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:--
"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.
"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 _must_ 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
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."
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.
"Have you noticed how the Irish people are gulled?"
Yes, I have noticed it. The _Freeman's Journal_, 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 _Freeman_, 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 _Freeman's
Journal_ as a liar. When quoting great masters examples of their work
are always interesting.
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 _had_ 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!
Mr. Chamberlain pointed this out, and referring to this incident the
_Freeman_ says:--
"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 _Freeman's_ 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 _Freeman_ 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 _Freeman_ 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 _Freeman's_ hours are
numbered. It would vanish as a dream, forgotten by all 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--
"There were Giants in those days."
Armagh, July 6th.
No. 45.--A PICTURE OF ROMISH "TOLERATION."
The 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 _Ichabod_. 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 revolve. Meanwhile, Armagh extends hospitality to stray
wrong-doers and Monaghan boards them out to the manifest injury of the
local turnkey industry.
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 mediaeval 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?
The principal shopkeepers of Monaghan have unpatriotic names.
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:--
"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?
"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.'
"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.
"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, 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?"
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
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. _Ubi bene, ibi patria._ Where I'm most happy,
that will be my country."