no further interest in their own affairs. To give the Irish +members power to vote on all questions coming before the Imperial +Parliament, while conceding to them the privilege of managing their +own affairs without interference, is indeed an eye-opener. The British +Parliament had sunk low enough when it began to heed the clamour of a +set of American-paid blackguards such as the bulk of the Irish members +are, by their own supporters, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>admitted to be. But how much lower has +England sunk when she accepts the dictation of these men, and says, +'You can manage your own affairs and direct my business too.' These +fellows are to be masters of Ireland <i>and</i> masters of England. For of +course, they can always exert a preponderating influence in British +affairs, holding as they do the balance of voting power. And +Englishmen will submit to this; and will let their members be gagged +and the clauses shoved through the House by hydraulic power. +Englishmen are so fond of boasting of their Freedom and Independence. +Why, they are being treated like fools and slaves. And by such a low +set of fellows. Some of the Nationalist members wipe their noses on +the tails of their coats, and when those are worn out they use their +coat-sleeves. One of them was staying in an hotel where I was, and I +saw him eat eggs. He cut off the top, and worked up the yolk with the +handle of his spoon, mixing pepper and mustard. Then he cut his bacon +into dice, and dipped each square in the egg before stoking himself. +That is a sample of the class now working the British Parliament. +There was an Irish patriot M.P.</p> + +<p>"Dillon is comparatively respectable, and if you knew Dillon you +wouldn't think that meant much. Chamberlain showed him up, but why +stop at one quotation? I see the judge is now in Tipperary. That was +the place Dillon, along with O'Brien, got to conspire against the law +with such frightful results. You remember they were sentenced to six +months' imprisonment, but breaking their bail they both ran away, +while the poor men who had got into trouble, without funds to bolt +with, went to hard labour. Dillon once said that if certain people had +cattle on land '<i>the cattle wouldn't prosper very much</i>,' and sure +enough a number of cattle near Tipperary have had their tails cut off. +Dillon, I say, is reckoned one of the most respectable. That does not +say much for the others. You are giving these men power. Will they use +that power to wring further concessions? They have often declared that +they will. The English Home Rulers say that they won't, that Irishmen +will be too grateful. They know not what they say. You'll have a +hostile Government at your very doors. What did Parnell say? 'When +England is at war and beaten to her knees, the idea of the Irish +Nationalists may be realised.' And Sexton, this very Sexton who is now +so much to the front, said that the 'one prevailing and unchangeable +passion between Ireland and England is the passion of hate.' Then what +hope is there of friendship in a Home Rule Bill which will infinitely +increase the number of points of dispute? And these men don't mean to +be pleased, either. They don't mean to try to be content. It wouldn't +pay them. They have their living to get. Well, they have shown +themselves clever. They can work England."</p> + +<p>A friend has furnished me with a few gems from the orations of the +Dillon aforesaid, whose threat of what would be done to loyalists +under an Irish Parliament has recently attracted so much <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>notice. He +tried to show that this was said in a moment of warmth, in a fit of +exasperation at the "Mitchelstown massacre," which took place a year +afterwards. What had annoyed him when at Limerick he said that any man +who stood aside from the national movement was "a dastard and a +coward, and he and his children after him would be remembered in the +days that are near at hand, when Ireland was a free nation?"—Date +September 20th, 1887. Dillon delights in dates. Again, what had +ruffled the patriot soul, when at Maryborough he spoke of dissentients +in the following terms:—"When the struggle is ended and the people of +this country have obtained that control over their own affairs which +must come very soon, he will be pointed out to his neighbours as a +coward and a traitor?"—January 15th, 1889. It was on November 1st, +1887, at Limerick, that the same friend of England said "let the +people of Ireland get arms in their hands," and promised to "manage +Ulster." It was at Dublin on August 23rd, 1887, that Mr. Dillon +said:—"If there is a man in Ireland base enough to back down, to turn +his back on the fight, I will denounce him from public platforms <i>by +name</i>, and I pledge myself to the Government that, let that man be who +he may, his life will not be a happy one, either in Ireland or across +the seas." All this, be it observed, was after the promulgation of the +Union of Hearts. Well might Mr. Gladstone, speaking of Mr. Dillon, who +is now one of his closest allies, say in the House of Commons:—</p> + +<p>"The honourable gentleman comes here as the apostle of a creed which +is a creed of force, which is a creed of oppression, which is a creed +of the destruction of all liberty, and of the erection of a despotism +against it, and on its ruins, different from every other despotism +only in this,—that it is more absolutely detached from all law, from +all tradition, and from all restraint." Sir William Harcourt also +referring to Mr. Dillon in the House once said, "The doctrine of the +Land League, expounded by the man who has authority to explain it, is +the doctrine of treason and assassination;" and in addition to this +strong pronouncement Sir William called it "a vile conspiracy." Both +Mr. Gladstone and Sir William Harcourt are now hand-and-glove with the +men of whom Mr. Gladstone said at Leeds:—"They are not ashamed to +point out in the press which they maintain how the ships of her +majesty's navy ought to be blown into the air, and how gentlemen they +are pleased to select ought to be the object of the knife of the +assassin and deprived of life because they do not conform to the new +Irish Gospel." Mr. Chamberlain's exposure of Dillon has brought down +the thunders of the Nationalist press. Did he ever say anything +stronger than this? One Nationalist paper, speaking of the member for +West Birmingham, says:—"There was something devilish in the +exultation of the strident voice and pale malignant face." The Home +Rule penmen are always describing him as "livid with impotent rage," +"trembling with ill-concealed vindictive passion," "hurrying from the +House to escape the mocking laughter of the amused Senate." The +member <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>for Bordesley is dealt with more lightly. "Mr. Jesse Collings +occupied some minutes with his usual amusing inanity" and so forth. +According to these writers the House rapidly empties when Mr. Balfour +or Mr. Chamberlain would fain hold forth, and fills to suffocation to +hear the noble periods of Dillon, Sexton, and Healy. Mr. Deasy, M.P. +for West Mayo, has recently been before the public rather prominently, +and his opinion of the Irish question may be interesting at the +present juncture. I heard much of this gentleman at Westport, where he +is well known. He is disgusted with the show of loyalty to which his +colleagues have treated Mr. Gladstone, who boasts of their +"satisfactory assurances." He knew that the Nationalist members, +speaking in England, made use of amicable expressions which no Irish +Nationalist audience would tolerate, and speaking of this he said:—"I +have never said on an English platform what I would not say here this +night. I have not been saying that we all want to be part and parcel +of the British Empire—with the lie on the top of my tongue, I am not +going to disgrace my constituency by going over to England and +uttering falsehoods there, and coming back and saying that I was +deceiving England at the time." This speech was made in 1891, only two +years ago. Is not this big print enough? Surely no reasonable person +will any longer believe in the loyal friendship of Nationalist +Ireland. To do so is to violate common sense. Only the fatuous +Gladstonians, Whose eyes will scarcely serve at most To guard their +wearers 'gainst a post, can be expected to take it in.</p> + +<p>It is hard to find a decent person in favour of the bill. Its +supporters are eminently unsatisfactory, inasmuch as they furnish no +readable matter, and content themselves with saying that Ireland will +have her freedom, and that prosperity will follow, as the night the +day, in the wake of the bill. But they can never indicate wherein is +their want of freedom, nor can they ever say <i>how</i> the bill will bring +about prosperity. Then, as a rule, the voters for the bill are persons +whose opinion no sane person would act upon in the most unimportant +matter. They never know the population of their own town, nor the +distance to the next. They are mostly sunk fathoms deep in blackest +ignorance, and characterised by most cantankerous perversity, now +rapidly merging, as the bill proceeds, into insolent bumptiousness. +The Lord-Lieutenant has returned to Dublin after having endured such +snubs and slights as Mr. Balfour never encountered. And yet Lord +Houghton waved the olive-branch. Everybody seems to have asked him for +a pier. I have given many instances of useless piers on the Western +Irish Coast. The parish priests who met the Viceroy asked for more, +and again more. Mr. Morley has been asked in the House what is going +to be done about the piers the priests have asked for. Let him appoint +a Commission to inquire into the history of Western Irish piers. The +report will be startling, and also instructive. A Glengariff man +admitted to me that the people of that famous town would make no use +of the pier if they had it. "But," said he, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>"the building of it would +bring a thousand pounds into the village." The English people are said +to dearly love a lord. The Irish people dearly love a pier.</p> + +<p class="date">Clones, July 13th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_48_A_SEARCH_FOR_ORANGE_ROWDYISM" id="No_48_A_SEARCH_FOR_ORANGE_ROWDYISM"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 48.—A SEARCH FOR "ORANGE ROWDYISM."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterb.png" alt="B" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />elfast is still of the same mind. Its citizens will not have Home +Rule. They are more than ever determined that the fruits of their +industry shall not be placed at the mercy of men who have consistently +advocated the doctrine of plunder. The law-abiding men of Belfast will +never submit to the rule of law-breakers, many of whom have expiated +their offences in the convict's cell. This debt-paying community will +not consent to be under the thumb of men whose most successful +doctrine has been the repudiation of legal contracts. The famous +merchants and manufacturers of the true capital of Ireland decline to +place their future fortunes in the hands of the unscrupulous and +beggarly adventurers who would form the bulk of a College Green +Parliament. The hard-working artizans of Belfast are firm in their +determination to resist the imposition of a legislature which will +drive capital from the country, diminish the sources of employment, +strangle all beneficial enterprise, and by destroying security +undermine and wreck all Irish industry. They know how the agitation +originates, and by whom it is directed. They have the results of Papal +influence before their eyes. While Belfast as a whole is clean, open, +airy, with splendid streets and magnificent buildings, the Catholic +portions of the city are as much like the pestilent dens of Tuam and +Tipperary as the authorities will permit. The uninstructed stranger +can pick out the Home Rule streets. In Belfast as elsewhere, +sweetness, light, and loyalty are inseparably conjoined, while evil +smells and dinginess are the invariable concomitants of disloyalty and +separatism. Fortunately for the Ulster city, the loyalists number +three to one, which fact accounts for its general cleanliness, the +thriving aspect of its commercial concerns, the decency and order of +its well-kept thoroughfares. And whatever Belfasters want they pay for +themselves. Belfast receives no Government grants for any municipal +purpose, while disloyal Dublin, screaming for equality of treatment, +is largely subsidised from Imperial sources. The Belfast people +entirely support their hospitals. The Dublin hospitals are largely +supported out of the public revenues. The Belfast Botanic Gardens are +kept going by Belfast. The Dublin Botanical Gardens are wholly +supported by Government. Further examples are needless, the facts +being simple as they are undeniable. Dublin gets everything. Belfast +gets absolutely nothing. Disloyalty is at a premium. Motley's the only +wear. The screamers are always getting something to stop <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span>their +mouths, a sop, not a gag. Steady, quiet, hard-working folks are of no +account. The Belfast men ask for nothing, and get it. They want no +pecuniary aid, being used to self-help, and liking it best. Stiff in +opinion, they know their own minds, and are accustomed to victory. +They do not in turn threaten and complain and cringe and curse and +fawn. They keep a level course and run on an even keel. They are bad +to beat, and can do with much letting alone. They are pious in their +way, and talk like Cromwell's Puritans. They abhor Popery, judging the +tree by its fruits, a test recommended by their chiefest classic. They +believe that Protestantism is daylight, that Popery is darkness, and +that the sun is rising. They believe with Carlyle that "Popery cannot +come back any more than paganism, which also lingers in some +countries." They also believe with the sage that "there is a perennial +nobleness and even sacredness in Work. Were he never so benighted, +forgetful of his high calling, there is always hope in a man who +actually and earnestly works; in Idleness alone is there perpetual +despair." So they work every day and all the day, save on rare +occasions, and for these holidays they make up by overtime. They think +Home Rule is useless at best, and not only useless, but dangerous. +They declare it would affect their liberties, and this notion is +ineradicable. Touch them in their freedom and the secold Northerners +become aflame. And while the Irish Kelts burn like straw—a flame and +a puff of smoke, and there an end—these Scots settlers are like oaken +logs, slow to take fire, but hard to extinguish. They prosper under +the Union, and therefore, say they, the Union is good. What the poor +Irish need is industry, not Acts of Parliament. The land is rich, the +laws are just, the judges are honest, and industry is encouraged. The +fault is in the people themselves, and in their pastors and masters. +The convergence of Ulster opinion reminds me of an old line, which +fitly illustrates the position of the Irish malcontent party—</p> + +<p><i>Heu mihi! quam pingui macer est mihi taurus in arvo.</i> Quaint old +Thomas Fuller (as I remember) has rendered this—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My starveling bull,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Ah, woe is me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In pasture full<br /></span> +<span class="i1">How lean is he!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noin">I am almost disposed to believe that Horace anticipated the case; or +that, like Mr. John Dillon, he had the gift of remembering occurrences +before they took place.</p> + +<p>Much has been spoken and written in England concerning "Orange +rowdyism." I saw the twenty thousand Orangemen who walked through +Belfast to Knocknagoney on Wednesday last. They had nearly five miles +to march on a hot day before they reached the meeting-place, some +hours to stand there listening to speeches, and then the long march +back again. Large numbers went to the Orange Halls, there to conclude +the day. I followed them thither, heard their speeches, noted their +modes of enjoyment, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>watched them unnoticed and unknown, save in one +instance, until they finally dispersed. Next day I went to Scarva, +forty miles away, to see the great sham fight which annually takes +place there between representatives of King James and King William of +Orange. There were sixty-four special trains, at cheap fares, running +to Scarva, besides the ordinary service, and let it be remembered that +Scarva is on the main line from Dublin to Belfast. Now let me state +precisely what I saw.</p> + +<p>The Belfast procession was very like the tail of the Belfast Balfour +demonstration, and with good reason, for both consisted of twenty +thousand Orangemen. But on Wednesday the Orangemen, instead of being +preceded by a hundred thousand citizens of Ulster, had it all to +themselves. The authorities know the character of Orangemen. They know +that scorching weather and long dusty marches are apt to lead to +copious libations, especially in holiday time. They know that +political feeling runs high, and that the present moment is one of +undue excitement. They know that the Papist party have taunted +Orangemen with the supposed progress of the bill, and that the same +people say daily that Orangeism will be at once abolished, and that +this year sees the last Orange procession in Belfast. "This is yer +last kick before we kick ye to hell," said a broken-nosed gentleman at +the corner of Carrick Hill. The authorities knew all these things, and +taking into account the known character of Orangeism, with the special +exasperation of the moment, and remembering their own responsibility +in the matter of order, how many extra policemen were drafted into the +city?</p> + +<p>Not one. The men who really know Orangemen knew that no precautions +were needed.</p> + +<p>There were brass bands, drum and fife bands, and bands of bagpipes. +The drums were something tremendous. The Belfast drumming is a thing +apart, like a Plymouth Brother. We have nothing like it in England. +The big drums run in couples, borne by stout fellows of infinite +muscle, and tireless energy. The kettle-drums hunt in packs, like +beagles. The big drums are the biggest the climate will grow, and the +drummers lash them into fury with thin canes, having no knob, no +wrapper of felt, no softening or mitigating influence whatever. The +bands played "God save the Queen," "Rule Britannia," "The Boyne +Water," and "The Death of Nelson." The fifes screamed shrilly, the +brass tubes blared, and every drummer drummed as if he had the Pope +himself under his especial care. The vigour and verve of these +marching musicians is very surprising. You cannot tire them out. The +tenth mile ended as fresh as the first, though every performer had +worked like a horse. There is a reason for this. Their hearts are in +the work. To them it means something. The scarves and busbies and +uniforms and desperate paroxysms of drumming are somewhat comical to +strangers, but the people looked earnest, and as if engaged in serious +business. Thousands of well-dressed people walked with the procession, +or looked gravely on. There was no horse-play, and no <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span>noise other +than the music. No bare feet, no bare heads, no rags, no dirt, no +disorder. A Papist sprang from his lair in a side street and tried to +snatch the scarf from a young man, who promptly drove him back to his +den. Nothing else happened. At midnight there were for the whole city +twenty police cases against thirty-nine for last year's twelfth. So +much for Orange rowdies in the streets. Let us look upon their private +orgies.</p> + +<p>At seven o'clock I went to the Orange Hall, Clifton Street, the +headquarters of the body. The various lodges were dispersed in several +rooms, where they seemed to be taking tea with their sisters and their +cousins and their aunts. A turn outside landed me opposite Saint +Patrick's Roman Catholic Church, and here was a strong guard of +police. The neighbouring streets of Carrick Hill, North Street, and +another, literally swarmed with filthy, bare-footed women, wearing the +hooded shawl of Limerick, of Tuam, of Tipperary. The men had a +dangerous look. Many were drunk, and some had bandaged heads. More +policemen half-way down Carrick Hill, and more still at the end. The +people who pay no taxes cost most to keep in order. I have somewhere +seen a body of returns showing that while the Unionist population +requires only ten or twelve policemen to every ten thousand people, +the Home Rule provinces take from forty-eight to fifty-two to manage +the same number. Returning to the Orange Hall a number of dirty, +bare-footed children walked in procession past the door singing +vociferously. They sung with great spirit to the tune of "Tramp, +tramp, tramp, the boys are marching," and seemed to enjoy it +amazingly. I did not catch the words. They stopped as I came up, but a +young fellow on guard at the hall said, "They grind up the children in +songs of a party nature, and send them here to annoy us. Of course, we +can't notice little children."</p> + +<p>This time I dropped in the thick of the entertainment. A mild, mild +man occupied the chair, young men and maidens, old men and children +sitting around. They were inebriating on ginger beer and biscuits, and +their wildest revelry was the singing of "The Old Folks at Home" by a +young lady in white. Mr. E.J. Fullwood, of Birmingham, who was there +as a visitor, made a rattling speech, and received a great ovation. A +quiet gentleman, by special request, made a few remarks on the +political situation. He said:—"We will resist a Home Rule Parliament +at any cost and at every cost. We will not have it. Our faith is +plighted, and we are not the men to go back of our word." His manner +was very subdued, and the audience also kept very quiet. What these +men say they say in their sober senses, and not by reason of +excitement. Another room was livelier. An English gentleman was +holding forth. Then the band played "No surrender," after which a lady +sang "Killarney's hills and vales." In a third room a brother was +calling on the brethren to give three cheers for "our beloved Queen," +under whose benignant reign blessings had been shed upon the British +Empire, "to which we belong, and to which we still belong, so long <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>as +they will have us." In a fourth room the listening Orangemen sat under +a discourse on the efficacy of prayer, which they were urged to make a +living part of their everyday life. All this was very disappointing, +and when in Royal Avenue the helmeted watchman of the night assured me +that nothing had happened, and that nothing was likely to happen, I +abandoned all hope of Orange rowdyism.</p> + +<p>Next day at ten, I went to Scarva, or, as the natives spell it, +Scarvagh. A neat little place full of Black Protestants. The houses +are clean and tidy, and the people have a well-to-do look. There was a +great crowd at the station, and a band of drummers were laying on with +such thundering effect that my very coat sleeves vibrated with the +concussion. A big arch of orange lilies bore the one word +<span class="sc">Welcome</span>, and the roadside was lined with stalls selling +provisions and ginger beer. The church on the hill flew the Orange +flag with the Union Jack. The Presbyterian meeting-house and a +Methodist Chapel complete the tale of worship-houses. The place is +without rags, dirt, beggars, or any other symptoms of Home Rule +patriotism. Neither is there a Roman Catholic Chapel. The signboards +bore Scots and English names. Mr. J. Hawthorne stood at his door, +big-boned and burly, with a handsome good-humoured face. "Ye'll gang +up the brae, till ye see an avenue with lots of folk intil it," said +this "Irishman," whose ancestors have lived at Scarva from time +immemorial.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we pit up the airch o' lilies to welcome our friends. They come +every year, and a gude mony o' them too, so we pit up that bit thing +oot o' friendship like."</p> + +<p>I told him this was to be the last occasion, as Mr. Dillon was +determined to manage Ulster. He laughed good-naturedly.</p> + +<p>"Mon alive, d'ye tell me that any mon said sic a fuleish speech? Mon, +its borne in on me that we'll tak a dooms lot of managin'. These chaps +dinna ken ower weel what they're talkin' aboot. An' they maun say +somethin' to please the fellows that keep them in siller. These things +hae gane on in Scarva sin' auld lang syne, an' nothin' e'er stappit +them. They went on when the Party Processions Act was law, an' tho' +the sojers ance cam frae Dublin to stop the demonstration, the +Orangemen mustered in sic force that they never interfered aifter all. +An' in Ulster we'll hauld our own, d'ye mind that? We've tauld them +oor mind, an' that we wunna hae Home Rule. We've tauld them that, an' +we'll stand by it. They've gotten oor ultimatum, an' they can mak a +kirk or a mill o' it."</p> + +<p>I gangit up the brae through dense crowds constantly increasing as the +sixty-four specials gradually came in. The way was sylvan and pretty, +big beech trees and elms meeting overhead, the road running along the +side of a steep hill sloping down to a small river, the slope +carefully tilled, and showing good husbandry. Then a beautifully +wooded and extensive demesne, and a mile of avenue, with many +thousands of well-dressed orderly people, the ladies <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>forming about +half the company. Then a large low, brown mansion with a gravelled +quadrangle, around which marched fife and drum bands playing "No +Surrender" and "The Boyne Water." And everywhere incessant drumming +and drinking of ginger beer. Banners were there of every size, shape, +and colour, many with painted devices, more or less well done. The +Lurgan Temperance Lodge exhibited Moses in the wilderness, holding up +the brazen serpent. "Three-fourths of the Orange Lodges are based on +temperance principles," said an Orange authority standing by, "and +what is more, they don't allow smoking. We Orange rowdies are to a +great extent temperance men." I remembered that the three meetings of +the night before were smokeless concerts, and that the fourth +resembled a Methodist love-feast, with an old brother telling his +experiences. Also that Captain Milligen, a leading Plymouth Brother of +Warrenpoint, had told me that he had been present at a Scarva meeting, +and that from beginning to end he never heard a bad word, nor saw +anything objectionable. The sham fight took place on a hill hard by. +Two fine young fellows fenced with old cavalry swords, and King James, +with green coat and plumes, succumbed to King William with orange coat +and plumes, while their respective armies to the number of about +thirty, fifteen on each side, fired in the air. I noticed that while a +few had ancient brass-bound muskets, which looked as if converted from +flint locks, most were armed with Snider rifles of army pattern. The +drums excelled themselves, and the fifers shrieked martial airs. The +people waved their hats and cheered, and that was the whole of it. +Returning to the station, a good young man gave me a tract, wherein I +found myself addressed as a Dear Unsaved Reader, and later as a +Hell-deserving Sinner. Then a Salvation Army man telling a crowd to +Escape for their lives, which I was just doing, and that once he had +loved pleasure, which seemed likely enough. Then a big banner whereon +was depicted David in the act of beheading Goliath with a yeomanry +sword, the Wicklow mountains in the distance. Then an old man on the +bridge declaring to the multitude that he would not be a Papist for +all that earth could give, and that nothing could induce his +fellow-citizens to submit to Home Rule for one second of time. "No, +never, never, never. Rather than accept of Popish rule, we'll take +arms in our hands as our fathers did, and like them we will conquer. +Have we not their example before us? Are we such dastards as to give +up that for which they shed their blood? Shall the sons be unworthy of +the sires? Never shall it be said that the children were unworthy +their inheritance of Freedom. Old as I am, I would take a musket, and +go forth in the name of the Lord. Shame on the Scots and English if +they desert us in our hour of need. Are they not our own kith and kin? +But whether they aid us, or whether they desert us, we will stand +firm, and be true to ourselves. Our cause is good, and we are bound to +win, as we won before. Only stand firm, shoulder to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span>shoulder. Shall +we bow down to Popery? No, by the God that made us, No. Shall we +truckle to Rome, shall we become slaves to Popish knaves, shall we +become subservient to priestcraft and lying and roguery and trickery? +Never shall it be said of us. We claim to be part and parcel of the +glorious British Empire. We have helped to upbuild that Empire, and we +claim our inheritance. We will <span class="fakesc">NOT</span> sell our birthright, we +will <span class="fakesc">NOT</span> connive at the destruction of Britain's greatness, +we will <span class="fakesc">NOT</span> have Home Rule. 'Shall we from the Union sever? +By the God that made us, never!'"</p> + +<p>The people listened silently, with grave, earnest faces. They mean +business. During my first visit to Belfast I interviewed the leading +citizens, the clergy, nobility, and gentry. This time I spoke with +artisans and craftsmen, and I found the same feeling, a deep and +immovable resolve to fight till the last extremity. It should be +remembered that all Ulstermen are not Orangemen. But the religious +bodies which have held aloof from Orangeism are just as determined. On +the Irish Church question the Orange body stood alone. The dissenting +sects were against them everywhere. All are united now, and the +attempt to force Home Rule on these resolute men would be attended by +the most awful consequences. They are not of a breed that easily +knocks under. They remind you of the Scottish Covenanters. They are +men with whom you would rather dine than fight. In Belfast, besides +Mr. Fullwood, of Birmingham, previously mentioned, I met with Mr. +Lyons, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, who in his walks abroad in the city had +put down in his pocket-book the names of all streets he judged to be +exclusively Catholic. He was right save in three cases, where the +people were mixed. He also observed that in the poorer quarters the +windows of all Protestant places of worship were protected by wire +netting, but that the Catholic chapels were not so protected. As the +Protestants are three to one, he thought this a curious commentary on +the statements anent Orange rowdyism. Mr. Deacon, of Manchester, and +the Englishmen hereinbefore mentioned were present at the Orange Hall, +and all saw what I have related. Mr. Henry Charlton, J.P., of +Gateshead-on-Tyne, agrees with them that the religious question is the +secret of the whole agitation, and that the sooner a leading statesman +meets the Home Rule movement on this, the true ground, the better for +the country. "We are too squeamish in England. We fear to offend our +Catholic friends, with whom there is no fault to be found. But we want +an influential speaker to say at once that the conflict is reality +between Protestantism and Popery. The best plan would be to state +things as they are, and to meet the enemy directly." So spoke one of +these visitors, a gentleman of great political experience. Is this +opinion not well worth consideration? Is not the time for soft +speaking nearly over?</p> + +<p>Mr. Dillon says he will manage Ulster. He will need the British Army +at his back. His Army of Independence will not avail him <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span>much. The +position of the Nationalist members towards Ulster is not unlike that +of the Chinaman who wanted an English sailor punished. "There he +stands," said the skipper, "go and punch his head." "No, no," said the +Celestial complainant, "me no likee-pikee that way. But spose three, +five, 'leven big sailors tie him up, hold him fast, then very much me +bamboo he." And that is how the Dillonites would hope to manage +Ulster.</p> + +<p class="date">Belfast, July 15th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_49_THE_CONSTITUTION_OF_THE_ORANGE_LODGES" id="No_49_THE_CONSTITUTION_OF_THE_ORANGE_LODGES"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 49.—THE CONSTITUTION OF THE ORANGE LODGES.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterp.png" alt="P" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />ortadown is another of the clean, well-built towns of Ulster +dependent for its prosperity on the linen trade. The River Bann flows +through it, a fine stone bridge spanning its waters in the principal +street. Everybody seems comfortably off, and dirty slums are nowhere +to be found. Some of the shops are very much larger than the size of +the town would seem to warrant, and one ironmonger's store is far +larger than any similar shop in Birmingham. The Presbyterian +meeting-house, on the right as you enter, and the Protestant Church, +which occupies a conspicuous position at the meeting of two main +thoroughfares, are plain, substantial buildings without any striking +architectural pretensions, and the Orange Hall, which seems an +indispensable adjunct of all "settler" towns, is also modest and +unassuming. The meadows bordering the Bann are spread with miles of +bleaching linen, for which the river is especially famous, its waters +having a very superior reputation for the production of dazzling +whiteness. The town is half-a-mile from the station, which is an +important junction, and the number of cars in waiting show that the +people expect the coming of business men. When first I visited the +town, placards announcing drill meetings at the Orange Hall were +everywhere stuck up, but I saw none during my last march round. +Perhaps the Orangemen have completed their arrangements. The Portadown +people have no intention of accepting Home Rule. On the contrary they +are determined to have none of it. At present they are quiet enough, +because they are confident that the bill can never pass, and they do +not wish to meet trouble halfway. The House of Lords is their best +bower anchor, and for the present they leave the matter with the +peers. So they mind their work, and spend their time in making linen. +When they demonstrate they do it with a will, but they cannot live by +demonstrations, and they are used to paying their way. They see what +happens in so-called "patriotic" districts, how neglect of duty +accompanies eternal agitation, and how the result is poverty and +failure to meet the ordinary obligations of social life. The artisans +of Portadown go to work every day, and the farmers do their level best +with the land, which all about this region is highly <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span>cultivated. They +claim to belong to the party of law and order, and they agree with the +great orator who once said:—"The party of law and order includes +every farmer who does not want to rob the landlord of his due and who +does not want to be forced to pay blackmail to agitation—every poor +fellow who desires to be at liberty to earn a day's wages by +whomsoever they are offered him, without being shunned, insulted, +beaten, or too probably murdered." The orator in question bears the +well-known name of William Ewart Gladstone, now intimately associated +with the names of Dillon, O'Brien, Sexton, O'Connor, Tim Healy, and +the rest of the agitators to whom he was referring in the above-quoted +speech, delivered at Hawick just ten years ago.</p> + +<p>A Portadown Orangeman complained bitterly of the attitude of the +English Gladstonian party with reference to his order. He said:—"We +have been denounced as rowdies and Orange blackguards until the +English people seem to believe it. They never think of comparing our +record with the record of the party denouncing us, nor do they know +anything of the history and constitution of the order. We have always +been loyal, always friends of England, and that is why the Nationalist +party so strongly disapprove of us. We have never occupied the time of +the English Parliament, nor have we leagued ourselves with the enemies +of England. We have maintained order, and taken care of English +interests in Ireland, besides looking after our own personal affairs. +We have not stood everlastingly hat in hand, crying, like the daughter +of the horse-leech, Give, give. And great is our reward. We are to be +handed over to a pack of Papist traitors and robbers, who for years +have made the country a perfect Hell. Mr. Gladstone would fain give +rich, industrious Ulster into the hands of lazy, improvident +Connaught. Let them try it on. Let them impose their taxes, and let +them try to collect them. They'll find in Ulster something to run up +against. We prefer business to fighting and disturbance, but when once +we make up our minds for a row we shall go in for a big thing. Most of +our people have a deep sense of religion, and they will look upon it +as a religious war. It will be the sword of the Lord and of Gideon. We +never will bow down to Popery. And that is what Home Rule means. We +see the abject condition of the Papists, and we know their slavish +superstitions. The bulk of them are body and soul in the hands of the +priests, and that is the secret of their non-success in life. The +poorest among them are taxed to death by the Church. A fee must be +paid for christening, and unless you pay a stiff figure you won't have +a priest at your funeral. The poor Catholics are buried without any +religious service whatever. They are taken to the churchyard by their +friends and put in a hole, like a dog. Pay, pay, pay, from the cradle +to the grave. And when the priests wish to raise money, they dictate +how much each person is to give. They do not believe in free-will +offerings, otherwise their receipts would be very small indeed. There +you have one explanation of Papist poverty. Are we to put our necks +under the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span>heels of a Parliament worked by Bishop Walsh of Dublin? +Never, as long as we can strike a blow for freedom. We look to England +at present. If England fails us, we shall look to ourselves. Our +fathers died to preserve us from King James and Popery, and we are not +going back to it at this time of day.</p> + +<p>"English Home Rulers have actually taken up the cry of Equality, and +down with Protestant ascendency. Such foolish ignorance almost amounts +to crime. Where are the Roman Catholic disabilities? For two +generations the Papists have had absolute equality. Every office is +open to them on the judicial bench. There have been Roman Catholic +Lord Chancellors, and Lord Chief Justices. O'Laughlin, O'Hagan, Naish, +Pallas, Barry, O'Brien, Keogh, and many others are all Roman Catholic +judges. The Papists have an overwhelming preponderance in +Parliamentary representation. They are looked after in the matter of +education, whether elementary, intermediate, or University. The system +of the National Board was introduced to meet the objections of the +Roman Catholics. They objected to the use of the Bible. As you know +the Papists object very strongly to the Bible, and as it came out some +time since, before the Commissioners of Education, of four hundred +Maynooth students only one in forty had a Bible at all. Theological +students without a Bible! But each was compelled to have a copy of +some Jesuit writer.</p> + +<p>"Where is the inequality? The Romanists have their own college, this +very Maynooth, entirely under the control of their own bishops, where +they educate the sons of small farmers and peasants and whiskey-shop +keepers by means of funds very largely taken from the Protestant +Church of Ireland. They do not desire equality, they are resolved on +ascendency. We who live in Ireland know and feel the spirit of +intolerance which marks the Romanist body. It is proposed to make of +Ireland a sort of Papal state. We have the declarations of Cardinal +Logue, of Archbishop Walsh, of Archbishop Croke before us. We need to +know no more. The English people pay no attention to them, or have +forgotten them. We bear them in mind, and we shall act accordingly."</p> + +<p>My friend's statements anent the raising of money by the Roman +Catholic clergy and the alleged poverty of Ireland reminded me that a +year ago at the opening of the Redemptorist Church of Dundalk the +collections of one day realised twelve hundred pounds, and that in the +same town a priest refused to baptise the child of a poor woman for +less than five shillings. She tendered four shillings and sixpence, +but the man of God sent her home for the odd sixpence. She then went +to the Protestant minister, who baptised the child for nothing. In +Warrenpoint the priest decided what subscriptions each and every +person should pay to the funds of the new Catholic Church, and in +Monaghan three well-to-do Papists had their cheques returned, as being +insufficient. The Romanist Cathedral of that poor little town is +currently reported to have cost half a million, but that it cost at +least a hundred thousand pounds, exclusive of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span>the stone, which was +given by the Protestant landowner, Lord Rossmore, is admitted by the +most reliable authorities. The landlord agreed to give the stone on +condition that the quarry should be filled up and the land levelled as +it was found at first. Stone for the cathedral, a convent, and many +other buildings was taken, but the conditions were not fulfilled, and +a hole with forty feet of water was left, so that the field was +dangerous for cattle. The Catholic party refused to level, and a +lawsuit was the result. My Monaghan letter related the total exclusion +of Protestants, including Lord Rossmore's agent, from the Town +Council. So much for Papal tolerance and gratitude.</p> + +<p>The English prejudice against Orangemen is ill-founded. Their +sheet-anchor is an open Bible, and their principles, as expressed by +their constitution, are such as ought to ensure the approval and +support of Englishmen. They read as follows:—"The institution is +composed of Protestants resolved to the utmost of their power to +support and defend the rightful Sovereign, the Protestant religion, +the laws of the country, the Legislative Union, and the succession to +the Throne being Protestant, and united further for the defence of +their own persons and properties and the maintenance of the public +peace. It is exclusively an association of those who are attached to +the religion of the Reformation, and <i>will not admit into the +brotherhood persons whom an intolerant spirit leads to persecute, +injure, or upbraid any man on account of his religious opinions</i>. They +associate also in honour of King William the Third, Prince of Orange, +whose name they bear, as supporters of his glorious memory." I have +italicised a few words which clear the association from the charge of +organised intolerance, which is made alike by English and Irish Home +Rulers. The Portadown folks are especially well-versed in the history +of the movement, and in the perils which impelled their forefathers to +band themselves together. According to Froude, it was on the 18th +September, 1795, that a peace was formally signed at Portadown between +the Peep-o'-Day Boys and the Defenders, and the hatchet was apparently +buried. But the incongruous elements were drawn together only for a +more violent recoil. The very same day Mr. Atkinson, a Protestant, one +of the Defender subscribers, was shot at. The following day a party of +Protestants were waylaid and beaten. On the 21st both parties +collected in force, and at a village in Tyrone, from which the event +took the name by which it is known, was fought the battle of the +Diamond. The Protestants won the day, though outnumbered. Eight and +forty Defenders were left dead on the field, and the same evening was +established the first lodge of an institution which was to gather into +it all that was best and noblest in Ireland. The name of Orangemen had +long existed. It had been used by loyal Protestants to designate those +of themselves who adhered most faithfully to the principles of 1688. +Threatened now with a general Roman Catholic insurrection, with the +Executive authority powerless, and determined at all events <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>not to +offer the throats of themselves and their families to the Roman +Catholic knife, they organised themselves into a volunteer police to +prevent murder, and to awe into submission the roving bands of +assassins who were scaring sleep from the bedside of every Protestant +household. They became the abhorrence of traitors whose crimes they +thwarted. The Government looked askance at a body of men who +interfered with the time-honoured policy of overcoming sedition by +tenderness and softness of speech. But the lodges grew and multiplied. +Honest men of all ranks sought admission into them as into spontaneous +Vigilance Committees to supply the place of the constabulary which +ought to have been, but was not, established; and if they did their +work with some roughness and irregularity, the work nevertheless was +done. By the spring of 1797 they could place twenty thousand men at +the disposition of the authorities. In 1798 they filled the ranks of +the Yeomanry, and beyond all other influences the Orange organisation +counteracted and thwarted the progress of the United Irishmen in +Ulster, and when the moment of danger arrived, had broken the right +arm of the insurrection. After this brief sketch of the origin of the +movement it would not be surprising if the constitutions of the body +inculcated intolerance, or even revenge. On the contrary, both these +things are sternly prohibited, and their contraries expressly insisted +on. A pious Brother of Portadown said:—"As Protestants we endeavour +to make the Bible our rule and guide. We endeavour to love our +neighbour as ourselves, we obey the constituted authorities, we +maintain and uphold the law, we fear God and honour the Queen. We are +firmly resolved to maintain our present position to the British Crown, +and we deny the right of Mr. Gladstone to give us away, or to barter +us for power. By the confession of his own followers, all his previous +legislation for Ireland has been a failure, for if it be not so, why +the present measure? We claim no ascendency, and we will submit to +none. It was from our ancestors that ascendency received its +death-blow. Ever since 1681 our leading doctrine has been equality for +all, without distinction of class or creed. By thrift and industry we +have created a state of commercial prosperity which is a credit and an +honour to the empire, while the Nationalist party under precisely +similar conditions have discredited the empire, and by perpetual +agitation, and not sticking to business, have brought every part of +the country under their influence to degradation and poverty; besides +which they have, by their repudiation of contracts, undermined the +morality of their supporters all over Ireland. The Nationalist farmers +prefer to have twenty-five per cent. off their rent by agitation or +intimidation rather than to double or treble the productiveness of +their land by hard work and the application of modern principles of +farming. We have seen from the first that the whole movement was +originated in roguery and sustained by roguery, and we see that it is +carried on by roguery. We not only know the men who keep up the +agitation, but we know the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>influences at work behind them. All their +talk is of Protestant ascendency. Can they point out a single instance +in which we have the upper hand, or state anything in which we as +Protestants have any advantage whatever? Mr. Gladstone himself cannot +do it. He has said so in as plain terms as he can be got to use. But +the time for talking is over. We have said our say, and we are +prepared to do our do. The Papists round here are very confident that +before long they will have a marked ascendency. They expect no less. +Let them attempt it. We shall be ready to stand our ground. As the +poet says, Now the field is not far off When we must give the world a +proof Of deeds, not words, and such as suit Another manner of +dispute."</p> + +<p>A Home Ruler encountered casually showed some temper. He said:—"All +the prosperity of which the Protestants boast is due to the fact that +for centuries they have been the favoured party. England has petted +them, and helped them, and encouraged them in every way. We were a +conquered people, and these settlements of Methodists, and +Presbyterians, and Quakers, and all the tag-rag-and-bob-tail of +dissent, were thrown into the country to hold it for England, and to +act as spies on the real possessors of the land, in the interests of +England. They were, and are, the English garrison. They have no part +with the natives, the original sons of the soil. What right, moral or +legal, have these Colquhouns, these Galbraiths, these Andersons, to +Irish soil? None but the right of the sword, the right of superior +force. Other nations have succumbed to the yoke of England, the +greatest tyrant with which the earth was ever cursed. The Scots and +Welsh lick the boots of the English because it pays them to do so. The +Irish have never given in, and they never will. For seven hundred +years we have rebelled, and as an Irishman I am proud of it. It shows +a spirit that no tyranny can break. What tyranny do we now undergo? +The tyranny of a master we do not like, and in whom we have no +confidence. We never agreed to accept the yoke of England. Now all we +ask is to be allowed to govern Ireland according to Irish ideas, and +after promising that we shall do so a bill is brought in which is a +perfect farce, and which puts us in a far worse condition than ever. +Some say that when once we get an Irish Parliament we can arrange +these small details. And mind this, we shall exact considerably more +because of English distrust and English meanness."</p> + +<p>I note in Saturday's issue of the party sheets a quotation from an +Irish-American paper, the <i>Saint Louis Republic</i>, which thus opines as +to the policy of the Irish leaders:—</p> + +<p>"They would better hold off until they have the bill out of the woods +before they start a scrimmage over small details. Ireland and America +will think any bill which establishes local government a progressive +step of glory enough for one year. If Ireland cannot improve the law +after it gets a Legislature it needs a few American politicians, more +than an extra fund." How does this promise for the peace that is to +follow this great measure of "Justice" to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span>Ireland? With the improved +methods of the Irish-American politicians, who, on the establishment +of an Irish Parliament, would inundate the country, finding in its +chaotic and helpless state a fit subject for plunder, the +meek-and-mild Radicals of the bread-and-butter type, who trollop +through the lobbies after the Grand Old Bell-wether, would be highly +delighted. How did the Items get into Parliament at all? Why did they +desert the mothers' meetings, the Band-of-Hope committees, the five +o'clock tea parties at which they made their reputations? There, +indeed, they found congenial society, there they were listened to with +rapt attention, there they could coruscate like Tritons among minnows. +Among the blind a one-eyed man is King. The English Home Rule members +are a collection of intellectual Cyclops. They can vote, though. They +can walk about, and that suffices their leader. If weak in the head, +they are strong in the legs. Legislation must in future be pronounced +with a hard g, or to avoid confusion of terms, and to preserve a pure +etymology, a new term is needed to describe the law-making of the Home +Rule members. Pedislation might serve at a pinch. I humbly commend the +term to the attention of my countrymen.</p> + +<p>Judged by classification of its friends and enemies, Home Rule comes +out badly indeed. The capitalists, manufacturers, merchants, +industrial community, professional men are against it. Six hundred +thousand Irish Churchmen are against it. Five hundred thousand +Methodists and Presbyterians are against it. Sixty thousand members of +smaller denominations are against it. A hundred and seventy-four +thousand Protestants in Leinster, and a hundred and six thousand in +Munster and Connaught are against it. The educated and loyal Roman +Catholic laity are against it. All who care for England and are +willing to join in singing "God save the Queen" are against it. On the +other hand amongst those who are for it, and allied with them, we find +the dynamiters of America, the Fenians and Invincibles, the illiterate +voters of Ireland, the idlers, the disloyal, the mutilators of cattle, +the boycotters, the moonlighters and outragemongers, the murderers, +the village ruffians, the city corner boys, and all the rest of the +blackguards who have flourished and been secure under the Land +League's fostering wing. Are we to stand quietly aside and see the +destinies of decent people entrusted to the leaders of a movement +which owes its success to such supporters? Are Englishmen willing to +be longer fooled by a Government of nincompoops?</p> + +<p>Those who have studied the thing on the spot will excuse a little +warmth. And then, I am subject to a kind of Dillonism. I am +exasperated at the recollection of what may possibly take place next +year.</p> + +<p class="date">Portadown, July 18th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_50_THE_HOLLOWNESS_OF_HOME_RULE" id="No_50_THE_HOLLOWNESS_OF_HOME_RULE"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 50.—THE HOLLOWNESS OF HOME RULE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his beautiful watering place cannot be compared with the celebrated +holiday resorts of England, Wales, Scotland, or France without doing +it injustice. It is unique in its characteristics, and globe-trotters +aver that earth does not show a spot with an outlook more beautiful. +From the beach the view of the mountain-bordered Lough extends for +many miles seaward. On the opposite slopes to the right are the fresh +green pastures and woods of Omeath, backed by the Carlingford +mountains. On the left are wooded hills a thousand feet high which +lead the eye to the Mourne Mountains at Rostrevor, where is the famous +Cloughmore (Big stone), a granite block nine feet high by fifteen feet +long, poised on the very apex of the mountain in the most remarkable +way. How it got there is indeed a puzzle, as it stands on a bed of +limestone nine hundred and fifty-seven feet above sea level. You can +see it from the square of Warrenpoint, four miles away, and no doubt +good eyes would make it out at a much greater distance. Geologists +talk about the glacial age, and say that the boulder was left there by +an iceberg from the north; but the mountain peasants know better. They +know that Fin McCoul heaved it at Brian Boru, jerking it across the +Lough from the opposite mountain five or six miles away, as an +indication that he didn't care a button for his rival. These modern +mountaineers are almost as easily gulled as their ancestors. They +believe in Home Rule because they will, under an Irish Legislature, +"get all they want." They have votes, and they use them under clerical +advice. "I don't know anything about Home Rule except that we are to +get all we want." Those are the very words of an enlightened and +independent elector resident near Cloughmore. Never was there more +simple faith, or more concise <i>credenda</i>. The Newcastle programme is +comparatively unpromising. The wildest Radical, the most advanced +Socialist, never came up to this. The Grand Old Man himself in his +most desperate struggles for place and power, never exactly promised +everything that everybody wished. To get all you want is, indeed, the +<i>summum bonum</i>, the Ultima Thule, the <i>ne plus ultra</i> of political +management. After this the old cries of peace, retrenchment, and +reform sound beggarly indeed. Never was there such a succinct and +complete compendium of political belief. Nobody can outbid the man who +offers "all you want." For compactness and simplicity and general +satisfactoriness this phase of Home Rule diplomacy takes the cake. +Failure to fulfil the promise is of course to be charged to the brutal +Saxon. Meanwhile the promise costs nothing, and like sheep's-head +broth is very filling at the price.</p> + +<p>Not long ago the point in the Lough was a rabbit warren, whence the +name. Before that the situation was too exposed to the incursions of +rovers to tempt settlers, and Narrow-water Castle, built to defend the +pass, was (and is) between the town and Newry. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>But times have +changed. Settlers flocked across from Ayr, from Troon, from Ardrossan, +and other Scots ports lying handy. A smart, attractive town has sprung +up, starting with a square a hundred yards across. Big ships which +cannot get up to Newry discharge in the Lough by means of lighters. An +eight-hundred-ton barque from Italy is unloading before my window. +There is a first-rate quay, with moorings for many vessels. The +harbour is connected by rail with all parts of Ireland, and in it +seven hundred to eight hundred ships yearly discharge cargoes. The +grassy beach-promenade is half-a-mile long, and an open tramcar runs +along the shore for three miles. The residents are alive to the +importance of catering for visitors, and the Town Commissioners, a +mixed body, have provided bathing accommodation for both sexes. +Galway, with thrice the population, a fine promenade, good sands, and +a grand bay, has no such arrangements; and Westport has very little +accommodation for tourists. The contrast between the North of Ireland +and the South and West comes out in everything.</p> + +<p>The Methodists and Presbyterians are strong in the town, to say +nothing of the two Protestant Churches, one in Warrenpoint and another +in the Clonallon suburb. The Catholic Chapel is counterbalanced by the +Masonic Hall. Wherefore it is not surprising to learn that the bulk of +the townsmen are staunch Unionists. The Nationalist papers have little +sale hereabouts, the <i>Belfast News Letter</i> and the <i>Irish Times</i> +having the pull. A business man, who has lived here for forty years, +said:—</p> + +<p>"We are fairly matched in numbers but the Conservatives have the +wealth and respectability. The fishermen and labourers are nearly all +Home Rulers, simply because they are Catholics. They are quite +incapable of saying <i>why</i> they are Home Rulers, and some of them even +profess to regard the proposed change with alarm, and say they prefer +that things should remain as they are. But although they speak so +fairly, yet when the time comes to vote, they vote as the priest tells +them. They have no option, with their belief. I don't blame the poor +fellows one bit. I followed the report of the South Meath election +petition very closely, and I know that the same kind of pressure was +exerted here. At Castlejordan Chapel Father O'Connell commanded the +people, in a sermon, to go to a Nationalist meeting, and said he would +be there, and that their parish priest expected them to go. He said +that if any were absent he would expect them to give a good and +sufficient reason for their absence. On another occasion a priest met +a number of men who were going to an opposition meeting, and turned +them back with threats. These priests not only threatened to refuse +extreme unction to persons who voted against the clerical party, but +they also threatened personal violence, and then said, 'Don't hit +back, for I have the holy sacrament on me.' Father John Fay, parish +priest of Summerhill, County Meath, told his people that they must not +look on him as a mere man; if they did they might have some <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span>prejudice +against him, for all had their shortcomings. 'The priest is the +ambassador of Jesus Christ, and not like other ambassadors. He carries +his Lord and Master about with him, and when the priest is with the +people Almighty God is with them.' That is what Father Fay reckoned +himself. Almighty God, no less. He alluded to the consecrated wafers +he had in his pocket. The doctrine of transubstantiation is here +invoked to assist in carrying a Home Rule candidate of the right +clerical shade. And all the awful language used from the altar, in the +confessional, all the threats of eternal damnation, and burning in the +fires of hell, all the refusals of mass, and to hear dying +confessions, were directed against another section of the Home Rule +party, and not against a Unionist at all. How does this promise for +the working of an Irish Parliament?</p> + +<p>"I note that the English Home Rule papers say nothing good of the +bill. They are always praising the management of the Old Parliamentary +Hand. They beslaver him with fulsome adoration. They cannot point out +anything good in the provisions of the bill, nor in the central idea +of the bill, but they must fill up somehow, and they praise his +artfulness, how he dodged this, and dexterously managed that. They +have nothing but admiration for his jugglery and House-of-Commons +tricks. They bring him down to the level of a practised conjuror or a +thimblerigger. But, with all his wonderful cleverness, he is not +admired or supported by any intelligent body of public men. The +gag-trick ought to settle him. We in Ulster feel sure that a general +election to-morrow would for ever deprive him of power. Of course the +Old Hand knows that, and will not give the country an opportunity of +pronouncing judgment. He and his flock of baa-lambs will put off the +day of reckoning as long as ever they can. Either on the present or +next year's register he is bound to be badly beaten. His course is +clear. He used to have three courses open to him, but now he has only +one. He must try to weather the storm until he has a chance of faking +the voters' lists so as to improve his own chances. It is said that +Mr. Henry Fowler is already preparing such a scheme. Like enough. If +tricks will win, I back the G.O.M. There are more tricks in him than +in a waggon-load of monkeys. The strangest thing I ever saw or ever +heard of is the calmness with which the English people take the +proposition that Ireland shall manage English affairs, while Ireland +is to manage her own without any interference. I should have expected +the British workman to processionise about this. I should have thought +the British middle-classes would have been up in arms at the bare +thought of so monstrous a proposition. And so they would if they +thought it would become law. But, like us, they know there will never +be any Home Rule. Then, they are not so nervous as we in Ireland are, +because they don't know as we do what Home Rule really means.</p> + +<p>"No earthly power can assist the Irish peasantry so long as they +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span>remain under the dominion of the priests. Popery is the vampire that +is sucking the life-blood of the country. It is fashionable nowadays +to abstain from denouncing other religious systems, on the plea of +toleration. I agree with perfect toleration, and I am not desirous of +making reference to Romanism. But they force it upon us. The Papist +clergy say that the poverty of the country is due to English rule. We +who live here know that it is due to Romish rule. How is it that all +Protestants are well off, and make no complaint? How is it that their +children never run barefoot? How is it that their families are well +educated, that their dwellings are clean, and that they pay their way? +Home Rule may impoverish those whom the teachings and habits of +Protestantism have enriched, but neither Home Rule nor anything else +will enrich those whom Popery has impoverished. England should turn a +deaf ear to the cry for Home Rule, which means the ruin of her only +friends in Ireland, and unknown damage to herself. To give her enemies +the means wherewithal to damage her is very midsummer madness."</p> + +<p>The difference between Protestant and Roman Catholic farmers was shown +in striking contrast on the Marquess of Lansdowne's estate in Queen's +County. Most of the tenants were non-judicial, and the total rents +amounted to £7,000, of which the Marquess allowed £1,100 to be +annually expended on the estate. In 1886 the tenants demanded +thirty-five per cent. reduction on non-judicial and twenty-five per +cent. on judicial rents, threatening as an alternative to adopt the +Plan of Campaign. The Marquess refused to comply with this exorbitant +demand, but offered reductions of fifteen to twenty-five per cent. on +non judicial rents. The tenants declined to pay anything, and the +landlord enforced his rights, Mr. Denis Kilbride, M.P., declaring that +"these evictions differed from most of the other evictions to this +extent,—that they were able to pay the rent. It was a fight of +intelligence against intelligence, a case of diamond cut diamond." Mr. +Kilbride, who held a large farm at a rental of seven hundred and sixty +pounds was one of the evicted. Another of these poor destitute, +homeless tenants, brutally turned out on the roadside to starve, or +die like a dog from exposure, was no sooner evicted than he entered a +racehorse for the great contest of the Curragh. This victim of Saxon +tyranny was named John Dunne, and his holding comprised more than +thirteen hundred acres. Let us hope the colt did him credit. Let us +trust that the evicted quadruped carried off the blue ribbon of +Kildare. For under the Lansdowne "Rack-rents" the struggling farmer +could barely keep one racehorse, which, like the fabled ewe-lamb of +ancient story, was his little all. Perhaps Mr. Dunne's colt was +related to that well-bred travelling horse, of which the picture +adorned the walls of Limerick and its vicinity, and which gloried in +the name of Justice to Ireland. There were no evicted Protestants on +the Lansdowne estate. Every Protestant farmer paid his rent and +steadfastly refused to join the Plan of Campaign.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span>The injustice of an Irish rent largely depends on the question, To +whom is it due? A good Nationalist may draw a higher rent than a +Loyalist. A sound Home Ruler may ask for and insist on an exorbitant +rent, but he is never denounced by the Nationalist press. The +Corporation of Dublin is red-hot in the matter of patriotism. Its +Parnellite members have from time to time comprised the pick of the +Nationalist agitators. The Dublin "patriot" press has ever been +foremost in denouncing Rack-rents. But the city of Dublin is a +landlord. It has agricultural tenants who are never allowed under pain +of eviction to get into arrears. The members of the Corporation fixed +the rents, and, strange to say, the tenants at the first opportunity +appealed to the Land Commissioners. Six of them holding four hundred +and twenty-seven acres of land, were paying £883 16s. 4d. The rent was +therefore over £2 an acre, which is perhaps double the average. The +Government valuation was £625 10s. The new rent was finally settled at +£683, being an all-round reduction of twenty-three per cent. Lord +Clanricarde is frequently denounced by Nationalists for excessive +rents, lack of conscience, and non-residence. The Land Commissioners +were unable to deduct anything like twenty-three per cent. from the +Clanricarde rent-roll. The Councillors of Dublin were never upbraided, +nor put in danger of their lives. The Loughrea people shot Lord +Clanricarde's agent, his driver, his wife, and several other people, +in protest against the Clanricarde rents and to encourage the landlord +to live on the estate. About a dozen were murdered altogether. Surely +these parallel cases should demonstrate the utter hollowness of the +Home Rule agitation.</p> + +<p>The Protestants of Warrenpoint, like those of Newry and Belfast, are +confident of their ability to hold their own. Their attitude is very +different from that of the trembling heretics of Tuam or Tipperary. +They are strong in numbers, discipline, and resolution, and in +addition to upholding their own personal cause they declare that their +isolated co-religionists in Leinster, Munster, and Connaught shall not +be forsaken nor left to their own shifts. A rough and ready farmer +thus spoke forth his mind:—"England may give the Papists a Parliament +to manage Papists, but not to manage Protestants. We should never +begin to consider the advisability of submitting to it. The thing's +clean impossible. What! Let Papists tax us! Pay for the spread of +Popery! Did you ever hear anything so absurd? Not one farthing would +<i>I</i> ever pay. I'd leave the country first. So would all the decent, +industrious folks. We know what happens in every country where Popery +gets the mastery. Look at Spain, Italy, and the Catholic parts of +Ireland. If England sends an army of redcoats to punish us for our +loyalty, we shall give way at once. We've sense enough to know that we +could do nothing against the Queen's troops, even if we wished to +fight them. But to take arms against the soldiers of England would be +quite against our principles. What we should <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>ultimately do, under +military compulsion, we have not yet decided, but we should never +under any circumstances show fight against the Queen. We don't think +the day will ever come when England would send the military to shoot +us for sticking to England. As for the police of the Irish Parliament, +that's another thing. They would have no assistance in Ulster. The +sheriff's officers, when engaged in the compulsory raising of taxes, +would have a lively time, and I am sure they would never get any +money. We don't take it seriously yet. If the bill were actually on +the statute book and an Irish House of Commons doing the Finnigan's +wake business with the furniture legs of the College Green Lunatic +Asylum, even then we would not take it seriously. We shall never think +it worth while to be serious until we see the British army firing on +us. It's too ridiculous. We pay no attention to the Irish Nationalist +members, whom we regard as a bankrupt lot of bursted windbags. Why, +hardly one of them could be trusted with the till of a totty-wallop +shop. To how many of them would Gladstone lend a sovereign? How many +of them could get tick in London for a new rig-out? Dublin is out of +the question, of course, because in Dublin these statesmen are known. +Would Englishmen let such men govern their country? Not likely. Nor +will we."</p> + +<p>I submitted that, so far as at present enacted, these very heroes were +really going to govern both England and Ireland. The great organ of +English Roman Catholicism objecting to this has given great offence to +the Irish Papists, and the Nationalist press is shrieking with futile +rage. English Catholicism and Irish Catholicism seem to be entirely +different politically. Englishmen are Englishmen first, and Catholics +next. Irishmen look first to Rome, and cordially hate England,—there +is the difference. The Conservative Catholic organ says, referring to +the retention of members at Westminster:—</p> + +<p>"With just as much reason might we import a band of eighty South +Africans, and whether they were eighty Zulus or eighty Archangels in +disguise, their presence in the British House of Commons would be a +gross violation of the principles of representative government. At +present, as members of the common Parliament of an United Kingdom, +English and Irish members have correlative rights, but when Irish +affairs are withdrawn from the Parliament at Westminster, on that day +must the Irish members cease to take part in purely British +legislation. We are asked to grant Home Rule to Ireland in deference +to the wishes of the local majority, and then we are told we must let +the local majority in Great Britain be dictated to by eighty men who +have neither stake in the country nor business in her Parliament, and +who do not represent so much as even a rotten borough between them."</p> + +<p>My Warrenpoint friend may well say that he cannot take it seriously. +The dignity of the English Parliament is, however, a matter of great +concern to Englishmen, and that for the present seems consigned to the +charge of Dillon, Healy, and Co. And all <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>to further the Union of +Hearts. Yet Misther Tay Day Sullivan, not content with the management +of both England and Ireland, proposes to oust us from India! The Irish +faction will boss the wuruld from ind to ind. Begorra, they will. Tay +Day says:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">England fears for India,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For there her cruel work<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was just as foul and hateful<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As any of the Turk.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when God sends us thither<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Her rule to overthrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With fearless hearts rejoicing<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To work His will we'll go.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stupid little England<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thinks to say us nay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But paltry little England<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Shall never stop our way.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There is a tribute of affection! There is an outpouring of loyalty! +There is an anthem to celebrate the Union of Hearts! It should be sung +round a table, Gladstonians and Irish Home Rulers hand in hand, as in +"Auld Lang Syne," and given out by Pastor W.E. Gladstone, as short +metre, two lines at a time. Why not? Stranger things are happening +every day.</p> + +<p class="date">Warrenpoint, July 20th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_51_THE_IRISH_PRESS_ON_FINALITY" id="No_51_THE_IRISH_PRESS_ON_FINALITY"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 51.—THE IRISH PRESS ON "FINALITY."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettere.png" alt="E" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />nglishmen who have any doubt remaining anent Home Rule should read +the Irish Nationalist press. Those who propose to concede the measure +for the sake of peace and finality should read, mark, learn, and +inwardly digest the <i>United Ireland</i> leader, which commences: "Let it +be pretended no more that the fate of the present Home Rule Bill is +henceforth a matter of vital interest to us," and afterwards says, "We +shall have to go on fighting—to go on fighting—without even a +temporary intermission, and whether this bill pass or not, this year +or next, or the year after, no matter what becomes of it." "Mr. +Gladstone's bill in its present form is exactly such a Central Council +as Mr. Chamberlain would have agreed to at the time of the Round Table +Conference. If it pass it can be no more than a milestone on our +march. To talk of finality any more would be simply grotesque, and yet +the Gladstonians have urged, in season and out of season, that the +bill would be nothing if not 'final, reasonably final.'" The English +Home Rulers are dealt with as severely as the most hardened Unionist +could wish. The writer speaks of their "disastrous fatuity in +consuming the whole of this session of the Imperial Parliament, and +the greater part of one or two more, over a Home Rule Bill which will +settle nothing, no, not even for three years." Disastrous fatuity is a +good phrase, an excellent good phrase, in sooth. I thank thee, Jew, +for teaching me <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span>that word. Those who believe in the security of the +Gladstonian safeguards, and the pacific disposition of the Nationalist +party, will perhaps be able to put a friendly construction on the +passage which begins:—"And it is already settled that no man in +Ireland is to bear a rifle unless he be a soldier of the army of +occupation, which will still be encamped on our soil 'to mak siccare.' +This hateful and degrading prohibition is what no Parnellite can +pretend to consent to for any reasonable or unreasonable fraction of a +period of reasonable finality." Those who believe in the severe +commercial morality and rigid honesty of the authors of the Plan of +Campaign will doubtless find their favourable opinion confirmed by the +succeeding remarkable complaint. "And the Irish Legislature—would it +not be better policy now to refuse to regard it as a Parliament and to +refuse to call it so?—is forbidden to take away any person's property +except by process of law, in accordance with settled principles and +precedents. There's trouble here." There is indeed trouble here. An +Irish Parliament which could not "take away any person's property +except by process of law" would be shorn of its principal functions, +would fail to justify its existence, would fall immeasurably short of +the popular expectation, would have, in fact, no earthly <i>raison d' +être</i>. An Irish Parliament without power to take from him that hath, +and give unto him that hath not, would be without functions, and the +foinest pisintry in the wuruld would instantly rebel against such a +nonentity. The farmers remember the oft-repeated statements of Mr. +Timothy Healy to the effect that "landlordism is the prop of the +British Government, and it is that we want to kick away." And the +benefit accruing from this vigorous action was by the same eloquent +patriot very plainly stated. "The people of this country ought never +to be satisfied so long as a single penny of rent is paid for a sod of +land in the whole of Ireland." And they never will be satisfied, with +or without rent. Their dissatisfaction has enabled Mr. Healy to put +money in his purse. The wail of a great people whose Parliament will +not be allowed to rob from all and sundry is accounted for towards the +close of the article. There will be trouble "as soon as the Dublin +Legislature becomes hard pushed for money, which will be desperately +often from the beginning, as is now plain."</p> + +<p>These considerations are closely observed by the people of Strabane, +the best of whom are steady loyalists. The town is bright, brisk, +thriving, and Scotch. Or rather the Scottish element is conspicuous in +the main street, with its McCollum and Mackey, its Crawford and Aikin, +its Colhoun and Finlay, its Lowry and McAnaw. There are several shirt +factories, of which the biggest is run by Stewart and Macdonald. A +number of names which may be either English or Scotch are equally to +the front, Taylor, White, and Simms, cheek by jowl with doubtful cases +like McCosker and McElhinney, which, however, smack somewhat of the +tartan. Macfarlane issues a notice, which is printed by Blair, and +besides <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span>White I notice Black and Gray. The establishment of Mr. +Snodgrass, near the Scotch Boot Stores, was remindful of Charles +Dickens, and the small flautist piping "Annie Laurie," put me in mind +of Robert Burns, the hairdresser of Warrenpoint. It became difficult +to realise that this was Ireland. Not far away are two mountains, +named respectively Mary Gray and Bessie Bell. The hills round Strabane +retain their Irish names, but the genius of the place is distinctly +Scottish. There are Irish parts of Strabane, but they are unpleasant +and unimportant. The Unionists pay three-fourths of the rates, but +there is only one Loyalist on the Town Council, which has nine +members, of which number three retire annually in rotation. The Town +Commissioners, as a whole, are not highly esteemed by the people of +Strabane. One of them, the leading light of the local Nationalist +party, is rated at £8. Another, a working plasterer, is the accredited +agent of the Home Rule party in this division of Tyrone, and is +playfully called the Objector-General, on account of his +characteristic method of working in the Registry Court. The Chairman, +who occupies the position of Mayor, but without the title, is rated at +£13. Two small publicans are rated at £12 and £27 respectively. The +remainder, including the Conservative member, are rated sufficiently +high to be regarded as having some stake in the country, and no +objection is taken on this score. But the Strabane Town Commissioners +are intolerant. Apart from the fact that they admit only one Unionist +to a body which derives three-fourths of its funds from Unionists, +they are distinctly intolerant in the matter of employment. They +employ no Protestants. Their solicitor, Mr. William Wilson, is indeed +of the proscribed faith, but he seems to have inherited the office +from his father. No Protestants need apply for any situation, however +small, under the Strabane Town Council, which pays its servants with +the money of Protestants. This is the party which clamours for +equality of treatment, and eternally complains of the exclusiveness of +Protestantism. A well-known Strabaner said:—</p> + +<p>"If we are shut out from the Town Council, it is, to some extent, our +own fault. Two causes mainly contributed to this result—the apathy of +the Unionist voters, and the unwillingness of our best men to rub up +against some of the men put forward by the other party. I say some +only, not all. We did not care to be mixed up with fellows of low +class, especially when they are as ignorant as possible. Then again, +we are well represented on the Poor Law Board, which really has all +the power, attending as it does to sanitation and so forth. The +Nationalists greedily snap at every shred and semblance of power, and +leave no stone unturned to get the mastery. There has come a sad +change over the poor folks, that is, the Roman Catholics. Formerly +they were civil and kind, and we all got on famously together. If a +Protestant was out in the country a mile or two away, and rain came +on, they were hospitable with that beautiful old courtesy which was +one of the best things <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>the nation possessed. It was something to +boast of. It was unique, and could not be found in such perfection out +of Ireland. It's all over now. Since Mr. Gladstone commenced to +destroy the country the poor folks hereabouts have changed very much +for the worse, and if you now got caught in a shower while out in the +country you might be drowned before they would ask you to take +shelter. They expect to be enjoying our property very shortly. They +fully believe that they will soon have the land and goods that we have +worked for and earned by the sweat of our brows, while they have stood +by complaining, instead of doing their best to get on. What shall I do +if Home Rule becomes law? Just this—I shall get out of the country in +double-quick time. There will be no security for life or property. The +country will be a perfect Hell upon Earth."</p> + +<p>There are three rivers at Strabane, which, notwithstanding the neglect +of the guide-books, is well worth the tourist's attention. The Mourne, +a really beautiful river, runs beside the town, washing the very +houses of a long street, and meeting the Finn, another fine river, in +the meadows near Lifford, which is in Donegal, but for all that only +ten minutes' walk from Strabane. From the confluence the river is +called the Foyle, so that from the splendid bridge leading into +Lifford may be seen the rare spectacle of three considerable rivers in +one meadow. Lifford is very clean and very pretty. The gaol is the +most striking building, and I wandered through its deserted corridors, +desolate as those of Monaghan. There were some strange marks in the +principal square; a number of parallel lines which puzzled me. I +turned to the gaoler who had just liberated me for some explanation.</p> + +<p>"Faith, thin, it's the militia officers that made them."</p> + +<p>"Studying fortification?"</p> + +<p>"Divil a fortification, thin. 'Tis lawn tennis it is, jist."</p> + +<p>And so it was. Two courts of lawn tennis in the square of the county +town of Donegal! That will give some idea of the business traffic.</p> + +<p>An experienced electioneerer said:—"We had an awful fight before we +could return Lord Frederick Hamilton for North Tyrone. We had all our +work cut out, for although we have on paper a majority of about one +hundred, many of our people are non-resident landlords, or army and +navy men, and they are not here to vote for us. So that our majority +of forty-nine was a close thing, though not so close as we expected. +The other side do not fight fair. Their tricks in the Registry Court +are most discreditable. Both parties fight the register, the +Nationalists expending any amount of time and money, and showing such +enthusiasm as our people never show. And this is the reason. Our Scots +farmers—for they are as Scottish as their ancestors of two hundred +years ago—<i>will</i> stick to their work, and persist in making their +work the paramount concern of their lives. They cannot believe that +objections will be made to their names on the register, and when such +objections have been raised they must appear in person, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>there +comes the difficulty. For if it's harvest time, or if engaged on any +necessary work, you cannot get them to the Court. At Newtonstewart +where the bulk of the voters are Protestant, no less than five +substantial farmers were objected to successively. The inspector, that +is, the Nationalist agent who is supposed to look into the claims of +the Unionist party, said that one had assigned the farm to his son, or +that another was not the real tenant, or that something else was +wrong, and as this statement established a <i>primâ-facie</i> case, it +became necessary for the persons whose votes were questioned to come +into Court. Now, there is the rub. The objector calculates that some +will not come, for he knows how hard it is to get them to come. Then +they stuff the register with bogus names. They put down dozens of +people who don't exist, with the object of polling somebody for +them—if any of them should escape the scrutiny of the opposite +party—and with the further object of causing the Unionist party +expense and loss of time. For there is a stamp duty of threepence to +be paid for every objection, and then the Loyalist lawyer and his +staff are kept at work for six weeks, instead of a fortnight or three +weeks, which should be the outside time taken. Then the annoyance and +loss of time to the industrious Unionist voters, who have to leave +their work. This does not hurt the opposite party, who have nothing +else to do, and who in these wrangling affairs are in their native +element, thoroughly enjoying themselves. What makes the work so hard +for the Loyalist lawyer is the fact that our folks are all for +business and look upon politics as a nuisance, while the other side +make politics the principal business of their lives. They are +tremendously energetic in this, but wonderfully supine in everything +else. In politics they spare neither time nor money, nor (for the +matter of that) swearing. The lying that goes on in the Registry Court +would astonish Englishmen. The Papist party themselves admit that they +are awful liars, but they laugh it off, and plead that all is fair in +love and war.</p> + +<p>"The priest sits in the Revision Court all day long. In these Revision +Courts every priest is an agent of the Separatist party. They watch +the inspectors and witnesses, keeping a keen eye on those who do not +swear hard enough, ready to reward or censure, as the case may be. +Every Sunday the people are instructed from the altar as to their +political action. This eternal elbowing-on keeps them up to their +work, as well as the promises of the good things to come. Our folks +are never worked up. That makes it very hard for us. They came up +pretty well last time, though. But when one side is all for business, +and the other side all for politics, the business folks are +handicapped.</p> + +<p>"The Nationalists ran John Dillon on one occasion. We smashed him up. +No respectable constituency would ever return any of his class, and we +resented the attempt to couple us with a man of that stamp. He was +beaten by several hundreds. Then they ran a Mr. Wylie, who had been a +Land Commissioner for this <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span>district. We thought that positively +indecent, and we wondered that any gentleman would put himself in such +a position. He had been round here reducing rents, and then he came +forward as a candidate. We accuse him of bad taste, nothing worse. He +only made one speech, though, and that was to thank the people for +placing him at the bottom of the poll. He confined himself to +canvassing. If he had once mounted the hustings we would have heckled +him about the Land Commission business. He knew that and never gave us +a chance. It was a cute stroke of policy to bring him forward. He was +a Presbyterian, and might be Land Commissioner again. At least the +people thought so. Then they tried a Professor Dougherty, of +Londonderry, another Home Rule Presbyterian; for there are a few, +though you could count them off on your fingers, and they are a +hundred times outnumbered by the Conservative Catholics. He belonged +to Magee College, and we trotted out the whole of his co-professors +against him. We never had a meeting without one or other of his +colleagues pitching into him—a great joke it was.</p> + +<p>"Over the water Mr. E.T. Herdman tried to get in for East Donegal, a +very popular man who pays thirty or forty thousand pounds a year in +wages. The people promised to support him. The priests promised to +support him. They asked what would they do else, and what did he take +them for? They are so anxious about employment, these good men. All +they want is the good of the people. You saw how they ran after the +Lord Lieutenant saying: Only find us work! You see how they run after +the Countess of Aberdeen, who is encouraging industry (and about whom +there are some pickings). What did the people of East Donegal do, +under the guidance of their clergy? They returned Arthur O'Connor, who +never did anything for them, who never darkens their doors, and who is +utterly unknown to them. What can you say for them after that?"</p> + +<p>The politician who was preferred to Mr. Herdman probably promised to +give the people "all they want," while the Unionist was only paying +them wages for working all the year round. And besides this, Mr. +O'Connor's speeches were probably more full-flavoured, more +soul-satisfying, than those of Mr. Herdman, who, being a practical man +of business, and having a sense of responsibility, would only talk +common-sense, and would promise no more than he could hope to perform. +Mr. O'Connor speaks in the epic style. He reminds you of Bombastes +Furioso, or Ancient Pistol, with a subtle admixture of Falstaff and +Parolles. He belongs to the lime-light and blue fire school of +oratory, and backs up a vivid imagination with a virulent hatred of +England. The raging sea of sedition which surged around us is now +silent enough. It Now hath quite forgot to rave While birds of calm +sit brooding on the charmed wave. The reason why is plain or should be +plain to anything above the level of a Gladstonian intellect. It +cannot be amiss, though, to recall a specimen of Mr. Arthur O'Connor's +style, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span>that so we may judge of his superior acceptability to the +people of East Donegal. Speaking after the Union of Hearts had been +invented and patented (provisionally), Mr. O'Connor said:—</p> + +<p>"I know it to be a fact that in whatever war Great Britain may be +involved, whatever Power she may have to struggle with, that Power can +count on a hundred thousand Irish arms to fight under her flag against +Great Britain—(great cheering). Does not the Government of the United +States know perfectly well that at three days' notice it could have a +force, of which one hundred thousand would only be a fraction, a force +willing to serve against Great Britain for the love of the thing, +without any pay?—(renewed applause). And it is not amiss that the +Government of England should know it also"—(continued applause). The +M.P. who made this speech is one of the politicians now dominating the +English Parliament at Westminster. It is in response to the clamour of +him and his sort that the gag is put on men like Balfour, Goschen, +Chamberlain. This little gem set in the silver sea, this isle, this +realm, this England, is becoming a paltry concern, is fast being +Gladstoned into drivelling imbecility. What does O'Connor mean by the +100,000 Irish arms? Does he mean 50,000 Irishmen? The point is +obscure, as will be seen from the oratory of another distinguished +patriot, who said, "Ten millions of Irish hearts are beating with high +anticipation, ten millions of eyes are looking forward to the passing +of the bill." A very large number of one-eyed Irishry.</p> + +<p>The <i>Irish Catholic</i> makes a slip. The journal approves of Mr. +Gladstone's closure, but with reference to the refusal of a newspaper +to print a Dr. Laggan's letter about, something delivers itself +thus:—</p> + +<div class="block" style="font-size: 90%;"><p>The application of the gag in polities has always been the resort +of the stupid, incapable, and tyrannical politician. Whether +tried in Russia, in France, or in England of old, it has +invariably failed in its purpose. The stifling of the individual +voice becomes of small advantage when the object-lesson of its +possessor with a bandage across his mouth, and his hands tied +behind his back, is presented to the populace. Just as the gag +has failed elsewhere it is, we are glad to think, destined to +fail in Ireland also, and, indeed, if it were not so destined, +Ireland would be precisely the best country to live out of.</p></div> + +<p class="noin">So much for absent-mindedness. It is pleasant to be able to agree with +the <i>Irish Catholic</i> for once.</p> + +<p>On the whole, the confusion is deepening. The Grand Juries of Ireland +are passing unanimous resolutions condemning the bill. The Nationalist +party condemns the bill. The Scottish Covenanters, who have not +delivered a political pronouncement for more than two hundred years, +and who never vote either way, have risen in their might and cursed +the bill, smiting the Papists hip and thigh with great slaughter, and +denouncing the movement as purely in the interests of Romanist +ascendency. Be it understood that these religionists live in Ireland +and date their malediction from Coleraine. But nothing will stop the +G.O.M.'s gallop over the precipice. Let <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span>him go, but let him not drag +the country after him. And in after years his Administration will be +described in words like those of Burke, who, speaking of the Gladstone +of his day, said, "He made an Administration so checked and speckled, +he put together a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically +dovetailed, a cabinet so variously inlaid, such a piece of diversified +mosaic, such a tesselated pavement without cement, that it was indeed +a curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch and unsure to stand upon. +The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards, stared at each +other, and were obliged to ask, 'Sir, your name?' 'Sir, you have the +advantage of me. Mr. Such-a-one, I beg a thousand pardons.' I venture +to say that persons were there who had never spoken to each other in +their lives until they found themselves together they knew not how, +pigging together heads and points in the same truckle bed." This is +prophecy.</p> + +<p>Have you heard that Mr. Balfour, who went through Ireland without an +escort, is unable to move about England without the protection of a +hundred and fifty mounted police to save him from English Home Rulers +who are burning to avenge the wrongs of Ireland? No? England is badly +served in the matter of news. They manage these things better in +Ireland. A leading Dublin Nationalist print has a number of prominent +headlines referring to the "facts." "The Arch-Coercionist Protected by +Police. Caught in His Own Trap." The writer even goes into particulars +and tells how "effusively" the ex-Secretary thanked the police for +protecting his "frail personality." The Irish moonlight patriots are +gratified. Balfour was their aversion. During his reign it could no +longer be said that the safest place in Ireland, the one spot where no +harm could befall you, was the criminal dock. Balfour stamped out +midnight villainy, and helped the industrious poor. Wherefore he is +honoured by honest Irishmen and hated by all rascalry. Ireland needs +him again with his <i>suaviter in modo, fortiter in re</i>; his fairness +and firmness, his hatred of tyranny, his determination to do right +though the heavens should fall. With Balfour in office the Irish +agitators have hard work to keep the broil agoing. They hate him +because of the integrity which won the confidence of the Irish people, +and because of the substantial benefit arising from his rule, a +benefit there was no denying because it was seen and known of all men. +The return of Balfour to power threatens to cut the ground from under +the feet of those who live by agitation. They dread him above +everything. They are horror-stricken at the prospect of a return to +his light railways and heavy sentences. Hence this attempt to damage +his prestige. Unhappy Mr. Balfour! To be protected by one hundred and +fifty mounted police, and not to know of it! And the venal English +press which conceals the fact, what shall be said of it? Where would +England be but for Irish newspaper enterprise?</p> + +<p class="date">Strabane, July 22nd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_52_HOW_THE_PRIESTS_CONTROL_THE_PEOPLE" id="No_52_HOW_THE_PRIESTS_CONTROL_THE_PEOPLE"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 52.—HOW THE PRIESTS CONTROL THE PEOPLE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />his is a terribly Protestant place. The people are unpatriotic and do +not want Home Rule. They speak of the Nationalist members with +contempt, and say they would rather be represented by gentlemen. They +are very incredulous, and refuse to believe in the honesty of "honest" +John Dillon. They say that Davitt is a humbug and Healy a blackguard. +They speak of O'Brien's breeches without weeping, and opine that +Davitt's imprisonments and Healy's horse-whipping served them both +right. These misguided Irishmen affect to believe that the English +laws are good, that Ireland is a splendid country, and that things +would be far better as they are. Raphoe is on the road to nowhere, and +yet it runs a rattling tweed mill—the proprietor is a Unionist, of +course. Queer it is to see this flourishing affair in the wilds of +Donegal. Blankets, travelling rugs, and tweed for both sexes, of +excellent quality and pretty patterns. Raphoe has a cathedral, but +without features of note. The bishop's palace is in ruins. In 1835 the +bishopric was annexed to Derry. The police of this district are sad at +heart. There are but few of them, very few indeed, and they have no +work to do. These Protestant districts afford no pleasurable +excitement. Work, work, work, without any intervals of moonlighting +and landlord shooting. These Saxon settlers have no imagination. Like +mill horses, they move in one everlasting round, unvaried even by a +modicum of brigandage. An occasional murder, a small suspicion of +arson, might relieve the wearisome monotony of their prosaic +existence, but they lack the poetic instinct. They have not the +sporting tastes of their Keltic countrymen. They are not ashamed of +this, but even glory in it. An Orangeman asked me to quote a case of +shooting from behind a wall by any of his order. He says no such thing +ever took place, and actually boasted of it! He declared that if the +body had in future any shooting to do they would do it in the open. +The Nationalist patriots are more advanced. They know a trick worth +two of that. The Protestant party have no experience in premeditated +murder, and must take a back seat as authorities in the matter. They +have not yet discovered that shooting from behind a wall is +comparatively safe, and safety is a paramount consideration. Landlords +and agents carry rifles, and should they be missed unpleasant results +might ensue. The case of Smith, quoted in a Mayo letter, shows the +danger of missing. It is not well to place the lives of experienced +and valuable murderers at the mercy of a worthless agent. The +Nationalist party cannot afford to expose to danger the priceless +ruffians whose efforts have converted Mr. Gladstone and his Tail. The +patriots need every man who can shoot, and the stone walls of Ireland +are a clear dispensation of Providence. To shoot in the open is a +flying in the face of natural laws. The patriots are wedded to the +walls, or, as they call them <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span>in Ireland, ditches. The "back iv a +ditch" is a proverbial expression for the coign of vantage assumed for +the slaying of your enemy. Like General Jackson, the Irish are +Stone-wallers, but in another sense. They have brought the Art of +Murder with Safety to its highest pitch of perfection. They are the +leading exponents of mural musketry.</p> + +<p>A moderate Unionist said:—"To speak of tolerance in the same breath +with Irish Roman Catholicism is simply nonsense. You will not find any +believers in this theory among the Protestants of this district, +although being more numerous they are not so much alarmed as the +unfortunate residents in Romanist centres. We cannot believe anything +so entirely opposed to the evidence of our senses. A Protestant farmer +of my acquaintance, the only Protestant on a certain estate, has +confided to me his intention of leaving the district should the bill +pass, because he thinks he could not afterwards live comfortably among +his old neighbours. A woman who had occupied the position of servant +in a Protestant family for forty years, recently went to her mistress +with tears in her eyes, and said her clergy had ordered her to leave, +as further continuance in the situation would be dangerous to her +eternal interests. A girl who had been four years in another situation +has also left on the same plea. The progress of Romanism is distinctly +towards intolerance. It becomes narrower and narrower as time goes on. +This is proved by the fact that formerly dispensations were granted +for mixed marriages—that is, Catholic and Protestant—on the +understanding that the children should be brought up, the boys in the +father's faith, the girls in the mother's. All that is now changed, +and dispensations are only granted on condition that all the children +shall be Roman Catholics. The absolute despotism of the Catholic +clergy is every year becoming more marked. They rule with a rod of +iron. A bailiff of my acquaintance who had paid all his clerical dues, +was very badly treated because he was a bailiff and for no other +earthly reason. No priest in Ireland would perform the marriage +ceremony for his daughter, who actually went to America to be married. +She was compelled to this, the bridegroom going out in another boat. +The ceremony being performed, they returned to Ireland, and the girl's +father assures me that the affair cost him fifty pounds. The case of +Mrs. Taylor, of Ballinamore, was a very cruel one, which a word from +the priest of the district would have altogether prevented. But that +word was not spoken, for she was a Protestant. Her brother had +discharged a cotter, I do not know whether justly or unjustly, but +although Mrs. Taylor had nothing whatever to do with the affair—and +it was not asserted that she had—she was severely boycotted. The +brother, who was the guilty party, if anybody was guilty, was rather +out of the way, and being a substantial farmer, quite able to hold his +own, could not be got at. But Mrs. Taylor was a widow, and lived by +running a corn mill. Nobody went near it, nobody would have anything +to do <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span>with the widow, who, however, struggled on, until the mill was +burnt to the ground. She was compensated by the County, and rebuilt +the mill. This spring it was again burnt down, and she is ruined. Her +property is now in the Receiver's hands, and she is going through the +Bankruptcy Court.</p> + +<p>"The Home Rule Bill has produced, with much that is tragic, some +comical effects. Since the passing of the Second Reading our servant +has become unmanageable. She is evidently affected in the same way as +many of the most ignorant Papists, believing that the time will soon +come when, by the operation of the new Act, she will so far rise in +the social scale as to be quite independent of her situation. This +kind of thing is visible all around. There is work for everyone about +here, but the farmers cannot get labourers. In many parts of Ireland +the cry is 'There is no employment,' but here it is not so. There is +plenty of work at good wages, waiting to be done, but men cannot be +got to do it. The Sion Mills, which employ twelve hundred people, +eight hundred Catholics and four hundred Protestants, would employ +many more if they could be had. The labourers of this district are +Catholic, and they prefer to stand loafing about to the performance of +regular work. They believe that a perpetual holiday is coming, and +that they may as well have a foretaste of the ease which is to come. +Up to the times of the Home Rule Bill they were industrious enough. +The Catholics of Tyrone and Donegal are not like those of the South +and West. They are very superior, both in cleanliness and industry. +Having for so long mingled with the Saxon settlers of the North, they +have imbibed some of their industrial spirit, and until lately there +was no reasonable ground of complaint. Their morale is unhappily now +sadly shaken, and whether the bill passes or not it will be long, very +long, before they resume their industrial pursuits with the energy and +regularity of men who have nothing on which to depend but their own +exertions. And whatever happens to the bill, the country will be the +poorer for its introduction. Ireland is now an excellent country to +live out of, and those who can leave it have the most enviable lot."</p> + +<p>A man of few words said:—"Under Home Rule the landlords may take +their hook at once. Their property will disappear instanter. The +tenant has already more lien on the land than the fee-simple <i>in toto</i> +is worth, and with a Nationalist Parliament he would pay no rent at +all. The judges would not grant processes, and if they did their +warrants could not be enforced. The destruction of the landlord class +means the destruction of English influence in Ireland. A short time +ago two men were talking together. One was doubtful, and said, +'Michael Davitt says we must have only five acres of land. Now you +have twenty-five acres, you'll lose twenty.' 'Ye didn't read it +right,' said the other. ''Tis the landlords and them that holds a +thousand and two thousand acres that'll be dispossessed, and their +land divided among the people. In six years we'll have the counthry +independent, and then we'll do as we like. Every <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span>Saxon will be +cleared out of the counthry. Only keep yer tongue between yer teeth. +Be quiet and wait a bit till ye see what happens.'</p> + +<p>"'But,' said the objector, 'them Ulster fellows'll give us no peace. +They have arms, and I'm towld they have a lot of sojers among them, +and that they're drilled, and have officers, regular military +officers. Sure, how would we do as we liked, wid an army of them +fellows agin us? And they're devils to fight, they say.'</p> + +<p>"'Arrah now, sure, ye're mighty ignorant, thin. Sure, they say they'll +not pay taxes. Thin the sojers comes in and shoots them down, and you +and I stands by wid our tongues in our cheeks. 'Tis no consarn of +ours. We have nothin' to say to it, one way or another. The Orangemen +can shoot the troops, and the troops can shoot the Orangemen, and they +can murdher each other to their heart's contint, and fight like +Kilkenny cats, till there's nothin' left but the tail. And good enough +for the likes of them. Sure, twill be great divarshun for them that +looks on. And that's the way of it, d'ye mind me?'"</p> + +<p>This worthy politician must have been a perfect Machiavelli. His +favourite saying was doubtless 'A plague on both your houses,' and +with equal certainty his favourite quotation the bardic 'Whether +Roderigo kill Cassio, or Cassio kill Roderigo, or each kill the other, +every way makes my gain.' His theory of Nationalist progress was +four-square and complete, and showed a neat dovetailing of means with +the end. There is some justification for his simple faith. He has seen +Mr. Gladstone and his supporters, converted <i>en bloc</i>, including the +great Sir William Harcourt, styled by the Parnellite sheet "the +new-born, emancipator of Ireland," the unambitious and retiring +Labouchere, the potent Cunninghame Graham, the profound Conybeare, and +the pertinacious Cobb—he has seen these great luminaries throwing in +their lot with the sworn enemies of England, and doing all that in +them lies to disintegrate and destroy the Empire, and the rude peasant +may be pardoned for expecting that the British army will, at his call, +complete what these worthies have so well begun. To narrow loyalist +liberties, to tax loyalist industry, to create a loyalist rebellion, +and to have the loyalists shot by other loyalists is an excellent +all-round scheme. This is indeed a high-souled patriotism.</p> + +<p>Continuing, my friend said:—"A Romanist neighbour of mine had +promised to vote for Lord Frederick Hamilton, for, as he said, he had +no confidence in any Irish Parliament. Just before the battle he +called and said he must vote the other way, for Father Somebody had +called on him and said, 'I hear you are going to vote for Lord +Frederick Hamilton.' Admitted. 'Then you may call in Lord Frederick +Hamilton to visit you on your death-bed. You can get him to administer +the Sacraments of the Church.' 'What could I do?' said the farmer. 'I +couldn't go against the priest. I could not incur the anger of my +clergy without imperilling my immortal soul. Besides that, I'd be made +a mark and a mock of. Perhaps I'd be refused admission to Mass, like +the men <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span>in South Meath who voted contrary to the orders of the +priest. So to save my soul I'll have to vote against my conscience. No +use in telling me we will vote by ballot. Them priests knows +everything. They fix themselves in the polling booths, and they can +read what way ye went in your face. Sure, they know us all inside and +out, since we were So high. We couldn't desave them.' Then they always +act as personation agents, and they order people who can read and +write to say they can't do either. So they have to declare aloud whom +they will vote for, and the priest hears for himself. This is the true +explanation of the fearful illiteracy of Donegal, as revealed by the +voting papers. Is it likely that in one quarter of Donegal—that is, +in one-fourth part of one county—there should be more illiterates +than in the whole of Scotland? Yet according to the election returns, +it was even so. The fact that the people declared themselves +illiterate at the orders of the priest, when they were not illiterate, +shows how degraded are the people, and how completely they are under +the thumb of the priests."</p> + +<p>A Protestant clergyman on his holidays, and not belonging to these +parts, was very eloquent on the subject of political popery. In all my +journeyings I have never interviewed a Protestant parson, save and +except Dr. Kane, whom I met in the Royal Avenue, Belfast, along with +the Marquess of Londonderry and Colonel Saunderson, as recorded in an +early letter. I was disposed to believe that the English public might +regard their evidence as being prejudiced, and therefore of little +value. But my Raphoe acquaintance was a singularly modest and moderate +man, upon whose opinion you at once felt you could rely. He said:—"My +Catholic neighbours were friends until lately. Nobody could have been +more kind and obliging. There was no sensible difference between us, +except that they did not come to church. They would do anything for me +and my family; we would do anything for them. Lately they have changed +their manner. They have grown cold. Their children playing with mine +have let out the secret. Through them we learn that the days of the +Protestants are numbered. Father says this, and mother says that. My +land is disposed of among my Papist neighbours. All my congregation +have similar experiences. This makes things very unpleasant, and +nothing can ever bring back the kind, neighbourly feeling of old. The +Papist clergy are the cause of it all. Their church is nothing if not +absolute, and dominancy is their aim. The Protestant party will get no +quarter. I do not say we shall be murdered, or even personally +maltreated. But when the large majority of a district want to see the +back of you, with the idea of dividing your farm or your Church lands, +they have many ways of making things so unpleasant that you would soon +be glad to go. For my own part, I should endeavour to leave the +country at the earliest possible moment. And that is what 999 +Protestants out of 1,000 would tell you. The clergy are inimical to +England. Here and there you find a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span>Conservative, and, strange to say, +the scholarly men, what you might call the gentlemanly party, are +against Home Rule. These, unhappily, are very few. The Maynooth men +are violently against England." This cleric called attention to the +opinion of Dr. Wylie, of Edinburgh, who has made a special study of +the matter. The learned professor says the more palpable decadence of +Ireland dates from the erection of Maynooth. Before the institution of +this school the Irish priests were educated in France, then the least +ultramontane country in popish Europe. They could not be there without +imbibing a certain portion of the spirit of "Gallican liberties." It +was argued that by educating them at home, we should have a class of +priests more national and more attached to British rule; at least we +would have gentlemen and scholars, who would humanise their flocks. +These have since been shown to be miserable sophisms. "Maynooth is a +thoroughly ultramontane school. We have exchanged the French-bred +priest, illread in Dens, with low notions of the supremacy, and +proportionally high notions of the British Crown, for a race of +crafty, Jesuitical, intriguing, thorough-trained priests of the +ultramontane school, who recognise but one power in the world—the +Pontifical—and who are incurably alienated from British interests and +rule. The loud and fearful curses fulminated from the altar, which +come rolling across the Channel, mingled with the wrathful howls of a +priest-ridden and maddened people, proclaim the result. These are your +Maynooth scholars and gentlemen! These are your pious flocks, tended +and fed by the lettered priests of Maynooth! Better had we flung our +money into the sea, than sent it across the Channel, to be a curse in +the first place to Ireland, and a curse in the second place to +ourselves, by the demoralising and anti-national sentiments it has +been employed to propagate. The better a priest, the worse a citizen. +And whom have Government found their bitterest enemies? Who are the +parties who have invariably withstood all their plans for civilising +Ireland? Why, those very priests whom they have clothed, and educated, +and fed."</p> + +<p>Such, according to an expert, are the men who now manipulate the +voting powers of the Irish people. The priests do not deny that they +have this full control; they merely say they have a right to it. +Bishop Walsh, of Dublin, says that as priests, and independent of all +human organisations, they have an inalienable and indisputable right +to guide the people in this momentous proceeding, as in every other +proceeding where the interests of Catholicity as well as the interests +of Irish nationality are involved. He suggested, and the suggestion +was adopted, that at all the political conventions held in the various +Irish counties an ex-officio vote should be given to the priests! This +embodied the principle that if Home Rule became law the Irish +priesthood would have privileges which would make them absolute rulers +of Ireland. Cardinal Logue says:—"We are face to face at the present +moment with a great disobedience to ecclesiastical authority." This +was in view of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span>Parnellite rebellion against priestly dictation. +"The doctrines of the present day," said the good Cardinal, "are +calculated (horror!) to wean the people from the priests' advice, to +separate the priests from the people, and (here the Cardinal must have +shivered with unspeakable disgust) <span class="fakesc">TO LET THE PEOPLE USE THEIR OWN +JUDGMENT</span>." These are Cardinal's words, not mine. To make any +comment would be to gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw a +perfume o'er the violet. Well might Mr. Gladstone say nineteen years +ago:—"It is the peculiarity of Roman theology, that by thrusting +itself into the temporal domain, it naturally, and even necessarily, +comes to be a frequent theme of political discussion." Archbishop +Croke was the inspirer of the Tipperary troubles, worked out by his +tools, Dillon, O'Brien, and Humphreys. Dr. Croke helped to found the +Gaelic Athletic Association, which is well-known to be the nucleus of +a rebel army. Dr. Croke gave £5 to the Manchester Murderers' Memorial +Fund, and accompanied the gift with a letter stating that the men who +murdered Police-sergeant Brett were "wrongfully arrested, unfairly +tried, barbarously executed, and went like heroes to their doom." It +was Dr. Croke who supported a movement to raise a pension for James +Stephens, the Fenian Head-centre, the famous Number One, the general +of the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood. We are asked to believe that +this gentleman and his crew of subordinate clergy are eminently loyal, +and that the moment a Home Rule Bill puts it into their power to +injure England, from that very moment they will become friendly +indeed, will cease to do evil and learn to do well, and that the +altars from which England is now every Sunday hotly denounced will in +future vibrate with the resonant expression of sacerdotal affection.</p> + +<p>These gentlemen must have a wonderful opinion of the gullibility of +the great Saxon race. But as they see a certain portion believe in Mr. +Gladstone they may expect them to believe in anything. To swallow the +G.O.M. plus Harcourt, Healy, Conybeare, Cobb, O'Brien, and the Home +Rule Bill is indeed a wonderful feat of deglutition.</p> + +<p class="date">Raphoe, (Co. Donegal), July 25th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_53_WHAT_THEY_THINK_IN_COUNTY_DONEGAL" id="No_53_WHAT_THEY_THINK_IN_COUNTY_DONEGAL"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 53.—WHAT THEY THINK IN COUNTY DONEGAL.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he Stranorlar people can be excessively funny. In a well-known public +resort yesterday I witnessed a specimen of their sportive style. A +young fellow was complaining that the examining doctor of some +recruiting station had refused him "by raison of my feet."</p> + +<p>"I heerd tell they wouldn't take men wid more than fifteen inches of +foot on thim," remarked a bystander. "The Queen couldn't shtand the +expinse at all at all in leather."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>"Arrah, now, will ye be aisy," said another. "Sure, Micky isn't all +out so bad as Tim Gallagher over there beyant, that has to get up an' +go downstairs afore he can tur-rn round in bed. An' all on account iv +the size iv his feet. 'Tis thrue what I spake, divil a lie I tell ye. +The boy has to get up and go down shtairs, an' go into the sthreet, +an' come up the other way afore he can tur-rn round, the crathur."</p> + +<p>"Hould yer whist, now, till I tell ye," said another. "Ye know +Kerrigan's whiskey-shop. Well, one day Kerrigan was standin' chattin' +wid his wife, when the shop-windy all at once wint dark, an' Kerrigan +roars out, 'What for are ye puttin' up the shutters so airly?' says +he. An' faix, 'twas no wondher ye'd think it, for ould Hennessy of +Ballybofey had fallen down in the street, an' it was the two +good-lookin' feet of him stickin' up that was darkenin' the shop. Ax +Kerrigan himself av it wasn't."</p> + +<p>A roar of laughter followed this sally, and the rejected recruit was +comforted.</p> + +<p>Stranorlar is pleasantly situated on the river Finn, in a fertile +valley surrounded by an amphitheatre of green hills, beyond which may +in some direction be seen the more imposing summits of the Donegal +highlands. The walk to Meenglas, Lord Lifford's Irish residence, would +be considered of wonderful beauty if its extensive views were visible +anywhere near Birmingham; but in Ireland, where lovely scenery is so +uncommonly common, you hardly give it a second glance. The tenantry +are mostly Nationalist, if they can be said to be anything at all. +They one and all speak highly of Lord Lifford, whose kindness and +long-suffering are administered <i>con amore</i> by genial Captain Baillie. +They have no opinions on Home Rule or, indeed, on any other political +subject, and will agree with anything the stranger may wish. Whatever +you profess as your own opinion is certain to be theirs, and like +Artemus Ward they might conclude their letters with "I don't know what +your politics are, but I agree with them." Every man Jack of the +Catholic peasantry votes as he is told by his priest, and no amount of +argument, no amount of most convincing logic, no earthly power could +make him do otherwise. He will agree with you, will swear all you say, +will go further than you go yourself, will clinch every argument you +offer in the most enthusiastic way. Then he will vote in the opposite +direction. He thinks that in voting against the priest he would be +voting against God, and his religion compels him to conscientiously +vote against his conscience, if any. A burning and shining light among +the Home Rulers of Stranorlar having been indicated, I contrived to +meet him accidentally as it were, and after some preliminary remarks +of a casual nature my friend informed me that he was agin Home Rule, +as, in his opinion, it would desthroy the counthry; that the farmers +believed they would get the land for nothing, and that they were told +this by "priests and lawyers;" that he believed this to be a delusion +from which the people would have a dreadful awakening; that +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span>Protestants were better off, cleaner, honester than Catholics; that +they were much more industrious and far better farmers, and so forth, +and so forth. This man is a red hot Nationalist, and was under the +impression he was "having his leg pulled," hence his accommodating +speech. When taxed with flagrant insincerity he only smiled, and +tacitly admitted the soft impeachment. Farmers you meet in rural lanes +will profess earnest Unionism, but—find out their religion—you need +ask no more. Whatever they may say, whatever their alleged opinions +may be, matters not a straw. They must and will vote as the priest +tells them. So that the last franchise Act endows every priest with a +thousand votes or so. Will anybody attempt to disprove this? Will any +living Irishman venture to contradict this statement? The fact being +admitted, Englishmen may be trusted to see its effect. Is there any +class or trading interest which would be by working men entrusted with +such enormous power? And these thousand-vote priests are unfriendly to +England, as is proved by their own utterances and by innumerable overt +acts. All of which merits consideration.</p> + +<p>The Stranorlar folks are warm politicians. At the present moment +feeling runs particularly high, on account of the riot on King +William's Day, to wit, July twelfth. Two Orangemen were returning from +Castlefinn, a few miles away, where a demonstration had taken place, +and passing through Stranorlar, accompanied by their sisters, they +were set upon by the populace, and brutally maltreated. Several shots +were fired, and some of the rioters were slightly wounded or rather +grazed by snipe shot, but not so seriously as to stop their daily +avocations. The Catholic party allege that the Orangemen assaulted the +village in general, firing without provocation. The Protestant party +say that this is absurd, and that it is not yet known who fired the +shots. A second case, less serious, is also on the carpet. A solitary +Orangeman returning from the same celebration is said to have been +waylaid, beaten, and robbed by a number of men who went two miles to +meet with him. This also is claimed as Orange rowdyism.</p> + +<p>A Protestant handicraftsman said:—"If we had a Catholic Parliament in +Dublin we should not be able to put our head out of doors. Those who +in England say otherwise are very ignorant. I have no patience with +them. Only the other day I heard an Englishman who had been in the +country six hours, all of which he had spent in a railway train, +arguing against an Irish gentleman who has spent all his life in the +country. 'Give 'em their civil rights,' says this English fellow. He +could say nothing else. Give 'em their civil rights,' says he. 'What +civil rights are they deprived of?' says the other. 'Give 'em their +civil rights,' says he. That was all he could say. He was for all the +world like a poll-parrot. He was one of these well-fed fellows, with +about three inches of fat on his ribs and three inches of bone in his +skull, and a power of sinse <i>outside</i> his head. He turned round on me +and asked me to agree with him. When I didn't he insulted me. 'I see +by your hands,' <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>says he, 'that you've been working with them, and not +with your brains,' says he. Well, he was a man with a gray beard, but +not a sign of gray hair on his head, so says I, 'Your beard,' says I, +'is twenty-five years younger than the rest of your hair, and it looks +twenty-five years older.' I see,' says I, 'that <i>you</i> have been +working with your jaws and not with your brains.' That made him vexed. +He didn't know what to say next, and 'twas well for him. He was too +ignorant for this counthry, though he might do very well for them +places where they vote for such men as Harcourt or the like of him.</p> + +<p>"The people of these parts are skinned alive by their religion. Not a +hand's turn can be done without money. Money for christening, for +confession, for everything from the cradle to the grave. And when +they're dead the poor folks are still ruining the counthry, for their +relatives run up and down begging money to get their souls out of +purgatory. I have no objection to that; let them do it if they like, +but let them not say they are poor because of England. The more money +they pay the sooner their father's or mother's soul is out of torment. +Of course they spend all they have. I was speaking with a priest +lately, and I said, 'Suppose I fell into Finn-water, and a man who saw +me drowning said, "I'll pull ye out for half-a-crown or a sovereign," +what would ye think of him?' Says the priest, 'I'd think him a brute +and a heathen.' 'But suppose, instead of Finn-water it was purgatory I +was in, and the priest said, "I'll pull ye out for five pounds," what +about him?' 'Good morning to ye,' says the sogarth aroon (dear +priest). There was no answer for me."</p> + +<p>Another Stranorlar man said:—"When the bill passed the second +reading, there was not a hill round about, for many a mile, without a +blazing tar-barrel on it, and the houses were lit up till ye'd think +the places were on fire. The people were rejoicing for they knew not +what. Says one to me, 'Ye can pack up yer clothes,' says he. They +think they will now get rid of the English, and have things all their +own way. That's their general idea. All their rejoicing passed off +without a word of dissent from any Unionist. But if we rejoiced—! +Suppose the bill were thrown out, and we lit a tar-barrel. We'd be +stoned, and, if possible, swept off the very face of the earth. On St. +Patrick's Day, March 17, they march over the place, flags flying, +drums beating, bands playing, and nobody says a word against it. But +if we started an Orange procession on July 12 in Stranorlar, we'd be +knocked into smithereens. And yet in the town we are about +half-and-half. Of course, when you get out into the wild districts the +Romanists greatly outnumber us. The plea of reduction of rent being +required is very absurd when you come to examine the matter. Many of +them pay three or four pounds a year only. What reduction on that sum +would do them any real good?"</p> + +<p>A land agent of Donegal showed me one page of a rent book, that I +might bear witness to indisputable facts. There were twenty-one +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span>annual rents on the page, and eleven of them were under two +pounds—most of them, in fact, were under thirty shillings. One man +held thirty-three acres for thirty-three shillings per annum. He had +paid no rent for two years. Another estate in Donegal has two thousand +tenants for a total rent of £2,800. The agent has to look after all +these "farmers"—to conciliate, threaten, soother, bully, beg, pray, +promise, cajole, hunt, treat, fight, curse, and comether the whole two +thousand a whole year for, and in consideration of, the princely sum +of a hundred and forty pounds. Many of the farmers have the privilege +of selling turf enough to clear the rent several times over, and of +course every man can shoot at the agent as much as he chooses, his +sport in this direction being only limited by his supply of +ammunition. Of late their powder has given out. Could not something be +done for these deserving men?</p> + +<p>A superior Home Ruler, one of those honest visionaries sometimes met +in Ireland, said:—"For my own part, I confess that I aspire to +complete independence. Then, and not till then, would the two +countries be friendly. We in Ulster are ten times more patriotic than +Irishmen elsewhere, for it is in Ulster that we have been most deeply +wronged. The Hamiltons of Abercorn planted the country round here with +Scotch settlers, and various agencies between 1688 and 1715 are said +to have brought over more than fifty thousand Scottish families to +Ulster, which was already populated to its utmost extent. The Irish +were dispossessed, kicked out, and they have been out ever since. The +Earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnel took flight to save their heads, and six +counties were declared confiscated—Londonderry, Donegal, Tyrone, +Fermanagh, Cavan, and Armagh. These were all 'planted' with English +and Scotch colonists. The land was given to certain favourites by the +English Government, which at that time was the stronger, and has +remained so ever since When we ask for our own again you cry out +'Robbery, robbery!' <i>We</i> are the people to say 'Stop thief!' You say +the owners of the land rebelled, and their property was rightly +confiscated. We say they had a right to rebel, and that rebellion was +an honourable action. You took the country at first by force and +fraud. We have, and always had, a right to regain what belongs to us, +by any means in our power. We have never expressed affection for the +English Crown. We have never affected loyalty. We have been open, +honourable enemies, and have always said we were biding our time. We +are accused of fraud, of duplicity. Never was any accusation so +ill-founded. I can refer to a hundred, aye, to a thousand utterances +of my countrymen which clearly set forth the sentiments which animate +every single individual Irishman. These settlers are not Irishmen. +Their best friends would never claim for them Irish nationality. Most +of them came from the South-west of Scotland, where the most rigid and +bigoted Presbyterianism flourished. Their creed, as well as ours, +forbade any intermarrying. Separate they were, and separate they +remain. You might as well try to mix dogs and cats. And the attitude +of the two races is mutually <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span>antagonistic—exactly like dogs and +cats. They have led a dog and cat life from the first, and if the +Scots have thriven while the Kelts have made little progress, it is +because the Scots have been favoured by the English Government, which +is composed of Teutons like themselves. Let the Scots stick to +England. It suits them, it does not suit us. The Welsh don't like you +either, but they have not the pluck to spit it out. They will tell +Irishmen what they think, and it is not flattering to England. They +are quite as bitter as Irishmen, and, like them, look on England as +the biggest humbug, hypocrite, and robber in the world. I never heard +a Welshman speak well of England, and I have spoken with scores of +them. Now, we have a religious difference with England, which Taffy +has not.</p> + +<p>"We claim that our nation is more talented than stupid England, more +sparkling, more brilliant. But we also say that as we are more +sentimental, and as sentiment is to us a matter of life and death, we +cannot develop our industries, we cannot do ourselves justice, while +subjugated by England. Freedom is our watchword. We want an army, a +navy, a diplomacy of our own. We do not admit that England has any +right to control our action, and we defy any man to prove that any +country has a right to dictate our laws. Independence must come in the +long run. Everything is tending in that direction. We may not get Home +Rule at present, but we <i>shall</i> get it. Then we shall be able to +report progress. I believe that the material prosperity of this +country will increase by leaps and bounds in exact proportion to the +loosening of Saxon restraint, and freedom from selfish English +interference. Our trade has been deliberately strangled, our +manufactures deliberately ruined, by English influence on behalf of +English interests. Then you ask us to believe that we have benefited +by our union with England! We do not believe it. England has been the +greatest modern curse, spreading her octopus arms over every weak +country in the world. She goes to make money, and says she only wishes +to push forward civilisation. Read Labouchere's opinion of England, +and you will see what she is—a greedy, whining hypocrite. She holds +India by fear, at the point of the bayonet—all for greed. Then her +speakers get up on their philanthropic platforms, and after shooting a +few thousand niggers and poisoning off the rest with rum, they say +that such and such a country is now under the blessed rule of England, +which is established merely for the propagation of the truth as it is +in Jesus. You make out that your rum, rifles, and missionaries are +only instruments in the hands of the Society for the Propagation of +the Gospel in Foreign Parts. Away with such hypocrisy! England is a +big bully, crushing the weak and truckling to the strong—truckling to +the weak, even, when fairly taken to. Look at the Transvaal. When I +see what a handful of Dutch farmers did with your grand army—when I +see how a country with less than a quarter of the population of +Ireland freed itself and knocked your bold army into a cocked hat, I +am ashamed to be an Irishman <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span>submitting to foreign rule. You will at +any rate see why we Irishmen in Ulster are even more rebellious than +our southern countrymen. It is because these devilish plantations were +in the North, and because we are outnumbered in the North by men who +are really foreigners. Let them be loyal. No doubt it suits them best. +But we will only be loyal to our country, which is Ireland, not +England. And if these Scots, wrongly called Ulstermen, don't like the +new arrangement, they can leave the country. No obstacle will be +placed in the way of their departure. That I can promise you. They +will leave the land, I suppose? That being so, we can spare the +settlers. And as they got the land for nothing, they must be content +to part with it on the same terms. Now you understand the No Rent cry. +Now you understand the No Landlord cry. The land was stolen from the +people, and the people carefully remember the fact. You hear +Nationalists speaking ill of the Irish members. The members have done +well for us. They have done grandly. Fourscore Irishmen have conquered +the British Empire, and without firing a shot. That after all beats +the record of the Boers, but they got complete independence. We are +not yet there; but it will come, it will come."</p> + +<p>An equally intelligent Unionist, who bore a Scottish name, +said:—"Does it suit England to throw us overboard? Because that means +the giving up of the country. You can't hold Ireland without a friend +in it. Twice the Protestant population have saved it for you. Its +geographical position forbids you to give it up. That would ruin you +at once. And yet immediate separation would be far better than a +wasting agitation. Better plunge over a precipice than be bled to +death. Better blow out your brains than be roasted at a slow fire. +England is being kicked to death by spiders. And all in the interests +of Rome. If the people here had any opinions I would not say a word +against anything they might do, but they have none at all. They show +their teeth because they are told to do so. All the disturbances which +disgrace the country are excited by the priests, who pretend to +disapprove of them, but who secretly approve. For the priests have the +people thoroughly in hand, and whatever they really disapprove they +can stop in one moment.</p> + +<p>"There is an organised clerical conspiracy to resist the law and to +keep the agitation on foot, with the object of obtaining a complete +Catholic ascendency. They bleed the poor people to death with their +exactions, and the number of new buildings they have lately erected in +Ireland almost exceeds belief. We have a splendid new Romanist Church +in this little place. Well may the people say they can't pay rent. +When Cardinal Logue's father died there was a collection for the +general Church which realised more than eight hundred pounds. When a +priest dies or when a priest's relative dies there is always a +collection for the cause. Eight hundred pounds out of the starving +peasantry of Donegal, for whose relief the English are always +collecting money! Cardinal Logue's father was Lord Leitrim's coachman, +and was on the spot when my lord was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span>shot. The horse fell lame at the +right moment. Curious coincidence—very. This Home Rule farce is +growing rather stale. Cannot the English see that it is urged by a set +of thieves and traitors? Cannot they see that brains and property are +everywhere against it? And Gladstone's speeches show such ignorance of +the subject that no Irishman can read or listen with common patience. +To judge from his Irish orations I should say that he is not fit to be +Prime Minister to a Parliament of idiots. What do you think?"</p> + +<p>I was sorry to dissent, but I said that to the best of my knowledge +and belief Mr. Gladstone was of all men best fitted for such a post.</p> + +<p class="date">Stranorlar (Co. Donegal), July 27th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_54_A_SAMPLE_OF_IRISH_LOYALTY" id="No_54_A_SAMPLE_OF_IRISH_LOYALTY"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 54.—A SAMPLE OF IRISH "LOYALTY."<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he country round here seems especially rich in minerals of all sorts. +Bog-ore, to be spoken of as bog ore, is abundant, and manganese is +known to exist in large quantities. Soapstone of excellent quality is +also plentiful, and the peasantry will tell you that on the passing of +the Home Rule Bill they will at once proceed to dig out the +inexhaustible stores of gold, silver, lead, iron, tin, and coal, with +which the district abounds. Ireland is a perfect El Dorado, and when +the brutal Saxon shall have taken his foot off her throat, when +Parlimint and the sojers allow the quarries to be worked, the mines to +be sunk, the diamonds under Belfast to be dug up, the country will +once more be prosperous, as in the owld ancient times, when the +O'Briens and O'Connells cut each other's throats in peace, and harried +their respective neighbourhoods without interference. Captain Ricky, +of Mount Hall, is exploiting the bog-ore, and sending it to England by +thousands of tons. The stuff is an oxide of iron and is used for +purifying gas. The queerest feature of the use of bog-ore is the fact +that when used up it is worth twenty-five per cent. more than before. +Delivered to the gas companies at thirty shillings a ton, it fetches +forty shillings when the gas-men have done with it. It seems to be +composed of peat which by a few millions of years of saturation in +water containing iron has become like iron-rust. The soapstone of +Killygordon is used instead of fire-clay, and is also made into French +chalk. Or rather it might be, but that the Captain declines to proceed +with its extraction pending the Home Rule scare. There is much alder +on the estate, which is watered by the river Finn. This is the right +wood for the manufacture of clogs for the people of Lancashire and +Yorkshire. Captain Ricky sends tons of these interesting articles to +the sister isle. Men are turning out these favourite instruments of +feminine correction, in a rough state, by boat loads. When the +coster's done a-jumping on his mother, he should thank Ireland <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span>for +his clogs. When the festive miner rejoices, his dancing would lack the +distinguishing clatter which is its richest charm, without alder grown +on the banks of the Donegal Finn. The countries were made to run in +harness. One is the complement of the other. The brainy dwellers of +Hibernia know this, and stick like limpets to England. Only the +visionary, the lazy, the ne'er-do weels, the incompetent, the +disorderly, the ignorant, the ambitious, want Home Rule. The +contemners of law and order want to flourish and grow fat. The Healys +and Sextons and all of that ilk know that while under an Irish +Parliament their country would be ruined, yet that they themselves +would pick up something in the general confusion, while Dillon, like +Mrs. Gargery, could be ever on the rampage, carrying out his promises +of dire revenge, and flourishing like a young bay tree. Nobody here +rejoiced when the bill was reported amended. They are losing faith in +its merits. Their simple faith received a severe shock after the +return to power of the Three-acres-and-a-Cow Government. Then the +Labourers' Dwellings Act proved a fraud. The peasantry asked the +neighbouring landowners for an acre of ground and a new cottage. A +neighbouring J.P. to-day told me that he had more than twenty +applications from people who are now awaiting the gold mines, the +great factories which the new Irish Government are about to open. If +you would remain poor, vote for the Unionist candidate. If you would +become rich beyond the dreams of avarice, if you would occupy the +place of the Protestant landlords, if you would preserve your immortal +soul from eternal flames, vote as instructed by Father Gilhooly. A +patriot priest yesterday said that the Day of Independence would be +the "Day of Ireland." He should have called it the <i>Dies Iræ</i>.</p> + +<p>A Scottish Covenanter, not of the straitest sect, has no faith in the +Home Rule Bill. He said:—"The people up in the mountains, those who +want Home Rule, or rather those who have voted for it and expect to +benefit by it, are all of the class no Act of Parliament would ever +help. They don't farm their land, and they don't want to farm it. Half +of it lies to waste every year, and they cut turf which they get for +nothing, and sell it in the small towns about for three or four +shillings a load, instead of making the land produce all it will. Go +to their houses at ten in the morning, and you will find them smoking +over the fire. My people are up and at work by six o'clock every +morning in the week. The Scots farmers round Strabane are that keen on +getting on that you can't get them away from their work, which is +their pleasure. They are so keen on making the most of the ground that +they are doing away with the hedges, and substituting barbed wire, +merely to gain the difference in area of ground to till. Look at yon +brae-face. Every yard tilled right up to the top. The Papist peasantry +would never do that. You want to know what's the reason? Goodness +knows. All the Protestants round here have got on till they have +farms. There are no Protestant labourers. If English working men, +agricultural <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span>fellows, would settle in Ireland, they would soon get +their Three acres and a cow. The people who can and will do the best +with the land ought to have it, that's my theory. Ireland everywhere +illustrates the principle of the survival of the fittest. The only way +to succeed is by work. The Catholic Irish are so accustomed to leave +everything to the priest that they have no self-reliance, and in +worldly matters they always ask, who will help us? They are all +beggars by nature. The Duchess of Marlborough and other kind but +mistaken ladies have pauperised some districts of Donegal. The people +have a natural indisposition to work, and a natural disposition to +beg. As for loyalty and tolerance, they have none of either. You never +saw industry without other virtues, you never saw laziness without +other vices. These everlasting grumblers are a generation of vipers. +They are a peevish and perverse set of lazy, skulking swindlers. They +can pay. Every man could pay his rent and be comfortably off if he +liked. The Protestant farmers pay and get along. And we agree that the +landlords favour the other sect. They know that we will do the right +thing, and they let us do it, but the Papists may do less—for less +than the right thing is what the landlord expects from them. He thinks +himself lucky if his Papist tenants come anyway near the mark. +Therefore I say, and any Protestant will say, the Papists are favoured +by the landlords."</p> + +<p>A staunch Conservative, though not a land-owner, said:—"We want +amendment of the Parliamentary voting regulations. No clergyman should +be allowed to sit in the Revision Court. Scandals without end could be +cited to show the necessity of this. I would, of course, exclude all +sects, though no Protestant preacher ever takes part directly or +indirectly in any of our political meetings. When a man has to make +oath as to the validity of his claim to the suffrage he will often +look at the priest who sits watching him. He gets a nod, and he goes +on with his swearing. The perjury of the Irish Revision Courts is +something fearful, and no one pays any attention to it. The Papists +swear just anything. They get absolved, but a Protestant has not this +great advantage and that holds him back. That is the Papist +explanation. In my presence the Home Rule inspector of this +district—we call the people who watch and work the registers the +inspectors—swore that James Kelly, of Cross Roads, Killygordon, was +the present tenant, the holder of the license, and the freeholder of a +public-house at the spot mentioned. Besides this he swore that the +name James Kelly was on the signboard. He therefore proposed to poll a +James Kelly. Now the person in question went to America in 1888, and +never returned. His name was not on the signboard, and the license was +for another person. The Judge declined to hear any further evidence +from Inspector Francis McLaughlin. That was the only penalty enforced. +Such things happen every day in Irish Revision Courts.</p> + +<p>"A man named James Burns put in a claim for a vote on behalf of land +held at Stroangebbah. He had none there. What he had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span>was at +Aughkeely, and this was not sufficient to entitle him to vote. Yes, +his name should be spelt Byrnes, but the Irish often prefer the +Protestant form of the name. Well, nobody believed that he was the +tenant of Stroangebbah; he was said to be a lodger only. The Judge +asked him for proof. He presented a paper purporting to be a receipt +for rent for Stroangebbah, but in reality the receipt was for the +ground at Aughkeely, which did not qualify. He curled up the paper so +as to show that his name was on it, and the Judge instantly passed his +claim, and placed him on the roll. A young fellow named Robert Ewing +at once exposed the trick, but the Judge declared that having placed +Burns on the roll, he must remain there until next revision. Judge +Keogh was his name. Yes, you would think an Irishman and a good +Catholic would have seen through such a trumpery trick.</p> + +<p>"When an illiterate declares for whom he will vote, we sometimes have +from twenty to thirty outsiders in the polling-booth. In England the +Court is cleared, and even the policeman has to go outside. But in +this favoured country any blackguard who likes to fill up a +declaration of secrecy, and go before a magistrate, can be present at +the whole of the proceedings. There is no secrecy for the illiterates. +Any corner-boy, any ruffian, any blackguard in the district can come +in and hear for whom men vote. These corner boys all get declarations +in their fists, and they march in gangs from one booth to another. +It's intimidation, no less. Get some M.P. to mention this as having +taken place at Stranorlar. The people of whom I complain were not even +voters. Anybody could be present. Ridiculous to talk of the ballot-box +in Ireland.</p> + +<p>"The Morley magistrates are in many cases a disgrace to the country. +We used to have an idea in these parts that a small publican could not +legally sit on the Bench. James McGlinchy, J.P., is a small publican +of Brockagh. Barring his trade, he's not so bad, as he can read and +write. But if you saw the lists, and if you knew the men +recommended——! Englishmen have no idea what low scoundrels have been +placed on the Bench in this country. Imperfect education we do not so +much mind when conjoined with character. O'Donnell is not a bad sort, +but he couldn't write 'adjourned.' Two magistrates were needed, and +nobody else arrived. Therefore the difficult word was necessary, and +O'Donnell felt it was beyond him. He called up a policeman, and +ordered him to do it. Whereat the county makes merry. There should be +an education test. Can all the English magistrates spell 'adjourned'? +You think so? That's very good. Not right that a man who can't spell +'adjourned' should give another man a spell of imprisonment."</p> + +<p>A Roman Catholic gentleman thus summed up the character of his +particular neighbourhood:—"The upper classes of both sects are in +every way equal. Among the lower classes I observe that the +Protestants do as much work as they can, while the Papists do as +little as they can. This accounts for the difference in their +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>appearance and position. Then the Protestants are far better educated, +and have arrived at the knowledge that everything that is good must be +gained by exertion, and that there is for them at least no substitute. +The others talk as if after the establishment of an Irish Parliament +money would be found growing on the bushes. No one need try to change +their opinion. When the time comes to vote they will vote as their +priest tells them. Someone has said that the British Government might +subsidise the Church, and so buy her off. It could not be done. The +bishops want power. I do not agree with them, and I do not support or +admit their claim to direct their flocks in political matters."</p> + +<p>The Marquess of Conyngham, whom I met at Strabane, said:—"The people +of Donegal are pleasant, kind, and civil. Taking them all round, they +are much more energetic than the Southerners, and we were making fair +progress until these Home Rule Bills were brought in. The country was +being opened up, and things were beginning to improve, when the bill +came and blighted everything. Now the people are growing idle and +discontented. They are all right when left alone. Everybody likes the +Donegal peasants, and they deserve to be liked. Only leave them alone; +that's what they want; and not Home Rule nor any other quackery."</p> + +<p>Strange things continue to happen in Ireland. This does not refer to +the continuous cutting-off of cows' tails, the slitting of horses' +tongues, and other similar expressions of impatience for the good time +coming, but to some strange things that have happened in connection +with agricultural affairs. Sir Samuel Hayes decided to abandon a farm +which would not pay, although he had no rent to meet. He was his own +landlord, but he did not work the farm. That was done by a bailiff, +who, curiously enough, was the highest bidder for the land. He of all +men should have known that if the farm would not pay expenses when +there was no rent, it would not reward the man who had rent to pay. +This reasoning proved fallacious. The farm which without rent proved a +loss, in the same hands turned out when rent was charged a perfect +gold-mine. In another case, a bailiff on leaving his employ expended +on land the accumulated savings of his thrifty years, and—strange to +say—his savings amounted to about three times the sum of his wages +during his life's service. A man who, having a pound a week, can save +three pounds, would in England be regarded as a prodigy. In Ireland +such things happen every day. Particulars as to the cases +hereinbefore-mentioned can be obtained from anybody in Killygordon, +which is altogether a remarkable place—to say nothing of its name, +which for obvious reasons has the misfortune to be unpleasant to the +Grand Old Man. <i>Nomen, Omen?</i></p> + +<p>An octogenarian J.P. said:—"They talk of gold and silver mines, and +lead and copper mines, and iron and quicksilver mines, but mining in +Ireland cannot, as a rule, be made to pay. Everything exists in +Ireland, but in such small quantities. The seams and veins are so +small. Mr. Ritchie, of Belfast, spent several <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span>fortunes in mining for +coal, iron, and other things. There was iron at Ballyshannon, but what +was the good? It cost less to bring iron to England from Algiers. We +had no railway to Donegal, fifteen miles away, and cartage was too +expensive. So far from Home Rule doing us any good, it would be a +cruel blow to the country, and especially to the poor. Employment +would become very scarce, as everybody who had money invested in +Ireland would be in haste to realise and get it away. There would be +no new enterprises, although the poor folk say, "We'll get employment +in big factories and mines." Where's the money to come from? From the +Irish Parliament, they say. And where will they get it from? Oh, a +Parliament always has money. All the money comes from Parliament, +which, in fact, actually makes money. The English Parliament makes all +the goold sovereigns, and when the Irish Parliament commences to +manufacture goold sovereigns at Dublin, then Ireland must be rich. Did +not Mr. Gladstone say there would be too much money? Did not he say +that in Parliament? That's what the poorest and most ignorant people +of Donegal say. The English Home Rulers, by their support of the +movement are inflicting injury on the Irish poor. We want the country +opening up with railways. The tourist district is unequalled in +Europe. Good hotels now, but you reach them mostly by cars. Balfour +was giving us rails. That one man in five years did more good to +Ireland than all other agencies operating for the previous forty +years. I have thought the thing out, and I can speak for that period +with certainty. Why could not they let him alone? The blackguards of +these parts still shout 'Hell to Balfour.'</p> + +<p>"Home Rule means to England a weakening, a loss of prestige, a new and +a terrible danger. The <i>Independent</i> says, 'When Ireland next fights +England she will not fight alone?' Very true. There is a strong +anti-English feeling among the lower American classes, who are largely +Irish, who have votes, and by their votes can influence American +policy. Let me point out the opinion of Lieutenant-Colonel Butler as +recorded in 'The Great Lone Land.' Here it is:—</p> + +<p>"You will be told that the hostility of the inhabitants of the United +States is confined to one class, and that class, though numerically +large, is politically insignificant. Do not believe it for one +instant; the hostility to England is universal, it is more deep-rooted +than any other feeling, it is an instinct and not a reason, and +consequently possesses the dogged strength of unreasoning antipathy. I +tell you, Mr. Bull, that were you pitted to-morrow against a race that +had not one idea in kindred with your own, were you fighting a deadly +struggle against a despotism the most galling on earth, were you +engaged with an enemy whose grip was around your neck and whose foot +was on your chest, that English-speaking cousin of yours over the +Atlantic, whose language is your language, whose literature is your +literature, whose civil code is begotten from your digests of law, +would stir no hand, no foot, to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span>save you, would gloat over your +agony, would keep the ring while you were being knocked out of all +semblance of motion and power, and would not be very far distant when +the moment came to hold a feast of eagles over your vast, disjointed +limbs. Make no mistake about it, and be not blinded by ties of kindred +or belief." And, further, "You will find them the firm friend of the +Russian, because that Russian is likely to become your enemy in Herat, +in Cabul, in Kashgar, in Constantinople. Nay, even should any +woman-killing Sepoy put you to sore strait by indiscriminate and +ruthless slaughter, he will be your cousin's friend for the simple +reason that he is your enemy." Without accepting the gallant Colonel's +dictum, it is as well to bear it in mind.</p> + +<p>A pensive youth in Ballybofey was deeply engaged with a scrap of +ballad literature, not by any means without literary merit. For and in +consideration of a Saxon sixpence I became the proprietor of the lay, +which is being circulated by thousands throughout Ireland. Those who +uphold the reputation of their Irish allies for loyalty to the Queen, +and friendship to the English nation, will, doubtless, find their +convictions deepened and strengthened by the following sample verses +addressed to intending recruits:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye whose spirits will not bow<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In peace to parish tyrants longer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye who wear the villain brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And ye who pine in hopeless hunger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fools, without the brave man's faith,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">All slaves and starvelings who are willing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sell yourselves to shame and death,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Accept the fatal Saxon shilling.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere you from your mountains go<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To feel the scourge of foreign fever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swear to serve the faithless foe<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Who lures you from your land for ever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swear henceforth its tools to be<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To slaughter trained by ceaseless drilling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Honour, home, and liberty<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Abandoned for a Saxon shilling.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go—to find 'mid crime and toil<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The doom to which such guilt is hurried,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go—to leave on Indian soil<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Your bones to bleach, accursed, unburied,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go—to crush the just and brave<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose wrongs with wrath the world are filling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go—to slay each brother slave,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or spurn the blood-stained Saxon Shilling.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Irish hearts! why should you bleed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To swell the tide of English glory?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aiding despots in their need,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Who've changed our green so oft to gory?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">None save those who wish to see<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The noblest killed, the meanest killing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And true hearts severed from the free,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Will take again the Saxon Shilling.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="noin">The British soldier is the meanest killing the noblest. The poet's +name is Buggy. All this is very surprising. Painted by Paddy <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[365]</a></span>Mr. John +Bull, J.P., will hardly recognise himself. Throughout the Nationalist +literature he is represented as a liar, a coward, a bully, a +hypocrite, a tyrant, and a robber. If he now consented to be made the +instrument of persons whose ascertained opinions exactly harmonise +with those enunciated above, the epithets of Fool and Idiot will +doubtless be added to the list. And in this instance the evil speakers +would be quite right. <i>Quod demonstrandum est.</i></p> + +<p class="date">Killygordon, July 29th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_55_A_TRULY_PATRIOTIC_PRIEST" id="No_55_A_TRULY_PATRIOTIC_PRIEST"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 55.—A TRULY PATRIOTIC PRIEST.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he rhythmical rocking of the little engine of the West Donegal line +running across from Killygordon seemed to say ceaselessly—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here's a health to ye, Father O'Flynn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Slainthe (health), and slainthe, and slainthe agin—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Powerfullest pracher, an' tinderest tacher,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' kindliest crature in ould Donegal!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Father O'Flynn must have been like a priest I met on Sunday, a +Loyalist and a Conservative. Priests of the old school are becoming +scarcer and scarcer every year, but one or two still exist. They do +not "get on." It is understood that their political attitude forbids +promotion. A priest who confesses to a respect for the Queen is not +likely to be acceptable to the multitude. A priest who believes that +the British laws are just and equitable, and that things would be +better remaining as they are, is looked upon as a <i>lusus naturæ</i>. He +said:—"I am a South of Ireland man, and was educated at Douai. I have +no sympathy with the great bulk of the Maynooth men, who are mostly +peasants and the sons of peasants. I do not think that the Maynooth +course is sufficient in one generation to lift the sons to any great +intellectual height above the besotted ignorance of the parents. I +believe in heredity, and I say that most of my colleagues are only +shaved labourers, stall-fed for three years. The low-bred men are now +the dominant power. Instead of tranquillising the people, which I hold +to be the duty of the clergy, they have done all they could to awaken +and keep alive their most dangerous passions. And to rouse the Irish, +especially the Southern Irish, is a matter of the greatest facility. I +hold that the clergy by degenerating into mere political agents are +strangely short-sighted. Their spiritual influence will in time be +dangerously undermined, and in the long run they will take nothing by +their motion. The Parnellite party will grow stronger and stronger, +and the extreme party, the party of Revolution, which now lacks a +leader, would on the passing of a Home Rule bill become the dominant +power. That is a great and salient factor of which up to the present +English politicians have taken no account. The party of Revolution is +the party <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[366]</a></span>which under an Irish Parliament would be master of the +situation. Leaders will not be lacking. But at present the party must +from the necessity of the case be amorphous, and therefore, +politically and as a power, practically non-existent. Pass the bill, +and then you will see something. A new party, the party of +Independence, or, as they will call it, of Freedom, will take shape +and formidably influence events. The temptation to take the lead will +be great. Independence and Separation will be a most popular cry. The +present men must either join the swim or be denounced as traitors, and +as Healy cannot now visit Dundalk without two hundred policemen to +protect him, while William O'Brien was nearly torn to pieces at +Cork—would, in fact, have been murdered but for the police—you may +conceive what would be the state of things when we have a +Revolutionary party and when the police were no longer under the fair +and judicial control of the British Government. Pass the bill and look +out for the Revolutionary party. They will have an immense backing in +point of numbers. And numbers rule in Ireland, not intelligence. The +bill will, of course, give nothing that the peasants expect. The fault +will assuredly lie with John Bull. The expectations of the ignorant, +that is, the great mass of the people, will be woefully disappointed. +Who is to blame? they will ask. Numbers of politicians are waiting to +tell them. Who but the brutal, greedy, selfish, perfidious Saxon? An +agitation will succeed, compared with which the worst times of the +Land League were preferable. I shudder to think of the chaos, the +seething and weltering confusion of the time to come. The Irish +people, the poor ignorants, will suffer most. And yet they are +innocent in this matter. They have, indeed, been blamed with the +excesses of a few of their number, but they are, if left to +themselves, a most kindly and law-abiding people. The Donegal peasants +are the best in the country. You will see poverty, but the degradation +of filthiness and laziness is not nearly so marked as in the South and +West, where the climate is warm, moist, enervating.</p> + +<p>"What, then, are my opinions, expressed in a concise form? I will tell +you. They are what <i>you</i> would call sound. They are the opinions of +Balfour, of Lord Salisbury. I hold Mr. Balfour in profound esteem as a +wise and sagacious administrator, a terror to evil-doers, and an +encourager of those who do well. I have a real affection for Mr. +Balfour, as for a great benefactor of my beloved country. For I love +my country so well that I feel the keenest personal interest in her +welfare. Perhaps I have a deeper affection for Ireland than even Tim +Healy or Sexton or Harcourt or O'Brien. What do I think of Gladstone? +I think him a scourge of Ireland, a curse, a destroyer far worse than +Oliver Cromwell. A heaven-born statesman? Do his followers call him +that? Well, I can only say that I hope and trust that heaven will not +be blessed with any further family."</p> + +<p>A military officer resident in this region, an Irishman bred <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[367]</a></span>and +born, said, "It's all a matter of religion. I was the other day +reading Maxwell's account of the Irish rebellion of 1798, and I +observed that although the Northern rebellion, which was the most +dangerous, as being the best organised, was mainly led by Protestants, +yet in other parts of Ireland, when a suspected person was captured by +the rebels, the first question was, not are you in favour of the Irish +Republic, but what is your religion? And the Protestants generally had +their throats cut. The same thing would occur again, under similar +circumstances. Religion would be the test. If a general state of +lawlessness should at any time arise, the Protestants in lonely +districts would not be safe from murder. Yes, I <i>do</i> say it, and I +stick to it. A very large number of outrages have been committed which +would not have taken place but for the religion of the offending +party. It is a virtue to lie to a heretic, to cheat him, to damage +him, to keep him out of heaven if possible. Anybody who knows Catholic +Ireland would agree with this most heartily. They believe that +whosoever killeth heretics doeth God service.</p> + +<p>"Irish folks are better than the people of other nations, and also +much worse. When they are good they are very good, and when they are +bad they are very bad. They run to extremes in a way which cool-headed +Britons do not understand. They are impulsive, and they jump to +conclusions. Their great disadvantage is a crushing clerical +influence. What's the use of thinking about anything when Father Pat +does it for them? What's the use of listening to argument when you +must in the end vote as Father Pat orders?</p> + +<p>"Englishmen have no idea what a splendid fellow the Irish peasant +really is when his mind is not poisoned and his unfortunate ignorance +exploited. I could give you instances of fidelity, affectionate +self-sacrifice and devotion which would astonish you. Not isolated or +sporadic cases, but arising from the average level of the Irish +character. After considerable travel, and a painstaking study of the +characteristics of various nations, I have come to the conclusion +that, taking one consideration with another, I prefer Paddy, ignorant +as he is. For after all his ignorance is not his own fault. He sees no +newspapers except an occasional local sheet, which is almost certain +to be a wretched, lying, priest-inspired rag. If he were seen looking +at any other it would be bad for him. But newspapers are practically +unknown in the agricultural districts. And men do not meet in crowds +as in England. They have not the attrition which wears away the +angularities. They live solitary among the mountains, or away in the +fields, and they never hear lectures, have no Institutes, get no +chance of improvement. The priest is their Clan Chieftain, their +spiritual adviser, their temporal adviser, their newspaper, their only +channel of superior information." At this point a tall, red-bearded +man who was passing touched his hat to the Colonel, who said, "My +gamekeeper. A fine, rough-coated Scotsman. Came <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[368]</a></span>over here a mad +Gladstonian. Pinned his faith to the G.O.M. Followed him blindly, and +owned he was content to do it. Get into conversation with him. Observe +the change, the decided change in his opinions."</p> + +<p>Soon I had Velveteens in full cry. His opinions were indeed decided. +Having admitted that they had boxed the compass during a six months' +residence in this down-trodden country, he went on to say, "The only +way ye could cure the discontent is to make no attempt at it. Then the +agitation would stop. The people are the biggest fules I ever saw. +Instead of returning a sound, advanced Radical like Emerson T. +Herdman, a man who pays them thirty or forty thousand a year, and who +spends all his money in their midst, the fules go and vote for a thing +like Arthur O'Connor, who never was here but once, and who never did +them the compliment of issuing an address. When Mr. Herdman came to +Stranorlar the people stoned him and his friends. And yet nobody ever +said, or could say, a word against the Herdmans, who are among the +most popular people in Ireland, and who deserve the best that can be +said of them. O'Connor costs these poor folks two hundred pounds a +year. They raise it in the constituency. Mr. Herdman would have cost +them nothing, and might have spent even more than he does at present. +He has opened up the greatest industry in the North-west of Ireland, +keeps a whole country-side going, and is an out-and-out Liberal. The +greatest exertions were made to secure his return, and the Catholics +promised to vote for him. He stumped the country, and left no stone +unturned. The Nationalist candidate never came here till the last +moment, and, as I said, issued no address. The people knew nothing of +him, and had never heard of him. But they voted as the priests told +them, and they would have voted for a stick. Ought such people to have +the franchise?</p> + +<p>"What would I do to settle the Irish question? I've heard that +somebody proposed sinking the country for twenty-four hours. That +might do. Or you could withdraw the police and military, and in every +market town open a depôt for the gratuitous distribution of arms and +ammunition. In ten days there would only be a very small population, +and you could then plant the country with people who would make the +best of it, and mind their work, instead of spending their time +standing about waiting for Home Rule to make them rich without work. +Or you could make a law which required every priest in the country to +clear out in twenty-four hours, on penalty of death. That is as +impossible as sinking the island, but it would be quite as sure a +cure. Those are my opinions, and those must be the opinions of every +man who has lived here and looked about him for a reasonable length of +time. The Scots Gladstonians are very decent folk. They mean well, and +they are friendly to Ireland. Their only fault lies in following their +hero, and in thinking that he cannot do wrong. If they knew what I +know, they would be of my mind. For I was as great a Gladstonian as +any of them."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[369]</a></span>A Presbyterian farmer said:—"On this estate the whole of the tenants +are Presbyterians. The agent told me that early in June the whole of +the rents up to May were paid, and that he would think that there was +not such another case in Ireland. How is that? Well, if the tenants +had been Romanists they would have so many things to pay. The priests +live like fighting cocks. Father McFadden, of Gweedore, makes from a +thousand to fifteen hundred a year. That is the man on whose door-step +Inspector Martin was murdered. The crowd beat out his brains with +palings, and when he tried to get into the priest's house, the door +was shut in his face. The clergy live well, and drink like troopers. +The easiest job in Ireland, and—if your conscience would allow +it—the best in every way. You are treated with great respect, you +have great influence, you have nothing to do, and you are extremely +well paid for it. Sometimes I think that humbug pays better than hard +work. The priests do <i>not</i> look after the poor. They do <i>not</i> work +among the destitute and ignorant after the fashion of the English +clergy. They are always extracting, extracting, extracting. The poor +are ground down by their exactions till they can't pay their rent. And +that is why the agent said that probably no other estate in Ireland +could show such a record as ours.</p> + +<p>"Home Rule will not satisfy the people. An Irish Parliament will do +them no good, no, nor fifty Irish Parliaments. They are unfriendly to +England because she is Protestant. People of the only true faith +cannot bear to be governed by a heretic nation. The laws are all +right, and they know it, but their animosity is excited by stories of +wrong-doing in their forefathers' days, and while on the one hand they +feel that they might easily be better off, on the other they are told +that the brutal Saxon keeps them poor. All this is done by the +priests. They actually admit that the English laws are excellent, but +then they fall back on the allegation that their administration is +corrupt. In vain you point to the Roman Catholic judges. In vain you +go over England's successive attempts to pacify Ireland by +conciliatory measures. The priest ruins all, for while your friend +seems to agree with you—they are so easily led—yet the priest will +secure his vote to a certainty. So long as a heretic power is at the +head, so long Ireland will be discontented. If the country were under +the rule of a Roman Catholic power, the people of Ireland would be +satisfied with any laws whatever. They would not grumble at anything. +The only alternative is the spread of education, and that goes on very +slowly in Ireland. We are very, very backward in Donegal, but not +nearly so bad as in the south and west. We have a bad name for poverty +and ignorance, but we do not deserve it in the same degree as the +Munster and Connaught folks. We dislike the Connaught people just as +much as you do in England. We hate dirt, and lawlessness and disorder, +and therefore we claim to be superior to the rest of the poor +counties. This is, of course, the civilised part of Donegal. But +wherever you go, you see nothing like the dirt of counties Galway and +Mayo.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[370]</a></span>"We want railways to open up the country. Balfour was building them +for us, and his institution of the Congested Districts Board did +wonderful things for us. Why, if he had done nothing but improve the +breed of fowls he would still have been worthy of remembrance as a +benefactor of this country. Before the Congested Board Committee +introduced superior breeds of fowls, the chickens were like +blackbirds. You could sit down and eat half-a-dozen of them. They were +no bigger than your thumb. But now we can get fowls equal to anything +you have in England. The same may be said of the horses, the pigs, the +cows, and all kinds of domestic animals and poultry. The fishing +industry has saved whole districts from starvation, and has done good +all round. When we get an Irish Parliament the grants for all these +purposes will be discontinued, and the tide of progress will be +checked. The poor folks are quite unable to see that by sticking to +England we have a wealthy neighbour to borrow from, and that this is +an inestimable advantage to a poor country like Ireland. Not long ago +I mentioned this to a priest, but he said, 'When we have a Parliament +of our own we'll not need to borrow money, for we'll have more than we +know what to do with. Did not Mr. Gladstone say we should have a +chronic plethora of money? John Bull certainly sends some money over +here, but he had it from here to begin with. He stole it from Ireland, +and he is only like a thief whose conscience urges him to restore a +portion, a very small portion, of the stolen goods. When we get +Independence—he used the word Independence—we shall be in a position +to lend money instead of needing to borrow!' The person who said all +this is the most influential politician of this district. His word to +his flock is law. Not one of them dare for his life vote otherwise +than as he tells them. They do not think this a hardship. They have no +political convictions, and would just as soon vote any one way as any +other."</p> + +<p>A Donegal Home Ruler said that the poor folks were quite right in +following the priests, and wanted to know if they would be right in +following the Tories. He said:—"They are no more ignorant than the +British working men, and not less independent. Don't the working +classes follow their leaders, voting in heaps, just as they are told, +without any notion of the Empire's greatness, and entirely with a view +to their own interests? Could anybody be more stupid, more totally +incapable of giving a valid reason for his action than your vaunted +British workman? Why, if the specimens we get over here are any guide, +if the samples are anything like the bulk, you might as well poll a +flock of sheep as a crowd of British working men. I say the Irish +peasantry are superior in intellect, conduct, and chayracther, and +that in following the priest they are acting as reasonable as your +British working-man, who follows his strike leaders and trade +agitators, and is perpetually cutting off his nose to spite his face. +No, we shall not get Home Rule now, but we must have it later on. Then +we shall demand more. Every <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[371]</a></span>time we have to ask we shall want more +and more. We shall wring it from England, and we shall make her pay +for the trouble she gives. She must be charged a sort of war +indemnity."</p> + +<p>The Dundalk press is on my track. I heard of this in Newry, but the +Dundalk papers do not reach the next town to Dundalk, and not a sheet +could be had for love or money. A friend having told me that the +<i>Gazette</i> was reviled, great efforts were made to obtain the reviling +print, but in vain. At last I saw the <i>Dundalk Democrat</i>, which in a +two-column comment on its colleague's maledictions of your humble +commissioner cleared me of the charges brought by the original +thunderer, which I have not yet been able to see. One of the said +charges is based on the statement that I asked to be allowed to be +present at the meeting, which permission was readily accorded. The +meeting was public and was placarded from one end of Dundalk to the +other. The public were invited to assemble in their thousands, and to +join in the onward march to freedom. Not more than twenty people +answered to the call, and the meeting was therefore a dead failure. +The idea of asking leave to be present at a public meeting is absurd. +The vituperative print says that I was <i>not</i> asked to deliver an +address, but was told that I could "do so if I liked." The truth is +manifest by the admitted fact that I declined, as being no speaker. +Such is the minute hair-splitting of Irish argumentation. The quips +and cranks of Tipperary Humphreys will be remembered, the paltry +quibbles by which he sought to establish a case, and his final retreat +under cover of the statement that he could not have believed that +"such a state of things was possible." The Dundalk marchers to freedom +(to the number of twenty) were not precisely the pick of the local +respectability, and my escape must be regarded as providential. As to +their outpourings of abuse, my philosophy resembles that of the old +whipper-in of the Meynell-Ingram Hounds:—"I bain't a cruel chap, I +bain't. But when I puts the lash among the hounds I <i>dew</i> like to hear +'em yowl; I <i>dew</i> like to see 'em skip, and writhe, and look mad. For +if ye don't make 'em feel, and if ye can't hear 'em yowl, there's +railly no pleasure in thrashin' of 'em."</p> + +<p class="date">Donegal, August 1st.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_56_DO-NOTHING_DONEGAL" id="No_56_DO-NOTHING_DONEGAL"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 56.—DO-NOTHING DONEGAL.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterd.png" alt="D" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />onegal improves on acquaintance. At first dull, dreary, and +disappointing, a more extended examination reveals much that is +interesting. The river Eske runs through the town, rippling over a +rocky bed of limestone like the Dee at Llangollen. Mountains arise on +every hand, some in the foreground, green and pleasant, backed by +sterile ranges having serrated summits, dark and frowning. The harbour +has an old-world look, with its quaint fishing boats and groves of +trees running down to the water's edge. The land is decidedly humpy, +and the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[372]</a></span>sea meanders among the meadows in long fillets like trout +brooks, sometimes tapering off to narrow ditches over which you can +easily step at highest tide. The land is fertile, mostly grazing, and +the cattle are of large and superior breed. The country is well +wooded, and the hedgerows are tall and well-kept. The ancient abbey, +like Mr. Gladstone's reputation, is in ruins. There is a ruined castle +on the river bank, and on the other side, exactly opposite, a +Methodist church, bearing the legend, <span class="sc">All are Welcome</span>. The +principal "square" is triangular, and has some good shops, which do +most of their business on market-days. An enormous anchor, half +embedded in the mud of the harbour, was left there by the French fleet +during "the throubles of the ruction." It is rather in the way, but +three generations of Irishmen have not found time to remove it. "Like +ourselves and our counthry it will stick in the mud until the end of +time," said a native. There is much lounging at corners by men who are +probably waiting for the Home Rule Bill, but the people compare +favourably with those of the South and West. They have more grit, more +industry, more perseverance. They are simple, civil, and obliging. +They are also cleaner and more tidy than the Southerners, though +decidedly poorer. "They get no price for their produce, no reasonable +wages for their industry. Their patience and contentment are +surprising, considering their circumstances. You can get work done for +twopence a day. The Southerners get thrice the money for their farm +produce. We have no ready means of getting things on the market. I +have thirty tons of hay to sell, and nobody in the district would give +me a pound for it." Thus spake one of the leading citizens, a Roman +Catholic, dead against Home Rule. "The resident gentry are all we have +to depend upon. Once plant a Parliament in Dublin, and there will be a +general exodus of the moneyed classes. Then the poor folks will have +nobody to look to, and they must follow them to England—which will +certainly be overrun with destitute Irish. Things have grown worse and +worse during the last ten years. Under a steady Government the country +would gradually improve until the comfort of the people would give the +agitators nothing to work upon. But with change upon change, with one +final settlement upon another final settlement, we don't know where we +are, nor what is going to happen next. How can we settle down to work? +How can we launch out into industrial enterprises? Every man who has +anything holds his hand for fear of loss. An Irish Parliament would be +a Parliament of confiscation, and nobody knows where they would draw +the line. Mr. Gladstone's land legislation has been a succession of +swindles. The principle of judicial rents is an atrocious violation of +the principles of business, one of which lays down the dictum that a +thing is worth as much as it will fetch. Surely the landlord ought to +be allowed to accept the offer of the highest bidder. And if you take +from him that right, and say to him you shall only accept such a +price, then you should at least guarantee the payment. But no, Mr. +Gladstone says you shall only <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[373]</a></span>have a certain price, and you must +recover the money as best you can. The judicial rent law, so much +vaunted, is not so good as it looks. It is often a premium on +indolence and a punishment of industry, and therefore grossly unjust. +Let me tell you how it works in Donegal.</p> + +<p>"Thirty years ago two men took contiguous farms of exactly the same +extent, at the same rent. There was not a pin to choose in the land, +either. One of them worked continuously, improving the farm until he +almost wrought himself to pieces. He and his children were at it night +and day, and their industry did wonders, as it always does. The other +was a lazy fellow, who lay in bed till mid-day and spent half his +waking hours at fairs and dances. The land in his occupation +deteriorated until it seemed to want reclaiming. The rent of both +farms was ten pounds a year. The Land Commission had both cases before +them, and, of course, based their estimate on the present value of the +land, without reference to any other considerations. Now mark what +happened—</p> + +<p>"The industrious man, who should have received a premium as a +benefactor of his country, had his rent raised from ten pounds to +eighteen.</p> + +<p>"The lazy man, who should have been kicked out of the country as +worthless, and an enemy to progress, had his rent reduced from ten +pounds to two pounds fifteen shillings.</p> + +<p>"The judicial reductions have hardly ever been of real benefit. The +average Irish peasant is so constituted that when he has less to pay +he simply makes less effort, or spends the difference, and more than +the difference, in extra whiskey.</p> + +<p>"The Donegal peasantry derive much benefit from the Irish practice of +con-acre. Con-acre means that the land is rented for one crop. It pays +the landowner well, and he always gets his money. The man who has no +land hires a piece for his potatoes, or for his oats, takes possession +when he puts in his seed, and delivers up possession when he gets his +crop off the ground. They pay, I think, because they have not the land +long enough to long for it altogether."</p> + +<p>I climbed the hill behind the Arran Hotel in company with the +proprietor, Mr. Timony, who also runs several large shops in Donegal. +The view is magnificent, extending in one direction to Carnowee and +the Blue Stack mountains, in another far over the wood-fringed bay, +and southward to the Benbulben range, terminated by a steep descent +like the end of a house. Mr. Timony is a Romanist, but is strongly +opposed to Home Rule, which in his opinion would lead to endless +trouble and confusion, and would, bring distress on the district, and +not prosperity. The hill was covered with mushrooms, which were +rotting unregarded. Mine host confessed that he did not know the +edible from the poisonous fungi, and said that the peasants of Donegal +were in the same case. "There are tons of these things on the +mountains, but no one gathers them. They would be afraid to go near +them for fear <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[374]</a></span>they would drop down dead on the spot." He showed me a +large stock of hand-woven cloth made by the peasantry, who, to their +credit, have mastered the process from beginning to end, and with +their rude appliances produce a good-looking article, of which the +only fault is that it can never be worn out. Irishmen will not buy it, +but England is an excellent customer, and the trade, already large, is +rapidly increasing. Good tweed, twenty-seven inches wide, may be +bought in Donegal for a shilling a yard, and stout twills for +one-and-sixpence. The people shear the wool, card it, spin it, dye the +yarn made from herbs growing on the sea-shore, on the rocks, in the +meadows, and weave it into cloth, which is much in vogue for shooting +suits and ladies' dresses. The pieces run from twenty to seventy yards +long, and whole families are engaged on the work, which commands a +ready sale at the wholesale depôts, the price being regulated by the +fineness, evenness of texture, and equality of tint throughout. The +Nationalist advice to burn everything English except English coals, is +as hollow as other patriotic utterances. But for England the Donegal +peasantry would have no market for their goods. "It isn't fine enough +for Irishmen," said Mr. Timony. "They prefer English shoddy. They like +the smooth-looking cloth such as I have seen made in Yorkshire, +manufactured out of rags. There's not ten pounds of wool in a thousand +yards of it. It looks more eyeable, but there is no length nor +toughness in the thread, which is made out of old worn-out cloth. Our +folks couldn't spin it. They must use good new yarn, or they couldn't +work at all. The Yorkshire folks have machinery, and you can do +anything with machinery."</p> + +<p>A good old Methodist said:—"The English people ought now to realise +the pass their Grand Old Gagger has brought them to. The finest +assembly of gentlemen in the world are bandying evil names and +punching each other's heads. Just what you might expect when the Prime +Minister has allied himself with blackguards and law-breakers. I used +to be one of his staunchest supporters, but I draw the line at lunacy. +When I saw him truckling to low-bred adventurers who are not worth +sixpence beyond what they can wring from their dupes, I thought it +time to change my course. When I saw the class of men with whom he +acts and under whose orders he works, I changed my opinion of the man. +For evil communications corrupt good manners, and a man is known by +the company he keeps. The whole session has been a degradation of the +British Parliament. Things have been going from bad to worse until we +have reached the climax. If Mr. Gladstone remains in power we must +change the qualifications of our members, and send the best fighting +men and the hardest hitters. We must heckle candidates as to their +'science,' and ascertain if their wind is good, and whether they are +active on their pins. And in course of time, if the G.O.M. still +presides, we shall have the Speaker acting as referee, and calling out +'Time, gentlemen, Time!' Some Gladstonian or other will doubtless +accept the post, and in that case we <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[375]</a></span>may expect him to sport a long +churchwarden and a glass of beer. That is what Mr. Gladstone is +bringing on the House, and the tendency has been visible for a long +time. When you hear of people continually shouting 'Judas, Judas,' +without a word of protest from the Prime Minister, you must admit that +the dignity of the House is a thing of the past. When you see the +general trend, you can judge what will be the result. When you see in +which direction a man is going, you can judge where he will arrive at +last.</p> + +<p>"For my part, and I can speak for all my friends, we have the greatest +confidence in the English people's commonsense, and in the long run we +know it will not fail. The Scotsmen, who are honest politicians and +keen, are throwing over Mr. Gladstone and all his works, although he +was for so long their greatest pride. And we are sure that the few +Englishmen who at the last election followed in his wake will see +their error, and that they will joyfully seize the first opportunity +of repairing their mistake. What would happen if the bill became law? +Nothing but evil. The Methodists would leave these parts in a body. We +could not remain with a Catholic Parliament in Dublin. We should not +be safe but for the English shield that covers us. The people, as a +whole, are quiet enough—when left alone. But they are very excitable. +Kind and civil as they may seem, they turn round in a moment. They +will believe anything they are told, their credulity is wonderful, and +their clergy have them entirely in their hands. The people might be +tolerant, but the clergy never. And Irish priests are very bitter and +very prejudiced. They say that we have bartered eternity for time, and +that, although we all thrive and do well, we have sold our souls for +earthly prosperity. My mind is made up. Once that bill becomes law you +must find room for me in England. We shall be able to live in peace on +the other side of the Channel."</p> + +<p>Another Methodist believed that the poverty of the people was somehow +due to their religion. He knew not precisely why this was the case, +but his observations left him no other conclusion. He instanced +Strabane, the Scots settlement over the border, and although in +Tyrone, yet only divided from Donegal by the river Mourne. "They have +at Strabane an annual agricultural and horticultural exhibition, which +does a great amount of good in educating the people. Last week they +distributed eight hundred pounds in prizes, and there were two +thousand two hundred entries. We have talked about a similar show in +Donegal, but we never do more than talk. We shall never have a show +until we get a sufficient number of Scotsmen to organise it and work +it up. The necessary energy for such a big affair seems to be the +private property of people holding the Protestant faith, for when we +see an energetic Romanist we look upon it as something so remarkable +as to merit investigation, and in nearly every case we find the person +in question is, although Catholic, either Saxon or half-breed. Nearly +all the Papists are Kelts. Is their want of energy due to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[376]</a></span>breed, to +religion, or to both? We hardly know. But I know a man's religion a +mile off, so to speak. Only let me see him at work in a field. His +religion comes out in his action. A Papist never works hard. He seems +to be always doing as little as ever he can. Then he's very much +surprised to find himself so poor, when the hard-working Protestant is +getting on. Presently the Black-mouth gets a farm, while the other +remains a labourer. Then the agitator comes round and says, 'Look how +heretic England favours Protestants. <i>You</i> are the children of the +soil, but who has the farms?' 'Begorra,' says Michael, 'an' that's +thrue, bedad it is now,' and thenceforward he cherishes a secret +animosity against the successful man, instead of blaming his own want +of industry. That's human nature. So he votes for Home Rule, for +anything that promises the land to himself, as the son of the soil. He +looks on the other man as an interloper, and his priest encourages +that view. That is their feeling, as they themselves express it every +day, and are we to believe against the evidence of our senses that +when they have the power to injure us, to drive us out of the country, +by making it too hot to hold us—are we to believe that they will not +exert their power, but on the contrary, will treat us considerably +better than before? That is what English Home Rulers ask us to +believe. That is what Irish Nationalist speakers say in England: they +would be laughed at here. Do not trust these men. They are what the +Scripture calls 'movers of sedition'—and nothing better."</p> + +<p>After some search I found a fine young Parnellite, who roundly +denounced the clergy of his own faith as enemies of their country. He +said:—"I <i>was</i> a Home Ruler, but although I hold the same opinion in +theory, I would not at this juncture put it into practice. I am +convinced that it would be bad for us. We are not ripe for +self-government. We want years of training before we could govern +ourselves with advantage. The South Meath election petition finally +convinced me. When I saw how ignorance was used by the clergy for the +furtherance of their own ends, I decided that we were not yet +sufficiently educated to be entrusted with power; and if Home Rule +were now offered to us, and the Home Rule that we ourselves have +advocated, I for one would dread to accept it. We must serve an +apprenticeship to the art of self-government. We must have a Local +Government Bill, and see how we get on. Then it can from time to time +be made larger and more liberal, entrusting us as we grow stronger +with heavier tasks. Give us Home Rule at this moment and you ruin us. +We should have several factions, more intent on getting power and in +damaging each other, than on solving all or any of the very +complicated and difficult questions which would come before them. +There would be no spirit of mutual accommodation such as prevails in +English assemblies. And our troubles would be your troubles. Keep it +back for a few years, and lead us up to Home Rule by easy gradations.</p> + +<p>"My anti-Parnellite friends say they will not return the members now +representing them. I believe they will. And if not, then <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[377]</a></span>they will +send others of no better social standing, and with no Parliamentary +training at all. They will send worse men, extreme men, men who have +not pledged themselves to the British Government. The pledges of +Dillon and Davitt—what are they worth? Surely nobody is so foolish as +to rely on such 'safeguards' as these.</p> + +<p>"I am sure that three-fourths of the educated Catholics of Ireland are +at this moment opposed to Home Rule in any shape or form, but—they +dare not say so. Ireland is a land of tyranny, clerical tyranny. +Ireland will not be free until the clergy withdraw their influence +from politics. If they continue in their present course, there will be +a reaction as education advances, and their last state will be worse +than the first. I know that some of them would gladly drop politics, +but they have to look to their bishops."</p> + +<p>A Nationalist tradesman said:—"The Protestants are favoured in every +way. Statistics recently given in the <i>Freeman</i> show that the money +annually paid to the favoured few, who hold appointments which ought +to be open to all, amount to five pounds a head for every Protestant +man, woman, and child in the country. The same favouritism runs +through everything. If a Catholic bids for a field of grass a +Protestant bid is taken, even if lower. I saw it done yesterday."</p> + +<p>My friend lost his temper when I asked him to say why the heretic +farmers were thriving while those of the true faith were starving, why +the heretics were clean while the others were dirty. He at last said +that the British Government subsidised all Soupers out of the secret +service money, and making a contemptuous grimace, to express his +opinion of such miscreants, curled up his hand and passed it behind +his back, thus dramatically indicating the underhand way in which the +money is conveyed to the favoured recipients.</p> + +<p>These people <i>will</i> believe anything. But who tells them this? And why +do not the clergy undeceive them?</p> + +<p>A final Black-mouth must be quoted. He said that the seller of the +standing grass preferred the heretical bid, although lower, "because +he felt more sure of the money," and pointing across the triangular +square, yclept the Diamond, said:—"All those corner-men are Home +Rulers. You never see a Unionist idling the day away at +street-corners. We have no Protestant corner-boys in Donegal, nor +anywhere else, so far as I know." The townsfolk are fairly +industrious, that is, when compared with the people of Southern Irish +towns, but there is a residuum—a Home Rule residuum. It sometimes +happens that jaded men, worn out with overwork, are recommended to go +to some quiet place and to do absolutely nothing. They can't do +nothing, they don't know how to begin. They should go to Donegal. The +place is silent as the tomb, and if they would learn to do nothing +they will there find many eminent professors of the science, who, +having devoted to it the study of a lifetime, have attained a virtuoso +proficiency.</p> + +<p class="date">Donegal, August 3rd.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_57_BAREFOOTED_AND_DILATORY" id="No_57_BAREFOOTED_AND_DILATORY"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[378]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 57.—BAREFOOTED AND DILATORY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />he Ballyshannon foundered on the coast of Cariboo, And down in +fathoms many went the captain and his crew. Down went the owners, +greedy men whom hope of gain allured. O, dry the starting tear, for +they were heavily insured."</p> + +<p>And thereby hangs a tale.</p> + +<p>Professor Crawford, of Trinity College, Dublin, says that when walking +down Regent Street, London, with William Allingham, then editor of +<i>Fraser's Magazine</i>, and a native of this Donegal town, the pair met +Charles Dickens, who advanced with beaming countenance, and taking +both Allingham's hands in his own, said in a hearty voice:</p> + +<p>"Well done, Ballyshannon!"</p> + +<p>This was in allusion to a recent article written by the <i>Fraser</i> +editor, who among his intimate friends and brother litterateurs was +playfully named after his birthplace. W.S. Gilbert was especially fond +of the sonorous appellation, and in the above-quoted Bab Ballad, his +gem of gems, named the ship Ballyshannon in remembrance of Allingham.</p> + +<p>The Ballyshannon folks are "going to" erect a memorial to Allingham, +of whose poems they have often heard. They are "going to" advertise +their town, and make its beauties known to the world—some day. They +are "going to" charter a steam dredger, and so improve the harbour, +which is dangerous. They are "going to" utilise the enormous +water-power of the River Erne, which runs to waste from Lough Erne to +the sea. They are "going to" run a few tweed and blanket factories +when they see their way quite clearly. They are "going to" start a +fishery fleet and a number of fish-curing sheds, to give employment to +the poor folks of the district. They need almost everything that man +<i>can</i> need, and they have especial facilities for supplying needs, but +as yet they have lacked time and opportunity. The town is only a +thousand years old, and its inhabitants have not yet had time to look +about them. A number of English anglers stroll about with long salmon +rods, or float their little barks on the broad bosom of the Erne, the +population looking dreamily on from the long bridge over the river, +which, like the Shannon at Athlone, flows through the heart of the +town. Nobody seems to be doing anything, except a few old beggar woman +squalid and frowsy as the mendicant hordes of Tuam, Tipperary, +Limerick, and Galway. The beggars are pertinacious enough for +anything, but theirs is the only enterprise the stranger sees. +Compared with that of Donegal the salmon-fishing seems expensive. The +landlord of the Arran Hotel in that town offers the Eske at +half-a-crown a day, but in Ballyshannon you must pay four pounds a +week and give up all the take except two. Salmon are scarce all over +Ireland this year. Three English fishers on the Erne <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_379" id="Page_379">[379]</a></span>shared the +universal bad luck, for in three days they had only captured one +five-pounder. The unusual drought has made the water low. The weather +of the past five months has been finer and dryer than any season for +sixty years. Ballyshannon looks dirty and dingy in any weather. It +lacks the smartness, the cleanliness, the width of thoroughfare, which +mark the heretic towns. It lacks the factories, the large shops, the +shipping which would infallibly be to the fore if its inhabitants were +mainly of Teuton origin. On the other hand, the Ballyshannon folks are +religious. They go to mass regularly, and confess themselves at +frequent intervals. The confessional box is their only place to spend +a happy day, and the act of confession, with the following penance, +their pleasantest mode of passing away the time. They are mostly Home +Rulers, and are deferring special effort to better themselves until +the Irish Parliament does away with the necessity. That blessed +institution once fairly settled at College Green will spare them the +pains of enterprise, and will show how large industries can be created +and sustained without capital, without business knowledge, without +technical skill, and for the sole purpose of affording the shiftless +population of Ballyshannon regular wages at the week's end. The +gentlemen who lean over the quaint bridge, with its twelve arches and +sharply-pointed buttresses, are merely waiting for the factories, +which are to spring from the earth fully-equipped at a wave of the +enchanter's hand, to be a blessing to the whole world while fulfilling +their chief mission of finding employment for the people of Ireland. +Meantime the Ballyshannoners are bitterly wroth with England because +she has not hurried up with the desired factories long ages ago. They +smoke thick twist and expectorate into the river, talking moodily of +the selfish Saxon, who instead of looking after them looks after +himself, and praising Tim Healy, whose spare cash is invested in a +factory in Scotland. Tim knows his countrymen; but, although his +cleverness is by them much admired, they do not know how really clever +he is. If they could realise the fact that Tim declines to invest in +Ireland they might admire him still more. The great drawback to Irish +enterprise lies in the fact that Irishmen who have brains enough to +make money have brains enough to invest it out of Ireland. They will +not trust Irishmen, nor will they rely on Irish industry. Ballyshannon +is waiting for the impersonal Somebody or the shadowy Something that +is to come forward and put everything right. Galway is so waiting, +Limerick is so waiting, Cork is so waiting, Westport, Newport, Donegal +are so waiting. It never occurs to them to do something for +themselves. When the suggestion is made they become irate, and +excitedly ask, What could we do? How are we to begin? Where are we to +find the money? Who is to take the first step? They fail to see that +the settlement towns have long since answered these queries, and that +the capacity to do so marks the difference in the breeds. These +hopeless, helpless, Keltic Irishmen are unfit for self-government. +They require the india-rubber tube <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_380" id="Page_380">[380]</a></span>and the feeding-bottle. They want +to be spoon-fed and patted on the back when they choke. To instance +the Scots settlements is to madden them. These thriving communities +are a standing reproach, and cannot be explained away. Saxon Strabane +flourishes, while Keltic Donegal declines, the latter having all the +advantages of the former with the addition of a harbour and good +fishing grounds. "Look at the condition of the country," say the Home +Rulers. "Behold the poverty of the peasantry," they continually do +cry. The visible nakedness of the land is their chief and most +effective argument. The Unionist answer is conclusive, and of itself +should be enough to demolish the Nationalists. See the Protestant +communities of Ireland,—all, without exception, advancing in +prosperity. They have no advantages which are denied to the +Nationalists. On the contrary, they live in the comparatively bleak +and unfertile North, which by their unceasing industry they have +developed to its fullest extent. They have tilled the ground until it +resembles a garden, they have deepened the rivers, built harbours, +created industries, been in every way successful. And all under +precisely the same laws, the same government. The richest spots of +Ireland, if inhabited by Keltic Irish, are steeped in poverty. The +poorest spots, if inhabited by men of Saxon blood, become fat and +well-liking. The fate of men lies mostly in themselves. This comes out +forcibly in Ireland. Race, breed, heredity, call it what you will, in +Ireland thrusts its influence on you, whether you will or no. +Neighbouring towns, neighbouring farms, neighbouring cottages, present +a series of striking contrasts, ever in favour of the Saxon, ever +against the Kelt. The latter has not yet discovered that the secret +word, the open sesame of the difficulty, the charm which only can give +permanent comfort, is—Work. Nor has his race the spirit of mechanical +invention or industrial enterprise, without which College Green +Parliaments may sit in vain. The pure-blooded Kelt is easily +discouraged, and no man sooner knows when he is beaten. More than +this, he always expects to be beaten, so that he is beaten before he +begins. As a talker he is unequalled, and in this long-eared age, when +the glibbest gabbler is reckoned the greatest man, his agitators have +floated to the front. The Ballyshannon people can talk with the +volubility of a Hebrew cheap Jack, but their jaw-power, like their +water-power, mostly runs to waste. They have the silly suspicion and +the childish credulity of the Donegal rural districts. A fluent +politician said, "Why are all the Protestants Unionists? Perfectly +simple, that. Because they are all well off. There you are. And being +well off, they want no change. That's their selfishness. Now we, who +are not Protestants (thank God), are for the most part poor. Our +living is precarious. We don't know where to look, nor what to do, to +improve our worldly position. We think it likely that an Irish +Parliament would do something for us. In what way? Why, in the +direction of public works and in the building of factories. Also in +the protection of Irish industries. Where would the money come from? +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_381" id="Page_381">[381]</a></span>Why, from England, to be sure. And if England wouldn't lend it, plenty +of other nations would; America, for instance. We shall have heaps of +money. Mr. Gladstone has said it, and he is famous as a financier. +There you have the reason why we want Home Rule, while the Protestants +don't. They are well enough off already.</p> + +<p>"<i>Why</i> are they well off, you ask? Also easy to answer. They have been +the spoiled children of fortune. They have been petted and pampered by +England for more than two hundred years. And although you will not of +course admit it, yet we know, everybody here knows, that they have +been secretly subsidised by every Tory Government. If they pay their +rents, where do they get the money? From the Tory party. And Tory +landlords give the best farms to Protestants, who having the pick of +the land, ought to be well off. Wherever you go you will find the +Protestants living on good land."</p> + +<p>I submitted that authentic records show that Ulster was formerly the +most sterile, barren, unpromising part of Ireland, and that the change +was entirely due to the two centuries of unremitting labour which the +Scots settlers and their descendants had bestowed on the land; but, +waiving this point, I asked him why the Unionist, that is, the +Protestant, party were so much better educated, and why the heretics +were so much cleaner. He had stated that the Black-mouths were +subsidised by the Tory Party. Did the British Government also supply +them with soap?</p> + +<p>At this point my friend's explanations became unintelligible, but his +general drift seemed to indicate that the people were too downtrodden, +too much oppressed, were groaning too painfully under the cruel +British yoke, to have the spirit to look after the duties of the +toilet. In other words, the Irish people will wash themselves when +they get Home Rule. At the next election Mr. Gladstone will doubtless +bring forward this aspect of the case as a sop to the soap-making +interest.</p> + +<p>Another Ballyshannoner was of a diametrically opposite opinion. "We +are poor because we have no notion of making money by modern methods. +We have always lived on the land, selling our superfluity to pay the +rent, and now that our arrangements are disturbed, we don't know which +way to turn. The blame rests with America, whose competition has so +lowered the price of produce that the farmer's superfluity, that is, +what he does not consume himself, will no longer suffice to pay the +rent. That is a general statement only. Landlords are generally +reasonable, and meet their tenants fairly enough when the tenants are +well-disposed and honest. The tenant-farmers of Ireland have no more +to complain of than the tenant-farmers of England—much less in +fact—but they have an army of agitators, an ignorant English press, +and the G.O.M. on their side. That makes all the difference. We have +occasional cases of unfair landlordism, but they are so rare as to be +the talk of a county or two.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_382" id="Page_382">[382]</a></span>"A Mrs. Hazlitt holds, with her farm, about twenty or thirty acres of +slobland reclaimed from the Atlantic. Slobland is land reclaimed from +the sea. This piece is on Donegal Bay. It was protected by a great +dyke after the Dutch style. But the Atlantic is sometimes angry, and +then he becomes unmanageable. He was ill-tempered one night (being +troubled with wind), and he just washed down the dyke and inundated +the reclaimed meadows, upon, which I have seen the most beautiful +crops. The landlord, the Reverend James Hamilton, a Protestant rector, +insists on rent being paid for this washed-away land. He does not +rebuild the dyke, and the land lies waste—the widow paying rent for +acres of useless salt marsh. That is pointed to by all the malcontents +in Donegal as a specimen of landlordism, and Protestant landlordism, +and more especially reverend Protestant landlordism. Nobody but a +parson would exact the rent. These isolated examples are cited to +bring discredit on Protestant landlords in general.</p> + +<p>"This town is asleep, and it will not awake till the last Judgment. In +1885 we had a manufacturer from Belfast looking about for the best +place for a big cloth mill on the river. The town was in a ferment of +excitement, and everybody began to wonder what he would do with his +additional income. The shop-keepers expected that their customers +would have twice the money to spend in future, and the working folks +began to be cocky with their employers, saying that they would get +much better wages at the great factory. Then Mr. Gladstone brought out +his '86 bill, and the Belfast man drew in his horns. He told me that +he would not risk a farthing in any speculative venture while the +threat of Home Rule was held over us. He was quite right. The +Ballyshannon men were relieved from the trouble of deciding how they +would spend their surplus money, and they ranged themselves on the +bridge or at their usual corners, where you may now see them, propping +up the old houses with their lazy backs, and discussing the wrongs of +Ireland. What they would do without their supposed, wrongs nobody +knows. In English hands this would be a money-making place. We have +enormous advantages of situation, and the water power is almost +unequalled in Ireland. Yet from here to Belleek, a distance of four +miles, there is nothing whatever being done with it.</p> + +<p>"The backwardness of the Irish and their poverty are, in my opinion, +due to their inferiority as a race of men. Wherever there is a +factory, you will find all the foremen Protestants—that is, Saxons. +And Irishmen expect it. They will not work under Irish foremen, if +they can help it. The Catholic labourer will work for the Protestant +farmer, for choice, every time. The Catholic housekeeper goes to the +Protestant shop, by preference. Where their own personal and earthly +interests are concerned, the Papist population always prefer the +guidance of the cursed heretic. And yet they express for the +Black-mouths the greatest contempt and aversion, and would willingly +put them out of the country <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383">[383]</a></span>to-morrow. That is because they wish to +possess our goods. They vote for Home Rule in the belief that they are +paving the way for a dismissal of Protestants, and the division of +their property. They do not know the name of the man who represents +them, the title of the Parliamentary division for which he sits, or +even, in many cases, the name of the county in which they themselves +reside. To talk reason to such people would be absurd. Trained from +their infancy to regard England as an enemy, they would not listen to +anyone speaking on her behalf. They declare that they are barefoot +because England wears their shoes, that they are starving that England +may be over-fed. The how, the why, the wherefore are not within their +ken, but they are sure of the facts. They had them from Father Dick, +Tom, or Harry, and the holy man would not tell a lie. Stupid people +over the Channel, listening to this iterated complaint, are acting as +though it were true. Gladstone took it up, and his followers followed. +No doubt it was all that most of them could do. Result,—tumult, +disturbance, confusion worse confounded. Home Rule means that the +country will be deluged with blood, that civilisation will receive a +shock which will send back the island for a century. The causes of +Ireland's poverty are laziness and lack of enterprise, the latter +accentuated by everlasting disturbance. Before the Nationalists we had +the Fenians, the Whiteboys, the Ribbon-men, the United Irishmen, the +Defenders, the goodness-knows-what, running back in continuous line up +to the dawn of history. No wonder we are poor. Cannot Gladstonians +read the records? If they did so, and if they were acquainted with the +character of the Irish when in their native land, they would agree +with my cook, herself a Kelt of Kelts, who says that Irishmen are +leather, good leather, but fit only for the sole, and not for the +uppers.</p> + +<p>"I used to regard Mr. Gladstone as an honest man. Now I think +otherwise. As for the ruck that follow him—well, if they were +intelligent when honest, or honest when intelligent, nobody could +understand their deviation from the path of reason and rectitude. But +the rogues will of course do anything they think will suit them best, +no matter what befalls their country; and as for the rest, why of +course no reasonable man would blame people for not thinking, when +Providence has not provided them with the requisite machinery."</p> + +<p class="date">Ballyshannon, August 5th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_58_THE_TRUTH_ABOUT_BUNDORAN" id="No_58_THE_TRUTH_ABOUT_BUNDORAN"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 58.—THE TRUTH ABOUT BUNDORAN.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />here is no railway between Donegal and Ballyshannon, fifteen miles +away. The largest town in the county is not connected with the +principal port. But you can steam from Ballyshannon to Bundoran, the +favourite watering-place of Donegal, quaint and romantic, with a deep +bay and grassy <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_384" id="Page_384">[384]</a></span>cliffs. The bathing-grounds have a smooth floor of +limestone, and the Atlantic rolls in majestically, sending aloft +columns of white spray as its waters strike the outlying islands of +rock, each with a green crown of vegetation. The bare-headed and +bare-legged natives walk side by side with the fashionably-dressed +citizens of Dublin, Belfast, and Londonderry. The poorest folks are +tolerably clean, and, unlike the Southerners, occasionally wash their +feet. The town is small, but there is plenty of good accommodation for +holiday makers. Bundoran is Catholic and intolerant. Although +depending on their Protestant countrymen for nine-tenths of their +livelihood, the people of Bundoran object to Protestantism, and the +intensity of their antipathy to the Black-mouths has impelled them to +quarrel with their bread-and-butter. Of late the question of tolerance +has been much discussed. Sapient persons whose assumption is equal to +their ignorance of the subject, affect to despise the fears of the +scattered Protestant population whose alarm is based on the experience +of a lifetime. English Home Rulers who wish to create effect +unblushingly affirm that the Protestants are the only intolerants, and +that the Papists are as distinguished for affectionate toleration as +for industry and honesty. In direct opposition to daily experience and +the evidence of history, they assert that the Papists are the +persecuted party, and that they only practise their religion with fear +and trembling. Notwithstanding the well-known doctrine of the Roman +Church, which preserves heaven exclusively for those within its own +pale, these eccentric politicians aver that under a Roman Catholic +Parliament, elected by the clergy alone, the isolated Protestants of +Catholic Ireland, known in the Papist vernacular as Black-faces, +Black-mouths, Heretics, Soupers, and Jumpers, would be treated with +perfect consideration, would enjoy the fullest freedom, the most +indulgent toleration, would, in short, be placed in a position of +equality with the predestined inhabitants of Paradise, or, to quote +Catechism, the inheritors of the Kingdom of Heaven. The persons most +nearly concerned know better. The shrewd farmers of Ulster, like the +Puritan brethren of Leinster, Munster, and Connaught, are entirely +devoid of faith in the promised Papist toleration. Protestant equality +under a Home Rule Parliament! You might as well tell them to plant +potatoes and expect therefrom a crop of oats. Men do not gather grapes +off thorns nor figs off thistles.</p> + +<p>The Bundoran Protestants have evidence to offer. The date is recent. +Not two hundred years ago, but in the year of grace +eighteen-hundred-and-ninety-three. Seeing that the little seaside +resort was full of holiday-makers from the Protestant counties of +Fermanagh and Tyrone, two young Protestant clergymen determined to hold +Gospel services in a tent which was pitched in a field the property of +Mr. James A. Hamilton, J.P. For about a week beforehand handbills +announcing the services for July 21 had been distributed in the town +and suburbs, but no controversial topic was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385">[385]</a></span>mentioned, nor was it +intended that the services should be other than strictly evangelical. +The tent was erected solely to accommodate the great influx of +visitors, after the manner so familiar in England. Here was a test of +Papal toleration. The tent was on private ground, and if Papists did +not like it they could easily keep away, making a wry face and spitting +out the abomination as they passed, after their liberal custom. This, +however, was not enough. No sooner had the handbills been issued, than +a most scurrilous placard appeared, calculated to inflame the passions +of the ignorant, and to make them act after their kind. The Gospellers +were accused of an attempt to poach on the Papal preserves, and it was +mockingly stated that they had at last come to Christianise the +benighted Papists. The effect of this placard was soon evident. It +became known that the Roman Catholics of the district had determined +that they would allow no Gospel services in Bundoran. The police +authorities, who know all about Papist "tolerance," increased the small +village force to twenty-five men, but, as the result proved, these were +absolutely useless. A mob of more than a thousand pious ruffians +gathered early in the evening, and attacked in a brutal and merciless +manner every person they suspected of being on the way to the meeting. +The two Evangelists went to the tent under the escort of the +twenty-five policemen, but before they could commence the service the +apostles of toleration made a desperate rush on the congregation, most +of whom were struck with bludgeons and stones, knocked down, kicked, +and otherwise maltreated. The constabulary with great determination, +but with much difficulty, protected the two young clergymen, upon whom +a most venomous attack was made. The Protestants defended themselves +with umbrellas, walking-sticks, and the like, but being strongly +charged these proved of little avail against the wild onslaught of the +party of toleration. Well may the local paper say that "a regular panic +pervades the resident and visiting Protestant families."</p> + +<p>Mr. Morley, replying to a question in the House, said the reports were +exaggerated. The hapless Irish Secretary, unable to meet this and +similar charges with denial, always relies on the plea of +"exaggeration." The statement given above is derived from +eye-witnesses of both creeds, and from an official source. One word as +to the plea of exaggeration.</p> + +<p>When I had investigated the fifteen moonlighting atrocities of four +weeks in County Limerick, the County Inspector, who had just returned +from a conference with Mr. Morley, said to me:—</p> + +<p>"Everything is ve-ry quiet. We're going on very nicely now." But the +<i>Gazette</i> gave particulars of the shooting in the legs of the four +members of the Quirke family, and Mr. Morley was obliged to admit the +fifteen outrages which constituted County Inspector Moriarty's idea of +"quiet." Subordinates will say there is peace when there is no peace, +if the master requires it. The Bundoran outrage is not susceptible of +exaggeration. Call another witness.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386">[386]</a></span>The <i>Sligo Independent</i>, which being published on the spot can speak +with authority, says that "the intolerant and bigoted Roman Catholics +of Bundoran and surrounding districts look upon Protestantism as a +kind of leprosy which ought at all hazards to be stamped out," and +further states that "even the ladies did not escape their fanatical +hatred and fury. Several people were severely injured, and a clergyman +who was coming to the meeting with his Bible in his hand, was thrown +down and badly beaten, the Book being torn from him and destroyed. +What may Protestants expect should the Home Rule Bill ever become law, +when such disgraceful outbursts of religious bigotry are quite common +under the existing <i>régime</i>? The natural conclusion is that all such +Gospel meetings would be put down with a strong hand, and Protestant +religious liberty trampled under foot by their unscrupulous Roman +Catholic fellow-countrymen. And yet Loyalists are told to trust in +them and all will be well!" Thus the Sligo journal; and its editor may +perhaps, under the circumstances, be pardoned for suggesting that "it +were better for Loyalists not to put themselves in the power of men +who have proved themselves unfit even to associate with civilised +beings. Bundoran will feel the evil effects of these insane attacks +upon defenceless people next season when tourists and pleasure-seekers +will avoid this seat of stupid bigotry, and visit some other summer +resort where they will at least be allowed to worship their Maker +according to their own desires." Exactly. Many visitors left at once, +and will never return. During my six hours' stay I heard complaints of +the falling-off of business. If the place be empty next summer the +people will attribute the loss to the British Government, and +especially to the machinations of the Tory party. An old fisherman +said the fish had left the bay. I assured him they would return under +a Dublin Parliament. He refused to be comforted, because they were +not.</p> + +<p>There is no railway from Bundoran to Sligo, that is, no direct +railway. The great lines mostly run from east to west, but the west +lacks connecting links. Look at the map of Ireland. Cast your eye on +the west coast. If you would go by rail from Westport to Sligo, you +must first go east to Mullingar. If you would go by rail from Sligo to +Bundoran, you must first go east to Enniskillen. If from Bundoran to +Donegal, less than twenty miles, you must again go to Enniskillen, +thence to Strabane, where you arrive after the best part of a day's +journey, ten miles further away than when you started, thence to +Stranorlar, changing there to the narrow-gauge railway for your final +trip. Travelling on the west coast is tedious and expensive, whether +you go round by rail or drive direct. Many of the most attractive +tourist districts are almost inaccessible. To open them up is to +enrich the neighbourhood. Few Englishmen know what the Balfour +railways really mean. The following statement gives particulars +respecting the Light Railways authorised by the Salisbury Government, +and constructed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387">[387]</a></span>either wholly or in part by the nation. These +railways introduce tourists to those parts of Ireland which are best +worth visiting, and the economy of time, money, and muscular tissue +effected by them would be hard to overestimate. But this is not all, +nor was this their primary purpose. They gave and still give +employment to the people of the district, and besides bringing the +money of the tourists into the country, enable the natives to send +their produce out of it, to place it on the market, to turn it into +gold. There is no railway from Dugort, in Achil, to any market. Fish +caught in Blacksod Bay are therefore worth nothing except as food for +the fisherman's family. Large crabs were offered to me for one +halfpenny each. Does this fact impress the usefulness of Balfour's +railways? Here they are complete:—</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="50%" summary="Balfour's contribution"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="60%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Name.</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Length in miles.</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Balfour's contribution.</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Donegal and Killybegs</td> + <td class="tdr">17¾</td> + <td class="tdr">£115,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Stranorlar and Glenties</td> + <td class="tdr">24½</td> + <td class="tdr">116,000</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noin">On this line you run for twelve miles from Stranorlar without seeing a +single cottage. There are none within sight on either side.</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="50%" summary="Balfour's contribution"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="60%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Downpatrick and Ardglass</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">7¼</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">£30,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Galway and Clifden</td> + <td class="tdr">50</td> + <td class="tdr">264,000</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noin">This will run in connection with the splendid system of the Midland +and Western Railway, opening up the grand scenery of Connemara, which +to the average Britisher is like a new world. No end of fishing here +among virgin shoals of trout and salmon, and nearly always for +nothing. It was along the first sixteen miles of this line, still +unopened, that I ran on the engine to Oughterard.</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="50%" summary="Balfour's contribution"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="60%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Westport to Mulranney</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">18¼</td> + <td class="tdr" width="20%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">£131,400</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" style="padding-left: 10%;">To which is added the</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Achil Island extension</td> + <td class="tdr">8¼</td> + <td class="tdr">65,000</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p class="noin">This will enable travellers to steam from Dublin to Achil Island viâ +Midland and Western, instead of the ten hours on an open car, which on +their arrival at Westport now awaits visitors to Dugort. It was on +this line that I had the startling adventures on a fiery untamed bogey +engine, lent to the <i>Gazette</i> by Mr. Robert Worthington, of Dublin. +But I must condense.</p> + +<div class="centered"> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="60%" summary="Balfour's contribution"> + <tr> + <td class="tdl" width="55%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">Claremorris and Collooney</td> + <td class="tdr" width="15%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">47</td> + <td class="tdr" width="15%" style="vertical-align: bottom;"> </td> + <td class="tdr" width="15%" style="vertical-align: bottom;">£150,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Ballina and Killala</td> + <td class="tdr">6½</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr">44,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Bantry extension</td> + <td class="tdr">2</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr">15,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Baltimore extension</td> + <td class="tdr">8</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr">56,700</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">West Kerry and Valentia</td> + <td class="tdr">27</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr">85,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Headford and Kenmare</td> + <td class="tdr">20</td> + <td class="tdr"> </td> + <td class="tdr">50,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Milltown, Malbay, Kilkee, and Kilrush</td> + <td class="tdr">26</td> + <td class="tdr">2% on</td> + <td class="tdr">120,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Tuam and Claremorris</td> + <td class="tdr">17</td> + <td class="tdr">2% on</td> + <td class="tdr">97,000</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tdl">Ballinrobe and Claremorris</td> + <td class="tdr">12</td> + <td class="tdr">2% on</td> + <td class="tdr">71,664</td> + </tr> +</table> +</div> + +<p>Besides these, similar lines have been constructed, and are now +working between Tralee, Dingle, and Castlegregory; Skibbereen and +Skull; Ballinscarty, Timoleague, and Courtmacsherry. The Cork and +Muskerry Railway, which runs through the groves of Blarney, owes its +completion and success to Mr. Balfour's administration.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_388" id="Page_388">[388]</a></span>Driving from Bray to the Dargle, my jarvey pointed to the ruins of a +light railway undertaken without the aid of the British intellect. +"'Tis a nice mess they made iv it, the quarrelin' pack o' consated +eejits! They must run a chape little thing to the Dargle, about two +miles away, along the roadside, just as Balfour showed them the way. +What have they done? Desthroyed the road. Lost all the money they +could raise. Got the maker to take back the rails (for they bought +thim afore they wanted thim), an' the only thing they now have in the +shape of shareholders' property is a lawsuit wid the Wicklow folks +about desthroyin' the road. Faix, an iligant dividend is that same. +An' them's the chaps that's to rule the counthry. That's the sort of +thim, I mane. Many's the time I seen the Irish mimbers. Sorra a thing +can they do, barrin' dhrink an' talk. I wouldn't thrust one of thim to +rub down a horse, nor wid a bottle of poteen. Divil a one of thim but +would dhrink as much whiskey as would wash down a car, an' if they +could run as fast as they can talk, begorra, ye might hunt hares wid +thim. Rule the counthry, would ye. Whe-w-w-w!" He whistled with a +"dying fall," like the strain in <i>Twelfth Night</i>.</p> + +<p>I drove from Bundoran to Sligo, the sea on the right, the Benbulben +mountains on the left, singularly shaped but splendid. The round +towers and ancient Irish crosses, the lakes and rivers of Sligo, are +full of interest and beauty. The Abbey ruins are exceptionally fine. +The town is fairly well built, but it is easy to realise that once +more it is Connaught. During a turn round Bridge Street, a country +cart heaves alongside, steered by a stalwart man in hodden gray. He +notes the stranger, and politely says,</p> + +<p>"Can I be of any use? I see you are a visitor."</p> + +<p>We fell into conversation. Presently I said, "Everything will be well +when you get Home Rule."</p> + +<p>He stopped the cart and protested against this statement. Unknowingly +I had tapped a celebrity. My hodden-gray friend was none other than +the famous Detective James Magee, who arrested James Stephens, the +Number One, the Head Centre of the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood; +also John O'Leary, editor of the Fenian <i>Irish People</i>, of which +O'Donovan Rossa was business manager. O'Leary was a doctor hailing +from Tipperary. He asked Magee if he might have his "night-cap," and +his captor allowed him to call for the whiskey at a well-known Dublin +resort, on parole of honour. Later, as a crowded street was reached, +O'Leary said, "There are three thousand of my friends there. If you go +that way I cannot save you. Better try a back street." "That was +handsome," said Mr. Magee. "O'Leary was a gentleman. Stephens was only +a 'blower.'" My friend was unalterably set against Home Rule, which he +regards as an empty, foolish cry. Being a pensioner he wishes to be +reticent, but his opinion is pronounced, and the Sligo people know it. +He has a high opinion of the law-abiding instincts of his compatriots, +and believes that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_389" id="Page_389">[389]</a></span>"if they were left to themselves" the district +would need no police. "A better-hearted, kinder, more obliging people +never lived," said this excellent judge, who after twenty-seven years +of police service, returned to end his days among them. And my short +experience of the Sligo folks confirms this statement. They were not +all so reserved as Detective-sergeant Magee. A thriving shopkeeper +said:—"The majority, if you count noses, are for Home Rule, but if +you count only brains and intelligence you would find an overwhelming +majority against it. Mr. Gladstone and his set of blockheads seem +quite impervious to reason, and even the constituencies of England +seem to lack information. The reason is plain. While we have been +minding our work the Nationalists have been agitating. For thirteen +years they have been on the stump, and have stolen a march on us and +they take a lot of catching up. We allowed them to empty their +wind-bags, forgetting that the English people were not so conversant +with the facts or with the character of the orators as we are. We +thought that no precautions were required, and that their preposterous +statements would be received in England as intelligent, enlightened +people would receive them here. Their strength in Ireland is almost +entirely among the illiterates, who in the polling booths are coerced +by their priests. I have seen a man crying because he had not been +allowed to vote for the candidate supported by his employer. Such a +ridiculous thing could not happen in England, and Englishmen who do +not know Ireland and the Irish will scarcely credit it. This shows how +unable most Saxons are to understand Irish character and motive.</p> + +<p>"All our civilisation is from England, all our progress, all our +enlightenment, and nearly all our money. As a poor, helpless, +semi-barbaric country, we ought to cleave to England with all our +might and main. A more and more complete and perfect unity is our best +hope. To ask for separation is the wildest absurdity. And just as we +were beginning to go along smoothly! That was entirely due to the just +but firm administration of the Balfour period.</p> + +<p>"Among Irishmen justice with firmness is always appreciated in the +long run. An Irish Secretary needs the hand of iron in the velvet +glove. Paddy spots the philanthropic fumbler in a moment, and uses +him, laughing the while at what he rightly calls his 'philandering.' +Morley means well, but nobody here respects him. He knows no more of +Irish character than a blind bull-pup. His master in my opinion is +worse, if possible. He is deaf to all the arguments of Irish sense and +Irish culture, and proposes to finally resolve the unresolvable, to +settle the Irish difficulty by a Catholic Parliament. As well go out +with a net to catch the wind. He listens to the representatives of +ruffianism, counting them first. We kept silent too long. We thought +the donkeys might bray for ever without shaking down the stars. We +were wrong. Now we are almost powerless. For what are a handful of +reasonable men against a crowd of blackguards with big sticks?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_390" id="Page_390">[390]</a></span>While conversing with Detective Magee, that astute gentleman pointed +out The O'Connor, lineal King of Connaught, and a staunch Unionist! A +devout Catholic and intensely Irish, yet the uncrowned King is a +loyalist. But The O'Connor is a man of superior understanding. After +this I saw three Home Rulers—yea, I conversed with four, one a +positive person whom I mistook for a farm labourer, but who proved to +be a National schoolmaster who absorbed whiskey like the desert sands. +A decent farmer who thought the Land League the finest thing in the +wuruld, complained that while the British Government have contracted +for hay at £8 15s., yet he and his friends could only get £3 for "best +saved." His idea of Home Rule was—No Rent to pay. A ferocious +commercial traveller, whose jaw and cheekbones were as much too large +as his eyes and forehead were too small, wanted to know "what right +had England to rule Ireland? Ye have no more right to rule Ireland +than to rule France." This was his only idea. He was a patriot of the +sentimental type, and wished that Ireland might take her place as an +independent nation with Belgium, Switzerland, Holland. His hero was +Paddy O'Donnell, of Bedlam—<i>clarum et venerabile nomen</i>—who for five +days held his house, since called the Fort, against a strong force of +police. "If all was like O'Donnell, we'd soon have the counthry to +ourselves," said my commercial friend. "An' if ye don't let us go, +we'll make ye wish ye did. Wait till ye get into throuble with France. +The Siam business may yet turn up thrumps." He was very voluble, very +loud, very illiterate, and I declined to discuss the question except +in Irish, which he did not speak. Like most of the patriot orators of +Ireland, he was as ignorant of his native language as of his native +literature, and every other. This is the class from whom the political +speakers who infest country places are drawn. At first sight they seem +unworthy of notice, but contempt may be pushed too far. Even wasps +become dangerous when in swarms. And Hatred is like fire: it makes +even light rubbish deadly.</p> + +<p class="date">Sligo, August 8th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_59_IRISH_NATIONALISM_IS_NOT_PATRIOTISM" id="No_59_IRISH_NATIONALISM_IS_NOT_PATRIOTISM"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 59.—IRISH NATIONALISM IS NOT PATRIOTISM.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/letterm.png" alt="M" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />y tour through Ireland having now come to an end, I propose to sum up +the conclusions I have formed in this and the three following +articles. In connection with the Home Rule Bill, we have heard much of +the "aspirations of a people." Mr. Gladstone has taken up the cry, and +his subservient followers at once brought their speeches and facial +expressions into harmony with the selected sentiment. These +anti-English Englishmen would fain pose as persons in advance of their +time, determined to do justice though the heavens should fall. They +agree with Mr. Labouchere that John Bull is a tyrant, a robber, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_391" id="Page_391">[391]</a></span>and a +hypocrite, and that it is high time justice should be done to Ireland. +As no substantial injustice exists, it is necessary to fall back on +sentiment, and to quote the "aspirations of a people." The desire for +a system of Irish autonomy is praised as a manifestation of patriotism +which in all ages of the world has been honoured by worthy men. The +English supporters of Mr. Gladstone, with their assumption of superior +virtue, their Pharasaic We are not as other men, nor even as these +Tories, would have us believe that with the granting of self-rule +Ireland will be satisfied, that the gratification of a laudable +sentiment is all that is now required to bind together the peoples in +an infrangible Union of Hearts, and that peace and prosperity will at +once follow in the wake of this merely sentimental concession.</p> + +<p>The great mass of the Irish electorate know nothing of all this. Tap +them wherever you will, north, south, east, or west, and you find one +dominant thought—that of pecuniary gain. They know nothing of the +proposed bill, and are totally incapable of comprehending its scope +and effect. The peasantry of Ireland are actuated by motives entirely +different from those affecting the rural constituencies of England. +The Briton is proud of his country, believes in its might, justice, +supremacy; and despite occasional grumbling is satisfied that the +powers that be will do him right in the long run. The Irish peasant is +essentially inimical to England. He is always "agin the +Government"—that is, the rule of England. He regards the landlord as +trebly an enemy—firstly as a heretic, secondly as the representative +of British rule, and last, but by no means least, as the person to +whom rent is due. He desires to abolish the landlord, not in the +interests of religion—I speak now of the peasantry, and not the +clergy—and not in the interests of patriotism, for if a Dublin +Parliament were to cost him sixpence, the priests themselves could +hardly drag him to the poll; but purely and simply to avoid any +further payment of what he regards as the accursed impost on the land. +Phillip Fahy, the leading light of Carnaun, near Athenry, is exactly +typical of rural Irish Patriotism. "Did ye hear of the Home Rule Bill? +What does it mane, at all, at all? Not one o' us knows more than that +lump o' stone ye sit on. Will it give us the land for nothin', for +that's all we hear? We'll be obliged av ye could explain it a thrifle, +for sorra one but's bad off, an' Father O'Baithershin says 'Howld yer +whist,' says he 'till ye see what'll happen,' says he. Will we get the +bit o' ground widout rint, yer honner's glory?" Mr. Tynan, of Monivea, +said that his landlord was liberal and good, and admitted that his +land was not too highly rented, but, said he, "We have no objection to +do better still." The run on the Irish Post Office Savings Banks at +once illustrates the patriotism of the people and their confidence in +the proposed Dublin Parliament. It was well known and understood, so +far as the poorer classes are capable of understanding anything, that +the floating balance of the Post Office Banks would constitute the +only working capital of the Irish <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_392" id="Page_392">[392]</a></span>Legislature. Here was an +opportunity for self-sacrifice. Here was a chance of manifesting the +faith animating the lovers of their country. But at the same time it +was made known that the Post Office would pass from the British +control to that of the Irish people's chosen representatives. It might +have been supposed that the electors would rejoice thereat with +exceeding great joy, and that in order to show their trust in an Irish +Parliament they would increase their deposits, and at considerable +personal inconvenience refrain from withdrawals. Nothing of the kind. +The "aspirations of a people" were at once strongly defined, but this +time not in the direction of patriotism. It availed not to urge upon +them the argument that the four millions of the Post Office Savings +Banks were absolutely necessary to the successful administration of an +Irish Parliament. In patriotic Dublin the run on the Post Office was +tremendous. The master of a small sub-office told me that the +withdrawals over his counter had for some time amounted to £200 per +week, and that they were increasing to £70 per day. There was not +enough gold in Dublin to meet the demands, and cash was being +forwarded from London. The patriots who had no money deposited in the +Post Office made no secret of their indignation, stigmatising their +fellow-countrymen as recreants and traitors, but without perceptible +effect. The Dublin Savings Bank became the trusted depositary of the +money. This institution is managed by an association of Dublin +merchants, not for profit, but for the encouragement of thrift, and +the confidence reposed in them was doubtless due to the fact that the +directors, on the introduction of the Home Rule Bill, had publicly +announced their intention, on the bill becoming law, to pay twenty +shillings in the pound and at once to close the bank. The patriot +depositors were not deterred by this announcement, nor by the +directors' letter to Mr. Gladstone, in which they declared that their +determination to wind up the affairs of the bank was due to the fact +that in the interest of their depositors they felt themselves unable +to accept the security of an Irish Legislature. Patriotism would +surely have resented this imputation. But Nationalism in its present +phase is nothing more than selfish cupidity and lust of gain. This is +made abundantly manifest by the freely-uttered sentiments of all +classes of the Nationalist party. The first answer I received to an +inquiry as to what advantages would be derived from a patriot +Parliament was elicited from an ancient Dubliner, whose extraordinary +credulity was equal to anything afterwards met with in the rural +districts:—"The millions an' millions that John Bull dhrags out iv +us, to kape up his grandeur, an' to pay sojers to grind us down, we'll +put into our own pockets, av you plaze." The complaint about the +British Government veto on Irish mining, which I fondly believed to be +sporadic, proved to be chronic, universal. Here again the notion of +easily acquired wealth was the impulse, and not the pure and +self-denying influence of patriotism. "The British Government won't +allow us to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_393" id="Page_393">[393]</a></span>work the gold mines in the Wicklow mountains. Whin we get +the bill every man can take a shpade, an', begorra! can dig what he +wants. The Phaynix Park is all cram-full o' coal that the Castle folks +won't allow us to dig, bad scran to them! Whin we get the bill we'll +sink them mines an' send the Castle to blazes." The coal under the +Phœnix Park is a matter of pious belief with every back-slum +Dubliner. The gold of the Wicklow mountains is proverbial all over +Ireland. There is not a nobleman's demesne that does not cover untold +wealth in some shape or form. It may be gold, silver, copper, lead, or +only coal or iron. But it is there, and the people of the +neighbourhood want an Irish Parliament in order that the treasures may +be turned into money. The more intelligent Nationalists foster these +beliefs, although they know them to be without foundation. They know +that the treasures do not exist in paying quantities, and also that if +they did exist their fellow-countrymen are too lazy to dig them up. +The Nationalist orators never rely on patriotic sentiment. They +promise the land for nothing. Mr. William O'Brien has unceasingly +offered as a bribe the promise of prairie rents for the farmers, but +Tim Healy went one better when at Limerick he said that "The people of +this country never ought to be satisfied so long as a single penny of +rent is paid for a sod of land in the whole of Ireland." Well might +Sir George Trevelyan say that Irish agitators have done much to +demoralise the country, and that in many parts of Ireland they gained +their livelihood by criminal agitation. The same authority tells us +that "an Irish Parliament will be independent of the Parliament of +this country, but will be dependent on the votes of the small farmers, +who have been taught that rent is robbery." That is a precise +statement of the position so far as the agricultural voters are +concerned. Their patriotism is nothing more nor less than a sure and +certain hope of pecuniary advantage. The green flag of Ireland has no +charms for them. The ancient glories of Hibernia are sung to them in +vain. They care not for the Onward march to Freedom. They will make no +sacrifices on the shrine of their country. The subscriptions furnished +by the Irish peasantry for the furtherance of the cause amount to +almost nothing, although extorted partly by compulsion and partly by +the hope of future profit. The following facts will show how +spontaneous is their patriotism. At a Sunday meeting at Gurteen in +1887, the Very Reverend Canon O'Donohoe in the chair, it was resolved, +"That a collection for the defence of Messrs. Dillon and O'Brien be +made during the ensuing week in this locality, and that not less than +sixpence be accepted from any person. <i>Anyone not subscribing will be +considered not in sympathy with the Branch.</i>" Those only who know +Ireland well will be able to appreciate the terrible significance of +the last sentence of this resolution, which for the information of the +peasantry was made public in the Nationalist <i>Sligo Champion</i>. A +similar incentive to patriotism seems to have been required by the +Kilshelan Branch, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_394" id="Page_394">[394]</a></span>for at another Sunday Meeting, the Reverend Father +Dunphy in the chair, it was unanimously resolved, "That all members +who do not pay in subscriptions on or before the next meeting, which +will be held on the last Sunday of this month, shall have their names +published and posted on the chapel gate for two consecutive Sundays." +This quotation is from the <i>Munster Express</i>, published in Limerick. +At a meeting reported by the <i>Kerry Sentinel</i> "the conduct of several +members, who had not renewed their subscriptions, was strongly +condemned, the reverend president, Father T. Enright, giving orders to +have a list, with their names, sent to him before the next meeting." +The chapel doors are used as instruments of boycotting. The priest +sits in judgment on all who are not sufficiently patriotic. The people +are compelled to subscribe to the cause, whether they like it or not. +These cases could be multiplied to infinity. They not only give an +excellent illustration of the conduct of the Irish clergy in political +affairs, but they also furnish a curious commentary on the enthusiasm +which is supposed to mark the Aspirations of a People, who, as Mr. +Gladstone might say are "rightly struggling to be free." I have +conversed with hundreds of Irish farmers and I never yet met one who +was willing to sacrifice a sixpence on "the altar of his country," or +to trust an Irish Parliament with his own property, or to invest a +penny on purely Irish security. He loves his ease, no man likes it +better, and No Rent means less exertion. Mr. O'Doherty, of County +Donegal, a Catholic Home Ruler, said the landlords were all right now +under compulsion, but what the tenantry demanded was to be released +entirely from the landlords' yoke. The farmers, he said, cared nothing +for Home Rule, but the Nationalists had preached prairie value, and +the people expected to drive out the landowners and Protestants. Mr. +John Cook, of Londonderry, a Protestant Home Ruler and a man of +culture, did not claim patriotism for the Nationalists, and +unconsciously put his finger on the real incentive when he said:—"The +landlords will be wronged under the present bill. It is a bad bill, an +unjust bill, and will do more harm than good. England should have a +voice in fixing the price of the land, for if the matter be left to +the Irish Parliament gross injustice will be done. The tenants were +buying their land, aided by the English loans, for they found that +their two-and-three-quarter per cent. interest came lower than their +rent. But they have quite ceased to buy, because they expect the Irish +Legislature to give them even better terms—or even to get the land +for nothing." Patriotism had meanwhile received another sop. Mr. Healy +advised the farmers to think twice before they bought their land, and +hinted that their patience was likely to be well rewarded. Father J. +Corcoran at Mullahoran, when consulted by a body of tenant farmers +whose landlord offered to sell, distinctly advised them not to +purchase, and gave a practical instruction on the subject, in which he +endeavoured to prove that seventeen or eighteen years' purchase was at +present unworthy of consideration, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_395" id="Page_395">[395]</a></span>advising the greatest caution +in buying at all under present circumstances. The farmers' conception +of Nationalism is plunder and confiscation. They vote for Home Rule +because they thereby expect to make money, to become freeholders, +landlords themselves, in short. They are taught that they have an +inherent right to the land, and that an Irish Parliament will restore +them their own. Father B. O'Hagan, addressing a meeting in company +with William O'Brien, said:—"We have two classes of landlords, in +brief. We have the royal scoundrels who took the land of our +forefathers. I ask any of those noble ruffians to show me the title by +which they lay claim to the soil of my ancestors. Then we have the +landlords who have purchased their estates in the Land Courts. But +they bought stolen goods, and they knew that the land was stolen. We +must get rid of the landlords." Paddy is perfectly safe. The landlords +who claim in descent and those who buy in the open market are equally +denounced. Let him support the Nationalist party, and the land becomes +his own. He does so, and his motive is by the unthinking called +patriotism and by Mr. Gladstone the Aspirations of a People.</p> + +<p>There are of course other classes of Nationalists, but in comparison +with the immense preponderance of rural voters they do not count for +much. Mr. McGregor, of Anglesea Street, Dublin, once an earnest +Gladstonian, said:—"The corner-men are Home Rulers because they want +to spend what they never earned, and the farmers because they hope to +get the land for nothing." The Dublin hotel-keepers are mostly Home +Rulers, and the proprietor of Jury's, next door to the proposed House +in College Green, is supposed to be consumed with patriotic fire. The +hotel has recently been refitted. The Dublin shopkeepers, "those of +the largest size," are strangely lacking in patriotism, and mostly +support the Union. Patriotism is claimed for the Nationalist members, +who, according to Nationalist sheets, were lifted from bog-holes, +tripe shops, and small whiskey shops to decide the destinies of +empires, to revel in comparative luxury, to enjoy a certain social +distinction, to exchange their native bogs for the British metropolis, +and to draw a salary beyond their wildest dreams. These questionable +gentlemen, with the horse's tongue and cow's tail cutters, the +firebrand priests and landlord-shooters, the moonlight marauders who +shoot old women and children in the legs, burn the haystacks of their +neighbours, refuse coffins and decent burial for the dead, apply the +fiendish tortures of boycotting to innocent women and children, +refusing them the means of subsistence, and poisoning their water +supply with human filth—these <i>are</i> patriots. Only their patriotism +must cost them nothing, It must be cultivated at the expense of +others. The patriots subscribe only under compulsion, and yet hope to +make a profit by the transaction. As of a certain party of old, it may +be said of them, "License they mean when they cry Liberty." Plunder +they mean when they cry Patriotism. The sober and industrious portion +of the Irish people, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396">[396]</a></span>the pick of every part of Ireland, being opposed +to Nationalism, are denied the virtue of patriotism. The merchants and +manufacturers of Dublin and Belfast, the leading professional men of +Ireland, the most learned scholars of her great University, her great +soldiers, White, Wolseley, Roberts, her greatest living authors, the +whole of her Protestant clergy of whatever sect, with their +congregations, the pith and marrow of everything that is strong, +stable, cultured, enlightened, prescient, must be pronounced +unpatriotic—if Nationalism is Patriotism. Contrary to all human +experience and to the course and constitution of nature, the people of +England are asked to believe that love of their native land and desire +to do the best for the commonweal, are the sole possession of the +ignorant and rowdy classes of Irishmen, and notwithstanding the +undeniable fact that Nationalist Irishmen of every colour accuse the +Nationalist members of self-seeking, and of absolute indifference to +everything: outside their own interests, we are asked to give to them +exclusively the honour due to men who sacrifice all for their country +and care for nothing but her welfare. Gladstonians themselves, in the +deepest depths of their credulity, cannot in their hearts believe in +Nationalist patriotism, except, perhaps, such as that of Mr. Kelly, of +Athenry, who said, "I'm a Home Ruler out and out. The counthry's +within a stone-throw of hell, and we may as well be in it altogether."</p> + +<p class="date">Birmingham, August 11th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_60_LAND_HUNGER_ITS_CAUSE_EFFECT_AND_REMEDY" id="No_60_LAND_HUNGER_ITS_CAUSE_EFFECT_AND_REMEDY"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 60.—LAND HUNGER: ITS CAUSE, EFFECT, AND REMEDY.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />hat Irish Nationalism is not Patriotism has been demonstrated by an +appeal to admitted facts. The farmers hope to be relieved from payment +of rent, the labourers hope to be employed in the mining of treasure +at remunerative wages, the agitators hope for place and power, and +everyone who has nothing hopes in the general confusion to make off +with something. There is, in short, a shrewd popular notion that the +foundering of the British ship of state would yield good wreckage. The +false lights have done excellent service. Dillon, Davitt, O'Brien. +Healy, and the rest of the would-be wreckers are shivering with +excitement at the prospect of the crash which they fondly believe to +be imminent. The helmsman is under their orders—will he be heaved +overboard before he has done his work? If so, farewell to hope of +plunder, farewell to hope of religions domination, to freehold farms +for nothing, to gold mines, to every hope that made life pleasant, to +all the fatuous beliefs that are the basis of Irish Nationalism. It +has been shown that "patriotic" subscriptions could only be raised by +threats, that the names of non-subscribers were posted on chapel +gates, that resolutions fixing <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_397" id="Page_397">[397]</a></span>the minimum were passed, with a rider +to the effect that persons not subscribing would be considered "out of +sympathy," and that this fund was for the defence of the patriots +Dillon and O'Brien, who afterwards ran away. The rush of the "patriot" +depositors on the Post Office Savings Banks so soon as it was known +that in the event of Home Rule the floating balance would constitute +the working capital of the new Parliament, and would therefore be in +the hands of brother "patriots," has been adduced as a fair measure of +patriotic sincerity, and endless minor examples might have been given. +We might have mentioned Delany, the principal clothier and outfitter +of intensely patriotic Limerick, who had not a yard of Irish tweed in +his stores; or the Dungannon folks, who think foul scorn of their own +coal, and persist in buying the English product at double the cost; or +Mr. Timony, of "patriotic Donegal," might have been quoted. +"Irishmen," said the great draper, "will not wear Donegal tweed. But +for England we should have no market at all." The patriots will not +"part." "I'm sorry for you," said the kind old lady. "<i>How much</i> are +you sorry?" said the tramp. Tried by this test, Irish patriotism comes +out very small. If "patriot" members had to live on the voluntary +offerings of their constituencies, the trade would expire of +inanition. The members would return to their bogs, their tripe shops, +their shebeens, and patriotism would become a lost art. Irishmen will +applaud with enthusiasm. They like a red-hot patriotic speech. But, +like the crowd listening to the harp and fiddle at the street corner, +they begin to shuffle off when the bag comes round.</p> + +<p>Irish land hunger is easy to understand and simple to define. The bulk +of the population are agricultural, and closely wedded to custom. +Their fathers lived on the land and by the land, and they expect to do +likewise. <i>Sæva paupertas, et avitus apto cum lare fundus.</i> Their +ideas of existence are inseparably connected with the land. Whatever +knowledge they have relates to the land. Their farming skill is very +limited; indeed, it may almost be said that they have none beyond that +possessed by savages—but it is their only possession. They have no +turn for mechanics. The rural Irishman is uneducated, and knows little +beyond what he sees around him. So far as his experience goes, to be +without land is to be without the one means of livelihood. The English +small farmer is differently situated. If farming will not pay he has +other resources. He can migrate to fifty towns having factories or +great public works. And besides this, the Saxon is not crippled by an +ignorant conservatism and a congenital inability to adapt himself to +changed circumstances. Paddy is content with little, if he have his +ease. He loves to put in the seed and then to sit down and wait for +the crop, varying the proceedings with fairs and festive gatherings. +Such is his conception of life. The ding-dong regularity of factory +work does not suit him, so he clings to the land, which provides him +with a bare subsistence, and that is all he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_398" id="Page_398">[398]</a></span>wants. No ambition to be +more luxurious than his father troubles him at all. Short spells of +work, and long spells of play, are ensured to the fortunate holder of +land. This is Paddy's conception of Paradise. Suppose the land held +were at first sufficient to maintain his family. The boys grow up, +and, according to custom, the paternal farm is divided, in the next +generation again subdivided, until at last the amount of land +remaining to each family is insufficient for its maintenance. Then the +district becomes congested. The poverty of the people is attributed to +the landlords, who are denounced as non-resident, notwithstanding the +demonstrations of an affectionate tenantry, who now and then shoot one +or two, <i>pour encourarger les autres</i>. If the people have food they +have little or no money. The agitator comes and promises No Rent, the +opening of gold mines and mighty factories, paying liberal wages, +under the fostering wing of an Irish Parliament. The people are +ignorant and credulous. They are, however, certain as to their own +poverty, and they desire a change. The Roman Catholics regard +themselves as the chosen people, the true sons of the soil, but they +see that most of the great landowners are Protestant, that the +Protestant farmers often hold uncommonly good land, and that if these +were once dispossessed the righteous might again flourish as green bay +trees. For while Papal Ireland is largely rock and bog, the heretical +portion is reclaimed and tilled, the bogs drained, the primeval +boulders rolled away, broken up, and made into fences. All this is +tempting. Irish land hunger is foreshadowed in the story of Naboth and +his vineyard.</p> + +<p>And Irish land hunger is largely responsible for Irish rents. Friends +and neighbours—aye, even relatives near as brothers and sisters, +compete against each other, and eagerly force up the price. Every +Irish land agent will tell you of underhand intrigue in connection +with land. Not only do brothers secretly strive to obtain advantage +over each other by means of higher bidding, but bribery is tried. Mr. +Robert Hare, of the Dublin Board of Works, said:—"My father was an +agent, and on one occasion he was weighing the respective claims of +two brothers to a piece of land which was about to become vacant and +perhaps considering their respective offers, when one sent him a +ten-pound note. He cut it in two and returned one-half, with an +intimation that on receiving a receipt he would forward the other." I +never met anyone in Ireland who would not readily admit that high +rents were mainly due to the action of the tenants themselves, who, +being actuated by what is called land-hunger, which is nothing more in +the majority of cases than the necessity to live, had in their +desperation bid more than the land was worth. Mr. Thomas Manley, of +Trim, County Meath, said:—"The tenant farmer has cried himself up, +and the Nationalists have cried him up as the finest, most +industrious, most self-sacrificing fellow in the world. But he isn't. +Not a bit of it. The landlords and their agents have over and over +again been shot for rack-renting when the rents had been forced up by +secret competition among <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_399" id="Page_399">[399]</a></span>neighbours and even relations. Ask any +living Irish farmer if I am right, and he will say, Yes, ten times +yes." As an Irish farmer and the son of an Irish farmer, living for +sixty years on Irish farms, and from his occupation as a horse-dealer, +claiming to have an intimate acquaintance with the whole of Ireland, +and with almost every farmer who can breed and rear a horse, Mr. +Manley is worth a hearing. Continuing, in the presence of several +intelligent Irishmen, some of them Home Rulers, but all agreeing with +the speaker, Mr. Manley said:—"Rents have been forced up by people +going behind each other's backs and offering more and more, in their +eagerness to acquire the holding outbidding each other. Landlords are +human; agents, if possible, still more human. They handed over the +land to the highest bidder. What more natural? The farmers offered +more than the land could pay. But why curse the landlords for what was +their own deliberate act?" Mr. Manley's knowledge of England enabled +him to say that "the Irish farmer is much better off than the English, +Scotch, or Welsh farmer, not only in the matter of law, but also in +the matter of soil." The legal point is demonstrable. Let us see how +the Irish tenant stands. The disinclination of the Irish for factory +work, as exemplified in the closing of the Galway jute factory, +because of irregularity of attendance, and the refusal of the starving +peasantry of congested Donegal and Connemara to accept regular +employment in the thread factory of Dunbar, MacMaster and Co., +notwithstanding the most tempting inducements, as set forth in my +letters from Ireland, has strangled enterprise, except in the North. +The ceaseless agitation of the revolutionary party has given rise to a +feeling of insecurity which deters capitalists from investing money in +Ireland. And it is only fair to say that a large majority of the most +intelligent men of every political colour concur in attributing much +of the poverty of Ireland to unrestricted Free Trade. Thus a variety +of causes have created land hunger, with its resulting land clamour, +which has brought about extraordinary legislation—extraordinary +because going far beyond the principles recognised by Republican +America, which in the first article of its Constitution draws the line +thus:—"<i>No State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of +contracts.</i>" Well might Lord Salisbury, in extending the Land Purchase +Act, carefully dissociate the Conservative party from the principle of +interference with free contract in the open market. In England a thing +is worth what it will fetch. It is not so in Ireland.</p> + +<p>A tenant can never be evicted unless a whole year's rent is due. The +landlord might want the land for himself or for his son, but he cannot +have it. The tenant must have six months' notice of eviction, and when +actually evicted can recover possession by paying what he owes, and in +that case the landlord becomes liable to the tenant for the crops on +the land, and for the profits he (the landlord) <i>might</i> have made. In +America the length of notice preceding eviction varies from three days +to thirty, the latter only in the State of Maine. Yet in Ireland, where +we hear so much of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_400" id="Page_400">[400]</a></span>brutal evictions, six months' notice is required, a +year's rent being due, this boon having been conferred by a "Coercion" +Government. An Irish tenant even when voluntarily leaving his farm must +be compensated by the landlord for all improvements made by himself or +his predecessors, or must be permitted to sell his improvements to the +incoming tenant. The tenant-right of a small farm is sometimes a +surprising sum. The moonlighting case I investigated at Newcastlewest, +Co. Limerick, arose from a tenant-right transaction, William Quirke +having bid £590 for the tenant-right of forty-nine acres formerly held +by J. Dore who was selling, as against £400 bid by Dore's cousin. +Quirke and three of his family were therefore shot in the legs, by way +of impressing the advisability of joining in the Onward march to +Freedom. But although the tenant is settled on the land for ever, and, +so long as he owes less than a year's rent, cannot be molested, it must +not be supposed that the rent he agreed to is unchangeable. Suppose the +tenant to be paying a judicial rent, which is decided by three persons, +one of them a lawyer, the other two acting respectively in the +interests of landlord and tenant, having examined and valued the farm. +Assume that the tenant gets more than a year behindhand. The landlord +desires to evict. Even then the tenant, by applying for another "Fair +Rent," can stay eviction. But while the rent may be lowered, the +landlord can never raise it under any circumstances. The law is +decidely one-sided. Leases may be broken. All leaseholders whose leases +would expire within ninety-nine years after the passing of the Land Act +of 1887 may go to Court, have their contracts broken, and a judicial +rent fixed. No countervailing advantage is given to the landlords. When +a tenant's valuation does not exceed £50, the Court before which +proceedings are being taken for the recovery of any debt, whether for +beef, bread, groceries, clothes, or whiskey, is empowered to stay +eviction, can allow the debtor to pay by instalments, and can extend +the time for such payment without limit. To the average British mind +this will smack of over-legislation, and serious Irishmen make the same +complaint. And still, to quote Father Mahony, of Cork, "still the Irish +peasant mourns, still groans beneath the cruel English yoke." The fact +is, he is almost killed with kindness. He is weighed down by the +multitude of benefactions. He reminds you of the tame sparrow you once +suffocated by overfeeding. So much has been done for him that he +naturally expects more, and instead of being grateful he grumbles more +than ever. He regards Mr. Gladstone as having acted under compulsion, +and as being an opportunist. The peasantry of Ireland have no respect +for the Grand Old Man. "Shure, we bate the bills out iv him. Shure, he +never gave us anythin' till we kicked it out iv his skin. Divil thank +him for doin' what we ordhered him to do."</p> + +<p>But perhaps the Tory Land Purchase Acts are most promising in, the +direction of finality. Lord Ashbourne's Act, as it was called (1885), +conferred on Irish tenants opportunities of purchasing <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_401" id="Page_401">[401]</a></span>their holdings +of quite an exceptional kind, and its scope and advantages were +enormously increased under the Land Purchase Act passed in 1891. If a +tenant wishes to buy his holding and arranges with his landlord as to +terms, he can change his position from an ordinary rentpayer into that +of a payer of an annuity, terminable in forty-nine years, and actually +less in amount than the rent! Most Irish landlords are willing to take +less than twenty years' purchase, but the tenants are by their leaders +advised not to buy. Otherwise the Government is prepared to advance +the necessary purchase money, to be repaid at the rate of four per +cent. per annum, which covers both principal and interest. Suppose the +tenant's rent to be £50, and that he agreed to buy at the seventeen +years' purchase so strongly discountenanced by the priest quoted in my +last. His rent or rather the annual payment substituted for rent, +would amount to £34, being a reduction of thirty-two per cent. If he +bought at fifteen years' purchase, rent £50, he would only pay £30 a +year, a reduction of forty per cent. If he bought at twenty years, +rent £50, he would have £40 a year to pay, being a reduction of twenty +per cent. In forty-nine years the holding would belong to him, or to +his children. In any case he must largely benefit. His rent is lower, +his share in the ownership is always becoming larger, and, if he +chooses, he can at any time sell his interest in the concern. Mr. +Palmer, of Tuam, said that those who had purchased under this Act were +happy and prosperous. Lord Shannon's tenants bought at twelve years' +purchase. In other words they exchanged their rent for one-half the +amount, payable to Government, the land to be their own in forty-nine +years. Lord Lansdowne's tenants agreed to buy at eighteen years' +purchase, all arrears to be forgiven on payment of half a year's rent. +These buyers are quiet and apparently contented. Their payments are +regular, and if they were left alone they would doubtless continue in +the path of rectitude. But the agitators, who find nick-names for +everything, have already begun to call this repayment of +purchase-money a Tribute to England; and the past history of Irish +leaders leads honest Irishmen, as well as Englishmen, to the +conviction that, once an Irish Parliament were established, with an +Irish constabulary under its rule, a No Tribute campaign would ensue, +which would lead to deplorable results. The privileges of Irish +tenants are far more numerous than I have space to indicate, but +perhaps enough has been said to give a clear idea of the chief causes +and effects of land hunger in Ireland.</p> + +<p>The remedy, in the opinion of many advanced and enlightened Home +Rulers, must come from a Tory Government. From the multitude of +counsellors I met in the thirty-two counties of Ireland, I will select +two who represent the vast majority of able men of every political +party. Mr. Thomas Manley said:—"Settle the land question, reform the +Poor Laws and the Grand Jury laws, and reclaim the land, which would +pay ten per cent." Mr. Mason, of Mullingar, said:—"The whole +agitation would be knocked on the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[402]</a></span>head by the introduction of a +severe land measure. Previous legislation has been very severe, and I +do not say that a further measure would be just and equitable. I +merely say that the people do not want Home Rule, but that they want +the advantages which they are told will accrue from Home Rule." And so +said everyone.</p> + +<p>To settle the land question is to settle everything. Religious +animosity would be silenced by self-interest. The operation of the +Land Purchase Act has undoubtedly done much to turn the people using +its provisions into good Conservatives—law-abiding and +law-supporting, as having a stake in the country. The people have not +the land for nothing but they look forward to its becoming honestly +their own, and meanwhile they enjoy the security insured by the +Government of England. In any attempt to settle this great problem, a +Conservative Government would probably be largely supported by the +landlords themselves, while the rank and file of Ireland would look +with respect and confidence on any bill bearing the honoured name of +Balfour. But how shall we decide the scope and character of such a +final Land Bill? I do not hesitate to say that it must contain a very +strong infusion of the compulsory element. The great measure of 1891 +is generous to a fault, but it is voluntary, and the result is that +the tenants who give greatest trouble—the poor, idle, ignorant dupes +of a scheming priesthood and a corrupt political conspiracy—never +come under its benefits, because they unquestioningly accept the +advice given them to wait until an Irish Parliament lets them have the +land for nothing.</p> + +<p>Compulsion is not required for the landlords half so much as it is for +the tenants. The conclusion arrived at may be stated in a few words. +Perhaps it may be worthy the consideration of our brilliant and +far-seeing Unionist leaders:—</p> + +<div class="block4"><p>The Land Purchase Act, 1891, should be amended by a Bill +providing (1) That the existing Land Commission shall be +strengthened in order to form a Court to which either Landlords +or Tenants shall have the right to apply for an order of the +Court placing them under the provisions of the Act of 1891, or +such extension of that Act as may hereafter be made. (2) It +should be the duty of the Court to inquire into the relations of +landlord and tenant, the condition of the estate and of the +tenants, and such other circumstances as may in the wisdom of the +Court seem necessary. (3) If the Court decides to issue an order, +the parties shall at once be placed in the same position as if +they had entered into a mutual agreement under the Land Purchase +Act, 1891; but it shall be the duty of the Court to fix the +number of years' purchase; and it shall have power either to +restrict or to enlarge the number of holdings over which its +order shall take effect.</p></div> + +<p>This is offered as the mere germ of a suggestion. I am familiar with +the arguments that may be brought against it. For the most part they +can be urged with equal effect against the whole system of +interference with that freedom of contract <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[403]</a></span>which prevails in England +and Scotland, but which, as I have pointed out, has already been +destroyed in Ireland. What I claim is that there <i>must</i> be a means of +defeating such a conspiracy to make the law inoperative as that +practised—to the grave detriment of Irish tenants' interests—by the +omnipresent agencies of the National League, ever since the Unionist +party set itself to solve the agrarian sources of Irish discontent.</p> + +<p class="date">Birmingham, August 14th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_61_CLERICAL_DOMINATION_AND_ITS_CONSEQUENCES" id="No_61_CLERICAL_DOMINATION_AND_ITS_CONSEQUENCES"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>No. 61.—CLERICAL DOMINATION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettert.png" alt="T" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />hose who play at bowls must expect rubbers. The Roman priesthood of +Ireland having assumed the manipulation of Irish politics, have laid +themselves open to mundane criticism. Said Mr. Gladstone:—"It is the +peculiarity of Roman theology that by thrusting itself into the +temporal domain, it naturally, and even necessarily, comes to be a +frequent theme of political discussion." Priestly pretensions to +authority are without limit. The Catholic clergy of Ireland claim the +right to coerce the laity in political matters, themselves remaining +exempt from public criticism. They also claim to be exempt from civil +jurisdiction, and to have the right of overruling the law of the land, +with every moral obligation, when clashing with the interests of the +Church. They distinctly teach that every political question is a +question of morals, and that to vote against the priest's instructions +is a deadly sin. Such being a few of the claims advanced by the Irish +priesthood, let us see on what rests the hope of these extraordinary +demands being recognised. A.M. Sullivan, a Roman Catholic Nationalist +M.P., says:—"Of all Catholic nations or countries in the world—the +Tyrol alone excepted—Ireland is perhaps the most Papal, the most +ultramontane. In Ireland religious conviction—what may be called +active Catholicism—marks the population, enters into their daily life +and thought and action. The churches are crowded as well by men as by +women, and in every sacrament and ceremony of their religion +participation is extensive and earnest. Reverence for the sacerdotal +character is so deep and strong as to be called superstition by +observers who belong to a different faith; and devotion to the Pope, +attachment to the Roman See, is probably more intense in Ireland than +in any other part of the habitable globe, the Leonine city itself not +excluded." In other words, the Irish are more Roman than the Romans +themselves. Here we have on the one hand the claims of the Romish +priesthood, and on the other the disposition of the Irish people. But +as the alleged claims will to the majority of Englishmen appear +monstrous and incredible, it becomes necessary to prove that these +claims are actually made.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[404]</a></span>The fall of Parnell brought the clergy into striking prominence. The +powerful personality of the Irish leader, his great popularity, and +his determination to rule alone, had to some extent forced the Church +into the background. Parnell once removed, the Church at once aimed at +undivided rule, directing all her energies to this end mercilessly and +without scruple. Her instruments were worthy of the work. The modern +Irish priest is usually low-bred, vulgar, and ignorant. The priest of +Lever's novels, brimming over with animal spirits, full of <i>bonhomie</i>, +sparkling with wit and abounding with jovial good-nature, is nowhere +to be found. The men of the olden time were educated in France, and by +rubbing against the cultured professors of Douai or Saint Omer, had +acquired a polish, a breadth of view, a <i>savoir faire</i>, denied to the +illiterate hordes of Maynooth. The olden priest was loyal, just as +cultured Irishmen who have travelled, whether in America, England, or +elsewhere, are loyal and averse to Home Rule. The modern priest, +usually the son of an Irishman such as visits England at harvest time, +brought up amidst squalor and filth, is in full sympathy with the +limited ideas of the peasantry among whom he was reared. The +conversation of his parents and associates would relate to the burden +of the Saxon yoke, and his surroundings would perpetually re-echo the +stories of Ireland's wrongs and woes. Any literature he might absorb +would be a priest-written history of Ireland, with the rebel doggerel +of 1798 and the more seductive sedition of later years. At Maynooth he +meets a crowd of students like himself, crammed to the throat with his +own prejudices, viewing everything from the same standpoint. He +returns to the people a full blown ecclesiastic, saturated with a +sense of his own importance and the absolute supremacy of the Church +he represents; knowing nothing of mankind outside his own narrow +sphere, profoundly ignorant of the world's political systems, and +intensely inimical to England. Average Keltic priests fully bear out +the description furnished by a loyal priest of Donegal, who, on +alluding to their social status and Maynooth course, said:—"They are +merely shaved labourers, stall-fed for three years."</p> + +<p>As to their exceptional claims. The attitude of omniscience and +omnipotence has often been crudely stated by the Catholic hierarchy. +Archbishop Walsh, of Dublin, has declared that there is no dividing +line between religion and politics. Dr. Walsh has also laid down the +dictum that, "As priests and independent of all human organisations, +we have an inalienable and indisputable right to guide our people in +every proceeding where the interests of Catholics as well as the +interests of Irish nationality are involved." This prelate rescinded +the wholesome rule enforced by his predecessors, forbidding the clergy +to take part in political demonstrations. He went further. He ordered +that at all political conventions an <i>ex-officio</i> vote should be given +to the priests. It is in view of this fact that the Unionists of +Ireland not unreasonably declare that under a Home Rule Bill the Roman +Catholic clergy <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[405]</a></span>would become endowed with civil privileges which +would make them absolute rulers of Ireland. It may be urged that +Bishop Walsh is discredited at Rome, and that therefore his utterances +may be somewhat discounted. But what of the new Irish Cardinal, +Archbishop Logue, of Armagh? He agrees with Dr. Walsh, and with +reference to the Parnellite split, thus delivers himself:—"We are +face to face with a grave disobedience to ecclesiastical authority! +The doctrines of the present day are calculated to wean the people +from the priests' advice, to separate the priests from the people, and +<i>to let the people use their own judgment</i>!" Surely nothing could be +clearer or more uncompromising than this. Bishop Nulty, alluding to +the refusal of Mr. Redmond's political party to accept without +question the political commands of the Church, thus hinted at the +consequences to recalcitrant Papists:—"It is exclusively through us +that the clean and holy oblation of the mass is offered daily for the +living and the dead on the thousands of altars throughout our country. +It is through our ministry that the poor penitent gets forgiveness of +his sins in the Sacrament of Penance. The dying Parnellite will hardly +dare to face the justice of his creator till he has been prepared and +anointed by us for the last awful struggle and for the terrible +judgment that will immediately follow it." This threat of eternal +damnation was eagerly taken up and re-echoed by the inferior clergy. +Father Patrick O'Connell speaking from the altar at Ballinabrackey +said that no Parnellite could receive the sacrament worthily, and +warned all parents against allowing their sons or daughters to attend +a Parnellite meeting, as it was not a merely political matter, but a +matter of their holy religion. In his sermon he referred to a meeting +of the political party favoured by the Church, and said that every +man, woman, and child must be present. All must assemble at the +chapel, and all must be in time to walk in procession to the place of +meeting. He would be there with Father McLoughlin, and the pair would +go round to see who was absent. All absentees must let him know the +reason why, and if the reason did not satisfy him he would meet them +in the highways and in the byways, at the Communion rails, and would +"set fire to their heels and toes." He would make it hot for them. +There would be no compromise. All voters against clerical instruction +he denounced as "infidels and heretics." Mr. Edward Weir, who was +suspected of having opinions of his own, was denounced in Castlejordan +Chapel as a 'Pigotted Guardian.' He was a member of the Poor Law +Board. He was threatened to be 'met at the communion rails,' by which +he understood that the sacrament would be refused to him. Two nights +afterwards the hedge around his house was set on fire, and fire was +placed on the gate in front of it. This was a gentle hint that the +people were backing the priest, and that unless he complied his house +might be next destroyed. When Mr. Michael Saurin, J.P., a member of +the Ballinabrackey congregation, went to vote, the door of the booth +was crammed to keep him out. The crowd booed and shouted at him, and +he was spat upon. The priests were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[406]</a></span>present in force. Nicholas Cooney +was also spat upon, and so was his brother, both on their clothes and +in their faces. Father Woods was looking on. Matthew Brogan, who was +also thought to be against clerical dictation, was refused admission +to mass; and not only poor Matthew himself, but his son, +daughter-in-law, her children, and two friends who were suspected of +sympathy. The woman insisted on entering the chapel, when one of the +crowd of true believers "near cut the hand off her." Michael Kenny and +Peter Fagan were served with the same sauce by these enthusiastic +preachers of the Onward March to Freedom, poor Fagan exhibiting the +touching devotion of the Irish peasantry by kneeling outside during +the whole of the service. Englishmen do not realise what these +refusals mean to Irish Catholics. They constitute the cruellest and +most effective coercion possible. To be refused the sacraments, to be +turned away from the door of his chapel, is to the Irish peasant a +turning away from the gates of Paradise, a denial of the Kingdom of +Heaven, a condemnation to everlasting torment, to say nothing of the +accompanying odium in which he is held by his neighbours and +associates, and the ever present dread of boycotting. Thomas Brogan +dare not leave the polling-booth for his life, until Mr. Carew took +him on his car. He had been threatened by the priest, who drew a +circle round him with a walking stick, to show that he was cut off +from his fellows, and that contamination must be feared. Patrick +Hogan, whose views were not in accordance with those of the priest, +was afraid to vote. He went to the booth, but feared to proceed. +Thomas Dunn was more plucky, but his temerity resulted in a cut face +and a black eye for his wife at the hands of a patriot named James +Mitchell. Father McEntee tore down a party flag belonging to the +station-master of Drumree, a Parnellite, and jumped on it, in a +towering rage, saying that the owner must follow the instructions of +the Bishop. He then threw the flag into a field. Father Crinnion, of +Batterstown, standing in his vestments at the altar, called out the +names of all persons supposed to be disaffected to the clerical cause, +and ordered them to meet him in the vestry after mass. He asked for +their votes, and showed a ballot paper. He had previously read in +chapel the opinion of Bishop Nulty, quoted above. Father Tynan told +Patrick King that unless he voted "straight" he would not receive the +sacraments on his deathbed. The same priest told John Cowley, of +Kilcavan, that unless he voted for the right candidate he would be +expelled from the Church, and would be deprived of Christian burial +when he died. Cases of this kind might be multiplied <i>ad infinitum</i>. +Father Shaw, of Longwood, accentuated the horrible condition of the +party who refused to vote under his orders by asking his congregation +to pray for them. Father Cassidy sailed on the same tack, and besides +thanked God that the "wrong 'uns" were so few. Father Fay, of Cool, +said (between the Gospels) that his political opponents should be +"treated like wild beasts," and that he would never forget the men who +voted against his orders. Thomas Darby was canvassed by his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_407" id="Page_407">[407]</a></span>priest, +who, on finding that his parishioner was pledged the other way, curtly +said, "Then you'll go to hell," to which Darby replied that he would +at any rate have a few companions. James Guerin has no confidence in +the secrecy of illiterate voting, for after voting in the presence of +a priest he had to jump a wall and hide in a wood to escape the +vengeance of the people. When he came out, at ten o'clock at night, he +was stoned. Father O'Donnell, presumably in the interests of peace, +advised his congregation to take their sticks to a certain meeting, +and promised to be there with his own faithful blackthorn. The peasant +Fagan, who said his prayers outside the chapel, was burned in effigy, +but priestly displeasure was not satisfied until his cowshed, with a +cart and harness were also destroyed by fire. To have independent +opinions costs something substantial in Ireland. The aspirations of a +People and the Onward March to Freedom are not kept up for nothing. +The patriots are not afraid of their trouble. They will not spoil the +Union of Hearts for want of a little incendiarism. Now and then, but +very seldom, the priests meet their match. They presume on their +spiritual immunity. The priest who refused to leave a house into which +he had intruded was threatened by Colonel Dopping with expulsion. +"Dare to touch my consecrated body," said the "shaved labourer." "Your +consecrated body be hanged!" said the Colonel, and out went Father +McFadden. Father Fay, of Summerhill, said in a sermon delivered at +Dangan:—"You must not look upon me as a mere man! The priest is the +ambassador of Jesus Christ, and not like other ambassadors either. He +carries his Lord and master about with him, and when the priest is +with the people, Almighty God is with them!" Father Fagan, of +Kildalkey, was so vexed with the refusal of John Murtagh to vote +according to clerical instructions that he said:—"May the landlords +come and hunt the whole of ye to hell's blazes." Murtagh said, "Ye +wish yer neighbour well, Sorr!" The man of God threatened to kick poor +Murtagh into the ditch, to which the erring parishioner replied that +in that case he would kick the good shepherd like a puppy. "Ah," said +Father Fagan, "you ruffian, you'll want me at the Last Day," and +refused to hear his wife's confession. The woman was dying, the +husband had been for the priest, and on the way to what proved a +death-bed, Father Fagan improved the shining hour by trying to nobble +a straying vote. The clergy make the most of their opportunities. At +Boardmills Father Skelly spread out a ballot paper on the altar at +Sunday service. Having described the situation of the names, he +pointed out where they were to make the cross. He then went on with +the mass. He thought of something else! Some of them, he hinted, were +pledged to the other side. They could shout for this candidate, but +when they went to vote they must "wink the other eye," as advised by +the music-hall song. Colonel Nolan, M.P., when canvasing at Headford, +was violently assaulted by a priest, who cut open the Parnellite head +with a stout blackthorn. Like a good Catholic, the Colonel would fain +have endured this clerical <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_408" id="Page_408">[408]</a></span>argument; but the police authorities +insisted on the matter seeing the light.</p> + +<p>Clerical domination and the means by which it is attained are +therefore proven by undeniable evidence. The Papal hierarchy and their +subordinates are resolved to be supreme. <i>Aut Cæsar, aut nullus.</i> And +it is a striking fact that by none is this doctrine so strongly +deprecated, so bitterly resented, as by the educated and enlightened +portion of Roman Catholic Ireland. <i>Their</i> aspirations are all on the +side of toleration, harmony and peaceful progress. <i>They</i> are not only +law-abiding, but loyal, and unlike the ignorant clergy and their still +more ignorant dupes, are ever ready to join in singing "God Save the +Queen." From an English, even a Conservative point of view, the +educated Catholics of Ireland, like all classes of English Catholics, +are everything that can be desired. But what are they among so many?</p> + +<p>The consequences of clerical domination, obtained by spiritual and +physical intimidation, are obvious enough. I have not space to show +how the system has been carried into the confessional, but numerous +examples are on record. Neither was it within the scope of this +article to prove, as could easily be done, that the clergy of Rome +claim to be above and outside the action of the statute law, and that +their action is calculated to make the position of Protestants +untenable. The moral degradation of the people, as exemplified by +their dread of the priest, who escorts them in hundreds to the +polling-booth, and by his persistent action and untiring vigilance +exploits their electoral power for his own aggrandisement, and for the +acquisition of Papal supremacy in Ireland, is to Englishmen of all +considerations the most important. Recent events have demonstrated the +fact that the politics of Ireland—and therefore the politics of +England—can be almost completely controlled for any purpose by the +thirty prelates who practically command the votes of an entire people. +A Roman Catholic barrister said to me:—"I do not blame the priests +for doing the best they can for themselves. They have the power, and +they use it for their own purposes. I say they use it unfairly, and +the Meath election petition has proved that they use it illegally. +They think otherwise, but without arguing this point, I say that +clerical domination will ruin the country. Irish election returns are +for the most part worthless as an expression of public opinion." +Another talented Irishman said:—"The glorious British Empire is now +bossed by a party of priests." And that this is unhappily true must be +conceded by every observant and impartial Englishman.</p> + +<p>Yet some there are, blind followers of the blind, obtuse to every +argument, impregnable to incontrovertible facts, who have cast in +their lot with the avowed enemies of England. They have their +day—every dog has it—but their day is far spent, and their night is +at hand. For England will never again submit to Romish rule. Nor will +Ireland when her eyes are opened.</p> + +<p class="date">Birmingham, August 16th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="No_62_CIVIL_WAR_A_CERTAINTY_OF_HOME_RULE" id="No_62_CIVIL_WAR_A_CERTAINTY_OF_HOME_RULE"></a><hr /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_409" id="Page_409">[409]</a></span><br /> + +<h3>No. 62.—CIVIL WAR A CERTAINTY OF HOME RULE.<span class="totoc"><a href="#toc">ToC</a></span></h3> +<br /> + +<p class="noin"><img src="images/lettere.png" alt="E" style="margin-right: .25em; float: left;" />nglish supporters of Mr. Gladstone affect to ridicule the fears of +armed and organised conflict between the rival races and religions of +Ireland. Their attitude in this respect is doubtless due to a slavish +following of their master. They keep their eye upon their figure-head. +When it frowns they become serious. When it smiles they try to be +funny. When it assumes an aspect of virtuous indignation, the tears +immediately spring to their eyes, and they go about saying what a +shame it is. They remind you of Professor Anderson and his +Inexhaustible Bottle. Like Paddy Byrne's barometer, they are "stuck +fast at Changeable." They are always on the move. Like Virgil's lady, +they are <i>varium et mutabile</i>. Like Shakespeare's gentlemen, they are +Deceivers ever, One foot on shore and one foot on sea, To one thing +constant never. Every morning they nervously scan the journals to see +what change of sentiment is required. Without this precaution they +would run the risk of meeting their political friends with the wrong +facial expression. The reason for all this is well known. Their motto +is <i>ad exemplum regis</i>. To-day Mr. Gladstone believes (or says he +believes) that if Ireland were left to herself, and the disturbing, +domineering, tyrannising influence of England were removed, the rival +races and religions would live together in perfect harmony and +brotherly love. His followers eagerly adopt this belief. But yesterday +Mr. Gladstone believed (or said he believed) "That the influence of +Great Britain in every Irish difficulty is not a domineering and +tyrannising, but a softening and mitigating influence, and that were +Ireland left to her own unaided agencies, it might be that the strife +of parties would then burst forth in a form calculated to strike +horror through the land." His followers believed that too, and they +would believe it again to-morrow if their leader harked back. The +quotation is from Hansard, and commences, "It is my firm belief." What +do Mr. Gladstone's infirm beliefs resemble?</p> + +<p>Putting aside the changeable Premier, gyrating like a dancing dervish, +and his Penny-in-the-slot party, let us call respectable evidence; let +us hear the opinion of competent and trustworthy witnesses; let us +examine the character of the forces which will be brought into +antagonism; let us observe what steps have been taken in view of +possibilities more or less remote; and then let us form our own +conclusions. And first as to opinions and evidence, let us hear Mr. +J.A. Froude, of all English historians the most famous expert on Irish +subjects. "The effect of Grattan's Constitution was to stimulate +political agitation and the conflict of the two races." That was a +Home Rule Parliament. And again Mr. Froude says:—"Ireland is +geographically and politically attached to this country, and cannot be +allowed to leave us if she wishes. In passing over the executive power +to an Irish Parliament we only increase the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_410" id="Page_410">[410]</a></span>difficulty of retaining +Ireland. We shall alienate the loyal part of the population, who will +regard themselves as betrayed. The necessity of reconquest will +remain, but the evils of it and the bloodshed to be occasioned by it +will be infinitely enhanced. Such respect for law and order as exists +in Ireland is entirely due to English authority. Remove it, and the +old anarchy will and must return. If the Home Rule Bill is passed +there will be a dangerous and desperate war, in which other countries +may take part who would gladly see our power broken." In Mr. Froude's +opinion, there would be war between England and Ireland, as well as +between Ulster and the South. His last sentence is curiously confirmed +by the <i>Irish Daily Independent</i>, which says:—"What England forgets +is the fact that when next Ireland fights she will not fight alone." +This is not a warning, like the prophecy of Mr. Froude, it is a +threat, for the <i>Independent</i> is not only a Nationalist, but an +intensely anti-English paper. Another great historian, Mr. Lecky, thus +expresses himself:—"The Parliament Mr. Gladstone proposes to set up +would be in violent hostility to the richest and most industrious +portion of the community. It is regarded with horror by nearly every +man who is a leader of industry in Ireland. All the great names in +Irish finance, manufacture, and trade are against it, and the men who +would undoubtedly lead it are men whom Mr. Gladstone not long ago +described with great justice as preaching the doctrine of public +plunder." The state of feeling here indicated could have but one +result; but Mr. Lecky is still more precise. "The assertion that Irish +Catholics have never shown any jealousy of Irish Protestants is of a +kind which I find it difficult to characterise with proper moderation. +Jealousy, unhappily, is far too feeble a word to describe adequately +the fierce reciprocal animosity which has dislocated Ireland for +centuries. It blazed into a furious flame in the religious wars of +Elizabeth, in the great rebellion of 1642, in the Jacobite struggle of +1689, in the religious war into which the rebellion of 1798 speedily +degenerated. These facts are about as conspicuous in the history of +Ireland as Magna Charta and the Commonwealth in the history of +England. No one who knows Ireland will deny that the policy of Mr. +Gladstone has contributed more than any other single cause to revive +and deepen the divisions which every good Irishman deplores." Mr. +Lecky believes that history repeats itself, and that the establishment +of an Irish Parliament would lead to a great Irish convulsion, similar +to those which he refers. My experience among Irish Churchmen +convinces me that their feeling is understated in the petition signed +by nearly fifteen thousand select vestrymen, and adopted by the +general Synod, "That we regard the measure as fraught with peril to +our civil and religious liberties, which are our prized inheritance; +that conflicts of interest and collisions of authority would create a +condition of frequent irritation and intolerable strain." The +Methodists in full Conference gave it as their opinion "That in the +judgment of this committee the bill, if <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_411" id="Page_411">[411]</a></span>it were to become law, so far +from being a message of peace to Ireland, would be a most fruitful +occasion of distressing discord and strife; that class would be +arrayed against class and party against party with a virulence now +rare and unknown; and that the inevitable result would be the +overturning of all order and good government." What does this mean if +not civil war? Be it understood that the existing feeling is now being +demonstrated by appeal to the most reliable authorities, all speaking +under a due sense of responsibility, and therefore with a studied +moderation. The Presbyterians, a numerous and powerful body, speaking +in the General Assembly, after declaring that the proposed measure +imperils their civil and religious liberties, and expressing their +determined opposition to an Irish Legislature and Executive, +controlled by men "marching through rapine to the dismemberment of the +Empire," whom a Special Commission found to be guilty of a criminal +Conspiracy, and who invented, supported, and tried to justify the Land +League, the Plan of Campaign, and boycotting—after this preamble, the +Presbyterians declare that the bill is "calculated to embitter the +hostility of conflicting creeds and parties in Ireland." The United +Presbyterian Church of Scotland resolved at a meeting of its Irish +Presbytery "that Home Rule would greatly intensify the antagonism now +existing between the two peoples inhabiting Ireland." The Quakers come +out pretty strong. They first ask to be believed. They hope that +Englishmen will give credence to the sincerity of their convictions +and the disinterestedness of their motives, and then they say that +Home Rule "cannot fail to be disastrous to Ireland, and must tend to +perpetuate and intensify the strife and discord which we have so long +lamented and which we earnestly desire, so far as in us lies, to +mitigate and allay." These protests are not all from Ulster. Every +Grand Jury in Ireland has expressed itself in similar terms. The +leading mercantile men of the three southern provinces of Ireland have +declared in writing that "the Bill of the Government throws amongst us +a new apple of discord, and plunges Ireland again into a state of +political and party ferment." Pages of quotation might be added. But +if those already adduced are not sufficient to satisfy my readers as +to the feeling of the Irish Unionist party, they would hardly be +persuaded though one rose from the dead.</p> + +<p>The feeling of the other party is still stronger, and has been so +often and openly expressed as to stand in no need of proof. Mr. Dillon +has threatened to "manage Ulster;" and others have over and over again +declared that the Protestant settlers are not Irishmen, and therefore +have no right in the country. The lower classes of Irish Nationalists +regard an Irish Legislature as an instrument to secure ascendency and +plunder. The ruling idea is loot. The Unionists are determined at all +costs to maintain religious equality and to hold their own. In Ulster +masters and men, landlords and tenants, are of one mind. They do not +bluster and brag. Those who represent them as rowdies do them +grievous <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_412" id="Page_412">[412]</a></span>wrong. They are sober, thrifty, industrious, pious. In +character they resemble Cromwell's Puritans, or the Scottish +Covenanters of old, and no wonder, for they are of the same stock. +They are by nature kindly and peaceful, but they become dangerous +indeed on the points of liberty, religion, and property. We can partly +judge their future by their past. In the dark and troublous days of +rebellion they held the country for England, established a police, did +for Ireland all that Government neglected to do, and then, having +restored order, the small but mighty minority threw aside their arms +and went back to their work. They are before everything industrial. +Wars and rumours of wars they detest, as injurious to trade, as well +as to higher interests. But when they take off their coats they always +win. They put into their efforts, whether in war or peace, such a +strenuous determination, such an unwavering resolution to succeed, +that they become invincible. They have the confidence inspired by +invariable success. Their opponents have the flabbiness and the lack +of self-reliance resulting from seven hundred years of whining and +querulous complaint. If Mr. Gladstone were to offer complete +separation to-morrow the Irish leaders dare not take it. They know +what would happen if Ulster took the field. Spite of their boasting, +Dillon & Co. know full well that their vaunted numbers would avail +them naught.</p> + +<p>The venerable William Arthur, a Nonconformist minister, says:—"We +will not be put under a Parliament in Dublin. The Imperial franchise +and all which that guarantees is our birthright. No man shall take it +from us. We will never sell it. If Englishmen and Scotchmen will not +let us live and die in the freedom we were born to, they will have to +come and kill us. On that ground stands the strongest party in +Ireland. For as sure as the Home Rule party is the larger, so surely +is the Unionist party the stronger. Ask any military man who has spent +a few years in the country. Settle the Irish question by putting the +stronger party under the weaker! You would only change a count of +heads into a trial of strength. Instead of the polling-booth, where +nothing counts but heads, you would set for the two parties another +trysting place. There brains count, education counts, purses count, +habits of hard work count, habits of command and habits of obedience +count, habits of success count, delight in overcoming difficulties +count, northern tenacity counts, and there are other things which I do +not mention that would count. Let not the two parties be summoned to +that trysting place!"</p> + +<p>During my visit to Belfast I had exceptional opportunities of +ascertaining the probabilities of armed resistance to the authority of +a Dublin Parliament. I visited what might fairly be called the Ulster +War Department, and there saw regular preparation for an open +campaign, the arrangements being under the most able and expert +superintendence. The tables were covered with documents connected with +the sale and purchase of rifles and munitions of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_413" id="Page_413">[413]</a></span>war. One of them set +forth the particulars of a German offer of two hundred and forty-five +thousand Mauser rifles, the arm lately discarded by the Prussian +Government, with fifty million cartridges. As I had frequent +opportunities of observing the manufacture of a hundred and fifty +thousand of these weapons by the National Arms and Ammunition Company +of Sparkbrook, I noted the present quotation, which was 16s. each, the +cartridges to be thrown in for nothing. Another offer referred to a +hundred and forty-nine thousand stand of arms with thirty million +cartridges. There were numerous offers from Birmingham, and a large +consignment of rifles and bayonets were about to be delivered in +Ireland, the entire freight of a small steamer, at a place which I was +then forbidden to mention, but which I may now say was Portaferry. An +enormous correspondence was submitted to me in confidence, and I was +surprised to see how deep and sincere was the sympathy of the working +men of England, who with gentlemen of position and influence, and +rifle volunteers by thousands were offering their aid in the field +should the bill become law. I saw a letter from a distinguished +English soldier with an offer of five hundred pounds and two hundred +men. Money was coming in plentifully, and all the correspondence was +unsought. The office had over fifty thousand pounds in hand, and +promises for more than half a million. The forces at that moment, +organised and drilled, numbered 164,614, all duly enrolled and pledged +to act together anywhere and at any time, many of them already well +armed, and the remainder about to be furnished with modern weapons. +The Government was becoming nervous. An order from headquarters +required a complete survey of the three barracks of Belfast, with an +exhaustive report as to their defensive capabilities. Plans of +existing musketry loopholes were to be made, and commanding officers +were to state if it would be advisable to add to them. Suggestions +were invited, and Mr. Morley, who at that very moment was telling +Parliament that no precautions were being taken, wanted to know if the +said barracks could be held against an organised force of civilians, +arriving unexpectedly, and when Tommy Atkins was taking his walks +abroad. At the same time, military officers were being secretly sworn +in as magistrates. Does this look like the fear of civil war? These +statements, made in the <i>Gazette</i> five months ago, have not been +contradicted. The rank and file of the English Home Rule party know +nothing of this—and by what their priestly allies would call +"invincible ignorance" they may be excused their inability to believe +in stern resistance to anything. The party of surrender are totally +incapable of understanding that men exist who would lay down their +lives for a principle. Mr. Gladstone and his Items, like the Irish +leaders and their dupes, are easily overmastered. You have only to +stand up to them, and they curl up like mongrel curs. But for this +fact were would be no Home Rule Bill. Of the two parties the Irish +were the stoutest, and the weakest went to the wall. The English <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_414" id="Page_414">[414]</a></span>Home +Rulers cannot conceive that their conquerors could be easily beaten, +or even that men can be found to meet them on the field. On the +contrary, the men of Ulster who know these heroes hold them in deepest +contempt, and in the event of an appeal to arms would treat them as so +many mice. Spite of their Army of Independence, the Nationalists +tacitly admit this, and would defer separation until they have first +by legislative enactments driven away "the English garrison," or +compelled Ulster in self-defence to declare against English rule. And, +strange to say, they propose to use to this end the force of English +arms. They calculate on the resistance of Ulster as a measure of +assistance to their own ultimate purposes. "All we have to do is to +stand by while British soldiers shoot them down like dogs." That is +their expectation, as expressed by one of themselves. Their plans are +well hid. But "The best-laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft agley," +as the priest-governed schemers may find to their cost.</p> + +<p>A second and more recent sojourn in Ulster deepened the impression +given by my first visit. Throughout the province the feeling is still +the same—an immovable determination to resist at all hazards the +imposts of a Dublin Parliament. They will have no acts or part in it. +They will send no members, they will pay no taxes, they will not +accord to it one jot or tittle of authority. They will offer armed +resistance to any force of police or Sheriff's officers acting under +warrants issued by the College Green legislators. Resistance to the +Queen's authority they regard as altogether out of the question. But +it remains to be seen whether British troops will "shoot them down +like dogs." The Ulstermen think not, and they have good reasons for +this opinion. The mere threat of Home Rule in 1886 cost forty lives in +the streets of Belfast alone. Who can say what would be the results of +the bill becoming law? Surely every reliable test points in one +direction. The Gladstonian party, without a shadow of reason, have +affected to doubt the courage and resolution of the Northerners, but +the breed of the men and their long history are a sufficient answer to +these cavillers. True it is that their courage has not been +demonstrated by murder, by shooting from behind a wall, or the +battering out of a policeman's brains, a hundred against one, or the +discharging of snipe-shot into the legs of old women and young +children, after the fashion so popular with the party with whom Mr. +Gladstone and his heterogeneous crew are now acting. But for all that, +the pluck and tenacity of Ulstermen are undeniable. Their cause is +good, and left to themselves they would win hands down.</p> + +<p>It is therefore demonstrated by a consensus of the weightiest +authorities and by the results of personal investigation that not only +would civil war between Irish parties be the inevitable result of Home +Rule, but that there would also be war between Ireland and England; +that Irish Unionists are determined to resist to the last, and that +they possess the means of resistance. They are touched on the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_415" id="Page_415">[415]</a></span>subjects they hold most sacred—religion, freedom, property; and +despite the assurances of Mr. Gladstone, who desires to judge the +Nationalist party by their future, the keen Ulstermen prefer to judge +them by their past. And bearing these things in mind, it is not +unreasonable to say that Englishmen who support the present policy of +the Separatist party are at once enemies of Ireland and traitors to +their native land.</p> + +<p>And now my task as your Special Commissioner in Ireland is at an end. +Without fear or favour I have described the country as I found it, and +have exposed the character and the motives of the men to whom Mr. +Gladstone would entrust its future government. I was no bigoted +partisan when my task began, but in a period of six months I have +traversed the country from end to end, and at every step my first +impressions have been deepened. It would be a folly—yea, it would be +a crime—to withdraw from Ireland that mitigating influence of British +rule which alone prevents a lovely island becoming the foul and +blood-stained arena of remorseless sectarian strife.</p> + +<p>Birmingham, August 18th.</p> + +<br /> +<br /> + +<div class="img"> +<img border="0" src="images/finis.png" width="25%" alt="FINIS" /> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<div class="img"><a name="map" id="map"></a> +<a href="images/map.jpg"> +<img border="0" src="images/map-tn.jpg" width="50%" alt="Map of Ireland Shewing Route" /></a><br /> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<a name="GENERAL_INDEX" id="GENERAL_INDEX"></a><hr /> +<br /> + +<h3>GENERAL INDEX</h3> +<br /> + +<ul><li><span class="sc">Achil Islands</span>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Agriculture</span>, Mr. Balfour's aids to, <a href="#Page_179">179</a> and <a href="#Page_370">370</a>.</li> + +<li>"<span class="sc">All You Want</span>," an Irish Programme, <a href="#Page_331">331</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">American</span> Tourist's Opinion, <a href="#Page_7">7</a> and <a href="#Page_31">31</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Help for Ireland, <a href="#Page_329">329</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Aran Islands</span>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Armagh</span>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ashbourne Act</span>, Happy results of, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Athenry</span>, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Balfour</span>, Right Hon. A.J., reception in Belfast, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>reception in Dublin, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>;</li> + <li>Galway Fisheries, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>;</li> + <li>Ditto, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>;</li> + <li>The Man for Ireland, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>;</li> + <li>Aids Agriculture, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>;</li> + <li>Secret of Success, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>;</li> + <li>List of his Light Railways, <a href="#Page_387">387</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ballymena</span>, Description of, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Banks</span>, Effects of Home Rule Bill on, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Beggars</span>, Irish, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>, and <a href="#Page_378">378</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Belfast</span>, Newcastle Miners in, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Belfast and Dublin Corporations compared, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>;</li> + <li>Chamber of Commerce, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>;</li> + <li>Riots of 1886, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>;</li> + <li>Later Opinions, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Blarney Stone</span>, The, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Bodyke</span>, Visit to, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>History of Estate, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>;</li> + <li>Evictions at, <a href="#Page_106">106</a> and <a href="#Page_109">109</a>;</li> + <li>Tenants could Pay, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Boycotting</span> (<i>see also</i> Outrage, &c.). + <ul class="nest"> + <li>The Darcy Family, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Strachan, of Tuam, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>;</li> + <li>Children Starving, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>;</li> + <li>For expressing Political Opinions, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>;</li> + <li>Father Humphreys on, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>;</li> + <li>Mrs. Taylor's Case, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Boyne</span>, Battle of the, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Bundoran</span>, Attack on Protestants at, <a href="#Page_384">384</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Cables</span>, Nationalists and Atlantic, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Chamberlain</span>, Right Hon. J., and Mr. Dillon, <a href="#Page_297">297</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Cappawhite</span>, Assault, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Capital</span>, Idle Irish, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Cathedrals</span>, Tipperary, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Monaghan, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Catholics</span>, Roman, Opinion of Unionist, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Hatred of Protestants, <a href="#Page_14">14</a> (<i>see also</i> Intolerance);</li> + <li>The Loyalist, <a href="#Page_166">166</a> and <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Cattle</span> in living rooms, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Character Sketches</span>—A Kerry Shopkeeper, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Philip Fahy, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>;</li> + <li>An Old Woman, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>;</li> + <li>Local Names, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>;</li> + <li>Ladies and their Boots, <a href="#Page_178">178</a>;</li> + <li>Bailiffs and Gangers, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>;</li> + <li>Achil Car Driver, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Charity</span>, Effects of Home Rule Bill on, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Hopelessness of helping the Irish by, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Churchyard</span>, an Irish, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Clare</span>, "Unmanageable Devils," <a href="#Page_74">74</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>the Curse of County, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>;</li> + <li>Civil War in, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Coercion</span>, Irish Legislature and, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Congested Districts</span>, a precise definition of, <a href="#Page_178">178</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Description of, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Cork</span>, Sentiment in, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Credulity</span> of Irish, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, and <a href="#Page_119">119</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Belief in Fairies, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>;</li> + <li>Hill full of Diamonds, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Croke</span>, Archbishop, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Customs</span>, Collection of, under Home Rule, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">De Burgho</span>, Lady, and Evictions, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Degradation</span>, Glimpses of Irish, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Dillon</span>, John, convicted at Tipperary, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Disloyalty</span> (<i>see also</i> Union of Hearts); "To hell with Queen Victoria," <a href="#Page_4">4</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>the Town Crier, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>;</li> + <li>Cursing the Queen, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>;</li> + <li>Father Ryan's Manifesto, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>;</li> + <li>Irish Press admits, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>;</li> + <li>Poem against joining the Army, <a href="#Page_364">364</a>;</li> + <li>T.D. Sullivan's Verses, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Donegal</span>, Do-Nothing, <a href="#Page_371">371</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Dublin</span>, Opinions in, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>compared with Belfast, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Dugort</span>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Dundalk</span>, <a href="#Page_278">278</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Dynamite</span>, Use of, justified, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Daly, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Education</span>, Catholic designs on, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Elections</span> (<i>see also</i> Voting) in Ulster, <a href="#Page_342">342</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>False Swearing, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">England</span>, Apathy of Electors in, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Effects of Home Rule on English Industries, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, also <a href="#Page_213">213</a> and <a href="#Page_372">372</a>;</li> + <li>English Ignorance of Ireland, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>;</li> + <li>Not Governed by Englishmen, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Evictions</span> (<i>see also</i> Bodyke). Sadleir case, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Ruane, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>;</li> + <li>What They Mean, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>;</li> + <li>In Queen's County, <a href="#Page_334">334</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Factories</span>, Galway Bag, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Ditto, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>;</li> + <li>Flour Mills, &c., idle, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Famine</span> in Achil, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>"Please God we'll have a Famine," <a href="#Page_255">255</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Farmers</span>, English and Irish compared, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Irish Petted and Spoiled, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Fenians</span>, Opinion of, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>O'Leary and Stephens, <a href="#Page_388">388</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Fisheries</span>, Priests' Falsehoods about, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Galway, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>;</li> + <li>Price of Fish, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>;</li> + <li>Aran Island, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>;</li> + <li>Curing Taught, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Flax</span>-Growing Neglected, <a href="#Page_290">290</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Forest</span> Planting in Congested Districts, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Fowl</span> Breeding Encouraged, <a href="#Page_370">370</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Franchise</span>, Effects of lowering, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Freemasons</span>, Archbishop Walsh and, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Funerals</span> in Connaught, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Gag</span>, <i>Irish Catholic</i> on, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Galway</span>, Board of Guardians, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Harbour Folly, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Geographical</span> Necessity, <a href="#Page_357">357</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Gladstone</span>, Right Hon. W.E., attacks Parnell, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>"Oi'm goin' across the Say," <a href="#Page_134">134</a>;</li> + <li>Mob Rule, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>;</li> + <li>As a "Jumper," <a href="#Page_248">248</a>;</li> + <li>his "firm belief," <a href="#Page_309">309</a>;</li> + <li>"the party of law and order," <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Gladstonians</span> converted in Ireland, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, and <a href="#Page_312">312</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Gort</span>, Description of, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Grubb</span>, Sir Howard, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Guardians</span>, Boards of, and Rates, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Harrington</span>, "Tim," <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Harvest</span> Hands for England, Irish, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li><i>see also under</i> England.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Healy</span>, "Tim," his parentage, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Holy Water</span>, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Home Rule</span>, a Coffin for, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Nationalist Opinions of Bill, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>;</li> + <li>How Nationalists will work, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>;</li> + <li>A Peasant's View of, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>;</li> + <li>Not Yet, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>;</li> + <li>Home Rule from Mr. Balfour, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Manley on, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>;</li> + <li>Praying against, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>;</li> + <li>Masses don't want, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>;</li> + <li>"Let us have Chaos," <a href="#Page_164">164</a>;</li> + <li>"Can we eat it?" <a href="#Page_173">173</a>;</li> + <li>An Irish Criticism of, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>;</li> + <li>Who oppose it? <a href="#Page_249">249</a>;</li> + <li><i>United Ireland</i> on, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>;</li> + <li>German View of, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>;</li> + <li>Its Friends and Enemies, <a href="#Page_330">330</a>;</li> + <li>Parnellites dread it now, <a href="#Page_376">376</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Houghton</span>, Lord, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Humorous Incidents</span> narrated: The Phœnix Park Orator, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>An "Iligant" Tenant, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>;</li> + <li>"The Devil's Bite," <a href="#Page_56">56</a>;</li> + <li>The Timprance Man, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>;</li> + <li>A Lending Transaction, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>;</li> + <li>The Galway Fisherman, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>;</li> + <li>"When I'm sober," <a href="#Page_148">148</a>;</li> + <li>"'Tis Home Rule ye want," <a href="#Page_160">160</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Morley and the Car-driver, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>;</li> + <li>The Wild Ass, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>;</li> + <li>Michael and the Postal Service, <a href="#Page_208">208</a>;</li> + <li>The Cattle Boat, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>;</li> + <li>A Question of Feet, <a href="#Page_357">357</a>;</li> + <li>An Irish Retort, <a href="#Page_364">364</a>;</li> + <li>Finn Water <i>v.</i> Purgatory, <a href="#Page_354">354</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Ignorance</span>, the Kerry Folks', <a href="#Page_68">68</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Immigration</span>, Effects of Home Rule on, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Improvidence</span>, in Connaught, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Irish Farmers', <a href="#Page_227">227</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Intimidation</span> (<i>see also</i> Bodyke), Sadleir's Case, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li> How it is Done, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Intolerance</span>, Irish, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>, <a href="#Page_349">349</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ireland</span>, Another Injustice to, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Irish Language</span>, <a href="#Page_203">203</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Irish National Federation</span>, Commissioner attends a "Mass Meeting" of the, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Sequel thereto, <a href="#Page_371">371</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Irish Members</span>, Popular Opinions of, <a href="#Page_8">8</a> and <a href="#Page_57">57</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Protected by Police, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>;</li> + <li>Contempt for, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>;</li> + <li>Why Distrusted, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>;</li> + <li>Matt Harris, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>;</li> + <li>Fenians on, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Juries</span>, The Cork, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Landlords</span> Must Exist, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Tim Healy on, <a href="#Page_338">338</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Land</span> (<i>see also</i> Rent), Sub-division of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Land Hunger, <a href="#Page_99">99</a> (<i>see also</i> Summary Article, <a href="#Page_396">396</a>);</li> + <li>Tenants Real Owners, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>;</li> + <li>a Farmer's View, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>;</li> + <li>Must be Worth Something, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>;</li> + <li>Land Commission Rewards Idleness, <a href="#Page_373">373</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Land League</span>, Defying the, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Reign at Loughrea, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;</li> + <li>Overmatched, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>;</li> + <li>Gladstone and Harcourt on, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Land Purchase</span>, Falsehoods about, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Laziness</span>, Examples of, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Mr. James Dunn on Irish, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. McMaster's Offer, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>;</li> + <li>In England Work, in Ireland Play, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>;</li> + <li>an Excuse for, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>;</li> + <li>Death and, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>;</li> + <li>"Going to," <a href="#Page_378">378</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Legislation</span>, with a Hard G, <a href="#Page_330">330</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Lies</span>, Nationalist, about Daly, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>about Westminster, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>;</li> + <li>about Mr. Balfour, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Linen Trade</span> of Londonderry, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Local Government</span>, A Nationalist on, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Logan</span>, M.P., False Statements about Rents, <a href="#Page_195">195</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Logue</span>, Cardinal, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>his Father, <a href="#Page_357">357</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Londonderry</span>, Description of, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">MacAdam</span>, Mr., Bodyke Agent, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">McFadden</span>, Father, his income, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Magee</span>, Detective James, <a href="#Page_388">388</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Mansions in Ruins</span>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Marriage</span> Customs in Connaught, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>in Achil Islands, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>;</li> + <li>Juvenile, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Maynooth</span>, Enemy of England, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Dr. Wylie on, <a href="#Page_350">350</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Mines</span>, Delusions about, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Minority</span>, The, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>, <a href="#Page_312">312</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Monaghan</span>, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Morley</span>, Right Hon. John, soliloquy, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>on the side of crime, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>;</li> + <li>tight-fisted, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>;</li> + <li>the cab-driver and, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>;</li> + <li>police on, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>;</li> + <li>philandering, <a href="#Page_389">389</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Mullingar</span>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Nationalism</span>, its real nature, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li><i>see also</i> summary article, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Newry</span>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Nolan</span>, Colonel, interview with, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>a Parnellite, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>;</li> + <li>assaulted by a priest, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">O'Brien, William</span>, convicted at Tipperary, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">O'Callaghan</span>, Colonel, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">O'Shaughnessy</span>, Dr., on Home Rule, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Orange Lodges</span>, their toleration, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>demonstrations, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>;</li> + <li>charged with rowdyism, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>;</li> + <li>constitution of the, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Outrages</span>: Two girls brutally assaulted, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>fifteen in County Clare, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>;</li> + <li>hushing up, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>;</li> + <li>dread of, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>;</li> + <li>Loughrea, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;</li> + <li>a terrible list of, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>;</li> + <li>a fire, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Moloney shot, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>;</li> + <li>Castle explosion, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Blood fired at, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Parliament</span>, an Irish, what it could do, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>fancy picture of, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Parnellites</span> and Anti-Parnellites defined, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Parnell</span>, Mr., Priests and, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>secret of his success, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>;</li> + <li>still worshipped in Dublin, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Peace</span>, Ireland needs, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Pledges</span> and Promises, Value of Irish, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Police</span>, The Dublin, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>refuse protection at Bodyke, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>;</li> + <li>Mr. Morley and the, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ponsonby</span> Rents, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Post Office</span> Savings Bank, Run on, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Potato</span> Seed Wasted, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Poverty</span>, English and Irish, <a href="#Page_255">255</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Press</span>, The Irish, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>on finality, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Priests and People</span> (<i>see also</i> Voting): A terrible danger, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>priests' one idea, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>;</li> + <li>priests at Home Rule Convention, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>;</li> + <li>never denounced outrage, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>;</li> + <li>people believe anything priest tells them, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>;</li> + <li>present day priests, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>;</li> + <li>"I am responsible," <a href="#Page_242">242</a>;</li> + <li>"admit bearer," <a href="#Page_263">263</a>;</li> + <li>"pay, pay, pay, from the cradle to the grave," <a href="#Page_325">325</a>;</li> + <li>spiritual tyranny, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>;</li> + <li>refusing the sacrament, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>;</li> + <li>a loyal priest, <a href="#Page_365">365</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Protectionists</span>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Protestants</span>, Attack on, at Cappawhite, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>persecution of, at Tuam, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>;</li> + <li>colony at Dugort, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>;</li> + <li>why they are Unionists, <a href="#Page_380">380</a>;</li> + <li>Bundoran outrage upon, <a href="#Page_384">384</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Railways</span>—Mr. Balfour's—Cork and Muskerry, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>the Connemara, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>;</li> + <li>a ride on a new line, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>;</li> + <li>an engine ride, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>;</li> + <li>building on a bog, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>;</li> + <li>a dangerous ride, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>;</li> + <li>full list of Balfour Light Railways, <a href="#Page_387">387</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Registration Frauds</span>, <a href="#Page_341">341</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Rents</span>, the Ponsonby, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>rack renting, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>;</li> + <li>quite low enough, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>;</li> + <li>what rack rent means, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>;</li> + <li>land must be worth something, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>;</li> + <li>to whom is rent due? <a href="#Page_335">335</a>;</li> + <li>Dublin Corporation tenants and Clanricarde tenants compared, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>;</li> + <li>a Donegal rent book, <a href="#Page_354">354</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Republic</span>, An Irish, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>could we reconquer? <a href="#Page_185">185</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ribbonmen</span> and Nationalists compared, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Rossmore</span>, Lord, and Monaghan Town Council, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Ruins</span>, Irish, <a href="#Page_310">310</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Salthill</span>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">St. Patrick</span>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Scotch</span> and Irish Compared, <a href="#Page_286">286</a> and <a href="#Page_375">375</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Securities</span>, Effect of Home Rule Bill on, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Secret</span> Societies, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Sentiment</span>, a Priest on Irish, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Smith</span> Barry, Mr., <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Soap</span> as a remedy for Ireland's ills, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Soldiers</span>, Irish Girls and, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>complaint when withdrawn, <a href="#Page_278">278</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Strabane</span> Agricultural Show, <a href="#Page_375">375</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Stranorlar</span>, <a href="#Page_352">352</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Strike</span> Leaders and Nationalists compared, <a href="#Page_370">370</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Sullivan</span>, T.D., on India, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Summary Articles</span>:— + <ul class="nest"> + <li>1—Irish Nationalism is not Patriotism, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>.</li> + <li>2—Land Hunger: Its Cause, Effect, and Remedy, <a href="#Page_396">396</a>.</li> + <li>3—Clerical Domination and its Consequences.</li> + <li>4—Civil War a certainty of Home Rule.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Superstition</span> (<i>see also</i> Credulity), the Holy Man, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.<br /><br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Tenants'</span> Losses, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Terrorism</span> in Dublin, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Rev. R. Eager, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>;</li> + <li>at Tipperary, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Tipperary</span>, New and Old, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Toleration</span>, would Catholics show? <a href="#Page_300">300</a> and <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Trade</span>, Home Rule effects on (<i>see also</i> England), <a href="#Page_7">7</a> and <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Tradition</span>, Effects of, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Tuam</span>, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Indignation Meeting, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Ulster</span>, Feeling on Home Rule Bill in, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Preparation for War, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>;</li> + <li>English Sympathy with, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>;</li> + <li>Loyalist Programme, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>;</li> + <li>Character of Ulstermen, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>;</li> + <li>Articles on, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>;</li> + <li>"tak a doom'd lot of managin'," <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Union</span> of Hearts, Dublin mob on, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>"When England's bur-r-sted up," <a href="#Page_74">74</a>;</li> + <li>Miss Gonne, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>;</li> + <li>Union Jack cut down, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>;</li> + <li>"When Britons first at Hell's command" (<i>see also</i> Disloyalty), <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Victoria</span> Disaster, Irish opinion of, <a href="#Page_297">297</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Voting</span>, Priests and, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Priests endowed with a thousand votes, <a href="#Page_353">353</a>;</li> + <li>Regulations wanted against priests, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> + </ul> +<br /></li> + + +<li><span class="sc">Walsh</span>, Archbishop, <a href="#Page_274">274</a>.</li> + +<li><span class="sc">War</span>, Preparations for, in Ulster, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>; + <ul class="nest"> + <li>Mr. Morley's precautions, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>;</li> + <li>Ireland's policy when England is at war, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>;</li> + <li>Danger of civil war, <a href="#Page_409">409</a>.</li> + </ul> +</li> + +<li><span class="sc">Worthington</span>, Mr. Robert, on ruin by Home Rule, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>.</li> +</ul> + +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + +<div class="tr"> +<p class="cen"><a name="TN" id="TN"></a>Typographical errors corrected in text:</p> +<br /> +Page 33: Ballymera replaced with Ballymena<br /> +Page 37: neighboughhood replaced with neighbourhood<br /> +Page 103: McAdam replaced with MacAdam<br /> +Page 107: indentification replaced with identification<br /> +Page 109: thelr replaced with their<br /> +Page 110: Goverment replaced with Government<br /> +Page 163: "villager iu Ireland" replaced with "villager in Ireland"<br /> +Page 211: estabblished replaced with established<br /> +Page 232: "People offer to to swop" replaced with "People offer to swop"<br /> +Page 259: enthusiam replaced with enthusiasm<br /> +Page 260: fiasca replaced with fiasco<br /> +Page 270: indentify replaced with identify<br /> +Page 270: indentified replaced with identified<br /> +Page 297: "the rulings power" replaced with "the ruling power"<br /> +Page 315: waa replaced with was<br /> +Page 320: againt replaced with against<br /> +Page 323: Rome Rule replaced with Home Rule<br /> +Page 353: innnumerable replaced with innumerable<br /> +Page 362: obained replaced with obtained<br /> +Page 370: "we should should have" replaced with "we should have"<br /> +Page 378: Linerick replaced with Limerick<br /> +Page 378: "Tha beggars" replaced with "The beggars"<br /> +Page 380: politican replaced with politician<br /> +Page 381: "had stated that the the Black-mouths" replaced with "had stated that the Black-mouths"<br /> + Index: McAdam was replaced with MacAdam<br /> +</div> + +<br /> +<hr /> +<br /> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Ireland as It Is, by +Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.) + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IRELAND AS IT IS *** + +***** This file should be named 29710-h.htm or 29710-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/7/1/29710/ + +Produced by Jeannie Howse, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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