Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule. Robert John Buckley
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:—
"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.
One word as to the alleged "intolerance of the fanatic Orangemen of Belfast."
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.
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.
Ballymena, April 6th.
No. 6.—THE EXODUS OF INDUSTRY.ToC
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 re Home Rule, thus:—
"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.
"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.
"Mr. Gladstone may think he knows best, but here the unanimous opinion is that trade will be fatally injured. Ireland 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."
Here Mr. Greer made the inevitable statement that Englishmen out of Ireland did not understand the question; and another large manufacturer chipped in with:—
"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."
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.
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' has 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."
Ingratitude, thy name is Irish Tenant!
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,