[Transcriber's note: The spelling inconsistencies of the original areretained in this etext. ]

 _BY THE SAME AUTHOR_

 POEMS

 INSURRECTIONS (Maunsel)

 THE HILL OF VISION "

 GREEN BRANCHES "

 SONGS FROM THE CLAY (Macmillan)

 THE ADVENTURES OF SEUMAS BEG "

 * * * * *

 PROSE

 THE CHARWOMANS DAUGHTER (Macmillan)

 THE CROCK OF GOLD "

 HERE ARE LADIES "

 THE DEMI-GODS "

 * * * * *

 THE INSURRECTION IN DUBLIN

 BY JAMES STEPHENS

 MAUNSEL & COMPANY, LTD. DUBLIN AND LONDON 1916

 CONTENTS

 FOREWORD

 CHAP. 

 I. MONDAY

 II. TUESDAY

 III. WEDNESDAY

 IV. THURSDAY

 V. FRIDAY

 VI. SATURDAY

 VII. SUNDAY

 VIII. THE INSURRECTION IS OVER

 IX. THE VOLUNTEERS

 X. SOME OF THE LEADERS

 XI. LABOUR AND THE INSURRECTION

 XII. THE IRISH QUESTIONS

 FOREWORD

The day before the rising was Easter Sunday, and they were cryingjoyfully in the Churches "Christ has risen. " On the following day theywere saying in the streets "Ireland has risen. " The luck of the momentwas with her. The auguries were good, and, notwithstanding all that hassucceeded, I do not believe she must take to the earth again, nor beever again buried. The pages hereafter were written day by day duringthe Insurrection that followed Holy Week, and, as a hasty impression ofa most singular time, the author allows them to stand without anyemendation. 

The few chapters which make up this book are not a history of therising. I knew nothing about the rising. I do not know anything about itnow, and it may be years before exact information on the subject isavailable. What I have written is no more than a statement of whatpassed in one quarter of our city, and a gathering together of therumour and tension which for nearly two weeks had to serve the Dublinpeople in lieu of news. It had to serve many Dublin people in place ofbread. 

To-day, the 8th of May, the book is finished, and, so far as Ireland isimmediately concerned, the insurrection is over. Action now lies withEngland, and on that action depends whether the Irish Insurrection isover or only suppressed. 

In their dealings with this country, English Statesmen have seldom shownpolitical imagination; sometimes they have been just, sometimes, andoften, unjust. After a certain point I dislike and despise justice. Itis an attribute of God, and is adequately managed by Him alone; butbetween man and man no other ethics save that of kindness can giveresults. I have not any hope that this ethic will replace that, and Imerely mention it in order that the good people who read these words mayenjoy the laugh which their digestion needs. 

I have faith in man, I have very little faith in States man. But Ibelieve that the world moves, and I believe that the weight of therolling planet is going to bring freedom to Ireland. Indeed, I name thisdate as the first day of Irish freedom, and the knowledge forbids memourn too deeply my friends who are dead. 

It may not be worthy of mention, but the truth is, that Ireland is notcowed. She is excited a little. She is gay a little. She was not withthe revolution, but in a few months she will be, and her heart which waswithering will be warmed by the knowledge that men have thought herworth dying for. She will prepare to make herself worthy of devotion, and that devotion will never fail her. So little does it take to raiseour hearts. 

Does it avail anything to describe these things to English readers? Theyhave never moved the English mind to anything except impatience, butto-day and at this desperate conjunction they may be less futile thanheretofore. England also has grown patriotic, even by necessity. It isnecessity alone makes patriots, for in times of peace a patriot is aquack when he is not a shark. Idealism pays in times of peace, it diesin time of war. Our idealists are dead and yours are dying hourly. 

The English mind may to-day be enabled to understand what is wrong withus, and why through centuries we have been "disthressful. " Let themlook at us, I do not say through the fumes that are still rising fromour ruined streets, but through the smoke that is rolling from the NorthSea to Switzerland, and read in their own souls the justification forall our risings, and for this rising. 

Is it wrong to say that England has not one friend in Europe? I say it. Her Allies of to-day were her enemies of yesterday, and politics alonewill decide what they will be to-morrow. I say it, and yet I am notentirely right, for she has one possible friend unless she should decidethat even one friend is excessive and irks her. That one possible friendis Ireland. I say, and with assurance, that if our national questionsare arranged there will remain no reason for enmity between the twocountries, and there will remain many reasons for friendship. 

It may be objected that the friendship of a country such as Ireland haslittle value; that she is too small geographically, and too thinlypopulated to give aid to any one. Only sixty odd years ago ourpopulation was close on ten millions of people, nor are we yet sterile;in area Ireland is not collossal, but neither is she microscopic. Mr. Shaw has spoken of her as a "cabbage patch at the back of beyond. " Onthis kind of description Rome might be called a hen-run and Greece aback yard. The sober fact is that Ireland has a larger geographical areathan many an independent and prosperous European kingdom, and for allhuman and social needs she is a fairly big country, and is beautiful andfertile to boot. She could be made worth knowing if goodwill and trustare available for the task. 

I believe that what is known as the "mastery of the seas" will, when thegreat war is finished, pass irretrievably from the hands or the ambitionof any nation, and that more urgently than ever in her history Englandwill have need of a friend. It is true that we might be her enemy andmight do her some small harm--it is truer that we could be her friend, and could be of very real assistance to her. 

Should the English Statesman decide that our friendship is worth havinglet him create a little of the political imagination already spoken of. Let him equip us (it is England's debt to Ireland) for freedom, not inthe manner of a miser who arranges for the chilly livelihood of a needyfemale relative; but the way a wealthy father would undertake thesettlement of his son. I fear I am assisting my reader to laugh toomuch, but laughter is the sole excess that is wholesome. 

If freedom is to come to Ireland--as I believe it is--then the EasterInsurrection was the only thing that could have happened. I speak as anIrishman, and am momentarily leaving out of account every otherconsideration. If, after all her striving, freedom had come to her as agift, as a peaceful present such as is sometimes given away with a poundof tea, Ireland would have accepted the gift with shamefacedness, andhave felt that her centuries of revolt had ended in something very likeridicule. The blood of brave men had to sanctify such a consummation ifthe national imagination was to be stirred to the dreadful businesswhich is the organizing of freedom, and both imagination and brains havebeen stagnant in Ireland this many a year. Following on such tameness, failure might have been predicted, or, at least feared, and war (let uscall it war for the sake of our pride) was due to Ireland before shecould enter gallantly on her inheritance. We might have crept intoliberty like some kind of domesticated man, whereas now we may beallowed to march into freedom with the honours of war. I am stillappealing to the political imagination, for if England allows Ireland toformally make peace with her that peace will be lasting, everlasting;but if the liberty you give us is all half-measures, and distrusts andstinginesses, then what is scarcely worth accepting will hardly be worththanking you for. 

There is a reference in the earlier pages of this record to a letterwhich I addressed to Mr. George Bernard Shaw and published in the _NewAge_. This was a thoughtless letter, and subsequent events have provedthat it was unmeaning and ridiculous. I have since, through the samehospitable journal, apologised to Mr. Shaw, but have let my reference tothe matter stand as an indication that electricity was already in theair. Every statement I made about him in that letter and in this bookwas erroneous; for, afterwards, when it would have been politic to runfor cover, he ran for the open, and he spoke there like the valiantthinker and great Irishman that he is. 

 * * * * *

Since the foregoing was written events have moved in this country. Thesituation is no longer the same. The executions have taken place. Onecannot justly exclaim against the measures adopted by the militarytribunal, and yet, in the interests of both countries one may deplorethem. I have said there was no bitterness in Ireland, and it was true atthe time of writing. It is no longer true; but it is still possible bygenerous Statesmanship to allay this, and to seal a true union betweenIreland and England. 

 THE

 INSURRECTION IN DUBLIN

 CHAPTER I

 MONDAY

This has taken everyone by surprise. It is possible, that, with theexception of their Staff, it has taken the Volunteers themselves bysurprise; but, to-day, our peaceful city is no longer peaceful; guns aresounding, or rolling and crackling from different directions, and, although rarely, the rattle of machine guns can be heard also. 

Two days ago war seemed very far away--so far, that I have covenantedwith myself to learn the alphabet of music. Tom Bodkin had promised topresent me with a musical instrument called a dulcimer--I persist inthinking that this is a species of guitar, although I am assured that itis a number of small metal plates which are struck with sticks, and Iconfess that this description of its function prejudices me more than alittle against it. There is no reason why I should think dubiously ofsuch an instrument, but I do not relish the idea of procuring music witha stick. With this dulcimer I shall be able to tap out our Irishmelodies when I am abroad, and transport myself to Ireland for a fewminutes, or a few bars. 

In preparation for this present I had through Saturday and Sunday beenlearning the notes of the Scale. The notes and spaces on the lines didnot trouble me much, but those above and below the line seemed ingeniousand complicated to a degree that frightened me. 

On Saturday I got the _Irish Times_, and found in it a long article byBernard Shaw (reprinted from the _New York Times_). One reads thingswritten by Shaw. Why one does read them I do not know exactly, exceptthat it is a habit we got into years ago, and we read an article by Shawjust as we put on our boots in the morning--that is, without thinkingabout it, and without any idea of reward. 

His article angered me exceedingly. It was called "Irish Nonsensetalked in Ireland. " It was written (as is almost all of his journalisticwork) with that _bonhomie_ which he has cultivated--it is hismannerism--and which is essentially hypocritical and untrue. _Bonhomie_!It is that man-of-the-world attitude, that shop attitude, thatbetween-you-and-me-for-are-we-not-equal-and-cultured attitude, which isthe tone of a card-sharper or a trick-of-the-loop man. That was the toneof Shaw's article. I wrote an open letter to him which I sent to the_New Age_, because I doubted that the Dublin papers would print it if Isent it to them, and I knew that the Irish people who read the otherpapers had never heard of Shaw, except as a trade-mark under which verygood Limerick bacon is sold, and that they would not be interested inthe opinions of a person named Shaw on any subject not relevant tobacon. I struck out of my letter a good many harsh things which I saidof him, and hoped he would reply to it in order that I could furnishthese acidities to him in a second letter. 

That was Saturday. 

On Sunday I had to go to my office, as the Director was absent inLondon, and there I applied myself to the notes and spaces below thestave, but relinquished the exercise, convinced that these mysterieswere unattainable by man, while the knowledge that above the stave therewere others and not less complex, stayed mournfully with me. 

I returned home, and as novels (perhaps it is only for the duration ofthe war) do not now interest me I read for some time in MadameBlavatsky's "Secret Doctrine, " which book interests me profoundly. George Russell was out of town or I would have gone round to his housein the evening to tell him what I thought about Shaw, and to listen tohis own much finer ideas on that as on every other subject. I went tobed. 

On the morning following I awoke into full insurrection and bloody war, but I did not know anything about it. It was Bank Holiday, but foremployments such as mine there are not any holidays, so I went to myoffice at the usual hour, and after transacting what business wasnecessary I bent myself to the notes above and below the stave, andmarvelled anew at the ingenuity of man. Peace was in the building, andif any of the attendants had knowledge or rumour of war they did notmention it to me. 

At one o'clock I went to lunch. Passing the corner of Merrion Row I sawtwo small groups of people. These people were regarding steadfastly inthe direction of St. Stephen's Green Park, and they spoke occasionallyto one another with that detached confidence which proved they weremutually unknown. I also, but without approaching them, stared in thedirection of the Green. I saw nothing but the narrow street whichwidened to the Park. Some few people were standing in tentativeattitudes, and all looking in the one direction. As I turned from themhomewards I received an impression of silence and expectation andexcitement. 

On the way home I noticed that many silent people were standing in theirdoorways--an unusual thing in Dublin outside of the back streets. Theglance of a Dublin man or woman conveys generally a criticism of one'spersonal appearance, and is a little hostile to the passer. The look ofeach person as I passed was steadfast, and contained an enquiry insteadof a criticism. I felt faintly uneasy, but withdrew my mind to ameditation which I had covenanted with myself to perform daily, andpassed to my house. 

There I was told that there had been a great deal of rifle firing allthe morning, and we concluded that the Military recruits or Volunteerdetachments were practising that arm. My return to business was by theway I had already come. At the corner of Merrion Row I found the samesilent groups, who were still looking in the direction of the Green, andaddressing each other occasionally with the detached confidence ofstrangers. Suddenly, and on the spur of the moment, I addressed one ofthese silent gazers. 

"Has there been an accident?" said I. 

I indicated the people standing about. 

"What's all this for?"

He was a sleepy, rough-looking man about 40 years of age, with a bluntred moustache, and the distant eyes which one sees in sailors. He lookedat me, stared at me as at a person from a different country. He grewwakeful and vivid. 

"Don't you know, " said he. 

And then he saw that I did not know. 

"The Sinn Feiners have seized the City this morning. "

"Oh!" said I. 

He continued with the savage earnestness of one who has amazement in hismouth:

"They seized the City at eleven o'clock this morning. The Green there isfull of them. They have captured the Castle. They have taken the PostOffice. "

"My God!" said I, staring at him, and instantly I turned and wentrunning towards the Green. 

In a few seconds I banished astonishment and began to walk. As I drewnear the Green rifle fire began like sharply-cracking whips. It was fromthe further side. I saw that the Gates were closed and men were standinginside with guns on their shoulders. I passed a house, the windows ofwhich were smashed in. As I went by a man in civilian clothes slippedthrough the Park gates, which instantly closed behind him. He rantowards me, and I halted. He was carrying two small packets in his hand. He passed me hurriedly, and, placing his leg inside the broken windowof the house behind me, he disappeared. Almost immediately another manin civilian clothes appeared from the broken window of another house. Healso had something (I don't know what) in his hand. He ran urgentlytowards the gates, which opened, admitted him, and closed again. 

In the centre of this side of the Park a rough barricade of carts andmotor cars had been sketched. It was still full of gaps. Behind it was ahalted tram, and along the vistas of the Green one saw other tramsderelict, untenanted. 

I came to the barricade. As I reached it and stood by the ShelbourneHotel, which it faced, a loud cry came from the Park. The gates openedand three men ran out. Two of them held rifles with fixed bayonets. Thethird gripped a heavy revolver in his fist. They ran towards a motor carwhich had just turned the corner, and halted it. The men with bayonetstook position instantly on either side of the car. The man with therevolver saluted, and I heard him begging the occupants to pardon him, and directing them to dismount. A man and woman got down. They wereagain saluted and requested to go to the sidewalk. They did so. 

 NOTE--As I pen these words rifle shot is cracking from three different directions and continually. Three minutes ago there was two discharges from heavy guns. These are the first heavy guns used in the Insurrection, 25th April. 

The man crossed and stood by me. He was very tall and thin, middle-aged, with a shaven, wasted face. "I want to get down to Armagh to-day, " hesaid to no one in particular. The loose bluish skin under his eyes wastwitching. The Volunteers directed the chauffeur to drive to thebarricade and lodge his car in a particular position there. He did itawkwardly, and after three attempts he succeeded in pleasing them. Hewas a big, brown-faced man, whose knees were rather high for the seat hewas in, and they jerked with the speed and persistence of somethingmoved with a powerful spring. His face was composed and fully undercommand, although his legs were not. He locked the car into thebarricade, and then, being a man accustomed to be commanded, he awaitedan order to descend. When the order came he walked directly to hismaster, still preserving all the solemnity of his features. These twomen did not address a word to each other, but their drilled andexpressionless eyes were loud with surprise and fear and rage. They wentinto the Hotel. 

I spoke to the man with the revolver. He was no more than a boy, notmore certainly than twenty years of age, short in stature, with closecurling red hair and blue eyes--a kindly-looking lad. The strap of hissombrero had torn loose on one side, and except while he held it in histeeth it flapped about his chin. His face was sunburnt and grimy withdust and sweat. 

This young man did not appear to me to be acting from his reason. He wasdoing his work from a determination implanted previously, days, weeksperhaps, on his imagination. His mind was--where? It was not with hisbody. And continually his eyes went searching widely, looking forspaces, scanning hastily the clouds, the vistas of the streets, lookingfor something that did not hinder him, looking away for a moment fromthe immediacies and rigours which were impressed where his mind hadbeen. 

When I spoke he looked at me, and I know that for some seconds he didnot see me. I said:--

"What is the meaning of all this? What has happened?"

He replied collectedly enough in speech, but with that ramble anderrancy clouding his eyes. 

"We have taken the City. We are expecting an attack from the military atany moment, and those people, " he indicated knots of men, women andchildren clustered towards the end of the Green, "won't go home for me. We have the Post Office, and the Railways, and the Castle. We have allthe City. We have everything. "

(Some men and two women drew behind me to listen). 

"This morning, " said he, "the police rushed us. One ran at me to take myrevolver. I fired but I missed him, and I hit a--"

"You have far too much talk, " said a voice to the young man. 

I turned a few steps away, and glancing back saw that he was staringafter me, but I know that he did not see me--he was looking at turmoil, and blood, and at figures that ran towards him and ran away--a world inmotion and he in the centre of it astonished. 

The men with him did not utter a sound. They were both older. One, indeed, a short, sturdy man, had a heavy white moustache. He was quitecollected, and took no notice of the skies, or the spaces. He saw a manin rubbers placing his hand on a motor bicycle in the barricade, andcalled to him instantly: "Let that alone. "

The motorist did not at once remove his hand, whereupon thewhite-moustached man gripped his gun in both hands and ran violentlytowards him. He ran directly to him, body to body, and, as he was shortand the motorist was very tall, stared fixedly up in his face. He roaredup at his face in a mighty voice. 

"Are you deaf? Are you deaf? Move back!"

The motorist moved away, pursued by an eye as steady and savage as thepoint of the bayonet that was level with it. 

Another motor car came round the Ely Place corner of the Green andwobbled at the sight of the barricade. The three men who had returnedto the gates roared "Halt, " but the driver made a tentative effort toturn his wheel. A great shout of many voices came then, and the threemen ran to him. 

"Drive to the barricade, " came the order. 

The driver turned his wheel a point further towards escape, andinstantly one of the men clapped a gun to the wheel and blew the tyreopen. Some words were exchanged, and then a shout:

"Drive it on the rim, drive it. "

The tone was very menacing, and the motorist turned his car slowly tothe barricade and placed it in. 

For an hour I tramped the City, seeing everywhere these knots ofwatchful strangers speaking together in low tones, and it sank into mymind that what I had heard was true, and that the City was ininsurrection. It had been promised for so long, and had been threatenedfor so long. Now it was here. I had seen it in the Green, others hadseen it in other parts--the same men clad in dark green and equippedwith rifle, bayonet, and bandolier, the same silent activity. The policehad disappeared from the streets. At that hour I did not see onepoliceman, nor did I see one for many days, and men said that several ofthem had been shot earlier in the morning; that an officer had been shoton Portobello Bridge, that many soldiers had been killed, and that agood many civilians were dead also. 

Around me as I walked the rumour of war and death was in the air. Continually and from every direction rifles were crackling and rolling;sometimes there was only one shot, again it would be a roll of firingcrested with single, short explosions, and sinking again to whip-likesnaps and whip-like echoes; then for a moment silence, and then againthe guns leaped in the air. 

The rumour of positions, bridges, public places, railway stations, Government offices, having been seized was persistent, and was notdenied by any voice. 

I met some few people I knew. P. H. , T. M. , who said: "Well!" and thrusttheir eyes into me as though they were rummaging me for information. 

But there were not very many people in the streets. The greater part ofthe population were away on Bank Holiday, and did not know anything ofthis business. Many of them would not know anything until they foundthey had to walk home from Kingstown, Dalkey, Howth, or wherever theywere. 

I returned to my office, decided that I would close it for the day. Themen were very relieved when I came in, and were more relieved when Iordered the gong to be sounded. There were some few people in the place, and they were soon put out. The outer gates were locked, and the greatdoor, but I kept the men on duty until the evening. We were the lastpublic institution open; all the others had been closed for hours. 

I went upstairs and sat down, but had barely reached the chair before Istood up again, and began to pace my room, to and fro, to and fro;amazed, expectant, inquiet; turning my ear to the shots, and my mind tospeculations that began in the middle, and were chased from there byothers before they had taken one thought forward. But then I took myselfresolutely and sat me down, and I pencilled out exercises above thestave, and under the stave; and discovered suddenly that I was againmarching the floor, to and fro, to and fro, with thoughts bursting aboutmy head as though they were fired on me from concealed batteries. 

At five o'clock I left. I met Miss P. , all of whose rumours coincidedwith those I had gathered. She was in exceeding good humour andinterested. Leaving her I met Cy----, and we turned together up to theGreen. As we proceeded, the sound of firing grew more distinct, but whenwe reached the Green it died away again. We stood a little below theShelbourne Hotel, looking at the barricade and into the Park. We couldsee nothing. Not a Volunteer was in sight. The Green seemed a desert. There were only the trees to be seen, and through them small greenvistas of sward. 

Just then a man stepped on the footpath and walked directly to thebarricade. He stopped and gripped the shafts of a lorry lodged near thecentre. At that instant the Park exploded into life and sound; fromnowhere armed men appeared at the railings, and they all shouted at theman. 

"Put down that lorry. Let out and go away. Let out at once. "

These were the cries. The man did not let out. He halted with the shaftsin his hand, and looked towards the vociferous pailings. Then, and veryslowly, he began to draw the lorry out of the barricade. The shouts cameto him again, very loud, very threatening, but he did not attend tothem. 

"He is the man that owns the lorry, " said a voice beside me. 

Dead silence fell on the people around while the man slowly drew hiscart down by the footpath. Then three shots rang out in succession. Atthe distance he could not be missed, and it was obvious they were tryingto frighten him. He dropped the shafts, and instead of going away hewalked over to the Volunteers. 

"He has a nerve, " said another voice behind me. 

The man walked directly towards the Volunteers, who, to the number ofabout ten, were lining the railings. He walked slowly, bent a littleforward, with one hand raised and one finger up as though he were goingto make a speech. Ten guns were pointing at him, and a voice repeatedmany times:

"Go and put back that lorry or you are a dead man. Go before I countfour. One, two, three, four--"

A rifle spat at him, and in two undulating movements the man sank onhimself and sagged to the ground. 

I ran to him with some others, while a woman screamed unmeaningly, allon one strident note. The man was picked up and carried to a hospitalbeside the Arts Club. There was a hole in the top of his head, and onedoes not know how ugly blood can look until it has been seen clotted inhair. As the poor man was being carried in, a woman plumped to her kneesin the road and began not to scream but to screetch. 

At that moment the Volunteers were hated. The men by whom I was and whowere lifting the body, roared into the railings:--

"We'll be coming back for you, damn you. "

From the railings there came no reply, and in an instant the place wasagain desert and silent, and the little green vistas were slumberingamong the trees. 

No one seemed able to estimate the number of men inside the Green, andthrough the day no considerable body of men had been seen, only thosewho held the gates, and the small parties of threes and fours whoarrested motors and carts for their barricades. Among these were somewho were only infants--one boy seemed about twelve years of age. He wasstrutting the centre of the road with a large revolver in his smallfist. A motor car came by him containing three men, and in the shortestof time he had the car lodged in his barricade, and dismissed itsstupified occupants with a wave of his armed hand. 

The knots were increasing about the streets, for now the Bank Holidaypeople began to wander back from places that were not distant, and tothem it had all to be explained anew. Free movement was possibleeverywhere in the City, but the constant crackle of rifles restrictedsomewhat that freedom. Up to one o'clock at night belated travellerswere straggling into the City, and curious people were wandering fromgroup to group still trying to gather information. 

I remained awake until four o'clock in the morning. Every five minutesa rifle cracked somewhere, but about a quarter to twelve sharp volleyingcame from the direction of Portobello Bridge, and died away after sometime. The windows of my flat listen out towards the Green, and obliquelytowards Sackville Street. In another quarter of an hour there werevolleys from Stephen's Green direction, and this continued withintensity for about twenty-five minutes. Then it fell into a sputter offire and ceased. 

I went to bed about four o'clock convinced that the Green had beenrushed by the military and captured, and that the rising was at an end. 

That was the first day of the insurrection. 

 CHAPTER II

 TUESDAY

A sultry, lowering day, and dusk skies fat with rain. 

I left for my office, believing that the insurrection was at an end. Ata corner I asked a man was it all finished. He said it was not, andthat, if anything, it was worse. 

On this day the rumours began, and I think it will be many a year beforethe rumours cease. The _Irish Times_ published an edition whichcontained nothing but an official Proclamation that evily-disposedpersons had disturbed the peace, and that the situation was well inhand. The news stated in three lines that there was a Sinn Fein risingin Dublin, and that the rest of the country was quiet. 

No English or country papers came. There was no delivery or collectionof letters. All the shops in the City were shut. There was no traffic ofany kind in the streets. There was no way of gathering any kind ofinformation, and rumour gave all the news. 

It seemed that the Military and the Government had been taken unawares. It was Bank Holiday, and many military officers had gone to the races, or were away on leave, and prominent members of the Irish Government hadgone to England on Sunday. 

It appeared that everything claimed on the previous day was true, andthat the City of Dublin was entirely in the hands of the Volunteers. They had taken and sacked Jacob's Biscuit Factory, and had converted itinto a fort which they held. They had the Post Office, and were buildingbaricades around it ten feet high of sandbags, cases, wireentanglements. They had pushed out all the windows and sandbagged themto half their height, while cart-loads of food, vegetables andammunition were going in continually. They had dug trenches and werelaying siege to one of the city barracks. 

It was current that intercourse between Germany and Ireland had beenfrequent chiefly by means of submarines, which came up near the coastand landed machine guns, rifles and ammunition. It was believed alsothat the whole country had risen, and that many strong places and citieswere in the hands of the Volunteers. Cork Barracks was said to be takenwhile the officers were away at the Curragh races, that the men withoutofficers were disorganised, and the place easily captured. 

It was said that Germans, thousands strong, had landed, and that manyIrish Americans with German officers had arrived also with full militaryequipment. 

On the previous day the Volunteers had proclaimed the Irish Republic. This ceremony was conducted from the Mansion House steps, and themanifesto was said to have been read by Pearse, of St. Enda's. TheRepublican and Volunteer flag was hoisted on the Mansion House. Thelatter consisted of vertical colours of green, white and orange. Kerrywireless station was reported captured, and news of the Republic flashedabroad. These rumours were flying in the street. 

It was also reported that two transports had come in the night and hadlanded from England about 8, 000 soldiers. An attack reported on thePost Office by a troop of lancers who were received with fire andrepulsed. It is foolish to send cavalry into street war. 

In connection with this lancer charge at the Post Office it is said thatthe people, and especially the women, sided with the soldiers, and thatthe Volunteers were assailed by these women with bricks, bottles, sticks, to cries of:

"Would you be hurting the poor men?"

There were other angry ladies who threatened Volunteers, addressing tothem this petrifying query:

"Would you be hurting the poor horses?"

Indeed, the best people in the world live in Dublin. 

The lancers retreated to the bottom of Sackville Street, where theyremained for some time in the centre of a crowd who were carressingtheir horses. It may have seemed to them a rather curious kind ofinsurrection--that is, if they were strangers to Ireland. 

In the Post Office neighbourhood the Volunteers had some difficulty indealing with the people who surged about them while they were preparingthe barricade, and hindered them to some little extent. One of theVolunteers was particularly noticeable. He held a lady's umbrella in hishand, and whenever some person became particularly annoying he wouldleap the barricade and chase his man half a street, hitting him over thehead with the umbrella. It was said that the wonder of the world was notthat Ireland was at war, but that after many hours the umbrella wasstill unbroken. A Volunteer night attack on the Quays was spoken of, whereat the military were said to have been taken by surprise and sixcarts of their ammunition captured. This was probably untrue. Also, thatthe Volunteers had blown up the Arsenal in the Phoenix Park. 

There had been looting in the night about Sackville Street, and it wascurrent that the Volunteers had shot twenty of the looters. 

The shops attacked were mainly haberdashers, shoe shops, and sweetshops. Very many sweet shops were raided, and until the end of therising sweet shops were the favourite mark of the looters. There issomething comical in this looting of sweet shops--something almostinnocent and child-like. Possibly most of the looters are children whoare having the sole gorge of their lives. They have tasted sweetstuffsthey had never toothed before, and will never taste again in this life, and until they die the insurrection of 1916 will have a sweet savour forthem. 

I went to the Green. At the corner of Merrion Row a horse was lying onthe footpath surrounded by blood. He bore two bullet wounds, but theblood came from his throat which had been cut. 

Inside the Green railings four bodies could be seen lying on the ground. They were dead Volunteers. 

The rain was falling now persistently, and persistently from the Greenand from the Shelbourne Hotel snipers were exchanging bullets. Somedistance beyond the Shelbourne I saw another Volunteer stretched out ona seat just within the railings. He was not dead, for, now and again, his hand moved feebly in a gesture for aid; the hand was completely redwith blood. His face could not be seen. He was just a limp mass, uponwhich the rain beat pitilessly, and he was sodden and shapeless, andmost miserable to see. His companions could not draw him in for thespot was covered by the snipers from the Shelbourne. Bystanders statedthat several attempts had already been made to rescue him, but that hewould have to remain there until the fall of night. 

From Trinity College windows and roof there was also sniping, but theShelbourne Hotel riflemen must have seriously troubled the Volunteers inthe Green. 

As I went back I stayed a while in front of the hotel to count the shotsthat had struck the windows. There were fourteen shots through theground windows. The holes were clean through, each surrounded by astar--the bullets went through but did not crack the glass. There werethree places in which the windows had holes half a foot to a foot wideand high. Here many rifles must have fired at the one moment. It musthave been as awkward inside the Shelbourne Hotel as it was inside theGreen. 

A lady who lived in Baggot Street said she had been up all night, and, with her neighbours, had supplied tea and bread to the soldiers who werelining the street. The officer to whom she spoke had made two or threeattacks to draw fire and estimate the Volunteers' positions, numbers, &c. , and he told her that he considered there were 3, 000 well-armedVolunteers in the Green, and as he had only 1, 000 soldiers, he could notafford to deliver a real attack, and was merely containing them. 

Amiens Street station reported recaptured by the military; otherstations are said to be still in the Volunteers' possession. 

The story goes that about twelve o'clock on Monday an English officerhad marched into the Post Office and demanded two penny stamps from theamazed Volunteers who were inside. He thought their uniforms were postaluniforms. They brought him in, and he is probably still trying to get aperspective on the occurrence. They had as prisoners in the Post Officea certain number of soldiers, and rumour had it that these menaccommodated themselves quickly to duress, and were busily engagedpeeling potatoes for the meal which they would partake of later on withthe Volunteers. 

Earlier in the day I met a wild individual who spat rumour as thoughhis mouth were a machine gun or a linotype machine. He believedeverything he heard; and everything he heard became as by magicfavourable to his hopes, which were violently anti-English. Oneunfavourable rumour was instantly crushed by him with three storieswhich were favourable and triumphantly so. He said the Germans hadlanded in three places. One of these landings alone consisted of fifteenthousand men. The other landings probably beat that figure. The wholeCity of Cork was in the hands of the Volunteers, and, to that extent, might be said to be peaceful. German warships had defeated the English, and their transports were speeding from every side. The whole countrywas up, and the garrison was out-numbered by one hundred to one. TheseDublin barracks which had not been taken were now besieged and on thepoint of surrender. 

I think this man created and winged every rumour that flew in Dublin, and he was the sole individual whom I heard definitely taking a side. Heleft me, and, looking back, I saw him pouring his news into the ear of agaping stranger whom he had arrested for the purpose. I almost wentback to hear would he tell the same tale or would he elaborate it into anew thing, for I am interested in the art of story-telling. 

At eleven o'clock the rain ceased, and to it succeeded a beautifulnight, gusty with wind, and packed with sailing clouds and stars. Wewere expecting visitors this night, but the sound of guns may havewarned most people away. Three only came, and with them we listened frommy window to the guns at the Green challenging and replying to eachother, and to where, further away, the Trinity snipers were crackling, and beyond again to the sounds of war from Sackville Street. The firingwas fairly heavy, and often the short rattle of machine guns could beheard. 

One of the stories told was that the Volunteers had taken the SouthDublin Union Workhouse, occupied it, and trenched the grounds. They wereheavily attacked by the military, who, at a loss of 150 men, took theplace. The tale went that towards the close the officer in commandoffered them terms of surrender, but the Volunteers replied that theywere not there to surrender. They were there to be killed. The garrisonconsisted of fifty men, and the story said that fifty men were killed. 

 CHAPTER III

 WEDNESDAY

It was three o'clock before I got to sleep last night, and during thehours machine guns and rifle firing had been continuous. 

This morning the sun is shining brilliantly, and the movement in thestreets possesses more of animation than it has done. The movement endsalways in a knot of people, and folk go from group to group vainlyseeking information, and quite content if the rumour they presentlygather differs even a little from the one they have just communicated. 

The first statement I heard was that the Green had been taken by themilitary; the second that it had been re-taken; the third that it hadnot been taken at all. The facts at last emerged that the Green had notbeen occupied by the soldiers, but that the Volunteers had retreatedfrom it into a house which commanded it. This was found to be theCollege of Surgeons, and from the windows and roof of this College theywere sniping. A machine gun was mounted on the roof; other machine guns, however, opposed them from the roofs of the Shelbourne Hotel, the UnitedService Club, and the Alexandra Club. Thus a triangular duel openedbetween these positions across the trees of the Park. 

Through the railings of the Green some rifles and bandoliers could beseen lying on the ground, as also the deserted trenches and snipers'holes. Small boys bolted in to see these sights and bolted out againwith bullets quickening their feet. Small boys do not believe thatpeople will really kill them, but small boys were killed. 

The dead horse was still lying stiff and lamentable on the footpath. 

This morning a gunboat came up the Liffey and helped to bombard LibertyHall. The Hall is breeched and useless. Rumour says that it was empty atthe time, and that Connolly with his men had marched long before to thePost Office and the Green. The same source of information relates thatthree thousand Volunteers came from Belfast on an excursion train andthat they marched into the Post Office. 

On this day only one of my men came in. He said that he had gone on theroof and had been shot at, consequently that the Volunteers held some ofthe covering houses. I went to the roof and remained there for half anhour. There were no shots, but the firing from the direction ofSackville Street was continuous and at times exceedingly heavy. 

To-day the _Irish Times_ was published. It contained a new militaryproclamation, and a statement that the country was peaceful, and toldthat in Sackville Street some houses were burned to the ground. 

On the outside railings a bill proclaiming Martial Law was posted. 

Into the newspaper statement that peace reigned in the country one wasinclined to read more of disquietude than of truth, and one said is thecountry so extraordinarily peaceful that it can be dismissed in threelines. There is too much peace or too much reticence, but it will besome time before we hear from outside of Dublin. 

Meanwhile the sun was shining. It was a delightful day, and the streetsoutside and around the areas of fire were animated and even gay. In thestreets of Dublin there were no morose faces to be seen. Almost everyonewas smiling and attentive, and a democratic feeling was abroad, to whichour City is very much a stranger; for while in private we are a sociableand talkative people we have no street manners or public ease whatever. Every person spoke to every other person, and men and women mixed andtalked without constraint. 

Was the City for or against the Volunteers? Was it for the Volunteers, and yet against the rising? It is considered now (writing a day or twoafterwards) that Dublin was entirely against the Volunteers, but on theday of which I write no such certainty could be put forward. There was asingular reticence on the subject. Men met and talked volubly, but theysaid nothing that indicated a personal desire or belief. They asked forand exchanged the latest news, or, rather, rumour, and while expressionswere frequent of astonishment at the suddenness and completeness of theoccurrence, no expression of opinion for or against was anywhereformulated. 

Sometimes a man said, "They will be beaten of course, " and, as heprophesied, the neighbour might surmise if he did so with a sad heart ora merry one, but they knew nothing and asked nothing of his views, andthemselves advanced no flag. 

This was among the men. 

The women were less guarded, or, perhaps, knew they had less to fear. Most of the female opinion I heard was not alone unfavourable butactively and viciously hostile to the rising. This was noticeable amongthe best dressed class of our population; the worst dressed, indeed thefemale dregs of Dublin life, expressed a like antagonism, and almost insimilar language. The view expressed was--

"I hope every man of them will be shot. "

And--

"They ought to be all shot. "

Shooting, indeed, was proceeding everywhere. During daylight, at least, the sound is not sinister nor depressing, and the thought that perhaps alife had exploded with that crack is not depressing either. 

In the last two years of world-war our ideas on death have undergone achange. It is not now the furtive thing that crawled into your bed andwhich you fought with pill-boxes and medicine bottles. It has becomeagain a rider of the wind whom you may go coursing with through thefields and open places. All the morbidity is gone, and the sickness, andwhat remains to Death is now health and excitement. So Dublin laughed atthe noise of its own bombardment, and made no moan about its dead--inthe sunlight. Afterwards--in the rooms, when the night fell, and insteadof silence that mechanical barking of the maxims and the whistle andscreams of the rifles, the solemn roar of the heavier guns, and the redglare covering the sky. It is possible that in the night Dublin did notlaugh, and that she was gay in the sunlight for no other reason thanthat the night was past. 

On this day fighting was incessant at Mount Street Bridge. A party ofVolunteers had seized three houses covering the bridge and convertedthese into forts. It is reported that military casualties at this pointwere very heavy. The Volunteers are said also to hold the South DublinUnion. The soldiers have seized Guinness's Brewery, while theiropponents have seized another brewery in the neighbourhood, and betweenthese two there is a continual fusilade. 

Fighting is brisk about Ringsend and along the Canal. Dame Street wassaid to be held in many places by the Volunteers. I went down DameStreet, but saw no Volunteers, and did not observe any sniping from thehouses. Further, as Dame Street is entirely commanded by the roofs andwindows of Trinity College, it is unlikely that they should be here. 

It was curious to observe this, at other times, so animated street, broad and deserted, with at the corners of side streets small knots ofpeople watching. Seen from behind, Grattan's Statue in College Greenseemed almost alive, and he had the air of addressing warnings andreproaches to Trinity College. 

The Proclamation issued to-day warns all people to remain within doorsuntil five o'clock in the morning, and after seven o'clock at night. 

It is still early. There is no news of any kind, and the rumours beginto catch quickly on each other and to cancel one another out. Dublin isentirely cut off from England, and from the outside world. It is, justas entirely cut off from the rest of Ireland; no news of any kindfilters in to us. We are land-locked and sea-locked, but, as yet, itdoes not much matter. 

Meantime the belief grows that the Volunteers may be able to hold outmuch longer than had been imagined. The idea at first among the peoplehad been that the insurrection would be ended the morning after it hadbegan. But to-day, the insurrection having lasted three days, people areready to conceive that it may last for ever. There is almost a feelingof gratitude towards the Volunteers because they are holding out for alittle while, for had they been beaten the first or second day the Citywould have been humiliated to the soul. 

People say: "Of course, they will be beaten. " The statement is almost aquery, and they continue, "but they are putting up a decent fight. " Forbeing beaten does not greatly matter in Ireland, but not fighting doesmatter. "They went forth always to the battle; and they always fell, "Indeed, the history of the Irish race is in that phrase. 

The firing from the roofs of Trinity College became violent. I crossedDame Street some distance up, struck down the Quays, and went alongthese until I reached the Ballast Office. Further than this it was notpossible to go, for a step beyond the Ballast Office would have broughtone into the unending stream of lead that was pouring from Trinity andother places. I was looking on O'Connell Bridge and Sackville Street, and the house facing me was Kelly's--a red-brick fishing tackle shop, one half of which was on the Quay and the other half in SackvilleStreet. This house was being bombarded. 

I counted the report of six different machine guns which played on it. Rifles innumerable and from every sort of place were potting itswindows, and at intervals of about half a minute the shells from a heavygun lobbed in through its windows or thumped mightily against its walls. 

For three hours that bombardment continued, and the walls stood in acloud of red dust and smoke. Rifle and machine gun bullets pattered overevery inch of it, and, unfailingly the heavy gun pounded its shellsthrough the windows. 

One's heart melted at the idea that human beings were crouching insidethat volcano of death, and I said to myself, "Not even a fly can bealive in that house. "

No head showed at any window, no rifle cracked from window or roof inreply. The house was dumb, lifeless, and I thought every one of thosemen are dead. 

It was then, and quite suddenly, that the possibilities of streetfighting flashed on me, and I knew there was no person in the house, andsaid to myself, "They have smashed through the walls with a hatchet andare sitting in the next house, or they have long ago climbed out by theskylight and are on a roof half a block away. " Then the thought came tome--they have and hold the entire of Sackville Street down to the PostOffice. Later on this proved to be the case, and I knew at this momentthat Sackville Street was doomed. 

I continued to watch the bombardment, but no longer with the anguishwhich had before torn me. Near by there were four men, and a few yardsaway, clustered in a laneway, there were a dozen others. An agitatedgirl was striding from the farther group to the one in which I was, andshe addressed the men in the most obscene language which I have everheard. She addressed them man by man, and she continued to speak and cryand scream at them with all that obstinate, angry patience of which onlya woman is capable. 

She cursed us all. She called down diseases on every human being in theworld excepting only the men who were being bombarded. She demanded ofthe folk in the laneway that they should march at least into the roadwayand prove that they were proud men and were not afraid of bullets. Shehad been herself into the danger zone. Had stood herself in the track ofthe guns, and had there cursed her fill for half an hour, and shedesired that the men should do at least what she had done. 

This girl was quite young--about nineteen years of age--and was dressedin the customary shawl and apron of her class. Her face was ratherpretty, or it had that pretty slenderness and softness of outline whichbelong to youth. But every sentence she spoke contained half a dozenindecent words. Alas, it was only that her vocabulary was not equal toher emotions, and she did not know how to be emphatic without beingobscene--it is the cause of most of the meaningless swearing one hearsevery day. She spoke to me for a minute, and her eyes were as soft asthose of a kitten and her language was as gentle as her eyes. She wanteda match to light a cigarette, but I had none, and said that I alsowanted one. In a few minutes she brought me a match, and then sherecommenced her tireless weaving of six vile words into hundreds ofstupid sentences. 

About five o'clock the guns eased off of Kelly's. 

To inexperienced eyes they did not seem to have done very much damage, but afterwards one found that although the walls were standing andapparently solid there was no inside to the house. From roof to basementthe building was bare as a dog kennel. There were no floors inside, there was nothing there but blank space; and on the ground within wasthe tumble and rubbish that had been roof and floors and furniture. Everything inside was smashed and pulverised into scrap and dust, andthe only objects that had consistency and their ancient shape were thebricks that fell when the shells struck them. 

Rifle shots had begun to strike the house on the further side of thestreet, a jewellers' shop called Hopkins & Hopkins. The impact of theseballs on the bricks was louder than the sound of the shot whichimmediately succeeded, and each bullet that struck brought down a showerof fine red dust from the walls. Perhaps thirty or forty shots in allwere fired at Hopkins', and then, except for an odd crack, firingceased. 

During all this time there had been no reply from the Volunteers, and Ithought they must be husbanding their ammunition, and so must be shortof it, and that it would be only a matter of a few days before the end. All this, I said to myself, will be finished in a few days, and theywill be finished; life here will recommence exactly where it left off, and except for some newly-filled graves, all will be as it had beenuntil they become a tradition and enter the imagination of their race. 

I spoke to several of the people about me, and found the samewillingness to exchange news that I had found elsewhere in the City, andthe same reticences as regarded their private opinions. Two of them, indeed, and they were the only two I met with during the insurrection, expressed, although in measured terms, admiration for the Volunteers, and while they did not side with them they did not say anything againstthem. One was a labouring man, the other a gentleman. The remark of thelatter was:

"I am an Irishman, and (pointing to the shells that were burstingthrough the windows in front of us) I hate to see that being done toother Irishmen. "

He had come from some part of the country to spend the Easter Holidaysin Dublin, and was unable to leave town again. 

The labouring man--he was about fifty-six years of age--spoke veryquietly and collectedly about the insurrection. He was a type with whomI had come very little in contact, and I was surprised to find howsimple and good his speech was, and how calm his ideas. He thoughtlabour was in this movement to a greater extent than was imagined. Imentioned that Liberty Hall had been blown up, and that the garrison hadeither surrendered or been killed. He replied that a gunboat had thatmorning come up the river and had blown Liberty Hall into smash, but, headded, there were no men in it. All the Labour Volunteers had marchedwith Connolly into the Post Office. 

He said the Labour Volunteers might possibly number about one thousandmen, but that it would be quite safe to say eight hundred, and he heldthat the Labour Volunteers, or the Citizens' Army, as they calledthemselves, had always been careful not to reveal their numbers. Theyhad always announced that they possessed about two hundred and fiftymen, and had never paraded any more than that number at any one time. Workingmen, he continued, knew that the men who marched were alwaysdifferent men. The police knew it, too, but they thought that theCitizens Army was the _most deserted-from force_ in the world. 

The men, however, were not deserters--you don't, he said, desert a manlike Connolly, and they were merely taking their turn at being drilledand disciplined. They were raised against the police who, in the bigstrike of two years ago, had acted towards them with unparallelledsavagery, and the men had determined that the police would never againfind them thus disorganised. 

This man believed that every member of the Citizen Army had marched withtheir leader. 

"The men, I know, " said he, "would not be afraid of anything, and, " hecontinued, "they are in the Post Office now. "

"What chance have they?"

"None, " he replied, "and they never said they had, and they neverthought they would have any. "

"How long do you think they'll be able to hold out?"

He nodded towards the house that had been bombarded by heavy guns. 

"That will root them out of it quick enough, " was his reply. 

"I'm going home, " said he then, "the people will be wondering if I'mdead or alive, " and he walked away from that sad street, as I did myselfa few minutes afterwards. 

 CHAPTER IV. 

 THURSDAY. 

Again, the rumours greeted one. This place had fallen and had notfallen. Such a position had been captured by the soldiers; recaptured bythe Volunteers, and had not been attacked at all. But certainly fightingwas proceeding. Up Mount Street, the rifle volleys were continuous, andthe coming and going of ambulance cars from that direction werecontinuous also. Some spoke of pitched battles on the bridge, and saidthat as yet the advantage lay with the Volunteers. 

At 11. 30 there came the sound of heavy guns firing in the direction ofSackville Street. I went on the roof, and remained there for some time. From this height the sounds could be heard plainly. There was sustainedfiring along the whole central line of the City, from the Green down toTrinity College, and from thence to Sackville Street, and the report ofthe various types of arm could be easily distinguished. There wererifles, machine guns and very heavy cannon. There was another soundwhich I could not put a name to, something that coughed out over all theother sounds, a short, sharp bark, or rather a short noise somethinglike the popping of a tremendous cork. 

I met D. H. His chief emotion is one of astonishment at the organizingpowers displayed by the Volunteers. We have exchanged rumours, and foundthat our equipment in this direction is almost identical. He says SheehySkeffington has been killed. That he was arrested in a house whereinarms were found, and was shot out of hand. 

I hope this is another rumour, for, so far as my knowledge of him goes, he was not with the Volunteers, and it is said that he was antagonisticto the forcible methods for which the Volunteers stood. But the tale ofhis death is so persistent that one is inclined to believe it. 

He was the most absurdly courageous man I have ever met with or heardof. He has been in every trouble that has touched Ireland these tenyears back, and he has always been in on the generous side, therefore, and naturally, on the side that was unpopular and weak. It would seemindeed that a cause had only to be weak to gain his sympathy, and hissympathy never stayed at home. There are so many good people who"sympathise" with this or that cause, and, having given that measure oftheir emotion, they give no more of it or of anything else. But herushed instantly to the street. A large stone, the lift of a footpath, the base of a statue, any place and every place was for him a pulpit;and, in the teeth of whatever oppression or disaster or power, he saidhis say. 

There are multitudes of men in Dublin of all classes and creeds who canboast that they kicked Sheehy Skeffington, or that they struck him onthe head with walking sticks and umbrellas, or that they smashed theirfists into his face, and jumped on him when he fell. It is by no meansan exaggeration to say that these things were done to him, and it istrue that he bore ill-will to no man, and that he accepted blows, andindignities and ridicule with the pathetic candour of a child who isdisguised as a man, and whose disguise cannot come off. His tongue, hispen, his body, all that he had and hoped for were at the immediateservice of whoever was bewildered or oppressed. He has been shot. Othermen have been shot, but they faced the guns knowing that they facedjustice, however stern and oppressive; and that what they had engaged toconfront was before them. He had no such thought to soothe from his mindanger or unforgiveness. He who was a pacifist was compelled to revolt tohis last breath, and on the instruments of his end he must have lookedas on murderers. I am sure that to the end he railed against oppression, and that he fell marvelling that the world can truly be as it is. Withhis death there passed away a brave man and a clean soul. 

Later on this day I met Mrs. Sheehy Skeffington in the street. Sheconfirmed the rumour that her husband had been arrested on the previousday, but further than that she had no news. So far as I know the solecrime of which her husband had been guilty was that he called for ameeting of the citizens to enrol special constables and prevent looting. 

Among the rumours it was stated with every accent of certitude thatMadame Markievicz had been captured in George's Street, and taken to theCastle. It was also current that Sir Roger Casement had been captured atsea and had already been shot in the Tower of London. The names ofseveral Volunteer Leaders are mentioned as being dead. But the surmisethat steals timidly from one mouth flies boldly as a certitude fromevery mouth that repeats it, and truth itself would now be listened towith only a gossip's ear, but no person would believe a word of it. 

This night also was calm and beautiful, but this night was the mostsinister and woeful of those that have passed. The sound of artillery, of rifles, machine guns, grenades, did not cease even for a moment. Frommy window I saw a red flare that crept to the sky, and stole over it andremained there glaring; the smoke reached from the ground to the clouds, and I could see great red sparks go soaring to enormous heights; whilealways, in the calm air, hour after hour there was the buzzing andrattling and thudding of guns, and, but for the guns, silence. 

It is in a dead silence this Insurrection is being fought, and oneimagines what must be the feeling of these men, young for the most part, and unused to violence, who are submitting silently to the crash andflame and explosion by which they are surrounded. 

 CHAPTER V. 

 FRIDAY. 

This morning there are no newspapers, no bread, no milk, no news. Thesun is shining, and the streets are lively but discreet. All peoplecontinue to talk to one another without distinction of class, but nobodyknows what any person thinks. 

It is a little singular the number of people who are smiling. I fancythey were listening to the guns last night, and they are smiling thismorning because the darkness is past, and because the sun is shining, and because they can move their limbs in space, and may talk withouthaving to sink their voices to a whisper. Guns do not sound so bad inthe day as they do at night, and no person can feel lonely while the sunshines. 

The men are smiling, but the women laugh, and their laughter does notdisplease, for whatever women do in whatever circumstances appears tohave a rightness of its own. It seems right that they should screamwhen danger to themselves is imminent, and it seems right that theyshould laugh when the danger only threatens others. 

It is rumoured this morning that Sackville Street has been burned outand levelled to the ground. It is said that the end is in sight; and, itis said, that matters are, if anything rather worse than better. Thatthe Volunteers have sallied from some of their strongholds andentrenched themselves, and that in one place alone (the South Lotts)they have seven machine guns. That when the houses which they heldbecame untenable they rushed out and seized other houses, and that, pursuing these tactics, there seemed no reason to believe that theInsurrection would ever come to an end. That the streets are filled withVolunteers in plain clothes, but having revolvers in their pockets. Thatthe streets are filled with soldiers equally revolvered and plainclothed, and that the least one says on any subject the less one wouldhave to answer for. 

The feeling that I tapped was definitely Anti-Volunteer, but the numberof people who would speak was few, and one regarded the noncommitalfolk who were so smiling and polite, and so prepared to talk, with muchcuriosity, seeking to read in their eyes, in their bearing, even in thecut of their clothes what might be the secret movements and cogitationsof their minds. 

I received the impression that numbers of them did not care a rap whatway it went; and that others had ceased to be mental creatures and weremerely machines for registering the sensations of the time. 

None of these people were prepared for Insurrection. The thing had beensprung on them so suddenly that they were unable to take sides, andtheir feeling of detachment was still so complete that they would havebetted on the business as if it had been a horse race or a dog fight. 

Many English troops have been landed each night, and it is believed thatthere are more than sixty thousand soldiers in Dublin alone, and thatthey are supplied with every offensive contrivance which military arthas invented. 

Merrion Square is strongly held by the soldiers. They are posted alongboth sides of the road at intervals of about twenty paces, and theirguns are continually barking up at the roofs which surround them in thegreat square. It is said that these roofs are held by the Volunteersfrom Mount Street Bridge to the Square, and that they hold in likemanner wide stretches of the City. 

They appear to have mapped out the roofs with all the thoroughness thathad hitherto been expended on the roads, and upon these roofs they areso mobile and crafty and so much at home that the work of the soldierswill be exceedingly difficult as well as dangerous. 

Still, and notwithstanding, men can only take to the roofs for a shorttime. Up there, there can be no means of transport, and theirammunition, as well as their food, will very soon be used up. It is thebeginning of the end, and the fact that they have to take to the roofs, even though that be in their programme, means that they are finished. 

From the roof there comes the sound of machine guns. Looking towardsSackville Street one picks out easily Nelson's Pillar, which towersslenderly over all the buildings of the neighbourhood. It is wreathed insmoke. Another towering building was the D. B. C. Café. Its Chinese-likepagoda was a landmark easily to be found, but to-day I could not findit. It was not there, and I knew that, even if all Sackville Street wasnot burned down, as rumour insisted, this great Café had certainly beencurtailed by its roof and might, perhaps, have been completely burned. 

On the gravel paths I found pieces of charred and burnt paper. Thesescraps must have been blown remarkably high to have crossed all theroofs that lie between Sackville Street and Merrion Square. 

At eleven o'clock there is continuous firing, and snipers firing fromthe direction of Mount Street, and in every direction of the City thesesounds are being duplicated. 

In Camden Street the sniping and casualties are said to have been veryheavy. One man saw two Volunteers taken from a house by the soldiers. They were placed kneeling in the centre of the road, and within oneminute of their capture they were dead. Simultaneously there fellseveral of the firing party. 

An officer in this part had his brains blown into the roadway. A younggirl ran into the road picked up his cap and scraped the brains into it. She covered this poor debris with a little straw, and carried the hatpiously to the nearest hospital in order that the brains might be buriedwith their owner. 

The continuation of her story was less gloomy although it affected theteller equally. 

"There is not, " said she, "a cat or a dog left alive in Camden Street. They are lying stiff out in the road and up on the roofs. There's lotsof women will be sorry for this war, " said she, "and their pets killedon them. "

In many parts of the City hunger began to be troublesome. A girl told methat her family, and another that had taken refuge with them, had eatennothing for three days. On this day her father managed to get two loavesof bread somewhere, and he brought these home. 

"When, " said the girl, "my father came in with the bread the wholefourteen of us ran at him, and in a minute we were all ashamed for theloaves were gone to the last crumb, and we were all as hungry as we hadbeen before he came in. The poor man, " said she, "did not even get a bitfor himself. " She held that the poor people were against the Volunteers. 

The Volunteers still hold Jacob's Biscuit Factory. It is rumoured that apriest visited them and counselled surrender, and they replied that theydid not go there to surrender but to be killed. They asked him to givethem absolution, and the story continues that he refused to do so--butthis is not (in its latter part) a story that can easily be credited. The Adelaide Hospital is close to this factory, and it is possible thatthe proximity of the hospital, delays or hinders military operationsagainst the factory. 

Rifle volleys are continuous about Merrion Square, and prolonged machinegun firing can be heard also. 

During the night the firing was heavy from almost every direction; andin the direction of Sackville Street a red glare told again of fire. 

It is hard to get to bed these nights. It is hard even to sit down, forthe moment one does sit down one stands immediately up again resumingthat ridiculous ship's march from the window to the wall and back. I amfoot weary as I have never been before in my life, but I cannot say thatI am excited. No person in Dublin is excited, but there exists a stateof tension and expectancy which is mentally more exasperating than anyexcitement could be. The absence of news is largely responsible forthis. We do not know what has happened, what is happening, or what isgoing to happen, and the reversion to barbarism (for barbarism islargely a lack of news) disturbs us. 

Each night we have got to bed at last murmuring, "I wonder will it beall over to-morrow, " and this night the like question accompanied us. 

 CHAPTER VI. 

 SATURDAY. 

This morning also there has been no bread, no milk, no meat, nonewspapers, but the sun is shining. It is astonishing that, thus earlyin the Spring, the weather should be so beautiful. 

It is stated freely that the Post Office has been taken, and just asfreely it is averred that it has not been taken. The approaches toMerrion Square are held by the military, and I was not permitted to goto my office. As I came to this point shots were fired at a motor carwhich had not stopped on being challenged. Bystanders said it was SirHorace Plunkett's car, and that he had been shot. Later we found thatSir Horace was not hurt, but that his nephew who drove the car had beenseverely wounded. 

At this hour the rumour of the fall of Verdun was persistent. Later onit was denied, as was denied the companion rumour of the relief of Kut. Saw R. Who had spent three days and the whole of his money in gettinghome from County Clare. He had heard that Mrs. Sheehy Skeffington'shouse was raided, and that two dead bodies had been taken out of it. SawMiss P. Who seemed sad. I do not know what her politics are, but I thinkthat the word "kindness" might be used to cover all her activities. Shehas a heart of gold, and the courage of many lions. I then met Mr. Commissioner Bailey who said the Volunteers had sent a deputation, andthat terms of surrender were being discussed. I hope this is true, and Ihope mercy will be shown to the men. Nobody believes there will be anymercy shown, and it is freely reported that they are shot in the street, or are taken to the nearest barracks and shot there. The belief growsthat no person who is now in the Insurrection will be alive when theInsurrection is ended. 

That is as it will be. But these days the thought of death does notstrike on the mind with any severity, and, should the European warcontinue much longer, the fear of death will entirely depart from man, as it has departed many times in history. With that great deterrentgone our rulers will be gravely at a loss in dealing with strikers andother such discontented people. Possibly they will have to resurrect thelong-buried idea of torture. 

The people in the streets are laughing and chatting. Indeed, there isgaiety in the air as well as sunshine, and no person seems to care thatmen are being shot every other minute, or bayoneted, or blown intoscraps or burned into cinders. These things are happening, nevertheless, but much of their importance has vanished. 

I met a man at the Green who was drawing a plan on the back of anenvelope. The problem was how his questioner was to get from where hewas standing to a street lying at the other side of the river, and theplan as drawn insisted that to cover this quarter of an hour's distancehe must set out on a pilgrimage of more than twenty miles. Another youngboy was standing near embracing a large ham. He had been trying forthree days to convey his ham to a house near the Gresham Hotel where hissister lived. He had almost given up hope, and he hearkenedintelligently to the idea that he should himself eat the ham and so getrid of it. 

The rifle fire was persistent all day, but, saving in certainlocalities, it was not heavy. Occasionally the machine guns rapped in. There was no sound of heavy artillery. 

The rumour grows that the Post Office has been evacuated, and that theVolunteers are at large and spreading everywhere across the roofs. Therumour grows also that terms of surrender are being discussed, and thatSackville Street has been levelled to the ground. 

At half-past seven in the evening calm is almost complete. The sound ofa rifle shot being only heard at long intervals. 

I got to bed this night earlier than usual. At two o'clock I left thewindow from which a red flare is yet visible in the direction ofSackville Street. The morning will tell if the Insurrection is finishedor not, but at this hour all is not over. Shots are ringing all aroundand down my street, and the vicious crackling of these rifles grow attimes into regular volleys. 

 CHAPTER VII. 

 SUNDAY. 

The Insurrection has not ceased. 

There is much rifle fire, but no sound from the machine guns or theeighteen pounders and trench mortars. 

From the window of my kitchen the flag of the Republic can be seenflying afar. This is the flag that flies over Jacob's Biscuit Factory, and I will know that the Insurrection has ended as soon as I see thisflag pulled down. 

When I went out there were few people in the streets. I met D. H. , and, together, we passed up the Green. The Republican flag was still flyingover the College of Surgeons. We tried to get down Grafton Street (wherebroken windows and two gaping interiors told of the recent visit oflooters), but a little down this street we were waved back by armedsentries. We then cut away by the Gaiety Theatre into Mercer's Street, where immense lines of poor people were drawn up waiting for theopening of the local bakery. We got into George's Street, thinking toturn down Dame Street and get from thence near enough to SackvilleStreet to see if the rumours about its destruction were true, but herealso we were halted by the military, and had to retrace our steps. 

There was no news of any kind to be gathered from the people we talkedto, nor had they even any rumours. 

This was the first day I had been able to get even a short distanceoutside of my own quarter, and it seemed that the people of my quarterwere more able in the manufacture of news or more imaginative than werethe people who live in other parts of the city. We had no sooner struckinto home parts than we found news. We were told that two of theVolunteer leaders had been shot. These were Pearse and Connolly. Thelatter was reported as lying in the Castle Hospital with a fracturedthigh. Pearse was cited as dead with two hundred of his men, followingtheir sally from the Post Office. The machine guns had caught them asthey left, and none of them remained alive. The news seemed afterwardsto be true except that instead of Pearse it was The O'Rahilly who hadbeen killed. Pearse died later and with less excitement. 

A man who had seen an English newspaper said that the Kut force hadsurrendered to the Turk, but that Verdun had not fallen to the Germans. The rumour was current also that a great naval battle had been foughtwhereat the German fleet had been totally destroyed with loss to theEnglish of eighteen warships. It was said that among the capturedVolunteers there had been a large body of Germans, but nobody believedit; and this rumour was inevitably followed by the tale that there wereone hundred German submarines lying in the Stephen's Green pond. 

At half-past two I met Mr. Commissioner Bailey, who told me that it wasall over, and that the Volunteers were surrendering everywhere in thecity. A motor car with two military officers, and two Volunteer leadershad driven to the College of Surgeons and been admitted. After a shortinterval Madame Marckievicz marched out of the College at the head ofabout 100 men, and they had given up their arms; the motor car with theVolunteer leaders was driving to other strongholds, and it was expectedthat before nightfall the capitulations would be complete. 

I started home, and on the way I met a man whom I had encountered somedays previously, and from whom rumours had sprung as though he wove themfrom his entrails, as a spider weaves his web. He was no less providedon this occasion, and it was curious to listen to his tale of Englishdefeats on every front. He announced the invasion of England in sixdifferent quarters, the total destruction of the English fleet, and thelanding of immense German armies on the West coast of Ireland. He madethese things up in his head. Then he repeated them to himself in a loudvoice, and became somehow persuaded that they had been told to him by awell-informed stranger, and then he believed them and told them toeverybody he met. Amongst other things Spain had declared war on ourbehalf, the Chilian Navy was hastening to our relief. For a pin hewould have sent France flying westward all forgetful of her own war. Asingular man truly, and as I do think the only thoroughly happy personin our city. 

It is half-past three o'clock, and from my window the Republican flagcan still be seen flying over Jacob's factory. There is occasionalshooting, but the city as a whole is quiet. At a quarter to five o'clocka heavy gun boomed once. Ten minutes later there was heavy machine gunfiring and much rifle shooting. In another ten minutes the flag atJacob's was hauled down. 

During the remainder of the night sniping and military replies wereincessant, particularly in my street. 

The raids have begun in private houses. Count Plunkett's house wasentered by the military who remained there for a very long time. Passinghome about two minutes after Proclamation hour I was pursued for thewhole of Fitzwilliam Square by bullets. They buzzed into the roadwaybeside me, and the sound as they whistled near was curious. The sound issomething like that made by a very swift saw, and one gets theimpression that as well as being very swift they are very heavy. 

Snipers are undoubtedly on the roofs opposite my house, and they are notasleep on these roofs. Possibly it is difficult to communicate withthese isolated bands the news of their companions' surrender, but it islikely they will learn, by the diminution of fire in other quarters thattheir work is over. 

In the morning on looking from my window I saw four policemen marchinginto the street. They were the first I had seen for a week. Soon now themilitary tale will finish, the police story will commence, the politicalstory will recommence, and, perhaps, the weeks that follow this one willsow the seed of more hatred than so many centuries will be able touproot again, for although Irish people do not greatly fear the militarythey fear the police, and they have very good reason to do so. 

 CHAPTER VIII. 

 THE INSURRECTION IS OVER. 

The Insurrection is over, and it is worth asking what has happened, howit has happened, and why it happened?

The first question is easily answered. The finest part of our city hasbeen blown to smithereens, and burned into ashes. Soldiers amongst uswho have served abroad say that the ruin of this quarter is morecomplete than any thing they have seen at Ypres, than anything they haveseen anywhere in France or Flanders. A great number of our men and womenand children, Volunteers and civilians confounded alike, are dead, andsome fifty thousand men who have been moved with military equipment toour land are now being removed therefrom. The English nation has beendisorganised no more than as they were affected by the transport ofthese men and material. That is what happened, and it is all thathappened. 

How it happened is another matter, and one which, perhaps, will not bemade clear for years. All we know in Dublin is that our city burst intoa kind of spontaneous war; that we lived through it during one singularweek, and that it faded away and disappeared almost as swiftly as it hadcome. The men who knew about it are, with two exceptions, dead, andthese two exceptions are in gaol, and likely to remain there longenough. (Since writing one of these men has been shot. )

Why it happened is a question that may be answered more particularly. Ithappened because the leader of the Irish Party misrepresented his peoplein the English House of Parliament. On the day of the declaration of warbetween England and Germany he took the Irish case, weighty with eightcenturies of history and tradition, and he threw it out of the window. He pledged Ireland to a particular course of action, and he had noauthority to give this pledge and he had no guarantee that it would bemet. The ramshackle intelligence of his party and his own emotionalnature betrayed him and us and England. He swore Ireland to loyalty asif he had Ireland in his pocket, and could answer for her. Ireland hasnever been disloyal to England, not even at this epoch, because she hasnever been loyal to England, and the profession of her National faithhas been unwavering, has been known to every English person alive, andhas been clamant to all the world beside. 

Is it that he wanted to be cheered? He could very easily have statedIreland's case truthfully, and have proclaimed a benevolent neutrality(if he cared to use the grandiloquent words) on the part of thiscountry. He would have gotten his cheers, he would in a few months havegotten Home Rule in return for Irish soldiers. He would have receivedpolitically whatever England could have safely given him. But, alas, these carefulnesses did not chime with his emotional moment. They werenot magnificent enough for one who felt that he was talking not toIreland or to England, but to the whole gaping and eager earth, and sohe pledged his country's credit so deeply that he did not leave her evenone National rag to cover herself with. 

After a lie truth bursts out, and it is no longer the radiant andserene goddess knew or hoped for--it is a disease, it is a moralsyphilis and will ravage until the body in which it can dwell has beenpurged. Mr. Redmond told the lie and he is answerable to England for theviolence she had to be guilty of, and to Ireland for the desolation towhich we have had to submit. Without his lie there had been noInsurrection; without it there had been at this moment, and for a yearpast, an end to the "Irish question. " Ireland must in ages gone havebeen guilty of abominable crimes or she could not at this juncture havebeen afflicted with a John Redmond. 

He is the immediate cause of this our latest Insurrection--the word isbig, much too big for the deed, and we should call it row, or riot, orsquabble, in order to draw the fact down to its dimensions, but theultimate blame for the trouble between the two countries does not fallagainst Ireland. 

The fault lies with England, and in these days while an effort is beingmade (interrupted, it is true, by cannon) to found a betterunderstanding between the two nations it is well that England shouldrecognize what she has done to Ireland, and should try at least toatone for it. The situation can be explained almost in a phrase. We area little country and you, a huge country, have persistently beaten us. We are a poor country and you, the richest country in the world, havepersistently robbed us. That is the historical fact, and whatevernational or political necessities are opposed in reply, it is true thatyou have never given Ireland any reason to love you, and you cannotclaim her affection without hypocrisy or stupidity. 

You think our people can only be tenacious in hate--it is a lie. Ourhistorical memory is truly tenacious, but during the long and miserabletale of our relations you have never given us one generosity to rememberyou by, and you must not claim our affection or our devotion until youare worthy of them. We are a good people; almost we are the onlyChristian people left in the world, nor has any nation shown suchforbearance towards their persecutor as we have always shown to you. Nonation has forgiven its enemies as we have forgiven you, time after timedown the miserable generations, the continuity of forgiveness onlyequalled by the continuity of your ill-treatment. Between our twocountries you have kept and protected a screen of traders andpoliticians who are just as truly your enemies as they are ours. In theend they will do most harm to you for we are by this vaccinated againstmisery but you are not, and the "loyalists" who sell their own countryfor a shilling will sell another country for a penny when theopportunity comes and safety with it. 

Meanwhile do not always hasten your presents to us out of a gun. Youhave done it so often that your guns begin to bore us, and you have nowan opportunity which may never occur again to make us your friends. There is no bitterness in Ireland against you on account of this war, and the lack of ill-feeling amongst us is entirely due to the more thanadmirable behaviour of the soldiers whom you sent over here. A peacethat will last for ever can be made with Ireland if you wish to make it, but you must take her hand at once, for in a few months' time she willnot open it to you; the old, bad relations will re-commence, the rancorwill be born and grow, and another memory will be stored away inIreland's capacious and retentive brain. 

 CHAPTER IX. 

 THE VOLUNTEERS. 

There is much talk of the extraordinary organising powers displayed inthe insurrection, but in truth there was nothing extraordinary in it. The real essence and singularity of the rising exists in its simplicity, and, saving for the courage which carried it out, the word extraordinaryis misplaced in this context. 

The tactics of the Volunteers as they began to emerge were reduced tothe very skeleton of "strategy. " It was only that they seized certaincentral and stragetical districts, garrisoned those and held them untilthey were put out of them. Once in their forts there was no furtheregress by the doors, and for purpose of entry and sortie they used theskylights and the roofs. On the roofs they had plenty of cover, and thiscover conferred on them a mobility which was their chief asset, andwhich alone enabled them to protract the rebellion beyond the first day. 

This was the entire of their home plan, and there is no doubt that theyhad studied Dublin roofs and means of inter-communication by roofs withthe closest care. Further than that I do not think they had organisedanything. But this was only the primary plan, and, unless they wereentirely mad, there must have been a sequel to it which did notmaterialise, and which would have materialised but that the EnglishFleet blocked the way. 

There is no doubt that they expected the country to rise with them, andthey must have known what their own numbers were, and what chance theyhad of making a protracted resistance. The word "resistance" is thekeyword of the rising, and the plan of holding out must have beenrounded off with a date. At that date something else was to havehappened which would relieve them. 

There is not much else that could happen except the landing of Germantroops in Ireland or in England. It would have been, I think, immaterialto them where these were landed, but the reasoning seems to point to thefact that they expected and had arranged for such a landing, althoughon this point there is as yet no evidence. 

The logic of this is so simple, so plausible, that it might be acceptedwithout further examination, and yet further examination is necessary, for in a country like Ireland logic and plausibility are more oftenwrong than right. It may just as easily be that except for furnishingsome arms and ammunition Germany was not in the rising at all, and thisI prefer to believe. It had been current long before the rising that theVolunteers knew they could not seriously embarass England, and thattheir sole aim was to make such a row in Ireland that the Irish questionwould take the status of an international one, and on the discussion ofterms of peace in the European war the claims of Ireland would have tobe considered by the whole Council of Europe and the world. 

That is, in my opinion, the metaphysic behind the rising. It is quitelikely that they hoped for German aid, possibly some thousands of men, who would enable them to prolong the row, but I do not believe theyexpected German armies, nor do I think they would have welcomed thesewith any cordiality. 

In this insurrection there are two things which are singular in thehistory of Irish risings. One is that there were no informers, or therewere no informers among the chiefs. I did hear people say in the streetsthat two days before the rising they knew it was to come; theyinvariably added that they had not believed the news, and had laughed atit. A priest said the same thing in my hearing, and it may be that therumour was widely spread, and that everybody, including the authorities, looked upon it as a joke. 

The other singularity of the rising is the amazing silence in which itwas fought. Nothing spoke but the guns; and the Volunteers on the oneside and the soldiers on the other potted each other and died inwhispers; it might have been said that both sides feared the Germanswould hear them and take advantage of their preoccupation. 

There is a third reason given for the rebellion, and it also is divorcedfrom foreign plots. It is said, and the belief in Dublin was widespread, that the Government intended to raid the Volunteers and seize theirarms. One remembers to-day the paper which Alderman Kelly read to theDublin Corporation, and which purported to be State Instructions thatthe Military and Police should raid the Volunteers, and seize their armsand leaders. The Volunteers had sworn they would not permit their armsto be taken from them. A list of the places to be raided was given, andthe news created something of a sensation in Ireland when it waspublished that evening. The Press, by instruction apparently, repudiatedthis document, but the Volunteers, with most of the public, believed itto be true, and it is more than likely that the rebellion took place inorder to forestall the Government. 

This is also an explanation of the rebellion, and is just as good a oneas any other. It is the explanation which I believe to be the true one. 

All the talk of German invasion and the landing of German troops inIreland is so much nonsense in view of the fact that England is masterof the seas, and that from a week before the war down to this date shehas been the undisputed monarch of those ridges. During this war therewill be no landing of troops in either England or Ireland unless Germanyin the meantime can solve the problem of submarine transport. It is aproblem which will be solved some day, for every problem can be solved, but it will hardly be during the progress of this war. The men at thehead of the Volunteers were not geniuses, neither were they fools, andthe difficulty of acquiring military aid from Germany must have seemedas insurmountable to them as it does to the Germans themselves. Theyrose because they felt that they had to do so, or be driven like sheepinto the nearest police barracks, and be laughed at by the whole ofIreland as cowards and braggarts. 

It would be interesting to know why, on the eve of the insurrection, Professor MacNeill resigned the presidency of the Volunteers. The storyof treachery which was heard in the streets is not the true one, for menof his type are not traitors, and this statement may be dismissedwithout further comment or notice. One is left to imagine what can havehappened during the conference which is said to have preceded therising, and which ended with the resignation of Professor MacNeill. 

This is my view, or my imagining, of what occurred. The conference wascalled because the various leaders felt that a hostile movement wasprojected by the Government, and that the times were exceedingly blackfor them. Neither Mr. Birrell nor Sir Mathew Nathan had any desire thatthere should be a conflict in Ireland during the war. This cannot bedoubted. From such a conflict there might follow all kinds of politicalrepercussions; but although the Government favoured the policy of_laissez faire_, there was a powerful military and political party inIreland whose whole effort was towards the disarming and punishment ofthe Volunteers--particularly I should say the punishment of theVolunteers. I believe, or rather I imagine, that Professor MacNeill wasapproached at the instance of Mr. Birrell or Sir Mathew Nathan andassured that the Government did not meditate any move against his men, and that so long as his Volunteers remained quiet they would not bemolested by the authorities. I would say that Professor MacNeill gaveand accepted the necessary assurances, and that when he informed hisconference of what had occurred, and found that they did not believefaith would be kept with them, he resigned in the dispairing hope thathis action might turn them from a purpose which he considered lunatic, or, at least, by restraining a number of his followers from rising, hemight limit the tale of men who would be uselessly killed. 

He was not alone in his vote against a rising. The O'Rahilly and someothers are reputed to have voted with him, but when insurrection wasdecided on, the O'Rahilly marched with his men, and surely a gallant mancould not have done otherwise. 

When the story of what occurred is authoritatively written (it may bewritten) I think that this will be found to be the truth of the matter, and that German intrigue and German money counted for so little in theinsurrection as to be negligible. 

 CHAPTER X. 

 SOME OF THE LEADERS. 

Meanwhile the insurrection, like all its historical forerunners, hasbeen quelled in blood. It sounds rhetorical to say so, but it was notquelled in peasoup or tisane. While it lasted the fighting was verydetermined, and it is easily, I think, the most considerable of Irishrebellions. 

The country was not with it, for be it remembered that a whole army ofIrishmen, possibly three hundred thousand of our race, are fighting withEngland instead of against her. In Dublin alone there is scarcely a poorhome in which a father, a brother, or a son is not serving in one of themany fronts which England is defending. Had the country risen, andfought as stubbornly as the Volunteers did, no troops could have beatenthem--well that is a wild statement, the heavy guns could always beatthem--but from whatever angle Irish people consider this affair it mustappear to them tragic and lamentable beyond expression, but not meanand not unheroic. 

It was hard enough that our men in the English armies should be slainfor causes which no amount of explanation will ever render less foreignto us, or even intelligible; but that our men who were left should bekilled in Ireland fighting against the same England that their brothersare fighting for ties the question into such knots of contradiction aswe may give up trying to unravel. We can only think--this hashappened--and let it unhappen itself as best it may. 

We say that the time always finds the man, and by it we mean: that whena responsibility is toward there will be found some shoulder to bend forthe yoke which all others shrink from. It is not always nor often thegreat ones of the earth who undertake these burdens--it is usually thegood folk, that gentle hierarchy who swear allegiance to mournfulnessand the under dog, as others dedicate themselves to mutton chops and theeasy nymph. It is not my intention to idealise any of the men who wereconcerned in this rebellion. Their country will, some few years hence, do that as adequately as she has done it for those who went before them. 

Those of the leaders whom I knew were not great men, nor brilliant--thatis they were more scholars than thinkers, and more thinkers than men ofaction; and I believe that in no capacity could they have attained towhat is called eminence, nor do I consider they coveted any such publicdistinction as is noted in that word. 

But in my definition they were good men--men, that is, who willed noevil, and whose movements of body or brain were unselfish and healthy. No person living is the worse off for having known Thomas MacDonagh, andI, at least, have never heard MacDonagh speak unkindly or even harshlyof anything that lived. It has been said of him that his lyrics wereepical; in a measure it is true, and it is true in the same measure thathis death was epical. He was the first of the leaders who was tried andshot. It was not easy for him to die leaving behind two young childrenand a young wife, and the thought that his last moment must have beentormented by their memory is very painful. We are all fatalists when westrike against power, and I hope he put care from him as the soldiersmarched him out. 

The O'Rahilly also I knew, but not intimately, and I can only speak of agood humour, a courtesy, and an energy that never failed. He was a manof unceasing ideas and unceasing speech, and laughter accompanied everysound made by his lips. 

Plunkett and Pearse I knew also, but not intimately. Young Plunkett, ashe was always called, would never strike one as a militant person. He, like Pearse and MacDonagh, wrote verse, and it was no better nor worsethan their's were. He had an appetite for quaint and difficultknowledge. He studied Egyptian and Sanscrit, and distant curious matterof that sort, and was interested in inventions and the theatre. He wastried and sentenced and shot. 

As to Pearse, I do not know how to place him, nor what to say of him. Ifthere was an idealist among the men concerned in this insurrection itwas he, and if there was any person in the world less fitted to head aninsurrection it was he also. I never could "touch" or sense in him thequalities which other men spoke of, and which made him militarycommandant of the rising. None of these men were magnetic in the sensethat Mr. Larkin is magnetic, and I would have said that Pearse was lessmagnetic than any of the others. Yet it was to him and around him theyclung. 

Men must find some centre either of power or action or intellect aboutwhich they may group themselves, and I think that Pearse became theleader because his temperament was more profoundly emotional than any ofthe others. He was emotional not in a flighty, but in a serious way, andone felt more that he suffered than that he enjoyed. 

He had a power; men who came into intimate contact with him began to actdifferently to their own desires and interests. His schoolmasters didnot always receive their salaries with regularity. The reason that hedid not pay them was the simple one that he had no money. Given byanother man this explanation would be uneconomic, but from him it was sological that even a child could comprehend it. These masters did notalways leave him. They remained, marvelling perhaps, and accepting, evenwith stupefaction, the theory that children must be taught, but that nosuch urgency is due towards the payment of wages. One of his boys saidthere was no fun in telling lies to Mr. Pearse, for, however outrageousthe lie, he always believed it. He built and renovated and improved hisschool because the results were good for his scholars, and somehow hefound builders to undertake these forlorn hopes. 

It was not, I think, that he "put his trust in God, " but that whensomething had to be done he did it, and entirely disregarded logic oreconomics or force. He said--such a thing has to be done and so far asone man can do it I will do it, and he bowed straightaway to the task. 

It is mournful to think of men like these having to take charge ofbloody and desolate work, and one can imagine them say, "Oh! cursedspite, " as they accepted responsibility. 

 CHAPTER XI

 LABOUR AND THE INSURRECTION. 

No person in Ireland seems to have exact information about theVolunteers, their aims, or their numbers. We know the names of theleaders now. They were recited to us with the tale of their execution;and with the declaration of a Republic we learned something of theiraim, but the estimate of their number runs through the figures ten, thirty, and fifty thousand. The first figure is undoubtedly too slender, the last excessive, and something between fifteen and twenty thousandfor all Ireland would be a reasonable guess. 

Of these, the Citizen Army or Labour side of the Volunteers, would notnumber more than one thousand men, and it is with difficulty such afigure could be arrived at. Yet it is freely argued, and the theory willgrow, that the causes of this latest insurrection should be sought amongthe labour problems of Dublin rather than in any national or patrioticsentiment, and this theory is buttressed by all the agile facts whichsuch a theory would be furnished with. 

It is an interesting view, but in my opinion it is an erroneous one. 

That Dublin labour was in the Volunteer movement to the strength of, perhaps, two hundred men, may be true--it is possible there were more, but it is unlikely that a greater number, or, as many, of the CitizenArmy marched when the order came. The overwhelming bulk of Volunteerswere actuated by the patriotic ideal which is the heritage and theburden of almost every Irishman born out of the Unionist circle, andtheir connection with labour was much more manual than mental. 

This view of the importance of labour to the Volunteers is held by twodistinct and opposed classes. 

Just as there are some who find the explanation of life in a sexualformula, so there is a class to whom the economic idea is very dear, andbeneath every human activity they will discover the shock of wages andprofit. It is truly there, but it pulls no more than its weight, and inIrish life the part played by labour has not yet been a weighty one;although on every view it is an important one. The labour idea inIreland has not arrived. It is in process of "becoming, " and when labourproblems are mentioned in this country a party does not come to themind, but two men only--they are Mr. Larkin and James Connolly, and theyare each in their way exceptional and curious men. 

There is another class who implicate labour, and they do so because itenables them to urge that as well as being grasping and nihilistic, Irish labour is disloyal and treacherous. 

The truth is that labour in Ireland has not yet succeeded in organisinganything--not even discontent. It is not self-conscious to any extent, and, outside of Dublin, it scarcely appears to exist. The nationalimagination is not free to deal with any other subject than that offreedom, and part of the policy of our "masters" is to see that we bekept busy with politics instead of social ideas. From their standpointthe policy is admirable, and up to the present it has thoroughlysucceeded. 

One does not hear from the lips of the Irish workingman, even inDublin, any of the affirmations and rejections which have long sincebecome the commonplaces of his comrades in other lands. But on thesubject of Irish freedom his views are instantly forthcoming, and hisdesires are explicit, and, to a degree, informed. This latter subjectthey understand and have fabricated an entire language to express it, but the other they do not understand nor cherish, and they are notprepared to die for it. 

It is possibly true that before any movement can attain to reallynational proportions there must be, as well as the intellectual idealwhich gives it utterance and a frame, a sense of economic misfortune togive it weight, and when these fuse the combination may well beirresistible. The organised labour discontent in Ireland, in Dublin, wasnot considerable enough to impose its aims or its colours on theVolunteers, and it is the labour ideal which merges and disappears inthe national one. The reputation of all the leaders of the insurrection, not excepting Connolly, is that they were intensely patriotic Irishmen, and also, but this time with the exception of Connolly, that they werenot particularly interested in the problems of labour. 

The great strike of two years ago remained undoubtedly as a bitter andlasting memory with Dublin labour--perhaps, even, it was not so much amemory as a hatred. Still, it was not hatred of England which was evokedat that time, nor can the stress of their conflict be traced to anEnglish source. It was hatred of local traders, and, particularly, hatred of the local police, and the local powers and tribunals, whichwere arrayed against them. 

One can without trouble discover reasons why they should go on strikeagain, but by no reasoning can I understand why they should go intorebellion against England, unless it was that they were patriots firstand trade unionists a very long way afterwards. 

I do not believe that this combination of the ideal and the practicalwas consummated in the Dublin insurrection, but I do believe that thefirst step towards the formation of such a party has now been taken, and that if, years hence, there should be further trouble in Irelandsuch trouble will not be so easily dealt with as this one has been. 

It may be that further trouble will not arise, for the co-operativemovement, which is growing slowly but steadily in Ireland, may arrangeour economic question, and, incidentally, our national questionalso--that is if the English people do not decide that the latter oughtto be settled at once. 

James Connolly had his heart in both the national and the economic camp, but he was a great-hearted man, and could afford to extend hisaffections where others could only dissipate them. 

There can be no doubt that his powers of orderly thinking were of greatservice to the Volunteers, for while Mr. Larkin was the magnetic centreof the Irish labour movement, Connolly was its brains. He has beensentenced to death for his part in the insurrection, and for two daysnow he has been dead. 

He had been severely wounded in the fighting, and was tended, one doesnot doubt with great care, until he regained enough strength to standup and be shot down again. 

Others are dead also. I was not acquainted with them, and with ConnollyI was not more than acquainted. I had met him twice many months ago, butother people were present each time, and he scarcely uttered a word oneither of these occasions. I was told that he was by nature silent. Hewas a man who can be ill-spared in Ireland, but labour, throughout theworld, may mourn for him also. 

A doctor who attended on him during his last hours says that Connollyreceived the sentence of his death quietly. He was to be shot on themorning following the sentence. This gentleman said to him:

"Connolly, when you stand up to be shot, will you say a prayer for me?"

Connolly replied:

"I will. "

His visitor continued:

"Will you say a prayer for the men who are shooting you?"

"I will, " said Connolly, "and I will say a prayer for every good man inthe world who is doing his duty. "

He was a steadfast man in all that he undertook. We may be sure hesteadfastly kept that promise. He would pray for others, who had nottime to pray for himself, as he had worked for others during the yearswhen he might have worked for himself. 

 CHAPTER XII. 

 THE IRISH QUESTIONS. 

There is truly an Irish question. There are two Irish questions, and themost important of them is not that which appears in our newspapers andin our political propaganda. 

The first is international, and can be stated shortly. It is the desireof Ireland to assume control of her national life. With this desire theEnglish people have professed to be in accord, and it is at any rate sothoroughly understood that nothing further need be made of it in thesepages. 

The other Irish question is different, and less simply described. Thedifficulty about it is that it cannot be approached until the questionof Ireland's freedom has by some means been settled, for this ideal offreedom has captured the imagination of the race. It rides Ireland likea nightmare, thwarting or preventing all civilising or cultural work inthis country, and it is not too much to say that Ireland cannot evenbegin to live until that obsession and fever has come to an end, and herimagination has been set free to do the work which imagination alone cando--Imagination is intelligent kindness--we have sore need of it. 

The second question might plausibly be called a religious one. It hasbeen so called, and, for it is less troublesome to accept an idea thanto question it, the statement has been accepted as truth--but it isuntrue, and it is deeply and villainously untrue. No lie in Irish lifehas been so persistent and so mischievous as this one, and no politicallie has ever been so ingeniously, and malevolently exploited. 

There is no religious intolerance in Ireland except that which ispolitical. I am not a member of the Catholic Church, and am not inclinedto be the advocate of a religious system which my mentality dislikes, but I have never found real intolerance among my fellow-countrymen ofthat religion. I have found it among Protestants. I will limit thatstatement, too. I have found it among some Protestants. But outside ofthe North of Ireland there is no religious question, and in the Northit is fundamentally more political than religious. 

All thinking is a fining down of one's ideas, and thus far we have cometo the statement of Ireland's second question. It is not Catholic orNationalist, nor have I said that it is entirely Protestant andUnionist, but it is on the extreme wing of this latter party thatresponsibility must be laid. It is difficult, even for an Irishmanliving in Ireland, to come on the real political fact which underliesIrish Protestant politics, and which fact has consistently opposed andbaffled every attempt made by either England or Ireland to come toterms. There is such a fact, and clustered around it is a body of menwhose hatred of their country is persistent and deadly and unexplained. 

One may make broad generalisations on the apparent situation andendeavour to solve it by those. We may say that loyalty to England isthe true centre of their action. I will believe it, but only to a point. Loyalty to England does not inevitably include this active hatred, thisblindness, this withering of all sympathy for the people among whom oneis born, and among whom one has lived in peace, for they have lived inpeace amongst us. We may say that it is due to the idea of privilege andthe desire for power. Again, I will accept it up to a point--but theseare cultural obsessions, and they cease to act when the breaking-pointis reached. 

I know of only two mental states which are utterly without bowels orconscience. These are cowardice and greed. Is it to a synthesis of thesestates that this more than mortal enmity may be traced? What do theyfear, and what is it they covet? What can they redoubt in a countrywhich is practically crimeless, or covet in a land that is almost asbare as a mutton bone? They have mesmerised themselves, these men, andhave imagined into our quiet air brigands and thugs and titans, with allthe other notabilities of a tale for children. 

I do not think that this either will tell the tale, but I do think thereis a story to be told--I imagine an esoteric wing to the Unionist Party. I imagine that Party includes a secret organisation--they may beOrangemen, they may be Masons, and, if there be such, I would dearlylike to know what the metaphysic of their position is, and how theysquare it with any idea of humanity or social life. Meantime, all thisis surmise, and I, as a novelist, have a notoriously flightyimagination, and am content to leave it at that. 

But this secondary Irish question is not so terrible as it appears. Itis terrible now, it would not be terrible if Ireland had nationalindependence. 

The great protection against a lie is--not to believe it; and Ireland, in this instance, has that protection. The claims made by the UnionistWing do not rely solely on the religious base. They use all thearguments. It is, according to them, unsafe to live in Ireland. (Let usleave this insurrection of a week out of the question. ) Life is not safein Ireland. Property shivers in terror of daily or nightlyappropriation. Other, undefined, but even more woeful glooms and creeps, wriggle stealthily abroad. 

These things are not regarded in Ireland, and, in truth, they are notmeat for Irish consumption. Irish judges are presented with whitegloves with a regularity which may even be annoying to them, and were itnot for political trouble they would be unable to look their salaries inthe face. The Irish Bar almost weep in chorus at the words "Land Act, "and stare, not dumbly, on destitution. These tales are meant for Englandand are sent there. They will cease to be exported when there is nomarket for them, and these men will perhaps end by becoming patrioticand social when they learn that they do not really command the BigBattalions. But Ireland has no protection against them while England canbe thrilled by their nonsense, and while she is willing to pound Irelandto a jelly on their appeal. Her only assistance against them is freedom. 

There are certain simplicities upon which all life is based. A man findsthat he is hungry and the knowledge enables him to go to work for therest of his life. A man makes the discovery (it has been a discovery tomany) that he is an Irishman, and the knowledge simplifies all hissubsequent political action. There is this comfort about being anIrishman, you can be entirely Irish, and claim thus to be as completeas a pebble or a star. But no Irish person can hope to be more than amuletto Englishman, and if that be an ambition and an end it is not anheroic one. 

But there is an Ulster difficulty, and no amount of burking it willsolve it. It is too generally conceived among Nationalists that theattitude of Ulster towards Ireland is rooted in ignorance and bigotry. Allow that both of these bad parts are included in the Northern outlook, they do not explain the Ulster standpoint; and nothing can explain theattitude of official Ireland _vis-a-vis_ with Ulster. 

What has the Irish Party ever done to allay Northern prejudice, or bringthe discontented section into line with the rest of Ireland? The answeris pathetically complete. They have done nothing. Or, if they have doneanything, it was only that which would set every Northerner grinding histeeth in anger. At a time when Orangeism was dying they raised andmarshalled the Hibernians, and we have the Ulsterman's answer to theHibernians in the situation by which we are confronted to-day. If theParty had even a little statesmanship among them they would for the pastten years have marched up and down the North explaining and mollifyingand courting the Black Northerner. But, like good Irishmen, they couldnot tear themselves away from England, and they paraded that countrywhere parade was not so urgent, and they made orations there until themere accent of an Irishman must make Englishmen wail for very boredom. 

Some of that parade might have gladdened the eyes of the Belfastcitizens; a few of those orations might have assisted the men of Derryto comprehend that, for the good of our common land, Home Rule and theunity of a nation was necessary if only to rid the country of theseblatherers. 

Let the Party explain why, among their political duties, they neglectedthe duty of placating Ulster in their proper persons. Why, in short, they boycotted Ulster and permitted political and religious and racialantagonism to grow inside of Ireland unchecked by any word from themupon that ground. Were they afraid "nuts" would be thrown at them?Whatever they dreaded, they gave Ulster the widest of wide berths, andwherever else they were visible and audible, they were silent and unseenin that part of Ireland. 

The Ulster grievance is ostensibly religious; but safeguards on thiscount are so easily created and applied that this issue might almost beleft out of account. The real difficulty is economic, and it is atangled one. But unless profit and loss are immediately discernible thesoul of man is not easily stirred by an accountant's tale, and thereforethe religious banner has been waved for our kinsfolk of Ulster, andunder the sacred emblem they are fighting for what some people callmammon, but which may be in truth just plain bread and butter. 

The words Sinn Fein mean "Ourselves, " and it is of ourselves I write inthis chapter. More urgent than any political emancipation is the drawingtogether of men of good will in the endeavour to assist theirnecessitous land. Our eyes must be withdrawn from the ends of the earthand fixed on that which is around us and which we can touch. Nopolitician will talk to us of Ireland if by any trick he can avoid thesubject. His tale is still of Westminster and Chimborazo and theMountains of the Moon. Irishmen must begin to think for themselves andof themselves, instead of expending energy on causes too distant to beassisted or hindered by them. I believe that our human material is asgood as will be found in the world. No better, perhaps, but not worse. And I believe that all but local politics are unfruitful andsoul-destroying. We have an island that is called little. It is morethan twenty times too spacious for our needs, and we will not haveexplored the last of it in our children's lifetime. We have moreproblems to resolve in our towns and cities than many generations ofminds will get tired of striving with. Here is the world, and all thatperplexes or delights the world is here also. Nothing is lost. Not evenbrave men. They have been used. From this day the great adventure opensfor Ireland. The Volunteers are dead, and the call is now forvolunteers.