Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule

Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule
Robert Buckley

Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule

SPECIAL COMMISSIONER'S PREFACE

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: —

"We have been to England, and we know three things, – that the Bill will pass the Commons, that the Lords will throw it out, and that the English people don't care if they do."

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.

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 retained his original faith. A very slight process of inductive reasoning will develop the suggestiveness of this incontestible fact.

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: —

Sæpe stylum vertas, iterum quæ digna legi sint Scripturus; neque, te ut miretur turba labores Contentus paucis lectoribus.

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.

    R.J.B.,
    Special Commissioner of the Birmingham Daily Gazette.

EDITOR'S REVIEW

The Birmingham Daily Gazette 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 Tipperary, will not soon forget his experience of giving the lie to the Gazette; 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!

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 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.

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 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.

No. 1. – THE SPIRIT OF THE CAPITAL

By 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.

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 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."

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.

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 not 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: —

"Is it an oak or an elm coffin ye want?"

"Ah, thin, just a chape deal coffin, shure – wid a few archangels on the lid."

"Will ye want any trimmings?"

"Arrah, what d'ye mane by trimmin's?"

"Trimmings for the coffin."

"Bad luck to yer trimmin's. What would I want wid them? Sure 'twas 'trimmin's' that kilt him!"

It is hoped that Saxon readers will see this subtle joke when I explain that "delirium" should come before "trimmin's."

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 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 en évidence. 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.

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."

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 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."

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 not to meet on College Green.

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, "We don't want it, we don't want it!" 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.

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."

Dublin, March 28th.

No. 2. – PANIC AND DISASTER

The 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.

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 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.

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.

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 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."

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.

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 me 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 did, an' could do it again! Sind me 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.

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.

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 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.

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.

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.

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 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.

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 we have the wather power, an' the invintions 'll be brought over here to be worked. An' that'll give the poor folks imploymint."

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.

Dublin, March 30th.