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.
"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.
"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?'"
"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.
"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 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 _will_ do so, how are you going to
raise the famous Tribute Money?"
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 _Shan van vocht_. "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--
Oi'm goin' across the say, says the Grand Old Man,
Oi'll be back some other day, says the Grand Old Man;
When Oireland gets fair play
We'll make Balfour rue the day,--
Remimber what I say, says the Grand Old Man.
Whin will ye come back? says the Grand Old Man,
Whin will ye come back? says the Grand Old Man,
Whin Balfour gets the sack
Wid Salisbury on his back,
Or unto hell does pack, says the Grand Old Man.
Will ye deny the Lague? says the Grand Old Man,
No, we'll continue to the Lague, says the Grand Old Man.
John Dillon says at every station,
'Twill be his conversation
Till Oireland is a nation, says the Grand Old Man.
There are three more verses of this immortal strain. The _Shan van
vocht_ 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.
Tuam (Co. Galway), May 9th.
No. 21.--MR. BALFOUR'S FISHERIES.
A 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, _mirabile dictu!_ 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 _en
queue_ 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 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."
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 _corruptio optimi pessima est_. There is another monkish
proverb which may strike them as they watch him in debate,
particularly when he seems to be cornered; it runs, _Non habet
anguillam, Per caudam qui tenet illam_, which may be extemporaneously
rendered, He has not surely caught the eel, Who only holds him by the
tail.
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. _Floreat_ McCoy!
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 _re_ toleration. He thinks 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."
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.
"How long were you in Ireland before you changed your mind?" I asked.
"Well," said Mr. Beddoes, "to tell the truth, I began to have my
doubts during the first week."
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."
"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 _Tuam News_ 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."
I secured the _Tuam News_ 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:--
TO THE EDITOR OF THE TUAM NEWS.
Sir,--Permit me a little space in the next issue of the _Tuam
News_, relative to my father being killed by the fairies which
appeared in the _Tuam News_ 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,
DAVID REDINGTON.
Kilcreevanty, May 8th, '93.
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 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.
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--
"What do you call those fish?"
Both men sprang hastily to their feet, and said--
"Black pollock, Sorr."
"Where do you catch them?"
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.
"Outside the Aran Islands."
Here several women joined the group, and more were seen hastening to
the scene of excitement from every point of the compass.
"How far away is that?"
"Thirty miles, Sorr."
"What are they worth?"
"A shilling a dozen."
"That is, a penny a pound?"
"No, but a shilling for a dozen fish, and there's thirteen to the
dozen."
"And how heavy is the average fish?"
He picked up one by the jaws, and weighing him on his hand, said--
"That chap would be nigh-hand fourteen pounds. Some's more, some's
less."
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."
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 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.