Kitabı oku: «Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule», sayfa 38

No. 47. – THE LOYALISTS AND THE LAWLESS

Clones, 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 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 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.

"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.

"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."

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, 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."

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.

"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, 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 and 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.

"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 'the cattle wouldn't prosper very much,' 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."

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 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 by name, 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: —

"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 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.

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 how 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, "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.

Clones, July 13th.

No. 48. – A SEARCH FOR "ORANGE ROWDYISM."

Belfast 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 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 —

Heu mihi! quam pingui macer est mihi taurus in arvo. Quaint old Thomas Fuller (as I remember) has rendered this —

 
My starveling bull,
Ah, woe is me,
In pasture full
How lean is he!
 

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.

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, 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.

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?

Not one. The men who really know Orangemen knew that no precautions were needed.

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 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.

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."