IRELAND SINCE PARNELL

 BY CAPTAIN D. D. SHEEHAN

 BARRISTER-AT-LAW LATE M. P. FOR MID-CORK

 LONDON

 DANIEL O'CONNOR 90 GREAT RUSSELL STREET, W. C. 1

 1921

 CONTENTS

 FOREWORDCHAPTER I. A LEADER APPEARS II. A LEADER IS DETHRONED! III. THE DEATH OF A LEADER IV. AN APPRECIATION OF PARNELL V. THE WRECK AND RUIN OF A PARTY VI. TOWARDS LIGHT AND LEADING VII. FORCES OF REGENERATION AND THEIR EFFECT VIII. THE BIRTH OF A MOVEMENT AND WHAT IT CAME TO IX. THE LAND QUESTION AND ITS SETTLEMENT X. LAND PURCHASE AND A DETERMINED CAMPAIGN TO KILL IT XI. THE MOVEMENT FOR DEVOLUTION AND ITS DEFEAT XII. THE LATER IRISH PARTY--ITS CHARACTER AND COMPOSITION XIII. A TALE OF BAD LEADERSHIP AND BAD FAITH XIV. LAND AND LABOUR XV. SOME FURTHER SALVAGE FROM THE WRECKAGE XVI. REUNION AND TREACHERY XVII. A NEW POWER ARISES IN IRELAND XVIII. A CAMPAIGN OF EXTERMINATION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES XIX. A GENERAL ELECTION THAT LEADS TO A "HOME RULE" BILL! XX. THE RISE OF SIR EDWARD CARSON XXI. SINN FEIN--ITS ORIGINAL MEANING AND PURPOSE XXII. LABOUR BECOMES A POWER IN IRISH LIFE XXIII. CARSON, ULSTER AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS XXIV. FORMATION OF IRISH VOLUNTEERS AND OUTBREAK OF WAR XXV. THE EASTER WEEK REBELLION AND AFTERWARDS XXVI. THE IRISH CONVENTION AND THE CONSCRIPTION OF IRELAND XXVII. "THE TIMES" AND IRISH SETTLEMENTXXVIII. THE ISSUES NOW AT STAKE

 FOREWORD

The writer of this work first saw the light on a modest farmstead inthe parish of Droumtariffe, North Cork. He came of a stock longsettled there, whose roots were firmly fixed in the soil, whose loveof motherland was passionate and intense, and who were ready "in othertimes, " when Fenianism won true hearts and daring spirits to its side, to risk their all in yet one more desperate battle for "the oldcause. " His father was a Fenian, and so was every relative of his, even unto the womenfolk. He heard around the fireside, in his youngerdays, the stirring stories of all the preparations which were thenmade for striking yet another blow for Ireland, and he too sighed andsorrowed for the disappointments that fell upon noble hearts andardent souls with the failure of "The Rising. "

He was not more than seven years of age when the terrible tribulationof eviction came to his family. He remembers, as if the events werebut of yesterday, the poignant despair of his mother in leaving thehome into which her dowry was brought and where her children wereborn, and the more silent resignation, but none the less deeply feltbitterness, of his father--a man of strong character and little givento expressing his emotions. He recalls that, a day or two before theeviction, he was taken away in a cart, known in this part of thecountry as "a crib, " with some of the household belongings, to seek atemporary shelter with some friends. May God be good to them for theirloving-kindness and warm hospitality!

He wondered, then, why there should be so much suffering and sorrow ashe saw expressed around him, in the world, and he was told that therewas nothing for it--that the lease of the farm had expired, that thelandlord wanted it for himself, and that though his father was willingto pay an increased rent, still out he had to go--and, what was worse, to have all his improvements confiscated, to have the fruits of theblood and sweat and energy of his forefathers appropriated by a manwho had no right under heaven to them, save such as the iniquitouslaws of those days gave him. 

It was something in the nature of poetic justice that the lad whosefamily was cast thus ruthlessly on the roadside in the summer of 1880, should, after the passage of the Land Act of 1903, have, in theprovidence of things, the opportunity and the power for negotiating, in fair and friendly and conciliatory fashion, for the expropriationfor evermore from all ownership in the land of the class who cast himand his people adrift in earlier years. 

The writer has it proudly to his credit that, acting on behalf of thetenants of County Cork, he individually negotiated the sales of morelanded estates than any other man, or combination of men, in Ireland, and that with the good will and, indeed, with the gratitude of thelandlords and their agents, and by reason of the fact that he appliedthe policy of Conference, Conciliation and Consent to this practicalconcern of men's lives, he secured for the tenants of County Cork amargin of from one and a half to two years' purchase better terms thanthe average rate prevailing elsewhere. 

For the rest he devoted himself during the better part of a quarter ofa century to the housing and the social betterment of the workers intown and country, with results which are reflected in their presentvastly improved condition. 

But his greatest effort, and what he would wish most to be rememberedfor is that, with a faithful few and against overwhelming odds, hetook his stand for Mr William O'Brien's policy of NationalReconciliation, which all thoughtful men now admit would have savedIreland from countless horrors and England from a series of mostappalling political blunders if only it had been given fair play and afair trial. 

It is no use, however, in a very sordid and material world, sighingfor the might-have-beens. What the writer seeks in the present work isto give, fairly and dispassionately, a narrative of what has happenedin Ireland since Parnell appeared upon the Irish scene and the curtainwas rung down upon the tragedy that brought the career of the one andonly "Uncrowned King of Ireland" to a close--and until, in turn, thedownfall of Parliamentarianism was accomplished by means which will, in due course, appear in these pages. 

 IRELAND SINCE PARNELL

 CHAPTER I

 A LEADER APPEARS

There are some who would dispute the greatness of Parnell--who woulddeny him the stature and the dignity of a leader of men. There areothers who would aver that Parnell was made by his lieutenants--thathe owed all his success in the political arena to their ability andfighting qualities and that he was essentially a man of mediocretalents himself. 

It might be enough to answer to these critics that Parnell could neverhold the place he does in history, that he could never have overawedthe House of Commons as he did, nor could he have emerged sotriumphantly from the ordeal of _The Times_ Commission were henot superabundantly endowed with all the elements and qualities ofgreatness. But apart from this no dispassionate student of the Parnellperiod can deny that it was fruitful in massive achievement forIreland. When Parnell appeared on the scene it might well be said ofthe country, what had been truly said of it in another generation, that it was "as a corpse on the dissecting-table. " It was he, and thegallant band which his indomitable purpose gathered round him, thatgalvanised the corpse into life and breathed into it a dauntlessspirit of resolve which carried it to the very threshold of itssublimest aspirations. To Isaac Butt is ascribed the merit of havingconceived and given form to the constitutional movement for Irishliberty. He is also credited with having invented the title "HomeRule"--a title which, whilst it was a magnificent rallying cry for acause, in the circumstances of the time when it was first used, wasprobably as mischievous in its ultimate results as any unfortunatenomenclature well could be, since all parties in Ireland and out of itbecame tied to its use when any other designation for the Irish demandmight have made it more palatable with the British masses. WinstonChurchill is reported to have said, in his Radical days, to aprominent Irish leader: "I cannot understand why you Irishmen are sostupidly wedded to the name 'Home Rule. ' If only you would call itanything else in the world, you would have no difficulty in gettingthe English to agree to it. "

But although Isaac Butt was a fine intellect and an earnest patriot henever succeeded in rousing Ireland to any great pitch of enthusiasmfor his policy. It was still sick, and weary, and despondent after theFenian failure, and the revolutionary leaders were not prone totolerate or countenance what they regarded as a Parliamentaryimposture. A considerable body of the Irish landed class supported theButt movement, because they had nothing to fear for their owninterests from it. They were members of his Parliamentary Party, notto help him on his way, but rather with the object of weakening andretarding his efforts. 

It was at this stage that Parnell arrived. The country was strickenwith famine--the hand of the lord, in the shape of the landlord, washeavy upon it. After a season of unexampled agricultural prosperitythe lean years had come to the Irish farmer and he was ripe foragitation and resistance. Butt had the Irish gentry on his side. Withthe sure instinct of the born leader Parnell set out to fight them. Hehad popular feeling with him. It was no difficult matter to rouse thedemocracy of the country against a class at whose doors they laid theblame for all their woes and troubles and manifold miseries. Butt waslikewise too old for his generation. He was a constitutional statesmanwho made noble appeal to the honesty and honour of British statesmen. Parnell, too, claimed to be a constitutional leader, but of anothertype. With the help of men like Michael Davitt and John Devoy he wasable to muster the full strength of the revolutionary forces behindhim and he adopted other methods in Parliament than lackadaisicalappeals to the British sense of right and justice. 

The time came when the older statesman had perforce to make way forthe younger leader. The man with a noble genius for statesman-likedesign--and this must be conceded to Isaac Butt--had to yield placeand power to the men whose genius consisted in making themselvesamazingly disagreeable to the British Government, both in Ireland andat Westminster. "The Policy of Exasperation" was the epithet appliedby Butt to the purpose of Parnell, in the belief that he was utteringthe weightiest reproach in his power against it. But this was thedescription of all others which recommended it to the Irish race--forit was, in truth, the only policy which could compel British statesmento give ear to the wretched story of Ireland's grievances and tolegislate in regard to them. It is sad to have to write it of Butt, asof so many other Irish leaders, that he died of a broken heart. Thosewho would labour for "Dark Rosaleen" have a rough and thorny road totravel, and they are happy if the end of their journey is not to befound in despair, disappointment and bitter tragedy. 

Parnell, once firmly seated in the saddle, lost no time in assertinghis power and authority. Mr William O'Brien, who writes with a quiteunique personal authority on the events of this time, tells us thatthere is some doubt whether "Joe" Biggar, as he was familiarly knownfrom one end of Ireland to the other, was not the actual inventor ofParliamentary obstruction. His own opinion is that it was Biggar whofirst discovered it but it was Parnell who perceived that the newweapon was capable of dislocating the entire machinery of Governmentat will and consequently gave to a disarmed Ireland a more formidablepower against her enemies than if she could have risen in armedinsurrection, so that a Parliament which wanted to hear nothing ofIreland heard of practically nothing else every night of their lives. 

Let it be, however, clearly understood that there was an Irish Partybefore Parnell's advent on the scene. It was never a very effectiveinstrument of popular right, but after Butt's death it became adecrepit old thing--without cohesion, purpose or, except in rareinstances, any genuine personal patriotism. It viewed the rise ofParnell and his limited body of supporters with disgust and dismay. Ithad no sympathy with his pertinacious campaign against all thecherished forms and traditions of "The House, " and it gave him nosupport. Rather it virulently opposed him and his small group, whowere without money and even without any organisation at their back. Parnell had also to contend with the principal Nationalist newspaperof the time--_The Freeman's Journal_--as well as such remnants asremained of Butt's Home Rule League. 

About this time, however, a movement--not for the first or the lasttime--came out of the West. A meeting had been held at Irishtown, County Mayo, which made history. It was here that the demand of "TheLand for the People" first took concrete form. Previously Mr Parnelland his lieutenants had been addressing meetings in many parts of thecountry, at which they advocated peasant proprietorship insubstitution for landlordism, but now instead of sporadic speechesthey had to their hand an organisation which supplied them with atremendous dynamic force and gave a new edge to their Parliamentaryperformances. And not the least value of the new movement was that itimmediately won over to active co-operation in its work the mostpowerful men in the old revolutionary organisation. I remember beingpresent, as a very little lad indeed, at a Land League meeting atKiskeam, Cork County, where scrolls spanned the village street bearingthe legend: "Ireland for the Irish and the Land for the People. "

The country people were present from far and near. Cavalcades ofhorsemen thronged in from many a distant place, wearing proudly theFenian sash of orange and green over their shoulder, and it struck myyouthful imagination what a dashing body of cavalry these would havemade in the fight for Ireland. Michael Davitt was the founder andmainspring of the Land League and it is within my memory that in thehearts and the talks of the people around their fireside hearths hewas at this time only second to Parnell in their hope and love. I amtold that Mr John Devoy shared with him the honour of co-founder ofthe Land League, but I confess I heard little of Mr Devoy, probablybecause he was compulsorily exiled about this time. [1]

In those days Parnell's following consisted of only seven men out ofone hundred and three Irish members. When the General Election of 1880was declared he was utterly unprepared to meet all its emergencies. For lack of candidates he had to allow himself to be nominated forthree constituencies, yet with marvellous and almost incredible energyhe fought on to the last polling-booth. The result was astounding. Heincreased his following to thirty-five, not, perhaps, overwhelming inpoint of numbers, but remarkable for the high intellectual standard ofthe young men who composed it, for their varied capacities, for theirfine patriotism, and their invincible determination to face all risksand invite all dangers. It has been said of Parnell that he was anintolerant autocrat in the selection of candidates for and membershipof the Party, and that he imposed his will ruthlessly upon them oncethey were elected. I am told by those who were best in a position toform a judgment, and whose veracity I would stake my life upon, thatnothing could be farther from the truth. Parnell had little to saywith the choosing of his lieutenants. Indeed, he was singularlyindifferent about it, as instances could be quoted to prove. Undoubtedly he held them together firmly, because he had the gift ofdeveloping all that was best in a staff of brilliant talents andvaried gifts, and so jealousies and personal idiosyncrasies had notthe room wherein to develop their poisonous growths. 

I pass rapidly over the achievements of Parnell in the years thatfollowed. He gave the country some watchwords that can never beforgotten, as when he told the farmers to "Keep a firm grip of yourhomesteads!" followed by the equally energetic exhortation: "Hold theharvest!" They were his Orders of the Day to his Irish army. Then camethe No-Rent Manifesto, the suppression of the Land League after onlytwelve months' existence, Kilmainham and its Treaty, and the Land Actof 1881, which I can speak of, from my own knowledge, as the firstgreat forward step in the emancipation of the Irish tenant farmer. MrDillon differed with Parnell as to the efficacy of this Act, but hewas as hopelessly wrong in his attitude then as he was twenty-twoyears later in connection with the Land Act of 1903. In 1882 theNational League came into being, giving a broader programme and adeeper depth of meaning to the aims of Parnell. At this time theParliamentary policy of the Party under his leadership was an absoluteindependence of all British Parties, and therein lay all its strengthand savour. There was also the pledge of the members to sit, act andvote together, which owed its wholesome force not so much to anythinginherent in the pledge itself as to the positive terror of a publicopinion in Ireland which would tolerate no tampering with it. Furthermore, a rigid rule obtained against members of the Partyseeking office or preferment for themselves or their friends on thesound principle that the Member of Parliament who sought ministerialfavours could not possibly be an impeccable and independent patriot. 

But the greatest achievement of Parnell was the fact that he had boththe great English parties bidding for his support. We know that theTory Party entered into negotiations with him on the Home Rule issue. Meanwhile, however, there was the more notable conversion ofGladstone, a triumph of unparalleled magnitude for Parnell and initself the most convincing testimony to the positive strength andabsolute greatness of the man. A wave of enthusiasm went up on bothsides of the Irish Sea for the alliance which seemed to symbolise theending of the age-long struggle between the two nations. True, thisalliance has since been strangely underrated in its effects, but therecan be no doubt that it evoked at the time a genuine outburst offriendliness on the part of the Irish masses to England. And at theGeneral Election of 1885 Parnell returned from Ireland with a solidphalanx of eighty-four members--eager, invincible, enthusiastic, boundunbreakably together in loyalty to their country and in devotion totheir leader. 

From 1885 to 1890 there was a general forgiving and forgetting ofhistoric wrongs and ancient feuds. The Irish Nationalists were willingto clasp hands across the sea in a brotherhood of friendship and evenof affection, but there stood apart, in open and flaming disaffection, the Protestant minority in Ireland, who were in a state of starkterror that the Home Rule Bill of 1886 meant the end of everything forthem--the end of their brutal ascendancy and probably also theconfiscation of their property and the ruin of their social position. 

Then, as on a more recent occasion, preparations for civil war weregoing on in Ulster, largely of English Party manufacture, and morewith an eye to British Party purposes than because of any sincereconvictions on the rights of the ascendancy element. Still the GrandOld Man carried on his indomitable campaign for justice to Ireland, notwithstanding the unfortunate cleavage which had taken place in theranks of his own Party, and it does not require any special gift ofprevision to assert, nor is it any unwarrantable assumption on thefacts to say, that the alliance between the Liberal and Irish Partieswould inevitably have triumphed as soon as a General Election came hadnot the appalling misunderstanding as to Gladstone's "Nullity ofLeadership" letter flung everything into chaos and irretrievablyruined the hopes of Ireland for more than a generation. 

And this brings me to what I regard as the greatest of Irishtragedies--the deposition and the dethronement of Parnell undercircumstances which will remain for all time a sadness and a sorrow tothe Irish race. 

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Devoy, although banished, did turn up secretly in Mayowhen the Land League was being organised, and his orders were supremewith the secret societies. ]

 CHAPTER II

 A LEADER IS DETHRONED!

In the cabin, in the shieling, in the home of the "fattest" farmer, aswell as around the open hearth of the most lowly peasant, in town andcountry, wherever there were hearts that hoped for Irish liberty andthat throbbed to the martial music of "the old cause, " the name ofParnell was revered with a devotion such as was scarcely ever renderedto any leader who had gone before him. A halo of romance had wovenitself around his figure and all the poetry and passion of the mysticCeltic spirit went forth to him in the homage of a great loyalty andregard. The title of "The Uncrowned King of Ireland" was no frothyexuberance as applied to him--for he was in truth a kingly man, robedin dignity, panoplied in power, with a grand and haughty bearingtowards the enemies of his people--in all things a worthy chieftain ofa noble race. The one and only time in life I saw him was when he wasa broken and a hunted man and when the pallor of death was upon hischeeks, but even then I was impressed by the majesty of his bearing, the dignity of his poise, the indescribably magnetic glance of hiswondrous eyes, and the lineaments of power in every gesture, everytone and every movement. He awed and he attracted at the same time. Hestood strikingly out from all others at that meeting at Tralee, whereI was one of a deputation from Killarney who presented him with anaddress of loyalty and confidence, which, by the way, I, as a youthfuljournalist starting on my own adventurous career, had drafted. It wasone of his last public appearances, and the pity of it all that itshould be so, when we now know, with the fuller light and knowledgethat has been thrown upon that bitterest chapter of our tribulations, that with the display of a little more reason and a justeraccommodation of temper, Parnell might have been saved for hiscountry, and the whole history of Ireland since then--if not, indeed, of the world--changed for the better. But these are vain regrets andit avails not to indulge them, though it is permissible to say thatthe desertion of Parnell brought its own swift retribution to thepeople for whom he had laboured so potently and well. 

I have read all the authentic literature I could lay hold of bearingupon the Parnell imbroglio, and it leaves me with the firm convictionthat if there had not been an almost unbelievable concatenation oferrors and misunderstandings and stupid blunderings, Parnell neednever have been sacrificed. And the fact stands out with clearnessthat the passage in Gladstone's "Nullity of Leadership" letter, whichwas the root cause of all the trouble that followed, would never havebeen published were it not that the political hacks, through motivesof party expediency, insisted on its inclusion. That plant of tendergrowth--the English Nonconformist conscience--it was that decreed thefall of the mighty Irish leader. 

It is only in recent years that the full facts of what happened duringwhat is known as "The Parnell Split" have been made public, and thesefacts make it quite clear that neither during the Divorce Courtproceedings nor subsequently had Parnell had a fair fighting chance. Let it be remembered that no leader was ever pursued by such malignantmethods of defamation as Parnell, and it is questionable how far theDivorce Court proceedings were not intended by his enemies as part ofthis unscrupulous campaign. Replying to a letter of William O'Brienbefore the trial, Parnell wrote: "You may rest quite sure that if thisproceeding ever comes to trial (which I very much doubt) it is not Iwho will quit the court with discredit. " And when the whole mischiefwas done, and the storm raged ruthlessly around him, Parnell toldO'Brien, during the Boulogne negotiations, that he all but came toblows with Sir Frank Lockwood (the respondent's counsel) wheninsisting that he should be himself examined in the Divorce Court, andhe intimated that if he had prevailed the political complications thatfollowed could never have arisen. On which declaration Mr O'Brien hasthis footnote: "The genial giant Sir Frank Lockwood confessed to me inafter years: 'Parnell was cruelly wronged all round. There is a greatreaction in England in his favour. I am not altogether without remorsemyself. '"

Not all at once were the flood-gates of vituperation let loose uponParnell. Not all at once did the question of his continued leadershiparise. He had led his people, with an incomparable skill andintrepidity, not unequally matched with the genius of Gladstonehimself, from a position of impotence and contempt to the supremepoint where success was within their reach. A General Election, bigwith the fate of Ireland, was not far off. Was the matchless leaderwho had led his people so far and so well to disappear and to leavehis country the prey of warring factions--he who had established anational unity such as Ireland had never known before? "For myself, "writes William O'Brien, "I should no more have voted Parnell'sdisplacement on the Divorce Court proceedings alone than England wouldhave thought of changing the command on the eve of the battle ofTrafalgar in a holy horror of the frailties of Lady Hamilton and herlover. "

The Liberal Nonconformists, however, shrieked for his head in a realor assumed outburst of moral frenzy, and the choice thrust upon theIrish people and their representatives was as to whether they shouldremain faithful to the alliance with the Liberal Party, to which theIrish nation unquestionably stood pledged, or to the leader who hadwon so much for them and who might win yet more if he had a unitedIreland behind him, unseduced and unterrified by the clamour ofEnglish Puritan moralists. O'Brien and Dillon and other leadingIrishmen were in America whilst passions were being excited and eventsmarching to destruction over here. "The knives were out, " as one fieryprotagonist of the day rather savagely declared. It is, as I havealready inferred, now made abundantly clear that Gladstone would nothave included in his letter the famous "Nullity of Leadership" passageif other counsels had not overborne his own better judgment. 

It was this letter of Gladstone which set the ball rolling againstParnell. Up till then the members of the Irish Party and the Irishpeople were solidly and, indeed, defiantly with him. No doubt MichaelDavitt joined with such zealots as the Rev. Mr Price Hughes and W. T. Stead in demanding the deposition of Parnell, but one need not beuncharitable in saying that Davitt had his quarrels with Parnell--andserious ones at that--on the Land Question and other items of thenational demand, and he was, besides, a man of impetuous temperament, not overmuch given to counting the consequences of his actions. 

Then there came the famous, or infamous, according as it be viewed, struggle in Committee Room 15 of the House of Commons, when, by amajority of 45 to 29, it was finally decided to declare the chairvacant, after a battle of unusual ferocity and personal bitterness. And now a new element of complication was added to the alreadysufficiently poignant tragedy by the entry of the Irish Catholicbishops on the scene. Hitherto they had refrained, with admirablerestraint, from interference, and they had done nothing to intensifythe agonies of the moment. It will always remain a matter for regretthat they did not avail themselves of a great opportunity, and theirown unparalleled power with the people, to mediate in the interests ofpeace--whilst their mediation might still avail. But unfortunately, with one notable exception, they united in staking the entire power ofthe Church on the dethronement of Parnell. The effect was twofold. Itadded fresh fury to the attacks of those who were howling for the headof their erstwhile chieftain and who were glad to add the thunderboltsof the Church to their own feebler weapons of assault; but the morepermanent effect, and, indeed, the more disastrous, was the doubt itleft on the minds of thousands of the best Irishmen whether there wasnot some malign plot in which the Church was associated with theban-dogs of the Liberal Party for dishing Home Rule by overthrowingParnell. It was recalled that the Catholic priesthood, with a fewglorious exceptions, stood apart from Parnell when he was strugglingto give life and force to the Irish movement, and thus it came to passthat for many a bitter year the part of the Irish priest in politicswas freely criticised by Catholics whose loyalty to the Church wasindisputable. 

Even still--if only the temporary withdrawal of Parnell weresecured--all might have been well. And it was to this end that theBoulogne negotiations were set on foot. Mr William O'Brien has, perhaps, left us the most complete record of what transpired in thecourse of those fateful conversations. Parnell naturally desired toget out of a delicate situation with all possible credit and honour, and his magnificent services entitled him to the utmost considerationin this respect. He insisted on demanding guarantees from Mr Gladstoneon Home Rule and the Land Question, and these given he expressed hiswillingness to retire from the position of Chairman of the Party. Atfirst he insisted on Mr William O'Brien being his successor, butO'Brien peremptorily dismissed this for reasons which were to himunalterable. Mr Dillon was then agreed to, and a settlement was on thepoint of achievement when a maladroit remark of this gentleman aboutthe administration of the Paris Funds so grievously wounded the prideof Parnell that the serenity of the negotiations was irreparablydisturbed, and from that moment the movement for peace was merely anempty show. 

Chaos had come again upon the Irish Cause, and the Irish people, whowere so near the goal of success, wasted many years, that might havebeen better spent, in futile and fratricidal strife, in which all thebaser passions of politics ran riot and played havoc with the finerpurposes of men engaged in a struggle for liberty and right. 

 CHAPTER III

 THE DEATH OF A LEADER

There is no Irishman who can study the incidents leading up toParnell's downfall and the wretched controversies connected with itwithout feelings of shame that such a needless sacrifice of greatnessshould have been made. 

Parnell broke off the Boulogne negotiations ostensibly on the groundthat the assurances of Mr Gladstone on the Home Rule Question were notsufficient and that if he was to be "thrown to the English wolves, " touse his own term, the Irish people were not getting their price inreturn. But giving the best thought possible to all the availablematerials it would seem that Mr Dillon's reflection on Parnell's_bona fides_ was really at the root of the ultimate break-away. 

Mr Barry O'Brien, in his _Life of Parnell_, thus describes theincident:

"Parnell went to Calais and met Mr O'Brien and Mr Dillon. The Liberalassurances were then submitted to him and he considered themunsatisfactory; but this was not the only trouble. Mr O'Brien hadlooked forward with hope to the meeting between Parnell and Mr Dillon. He believed the meeting would make for peace. He was awfullydisappointed. Mr Dillon succeeded completely in getting Parnell's backup, adding seriously to the difficulties of the situation. He seemedspecially to have offended Parnell by proposing that he (Mr Dillon)should have the decisive voice in the distribution of the ParisFunds.... Mr Dillon proposed that the funds might be drawn without theintervention of Parnell; that, in fact, Mr Dillon should take theplace Parnell had hitherto held. [1] Parnell scornfully brushed asidethis proposal and broke off relations with Mr Dillon altogether, though to the end he remained on friendly terms with Mr O'Brien. "

It is a vivid memory with me how closely we in Ireland hung upon thevarying fortunes and vicissitudes of the Boulogne pourparlers, and howearnest was the hope in every honest Irish heart that a way out mightbe found which would not involve our incomparable leader in furtherhumiliations. But alas for our hopes! The hemlock had to be drained tothe last bitter drop. Meanwhile Parnell never rested day or night. Herushed from one end of the country to the other, addressing meetings, fighting elections, stimulating his followers, answering his defamersand all the time exhausting the scant reserves of strength that wereleft him. 

Considering all the causes of his downfall in the light of laterevents the alliance of the Irish Party with English Liberalism was, inmy judgment, the primary factor. Were it not for this entanglement orobligation--call it what you will--the Gladstone letter would neverhave been written. And even that letter was no sufficientjustification for throwing Parnell overboard. If it were a question ofthe defeat of the Home Rule cause and the withdrawal of Mr Gladstonefrom the leadership of the Liberal Party, something may be said forit, but the words actually used by Mr Gladstone were: "The continuanceof Parnell's leadership would render my retention of the leadership ofthe Liberal Party almost a nullity. " Be it observed, Gladstone did notsay he was going to retire from leadership; nor did he say he wasgoing to abandon Home Rule--to forsake a principle founded on justiceand for which he had divided the Liberal Party and risked his ownreputation as a statesman. 

To think that Gladstone meant this is not alone inconceivable, butpreposterous. And, indeed, it has been recently made abundantly clearin Lord Morley's book of personal reminiscences that the Parnell Splitneed never have taken place at all had steps been taken by anyresponsible body of intermediaries to obtain Gladstone's real views. We now know it for absolute fact that Gladstone had had actuallystruck out of his letter as prepared by him for publication the fataland fateful passage and that it was only reinserted at Mr JohnMorley's dictation. Mr Morley's own narrative of the circumstancesdeserves quotation:

"At 8 to dinner in Stratton Street. I sat next to Granville and nextto him was Mr G. We were all gay enough and as unlike as possible to amarooned crew. Towards the end of the feast Mr G. Handed to me, at theback of Granville's chair, the draft of the famous letter in anunsealed envelope. While he read the Queen's speech to the rest Iperused and reperused the letter. Granville also read it. I said to MrG. Across Granville: 'But you have not put in the very thing thatwould be most likely of all things to move him, ' referring to thestatement in the original draft, that Parnell's retention would meanthe nullity of Gladstone's leadership. Harcourt again regretted thatit was addressed to me and not to P. And agreed with me that it oughtto be strengthened as I had indicated if it was meant really to affectP. 's mind. Mr G. Rose, went to the writing-table and with me standingby wrote, on a sheet of Arnold M. 's grey paper, the importantinsertion. I marked then and there under his eyes the point at whichthe insertion was to be made and put the whole into my pocket. Nobodyelse besides H. Was consulted about it, or saw it. "

Thus the fate of a great man and, to a very considerable extent also, the destiny of an ancient nation was decided by one of thoseunaccountable mischances which are the weapons of Fate in aninscrutable world. I think that to-day Ireland generally mourns itthat Parnell should ever have been deposed in obedience to a Britishmandate--or perhaps, as those who conscientiously opposed Mr Parnellat the time might prefer to term it, because of their fidelity to acompact honestly entered into with the Liberal Party--an alliancewhich they no doubt believed to be essential to the grant of HomeRule. 

We have since learned, through much travail and disappointment, whatlittle faith can be reposed in the most emphatic pledges of BritishParties or leaders, and we had been wiser in 1890 if we had takensides with Parnell against the whole world had the need arisen. As itwas, fought on front and flank, with the thunders of the Church, andthe ribaldry of malicious tongues to scatter their venomed dartsabroad, Parnell was a doomed man. Not that he lacked indomitablecourage or loyal support. But his frail body was not equal to thedemands of the undaunted spirit upon it, and so he went to his gravebroken but not beaten--great even in that last desperate stand he hadmade for his own position, as he was great in all that he hadundertaken, suffered and achieved for his country. It was a hushed andheart-broken Ireland that heard of his death. It was as if a pall hadfallen over the land on that grey October morning in 1891 when thenews of his passing was flashed across from the England that hescorned to the Ireland that he loved. It may be that those who hadreviled him and cast the wounding word against him had then theirmoment of regret and the wish that what had been heatedly spoken mightbe unsaid, but those who loved him and who were loyal to the end foundno consolation beyond this, that they had stood, with leal hearts andtrue, beside the man who had found Ireland broken, maimed anddispirited and who had lifted her to the proud position of consciousstrength and self-reliant nationhood. 

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: This is not exact. What Dillon proposed was that Parnell, McCarthy and Dillon himself should be the trustees, the majority to besufficient to sign cheques. When Parnell objected to a third beingadded, Dillon made the observation which ruined everything: "Yes, indeed, and the first time I was in trouble to leave me without apound to pay the men" (O'Brien's _An Olive Branch in Ireland_). ]

 CHAPTER IV

 AN APPRECIATION OF PARNELL

With the death of Parnell a cloud of despair seemed to settle upon theland. Chaos had come again; indeed, it had come before, ever since thewar of faction was set on foot and men devoted themselves to thesatisfaction of savage passions rather than constructive endeavour fornational ideals. We could have no greater tribute to Parnell's powerthan this--that when he disappeared the Party he had created was rentinto at least three warring sections, intent for the most part ontheir own miserable rivalries, wasting their energies on smallintrigues and wretched personalities and by their futilities bringingshame and disaster upon the Irish Cause. There followed what MrWilliam O'Brien describes in his _Evening Memories_ as "eightyears of unredeemed blackness and horror, upon which no Irishman ofany of the three contending factions can look back without shame andfew English Liberals without remorse. "

And thus Ireland parted with "the greatest of her Captains" and reapeda full crop of failures as her reward. Too late there were flashingtestimonials to his greatness. Too late it became a commonplaceobservation in Ireland, when the impotence of the sordid sections wasapparent: "How different it would all be if Parnell were alive. " Toolate did we have tributes to Parnell's capacity from friend and foewhich magnified his gifts of leadership beyond reach of the envious. Even the man who was more than any other responsible for his fall saidof Parnell (Mr Barry O'Brien's _Life of Parnell_):

"Parnell was the most remarkable man I ever met. I do not say theablest man; I say the most remarkable and the most interesting. He wasan intellectual phenomenon. He was unlike anyone I had ever met. Hedid things and said things unlike other men. His ascendancy over hisParty was extraordinary. There has never been anything like it in myexperience in the House of Commons. He succeeded in surroundinghimself with very clever men, with men exactly suited for his purpose. They have changed since--I don't know why. Everything seems to havechanged. But in his time he had a most efficient party, anextraordinary party. I do not say extraordinary as an opposition butextraordinary as a Government. The absolute obedience, the strictdiscipline, the military discipline in which he held them was unlikeanything I have ever seen. They were always there, they were alwaysready, they were always united, they never shirked the combat andParnell was supreme all the time. "

"Parnell was supreme all the time. " This is the complete answer tothose--and some of them are alive still--who said in the days of "theSplit" that it was his Party which made him and not he who made theParty. In this connection I might quote also the following briefextract from a letter written by Mr William O'Brien to ArchbishopCroke during the Boulogne negotiations:

"We have a dozen excellent front bench men in our Party but there isno other Parnell. They all mean well but it is not the same thing. Thestuff talked of Parnell's being a sham leader, sucking the brains ofhis chief men, is the most pitiful rubbish. "

Time proved, only too tragically, the correctness of Mr O'Brien'sjudgment. When the guiding and governing hand of Parnell was withdrawnthe Party went to pieces. In the words of Gladstone: "they had changedsince then"--and I may add that at no subsequent period did they gainthe same cohesion, purpose or power as a Party. 

It may be well when dealing with Parnell's position in Irish historyto quote the considered opinion of an independent writer of neutralnationality. M. Paul Dubois, a well-known French author, in hismasterly work, _Contemporary Ireland_, thus gives his estimate ofParnell:

"Parnell shares with O'Connell the glory of being the greatest ofIrish leaders. Like O'Connell he was a landlord and his familytraditions were those of an aristocrat. Like him, too, he wasoverbearing, even despotic in temperament. But in all else Parnell wasthe very opposite of the 'Liberator. ' The Protestant leader of aCatholic people, he won popularity in Ireland without being at alltimes either understood or personally liked. In outward appearance hehad nothing of the Irishman, nothing of the Celt about him. He wascold, distant and unexpansive in manner and had more followers thanfriends. His speech was not that of a great orator. Yet he wassingularly powerful and penetrating, with here and there brilliantflashes that showed profound wisdom. A man of few words, of strengthrather than breadth of mind--his political ideals were often uncertainand confused--he was better fitted to be a combatant than aconstructive politician. Beyond all else he was a Parliamentaryfighter of extraordinary ability, perfectly self-controlled, cold andbitter, powerful at hitting back. It was precisely these Englishqualities that enabled him to attain such remarkable success in hisstruggle with the English. Pride was perhaps a stronger motive withhim than patriotism or faith. "

We have here the opinions of those who knew Parnell in Parliament--theone as his opponent, the other as, perhaps, his most intimatefriend--and of an independent outsider who had no part or lot in Irishcontroversies. It may be perhaps not amiss if I conclude thisappreciation of Parnell with the views of an Irishman of the latestschool of Irish thought. Mr R. Mitchell Henry, in his work, _TheEvolution of Sinn Fein_, writes:

"The pathetic and humiliating performance (of the Butt 'Home Rulers')was ended by the appearance of Charles Stewart Parnell, who infusedinto the forms of Parliamentary action the sacred fury of battle. Hedetermined that Ireland, refused the right of managing her owndestinies, should at least hamper the English in the government oftheir own house; he struck at the dignity of Parliament and woundedthe susceptibilities of Englishmen by his assault upon the institutionof which they are most justly proud. His policy of Parliamentaryobstruction went hand in hand with an advanced land agitation at home. The remnant of the Fenian Party rallied to his cause and suspended forthe time, in his interests and in furtherance of his policy, theirrevolutionary activities. For Parnell appealed to them by his honestdeclaration of his intentions; he made it plain both to Ireland and tothe Irish in America that his policy was no mere attempt at areadjustment of details in Anglo-Irish relations but the first step onthe road to national independence. He was strong enough both toannounce his ultimate intentions and to define with precision thelimit which must be placed upon the immediate measures to be taken.... He is remembered, not as the leader who helped to force a LiberalGovernment to produce two Home Rule Bills but as the leader who said'No man can set bounds to the march of a nation.... ' To him theBritish Empire was an abstraction in which Ireland had no spiritualconcern; it formed part of the order of the material world in whichIreland found a place; it had, like the climatic conditions of Europe, or the Gulf Stream, a real and preponderating influence on thedestinies of Ireland. But the Irish claim was, to him, the claim of anation to its inherent rights, not the claim of a portion of an empireto its share in the benefits which the Constitution of that empirebestowed upon its more favoured parts. "

Judged by the most varied standards and opinions the greatness ofParnell as the leader of a nation is universally conceded. Thequestion may be asked: But what did Parnell actually accomplish toentitle him to this distinction? I will attempt briefly to summarisehis achievements. He found a nation of serfs, and if he did notactually make a nation of freemen of them he set them on the high roadto freedom, he gave them a measure of their power when united anddisciplined, and he taught them how to resist and combat thearrogance, the greed and the inbred cruelty of landlordism. He struckat England through its most vulnerable point--through its Irishgarrison, with its cohorts of unscrupulous mercenaries and hangers-on. He struck at it in the very citadel of its own vaunted liberties--inthe Parliament whose prestige was its proudest possession and which hemade it his aim to shatter, to ridicule and to destroy. He convertedan Irish Party of complaisant time-servers, Whigs and office-seekersinto a Party of irreproachable incorruptibility, unbreakable unity, iron discipline and a magnificently disinterested patriotism. Heformulated the demand for Irish nationhood with clearness andprecision. He knew how to bargain with the wiliest and subtleststatesman of his age, and great and powerful as Gladstone was he metin Parnell a man equally conscious of his own strength and equallytenacious of his principles. In fact, on every encounter the ultimateadvantage rested with Parnell. He won on the Land Question, he won onthe labourer's demands, he won on the Home Rule issue and he showedwhat a potent weapon the balance of power could be in the hands of acapable and determined Irish leader. 

Not alone did he create an impregnable Irish Party; he established aunited Irish race throughout the world. His sway was acknowledged withthe same implicit confidence among the exiled Irish in America andAustralia as it was by the home-folk in Ireland. He was the greatcementing influence of an Irish solidarity such as was never beforeattempted or realised. He did a great deal to arrest the outflow ofthe nation's best blood by emigration, and, if he had no strong orstriking policy on matters educational and industrial, he gave manhoodto the people, he developed character in them, he gave them securityin their lands and homes, and, if the unhappy cataclysm of his laterdays had not be-fallen, he would unquestionably have given them ameasure of self-government from which they could march onward to thefullest emancipation that the status of nationhood demands. 

There was never stagnation, nor stupidity, nor blundering in thehandling of Irish affairs whilst his hand was on the helm. It was onlylater that the creeping paralysis of inefficiency and incompetenceexhibited itself and that a people deprived of his genius fordirection and control sank into unimagined depths of apathy, indifference and gloom. 

He thwarted and defeated what appeared to be the settled policy ofEngland--namely, to palter and toy with Irish problems, to postponetheir settlement, to engage in savage repressions and ruthlessoppressions until, the race being decimated by emigration or, whatremained, being destroyed in their ancient faiths by a ruthless methodof Anglicisation, the Irish Question would settle itself by a processof gradual attenuation unto final disappearance. 

It was Parnell who practically put an end to evictions inIreland--those "sentences of death" under which, from 1849 to 1882, there were no less than 363, 000 peasant families turned out of theirhomes and driven out of their country. It was his policy whichinvested the tenants with solid legal rights and gave themunquestioned guarantees against landlord lawlessness. He and hislieutenants had their bouts with Dublin Castle, and they proved what avery vulnerable institution it was when courageously assailed. 

Taken all in all, he brought a new life into Ireland. He left it forever under manifold obligations to him, and whilst grass grows andwater runs and the Celtic race endures, Ireland will revere the nameof Parnell and rank him amongst the noblest of her leaders. 

 CHAPTER V

 THE WRECK AND RUIN OF A PARTY

The blight that had come upon Irish politics did not abate with thedeath of Parnell. Neither side seemed to spare enough charity from itschildish disputations to make an honest and sincere effort atsettlement. There was no softening of the asperities of public life onthe part of the Parnellites--they claimed that their leader had beenhounded to his death, and they were not going to join hands in ablessed forgiveness of the bitter years that had passed with those whohad lost to Ireland her greatest champion. On the other hand, theAnti-Parnellites showed no better disposition. It had been one oftheir main contentions that Parnell was not an indispensable leaderand that he could be very well done without. They were to prove bytheir own conduct and incapacity what a hollow mockery this was andhow feeble was even the best of them without the guidance of themaster mind. They cut a pitiful figure in Parliament, where theirinternal bickerings and miserable squabbles reduced them to positiveimpotence. For years the "Antis, " as they were termed, were dividedinto two almost equal sections, one upholding the claims of JohnDillon and the other faithful to the flag of T. M. Healy. MeanwhileJustin McCarthy, a man of excellent intention but of feeble grasp, occupied the chair of the Party, but did nothing to direct its policy. He was a decent figurehead, but not much else. William O'Brien lentall the support of his powerful personality to Mr Dillon in the hopethat, by establishing his leadership and keeping the door open forreconciliation with the Parnellite minority, he could restore theParty to some of its former efficiency and make it once again thespear-head of the constitutional fight for Ireland's liberties. MrHealy, whose boldness of attack upon Parnell had won him theenthusiastic regard of the clergy as well as the title of "The Man inthe Gap, " was also well supported within the Party--in fact, therewere times when he carried a majority of the Party with him. AfterParnell's overthrow a committee was elected by the Anti-Parnellites todebate and decide policy, but it was in truth left to decide verylittle, for the agile intellect of Mr Healy invariably transferred thefight from it to the Party, which had now become a veritable hell ofincompatibilities and disagreements. 

At this time also indications came from outside that all was not wellwithin the Liberal ranks. Some of the most prominent members of thisParty began to think that the G. O. M. Was getting too old for activeleadership and should be sent to the House of Lords. Justin McCarthyalso reported an interview he had with Gladstone, in which the G. O. M. Plainly hinted that, so far as Home Rule was concerned, he could nolonger hope to be in at the finish, and that there was a strongfeeling among his own friends that Irish legislation should be shelvedfor a few years so that place might be yielded to British affairs. TheGeneral Election of 1892 had taken place not, as may be imagined, under the best set of circumstances for the Liberals. The Nationalistmembers were still faithful to their alliance, which had cost Irelandso much, and which was to cost her yet more, and this enabled theLiberals to remain in office with a shifting and insecure majority ofabout 42 when all their hosts were reckoned up. 

It is claimed for the Home Rule Bill of 1893 that it satisfied all MrParnell's stipulations. However this may be, Mr Redmond and hisfriends seemed to think otherwise, for they raised many points andpressed several amendments to a division on one occasion, reducing theGovernment majority to 14 on the question of the Irish representationat Westminster, which the Parnellites insisted should remain at 103. How the mind of Nationalist Ireland has changed since then!

Mr Thomas Sexton was one of the brilliant intellects of the Party atthis period, a consummate orator, a reputed master of all theintricacies of international finance, and in every sense of the word afirst-rate House of Commons man. But he had in some way or otheraroused the implacable ire of Mr T. M. Healy, whose sardonic invectivehe could not stand. A politician has no right to possess a sensitiveskin, but somehow Mr Sexton did, with the result that he allowedhimself to be driven from public life rather than endure the continualstabs of a tongue that could be very terrible at times--though I wouldsay myself of its owner that he possesses a heart as warm as ever beatin Irish breast. 

The fate of the Home Rule Bill of 1893 was already assured long beforeit left the House of Commons. Like the Bill of 1886 it came to griefon the fear of the English Unionists for the unity of the Empire. HomeRule was conquered by Imperialism, and the Ulster opposition wasmerely used as a powerful and effective argument in the campaign. 

Ireland had sunk meanwhile into a hopeless stupor. The attitude of theIrish masses appeared to be one of despairing indifference to all theparties whose several newspapers were daily engaged in the delectabletask of hurling anathemas at each other's heads. Interest in thenational cause had almost completely ebbed away. A Liberal ChiefSecretary, in the person of Mr John Morley, reigned in Dublin Castle, but all that he is remembered for now is that he started theinnovation of placing Nationalist and Catholic Justices of the Peaceon the bench, who became known in time as "the Morley magistrates. "Otherwise he left Dublin Castle as formidable a fortress of ascendancyauthority as it had ever been. Under conditions as they were then, oras they are now, no Chief Secretary can hope to fundamentally alterthe power of the Castle. "Imagine, " writes M. Paul Dubois in_Contemporary Ireland_: "the situation of a Chief Secretary newlyappointed to his most difficult office. He comes to Ireland full ofprejudices and preconceptions, and, like most Englishmen, excessivelyignorant of Irish conditions.... It does not take him long to discoverthat he is completely in the hands of his functionaries. HisParliamentary duties keep him in London for six or eight months of theyear, and he is forced to accept his information on current affairs inIreland from the permanent officials of the Castle, without havingeven an opportunity of verifying it, and to rely on theirrecommendations in making appointments. The representative of Irelandin England and of England in Ireland he is 'an embarrassed phantom'doomed to be swept away by the first gust of political change. Thelast twenty years, indeed, have seen thirteen chief secretaries comeand go! With or against his will he is a close prisoner of theirresponsible coterie which forms the inner circle of Irishadministration. Even a change of Government in England is not a changeof Government in Ireland. The Chief Secretary goes, but the permanentofficials remain. The case of the clock is changed, but the mechanismcontinues as before.... The Irish oligarchy has retained its supremacyin the Castle. Dislodged elsewhere it still holds the central fortressof Irish administration and will continue to hold it until theconcession of autonomy to Ireland enables the country to re-mould itsadministrative system on national and democratic lines. "

When it came to Gladstone surrendering the sceptre he had so long andbrilliantly wielded, I do not remember that the event excited anyoverpowering interest in Ireland. Outside the ranks of the politiciansthe people had almost ceased to speculate on these matters. A periodof utter stagnation had supervened and it came as no surprise or shockto Nationalist sentiment when Home Rule was formally abandoned byGladstone's successor, Lord Rosebery. "Home Rule is as dead as QueenAnne, " declared Mr Chamberlain. These are the kind of declarationsusually made in the exuberance of a personal or political triumph, butthe passing of the years has a curious knack of giving them emphaticrefutation. 

Divided as they were and torn with dissensions, the Nationalists werenot in a position where they could effectively demand guarantees fromLord Rosebery or enter into any definite arrangement with him. Theykept up their squalid squabble and indulged their personal rivalries, but a disgusted country had practically withdrawn all support fromthem, and an Irish race which in the heyday of Parnell was so proud tocontribute to their war-chest, now buttoned up its pockets and in themost practical manner told them it wanted none of them. 

In this state of dereliction and despair did the General Election of1895 surprise them. The Parnellites had their old organisation--theNational League--and the Anti-Parnellites had established inopposition to this the National Federation, so that Ireland had asufficiency of Leagues but no concrete programme beyond a disreputablepolicy of hacking each other all round. As a matter of fact, we had inCork city the curious and almost incredible spectacle of theDillonites and Healyites joining forces to crush the Parnellitecandidate, whilst elsewhere they were tearing one another to tatters, as it would almost appear, for the mere love of the thing. 

There was one pathetic figure in all this wretched business--that ofthe Hon. Edward Blake, who had been Prime Minister of Canada and whohad surrendered a position of commanding eminence in the political, legal and social life of the Dominion to give the benefit of hissplendid talents to the service of Ireland. It was a service renderedall in vain, though, to the end of his life, with a noble fidelity, hedevoted himself to his chosen cause, thus completing a sacrifice whichdeserved a worthier reward. 

At this period the Home Rule Cause seemed to be buried in the samegrave with Parnell. It may be remarked that there were countlessbodies of the Irish peasantry who still believed that Parnell had notdied, that the sad pageant of his funeral and burial was a prearrangedshow to deceive his enemies, and that the time would soon come whenthe mighty leader would emerge from his seclusion to captain the hostsof Irish nationality in the final battle for independence. This idealately found expression in a powerful play by Mr Lennox Robinson, entitled _The Lost Leader_. 

But, alas! for the belief, the chieftain had only too surely passedaway, and when the General Election of 1895 was over it was abattered, broken and bitterly divided Irish Party which returned toWestminster--a Party which had lost all faith in itself and which wasa byword and a reproach alike for its helpless inefficiency and itspetty intestine quarrels. 

 CHAPTER VI

 TOWARDS LIGHT AND LEADING

Whilst the slow corruption of the Party had been going on in Ireland, the cause of Home Rule had been going down to inevitable ruin. Thewarnings on which Parnell founded his refusal to be expelled from theleadership by dictation from England were more than justified in theevent. And later circumstances only too bitterly confirmed it, thatany blind dependence upon the Liberal Party was to be paid for indisappointment, if not in positive betrayal of Irish interests. A ToryParty had now come into power with a large majority, and the peoplewere treated alternately or concurrently to doses of coercion andproposals initiated with the avowed object of killing Home Rule withkindness. This had been the declared policy of Mr Arthur Balfour whenhis attempt to inaugurate his uncle Lord Salisbury's policy of twentyyears of resolute government had failed, and when, with considerableconstructive foresight, he established the Congested Districts Boardin 1891 as a sort of opposition show--and not too unsuccessful atthat--to the Plan of Campaign and the Home Rule agitation. 

With the developments that followed the Irish Party had practically noconnection. They were neither their authors nor instruments, though theyhad the sublime audacity in a later generation to claim to be thelegitimate inheritors of all these accomplishments. Mr Dillon had nowarrived at the summit of his Parliamentary ambition--he was the leaderof "the majority" Party, but his success seemed to bring him no comfort, and certainly discovered no golden vein of statesmanship in hiscomposition. The quarrels and recriminations of the three sectionalorganisations--the National Federation of the Dillonites, the NationalLeague of the Parnellites, and the People's Rights Association of theHealyites--continued unabated. But beyond the capacity for vulgar abusethey possessed none other. Parliamentarianism was dying on its legs andconstitutionalism appeared to have received its death-blow. The countryhad lost all respect for its "Members, " and young and old were sickunto death of a movement which offered no immediate prospects of actionand no hope for the future. A generation of sceptics and scoffers wasbeing created, and even if the idealists, who are always to be found inlarge number in Ireland, still remained unconquerable in their faiththat a resurgent and regenerated Ireland must arise some time, andsomehow, they were remarkably silent in the expression of theirconvictions. Mr William O'Brien thus describes the unspeakable depths towhich the Party had fallen in those days:

"The invariable last word to all our consultations was the patheticone, 'Give me a fund and I see my way to doing anything. ' And so wehad travelled drearily for years in the vicious circle that therecould be no creative energy in the Party without funds, and that therecould be no possibility for funds for a party thus ingloriouslyinactive. Although myself removed from Parliament my aid had beenconstantly invoked by Mr Dillon on the eve of any important meeting ofthe Party in London, or of the Council of the National Federation inDublin, for there was not one of them that was not haunted by theanticipation of some surprise from Mr Healy's fertile ingenuity. Thereis an unutterable discomfort in the recollections of the invariablecourse of procedure on these occasions--first, the dozens ofbeseeching letters to be written to our friends, imploring theirattendance at meetings at which, if Mr Healy found us in fullstrength, all was uneventful and they had an expensive journey fortheir pains; next, the consultations far into the night precedingevery trial of strength; the painful ticking off, man by man, of thefriends, foes, and doubtfuls on the Party list, the careful collectionof information as to the latest frame of mind of this or that man ofthe four or five waverers who might turn the scale; the resolution, after endless debates, to take strong action to force the Party to amanful choice at long last between Mr Dillon and his tormentors, andto give somebody or anybody authority enough to effect something; andthen almost invariably the next day the discovery that all the labourhad been wasted and the strong action resolved upon had been droppedin deference to some drivelling hesitation of some of the four or fivedoubtfuls who had become _de facto_ the real leaders of theParty. "

I venture to say that a confession of more amazing impotency, indecision and inefficiency it would be impossible to make. It bringsbefore the mind as nothing else could the utter degradation of a Partywhich only a few brief years before was the terror of the BritishParliament and the pride of the Irish race. 

One occasion there was between the Parnell Split and the subsequentreunion in 1900 when the warring factions might have been induced tocompose their differences and to reform their ranks. A Convention ofthe Irish Race was summoned in 1906 which was carefully organised andwhich in its character and representative authority was in every way avery unique and remarkable gathering. I attended it myself in myjournalistic capacity, and I was deeply impressed by the fact thathere was an assembly which might very well mark the opening of a freshepoch in Irish history, for there had come together for counsel anddeliberation men from the United States, Canada, Australia, NewZealand, South Africa, Newfoundland, the Argentine, as well as fromall parts of Great Britain and Ireland--men who, by reason of theireminence, public worth, sympathies and patriotism, were calculated togive a new direction and an inspiring stimulus to the Irish Movement. They were men lifted high above the passions and rivalries which hadwrought distraction and division amongst the people at home, and itneeds no great argument to show what a powerful and impartial tribunalthey might have been made into for the restoration of peace and there-establishment of a new order in Irish political affairs. But thisgreat opportunity was lost. The factions had not yet fought themselvesto a standstill. Mr Redmond and Mr Healy resisted the most pressingentreaties of the American and Australian delegates to join theConvention, and, beyond a series of laudable speeches and resolutions, a Convention which might have been constituted the happy harbinger ofunity left no enduring mark on the life of the people or the fate ofparties. 

When Mr Gerald Balfour became Chief Secretary for Ireland after theHome Rule debacle of 1895 he determined to continue the policy, inaugurated by his more famous brother, of appeasement by considerableinternal reforms, which have made his administration for evermemorable. There have ever been in Irish life certain narrow coteriesof thought which believed that with every advance of prosperitysecured by the people, and every step taken by them in individualindependence, there would be a corresponding weakness in their desireand demand for a full measure of national freedom. A more fatal orfoolish conviction there could not be. The whole history of nationsand peoples battling for the right is against it. The more a peopleget upon their feet, the more they secure a grip upon themselves andtheir inheritance, the more they are established in security andwell-being, the more earnestly, indefatigably and unalterably are theydetermined to get all that is due to them. They will make every heightthey attain a fortress from which to fight for the ultimate pinnacleof their rights. The more prosperous they become, the better are theyable to demand that the complete parchments and title-deeds of theirliberty and independence shall be engrossed. Hence the broader-mindedtype of Irish Nationalist saw nothing to fear from Mr Balfour'sattempts to improve the material condition of the people. Unfortunately for his reputation, Mr Dillon always uniformly opposedany proposals which were calculated to take the yoke of landlordismfrom off the necks of the farmers. He seemed to think that asettlement of the Land and National questions should go hand in hand, for the reason that if the Land Question were once disposed of thefarmers would then settle down to a quiescent existence and have nofurther interest in the national struggle. 

Accordingly Mr Balfour's good intentions were fought and frustratedfrom two opposing sources. His Land Act of 1906 and his LocalGovernment (Ireland) Act, 1898, were furiously opposed by the IrishUnionists and the Dillonites alike. The Land Bill was by no means aheroic measure, and made no serious effort to deal with the landproblem in a big or comprehensive fashion. The Local Government Bill, on the other hand, was a most far-reaching measure, one of nationalscope and importance, full of the most tremendous opportunities andpossibilities, and how any Irish leader in his senses could have beenso short-sighted as to oppose it will for ever remain one of themysteries of political life. This Bill broke for ever the back oflandlord power in Irish administration. It gave into the hands of thepeople for the first time the absolute control of their own localaffairs. It enfranchised the workers in town and country, enablingthem to vote for the man of their choice at all local elections. Itput an end to the pernicious power of the landed gentry, who hithertoraised the rates for all local services, dispersed patronage and wereguilty of many misdeeds and malversations, as well of being prolificin every conceivable form of abuse which a rotten and corrupt systemcould lend itself to. To this the Local Government Act of 1898 put aviolent and abrupt end. The Grand Juries and the Presentment Sessionswere abolished. Elected Councils took their place. The franchise wasextended to embrace every householder and even a considerable body ofwomen. It was the exit of "the garrison" and the entrance of thepeople--the triumph of the democratic principle and the end ofaristocratic power in local life. 

Next to the grant of Home Rule there could not be a more remarkableconcession to popular right and feeling. Yet Mr Dillon had to findfault with it because its provisions, to use his own words, included"blackmail to the landlords" and arranged for "a flagitious waste ofpublic funds"--the foundation on which these charges rested beingthat, following an unvarying tradition, the Unionist Government bribedthe landlords into acceptance of the Bill by relieving them of halftheir payment for Poor Rate, whilst it gave a corresponding relief ofhalf the County Dues to the tenants. He also ventured the prediction, easily falsified in the results, that the tenants' portion of the raterelief would be transferred to the landlords in the shape of increasedrents. As a matter of fact, the second term judicial rents, subsequently fixed, were down by an average of 22 per cent. 

Mr Redmond, wiser than Mr Dillon, saw that the Bill had magnificentpossibilities; he welcomed it, and he promised that the influence ofhis friends and himself would be directed to obtain for the principlesit contained a fair and successful working. But, with a surprisinglack of political acumen, he likewise expressed his determination topreserve in the new councils the presence and power of the landlordand _ex-officio_ element. This was, in the circumstances, withthe Land Question unsettled and landlordism still an insidious power, a rather gratuitous surrender to the privileged classes. 

Before the Local Government Act was sent on its heaven-born mission ofnational amelioration another considerable happening had taken place:the Financial Relations Commission appointed to inquire into thefinancial relations between Ireland and Great Britain having tenderedits report in 1896. Financial experts had long contended that Irelandwas grievously overtaxed, and that there could be no just dealingbetween the two countries until the amount of this overtaxation wasaccurately and scientifically ascertained and a proper balance drawn. It was provided in the Act of Union that the two countries shouldretain their separate budgets and should each remain charged withtheir respective past debts, and a relative proportion of contributionto Imperial expenses was fixed. But the British Parliament did notlong respect this provision. In 1817 it decreed a financial unionbetween the two countries, amalgamated their budgets and exchequers, and ordered that henceforth all the receipts and expenditure of theUnited Kingdom should be consolidated into one single fund, which washenceforward to be known as the Consolidated Fund. It was not longbefore we had cumulative examples of the truth of Dr Johnson's dictumthat England would unite with us only that she may rob us. SuccessiveEnglish chancellors imposed additional burdens upon our poor andimpoverished country, until it was in truth almost taxed out ofexistence. The weakest points in the Gladstonian Home Rule Bills wereadmittedly those dealing with finance. 

The publication of the report of the Financial Relations Commission, which had been taking evidence for two years, created a formidableoutcry in Ireland. We had long protested against our taxes beinglevied by an external power; now we knew also that we were beingrobbed of very large amounts annually. The Joint Report of theCommission, signed by eleven out of thirteen members, decided that theAct of Union placed on the shoulders of Ireland a burden impossiblefor her to bear; that the increase of taxation laid on her in themiddle of the nineteenth century could not be justified, and, finally, that the existing taxable capacity of Ireland did not exceedone-twentieth part of that of Great Britain (and was perhaps farless), whereas Ireland paid in taxes one-eleventh of the amount paidby Great Britain. Furthermore, the actual amount taken each year inthe shape of overtaxation was variously estimated to be between twoand three quarters and three millions. Instantly Ireland was up inarms against this monstrous exaction. For a time the country wasroused from its torpor and anything seemed possible. All classes andcreeds were united in denouncing the flagrant theft of the nation'ssubstance by the predominant partner. By force and fraud the Act ofUnion was passed: by force and fraud we were kept in a state ofbeggary for well-nigh one hundred years and our poverty flauntedabroad as proof of our idleness and incapacity. What wonder that wefelt ourselves outraged and wronged and bullied? Huge demonstrationsof protest were held in all parts of the country. These were attendedby men of all sects and of every political hue. Nationalist andUnionist, landlord and tenant, Protestant and Catholic stood on thesame platform and vied with each other in denunciation of the commonrobber. At Cork Lord Castletown recalled the Boston Tea riots. AtLimerick Lord Dunraven presided at a meeting which was addressed bythe Most Rev. Dr O'Dwyer, the Catholic bishop of the diocese, and byMr John Daly, a Fenian who had spent almost a lifetime in prison toexpiate his nationality. 

There was a general forgetfulness of quarrels and differences whilstthis ferment of truly national indignation lasted. But the cohesivematerials were not sound enough to make it a lasting union of thewhole people. There were still class fights to be fought to theirappointed end, and so the agitation gradually filtered out, andIreland remains to-day still groaning under the intolerable burden ofovertaxation, not lessened, but enormously increased, by a war whichIreland claims was none of her business. 

The subsidence of the political fever from 1891 to 1898 was notwithout its compensations in other directions. Ireland had time tothink of other things, to enter into a sort of spiritual retreat--towonder whether if, after all, politics were everything, whether theexclusive pursuit of them did not mean that other vital factors in thenational life were forgotten, and whether the attainment of materialambitions might not be purchased at too great a sacrifice--at the lossof those spiritual and moral forces without which no nation can beeither great or good in the best sense. There was much to be done inthis direction. The iron of slavery had very nearly entered our souls. Centuries of landlord oppression, of starvation, duplicity andAnglicisation had very nearly destroyed whatever there was of moralvirtue and moral worth in our nature. The Irish language--ourdistinctive badge of nationhood--had almost died upon the lips of thepeople. The old Gaelic traditions and pastimes were fast fading away. Had these gone we might, indeed, win Home Rule, but we would have lostthings immeasurably greater, for "not by bread alone doth manlive"--we would have lost that independence of the soul, that moralgrandeur, that intellectual distinction, that spiritual strengthwithout which all the charters of liberty which any foreign Parliamentcould confer would be only so many "scraps of paper, " assuring us itmay be of fine clothes and well-filled stomachs and self-satisfiedminds, but conferring none of those glories whose shining illuminesthe dark ways of life and leads us towards that light which surpassethall understanding. 

Thanks to the workings of an inscrutable Providence it was, however, whilst the worst form of political stagnation had settled on the landthat other deeper depths were stirring and that the people were ofthemselves moving towards a truer light and a higher leading. 

 CHAPTER VII

 FORCES OF REGENERATION AND THEIR EFFECT

"George A. Birmingham" (who in private life is Canon Hannay), in hisadmirable book, _An Irishman Looks at his World_, tells us: "Themost important educational work in Ireland during the last twentyyears has been done independently of universities or schools, " and inthis statement I entirely agree with him. And I may add that in thiswork Canon Hannay himself bore no inconsiderable part. During apolitical campaign in Mayo in 1910 I had some delightful conversationswith Canon Hannay in my hotel at Westport, and his views expressed inthe volume from which I quote are only a development of those which hethen outlined. Both as to the vexed questions then disturbing Northand South Ireland and as to the lines along which national growthought to take place we had much in common. We agreed that nationalitymeans much more than mere political independence--that it is foundedon the character and intellect of the people, that it lives and isexpressed in its culture, customs and traditions, in its literature, its songs and its arts. We saw hope for Ireland because she wasremaking and remoulding herself from within--the only sure way inwhich she could work out her eventual salvation, whatever politicalparties or combinations may come or go. 

This process of regeneration took firm root when the parties wereexhausting themselves in mournful internal strife. Through the wholeof the nineteenth century it had been the malign purpose of England todestroy the spirit of nationality through its control of the schools. Just as in the previous century it sought to reduce Ireland to a stateof servitude through the operations of the Penal Laws, so it nowsought to continue its malefic purpose by a system of education "sobad that if England had wished to kill Ireland's soul when she imposedit on the Sister Isle she could not have discovered a better means ofdoing so" (M. Paul Dubois). And the same authority ascribes thefatalism, the lethargy, the moral inertia and intellectual passivity, the general absence of energy and character which prevailed in Irelandten or twelve years ago to the fact that England struck at Irelandthrough her brain and sought to demoralise and ruin the national mind. 

Thank God for it that the effort failed, but it failed mainly owing tothe fact that a new generation of prophets had arisen in Ireland whosaw that in the revival and reform of national education rested thebest hope for the future. They recalled the gospel of Thomas Davis andthe other noble minds of the Young Ireland era that we needs musteducate in order that we may be free. They sought to give form andeffect to the splendid ideals of the Young Irelanders. A new spiritwas abroad, and not in matters educational alone. The doctrine ofself-help and self-reliance was being preached and, what was better, practised. 

The Gaelic League, founded in 1893 by a few enthusiastic Irishspirits, was formed to effect an Irish renascence in matters of themind and spirit. It was non-sectarian and non-political. Its purposewas purely psychological and educational--it sought the preservationof the Irish language from a fast-threatening decay, it encouraged thestudy of ancient Irish literature and it promoted the cultivation of amodern literature in the Irish language. Its beginnings were modest, and its founders were practically three unknown young men whose onlyspecial equipment for leadership of a new movement were boundlessenthusiasm and the possession of the scholastic temperament. DouglasHyde, the son of a Protestant clergyman, dwelt far away in anunimportant parish in Connaught, and, while still a boy, becamedevoted to the study of the Irish language. Father O'Growney was aproduct of Maynooth culture, whose love of the Irish tongue became thebest part of his nature, and John MacNeill (now so well known as aSinn Fein leader) was born in Antrim, educated in a Belfast school andacquired his love for Irish in the Aran islands. It is marvellous toconsider how the programme of the new League "caught on. " Somemovements make their appeal to a class or a cult--to the young, themiddle-aged or the old. But the Gaelic League, perhaps because of thevery simplicity and directness of its objects, made an appeal to all. It numbered its adherents in every walk of life; it drew itsmembership from all political parties; it gathered the sects withinits folds, and the greatest tribute that can be paid it is that ittaught all its disciples a new way of looking at Ireland and gave thema new pride in their country. Ireland became national and independentin a sense it had not learnt before--it realised that "the essentialmark of nationhood is the intellectual, social and moral patrimonywhich the past bequeaths to the present, which, amplified, or at leastpreserved, the present must bequeath to the future, and that it isthis which makes the strength and individuality of a people. "

Its branches spread rapidly throughout Ireland, and the movement wastaken up abroad with equal enthusiasm. Irish language classes wereorganised, Irish history of the native--as distinct from theBritish--brand was taught. Lessons in dancing and singing were givenand the old national airs were revived and became the popular music ofthe day. It would take too much of my space to recount all the variedactivities of the League, all that it did to preserve ancient Irishculture, to make the past live again in the lives of the people, tofoster national sports and recreations, to organise Gaelic festivalsof the kind that flourished in Ireland's artistic past, to create anIrish Ireland and to arrest the decadence of manners and theAnglicisation which had almost eaten into the souls of the people anddestroyed their true Celtic character. Mr P. H. Pearse truly said ofit: "The Gaelic League will be recognised in history as the mostrevolutionary influence that ever came into Ireland. " It saved thesoul of Ireland when it was in imminent danger of being lost, and itstriumph was in great measure due to the fact that it held rigidlyaloof from the professedly political parties, although it may be saidfor it that it undoubtedly laid the foundations of that school ofthought which made all the later developments of nationality possible. And the amazing thing is that the priest and the parson, the gentryand the middle classes, equally with the peasantry, vied with eachother in extending the influence and power of the movement. One of itsstrongest supporters was a leader of the Belfast Orangemen, the lateDr Kane, who observed that though he was a Unionist and a Protestanthe did not forget that he had sprung from the Clan O'Cahan. Thestimulation given to national thought and purpose spread in manydirections. A new race of Irish priests was being educated on morethoroughly Irish lines, and they went forth to their duties with theinspiration, as it were, of a new call. A crusade was started againstemigration, which was fast draining the country of its reserves ofbrain, brawn and beauty. The dullness of the country-side, animportant factor in forcing the young and adventurous abroad, wasrelieved by the new enthusiasm for Irish games and pastimes andrecreations--for the _seanchus_, the _sgoruidheacht_, the_ceilidhe_ and the _Feiseanna_. 

In giving to the young especially a new pride in their country and intheir own, great and distinctive national heritage, it did a greatdeal to strengthen the national character and to make it moreindependent and self-reliant. It started the great work of rooting outthe slavery which centuries of dependency and subjection had bred intothe marrow of the race. Mr Arthur Griffith has admitted that thepresent generation could never have effected this work had not Parnelland his generation done their brave labour before them, but consideredin themselves the achievements of the Gaelic League can only bedescribed as mighty both in the actual revolution it wrought in themoral, intellectual and spiritual sphere, in the reaction it createdagainst the coarser materialism of imported modes and manners, and inthe new spirit which it breathed into the entire people. 

Coincident with the foundation of the Gaelic League, otherregenerative influences were also at work. These aimed at the economicreconstruction and the industrial development of the country by theinculcation of the principles of self-help, self-reliance andco-operation, and by the wider dissemination of technical instructionand agricultural education. Ireland, by reason, I suppose, of itscondition, its arrested development and its psychology, is a countrymuch given to "new movements, " most of which have a very briefexistence. They are born but to breathe and then expire. In the ease, however, of the Gaelic League, and the movements for co-operationamongst the farmers, and for technical instruction in the arts andcrafts most suitable to the country, these movements were conceivedand created strongly to endure. And to the credit of their authorsand, be it said also, of the country for whose upliftment andbetterment they were intended, they have endured greatly, and greatlyfulfilled their purpose. 

It is conceded by all who have any knowledge of the subject that theeconomic decadence of Ireland is not due to any lack of naturalresources; neither is it due to insufficiency of capital or absence ofworkers. It is due to want of initiative, want of enterprise, want ofbusiness method, want of confidence, and want of education on theright lines. The education which should have been fashioned to fit theyouth of Ireland for a life of work and industry and usefulness intheir own land was invented with the express object of making of them"happy English children. " There are possibly a few hundred millionssterling of Irish money, belonging in the main to the farmers andwell-to-do shopkeepers, lying idle in Irish banks, and the irony of itis that these savings of the Irish are invested in Britishenterprises. They help to enrich the British plutocrat and to provideemployment for the British worker, whilst the vast natural resourcesof Ireland remain undeveloped and the cream of Ireland's productivepower, in the shape of its workers, betake themselves to other landsto assist in strengthening the structure and stability of othernations, when they should be engaged in raising the fabric of aprosperous commonwealth at home. 

Those, however, who would blame Ireland for its present position ofindustrial stagnation forget that it was not always thus--they do notbear it in mind that Ireland had a great commercial past, that it hadits own mercantile marine doing direct trade with foreign countries, that it had flourishing industries and factories and mills all overthe country, but that all these were killed and destroyed and drivenout of existence by the cruel trade policy of England, which decreedthe death of every Irish industry or manufacture which stood in theway of its own industrial progress. 

Those who sought the economic reconstruction of the country hadaccordingly to contend against a very evil inheritance. The commercialspirit had been destroyed; it should be educated anew. The desire tofoster home products and manufactures had ceased to exist; it shouldbe re-born and a patriotic preference for home manufactures instilledinto the people. Pride in one's labour--the very essence ofefficiency--had gone out of the country. It should be aroused again. Economic reform should proceed first on educational lines before itcould be hoped to establish new industries with any hope of success. The pioneer in this work was the Hon. (now Sir) Horace Plunkett whoreturned to Ireland after some ranching experiences in the UnitedStates and set himself the task of effecting the economic regenerationof rural Ireland by preaching the gospel of self-help andco-operation. It is no part of my purpose to inquire into the secretmotives of Sir Horace Plunkett, if he ever had any, or to allege, as acertain writer (M. Paul Dubois) has done, that Sir Horace promoted themovement for economic reform in the hope of reconciling Ireland to theUnion and to Imperialism. I may lament it, as I do, that Sir Horace, who now believes himself to be the discoverer of Dominion Home Rule, did not raise his voice either for the Agrarian Settlement or for HomeRule during all the years while he was a real power in the country. Iam not however going to allow my views on these questions to deflectmy judgment from the real merit of the work performed by Sir Horaceand his associates in the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society, which in the teeth of considerable difficulties and obstaclessucceeded in propagating through Ireland the principles of self-helpand co-operation. 

From the first, the Society had many and powerful enemies, most of theopposition springing from interested and malevolent parties. But thereis, perhaps, no man in all the world so quick to see what is reallyfor his advantage as the Irish farmer, and so the movement graduallyfound favour, and co-operative associations began to be formed in allparts of Ireland. The agricultural labourer has all along regarded theCreamery side of co-operation with absolute dislike. He declares thatit is fast denuding the land of labour, that it tends to decreasetillage, and is one of the most active causes of emigration. They say, and there is ocular evidence of the fact, that a donkey and a littleboy or girl to drive him to the Creamery now do the work of dairymaidsand farm hands. But, whilst this is a criticism justified by existingconditions, it does not mean that co-operation is a thing bad initself, or that there is anything inherently vicious in it to cause orcreate the employment of less labour. What it does mean is that theeducation of the farmer is still far from complete, that he does notyet know how to make the best use of his land, and that he does nottill and cultivate it as he ought to make it really fruitful. Besidesthe Creamery system there are other forms of co-operation which haveexercised a most beneficent influence amongst the peasantry. Theseinclude agricultural societies for the improvement of the breed ofcattle, a number of country banks, mostly of the Raiffeisen type, co-operative associations of rural industries, principally lace, andsocieties for the sale of eggs and fowls, the dressing of flax, andgeneral agriculture. 

A direct outcome of the Co-operative Movement was the creation by Actof Parliament in 1899 of the Department of Agriculture and TechnicalInstruction in Ireland--a Department which, though it possesses manyfaults of administration and of policy, has nevertheless had adistinctly wholesome influence on Irish life. In relation to theCo-operative Movement the judgment of Mr Dillon was once againsignally at fault. He gave it vehement opposition at every point andthrew the whole weight of his personal following into the effort toarrest its growth and expansion. Happily, however, the practical goodsense of the people saved them from becoming the dupes of parties whohad axes of their own, political or personal, to grind, and thusco-operation and self-help have won, in spite of all obstacles andobjections, a very fair measure of success. 

Meanwhile a remarkable development was taking place in the matter ofbringing popular and educative literature within reach of the masses. Public and parish libraries and village halls were widely established. These were supplementary to the greater movements to which referencehas been made, but they were indicative of the steady bent of thenational mind towards enlightenment and education, and of a desire inall things appertaining to the national life for more and betterinstruction. Another important movement there was to which littlereference is made in publications dealing with the period--namely, theorganisation of the town and country labourers for their political andsocial improvement. It was first known as the Irish Democratic Tradeand Labour Federation, but this went to pieces in the generalconfusion of the Split. It was resurrected subsequently under thetitle of the Irish Land and Labour Association. I mention it here asan additional instance of the regenerative agencies that were at workin every domain of Irish life, and among all classes, at a time whenthe politicians were tearing themselves to pieces and providing aRoman holiday for their Saxon friends. 

 CHAPTER VIII

 THE BIRTH OF A MOVEMENT AND WHAT IT CAME TO

Whilst Ireland was thus finding her soul and Mr Gerald Balfourpursuing his beneficent schemes for "killing Home Rule with kindness, "the country had sickened unto death of the "parties" and theirdisgusting vagaries. Mr William O'Brien, although giving loyal supportand, what is more, very material assistance to Mr Dillon and hisfriends, was not himself a Member of Parliament, but was doing farbetter work as a citizen, studying, from his quiet retreat on theshores of Clew Bay, the shocking conditions of the Western peasantry, who were compelled to eke out an existence of starvation and miseryamid the crags and moors and fastnesses of the west, whilst almostfrom their very doorsteps there stretched away mile upon mile of therich green pastures from which their fathers were evicted during theclearances that followed the Great Famine of 1847, and which M. PaulDubois describes as "the greatest legalised crime that humanity hasever accomplished against humanity. "

"To look over the fence of the famine-stricken village and see therich green solitudes, which might yield full and plenty, spread out atthe very doorsteps of the ragged and hungry peasants, was to fill astranger with a sacred rage and make it an unshirkable duty to strivetowards undoing the unnatural divorce between the people and the land"(William O'Brien in an _Olive Branch in Ireland_). 

Mr Arthur Balfour had established the Congested Districts Board in1891 to deal with the Western problem, where "the beasts have eaten upthe men, " and when Mr O'Brien settled down at Mallow Cottage hedevoted himself energetically to assisting the Board in variousprojects of local development. But his experiences proved that theseminor reforms were at the best only palliatives, "sending men ruffleswho wanted shirts, " and that there could be only one reallysatisfactory solution--to restore to the people the land that had beentheirs in bygone time, to root out the bullocks and the sheep and toroot in the people into their ancient inheritance. It was only afteryears of patient effort that he at last succeeded in persuading theCongested Districts Board to make its first experiment in landpurchase for the purpose of enlarging the people's holdings and makingthem the owners of their own fields. [1] The scene was Clare Island, "the romantic dominion of Granya Uaile, the 'Queen of Men, '" who formany years brought Elizabeth's best captains to grief among her wildislands. The lordship of this island of 3949 acres, with itsninety-five families, had passed into the hands of a land-jobber, "with bowels of iron, " who sought to extract his cent. Per cent. Fromthe unfortunate islanders by a series of police expeditions in agunboat, with a crop of resulting evictions, bayonet charges andimprisonments. 

The result of the experiment was, beyond expectation, happy. Aftermany delays the Congested Districts Board handed over the island toits new peasant proprietors, now secure for ever more in their ownhomesteads, but this transfer was not completed until the Archbishopof Tuam and Mr O'Brien had guaranteed the payment of the purchaseinstalments for the first seven years--a guarantee which to theislanders' immortal credit never cost the guarantors a farthing. 

Fired to enthusiasm by the success of this experiment Mr O'Brienconceived the idea of a virile agitation for the replantation of thewhole of Connaught, so that the people should be transplanted fromtheir starvation plots to the abundant green patrimony around them. Heavows that no political objects entered into his first conceptions ofthis movement in the West. But the approach of the centenary of theinsurrection of 1798, with its inspiring memories of the UnitedIrishmen, furnished him with the idea, and the happy title for a neworganisation which, in his own words, "drawing an irresistiblestrength and reality from the conditions in the West, would also throwopen to the free air of a new national spirit those caverns andtabernacles of faction in which good men of all political persuasionshad been suffocating for the previous eight years. " Accordingly theUnited Irish League was born into the world at Westport on the 16thJanuary 1898, to achieve results which, if they be not greater--thoughgreat, indeed, they are--the fault assuredly rests not with thefounder of the League, but with those others who malevolently thwartedhis purposes. The occasion was opportune. The three several movementsof the Dillonites, Redmondites and Healyites were in ruins, andIreland went its way unheeding of them. The young men were busy withtheir '98 and Wolfe Tone Clubs. They drank deep of the doctrines of aheroic age. Centenary celebrations were held throughout the country, at which men were exhorted to study the history of an era when menwere proud to die for the land they loved. For a space we listened tothe martial music of other days, and our hearts throbbed to itsstirring notes. The soul of the nation was uplifted above the squalidrivalries of the "'ites" and the "'isms. " It awaited a unifyinginfluence and a programme which would disregard the factions and leavea wide-open door for all Nationalists to come in, no matter what sidesthey had previously taken or whether they had taken any at all. 

This wide-open door and this broad-based programme the United IrishLeague offered. Mr Dillon attended the inaugural meeting, but fromwhat Mr O'Brien tells us he did not seem to grasp the fullpotentialities of the occasion, "and he made his own speech withoutany indication that any unusual results were expected to follow. " MrTimothy Harrington, one of the leading and most levelheaded of theParnellite members, also attended, in defiance of bitter attack fromhis own side, showing a moral courage sadly lacking in our public men, either then or later. By what I cannot help thinking was a mostfortuitous circumstance for the League, at a moment when its existencewas not known outside three or four parishes, Mr Gerald Balfourdetermined to swoop down upon it and to crush it with the whole mightof the Crown forces. Two Resident Magistrates and the AssistantInspector-General of Constabulary, with a small army corps of specialpolice, were sent to Westport. Result--the inevitable conflict betweenthe police and people took place, prosecutions followed, extra policetaxes were put on and a store of popular resentment was aroused, theLeague getting an advertisement which was worth scores of organisersand monster meetings. I am myself satisfied that it was the ferocityof the Crown attack upon the League which gave it its surest passportto popular favour. Whilst the United Irish League was struggling intolife in the west I was engaged in the south in an attempt to lead thelabourers out of the bondage and misery that encompassed them--theirown sad legacy of generations of servitude and subjection--but I amnevertheless pleased to recall now that, as the editor of a notunimportant provincial newspaper in Cork, I followed the earlystruggles of the new League with sympathy and gave it cordial welcomewhen it travelled our way. 

As a mere statement of indisputable fact, it is but just to saythat the entire burden of organising the League fell upon theshoulders of Mr O'Brien. When it was yet an infant, so to speak, inswaddling-clothes, and indeed for long after, when it grew to lustierlife, he had to bear the whole brunt of the battle for its existence, without any political party to support him, without any greatnewspaper to espouse his cause and without any public funds to supplycampaign expenses. Nay, far worse, he had to face the bitter hostilityof the Redmondites and Healyites "and the scarcely less depressingneutrality" of the Dillonites, whilst under an incessant fire of shotand shell from a Coercion Government. After Mr Dillon's one appearanceat Westport he was not seen on the League platform for many a day. AtWestport he had exhorted the crowd to "be ready at the call of theircaptain by day or night, " but having delivered this incitement he leftto others the duty of facing the consequences, candidly declaring thathe had made up his mind never to go to jail again. Mr Harrington, however, remained the steadfast friend of the League, and Mr Davittalso gave it his personal benediction, all the more generous andpraiseworthy in that his views of national policy seldom agreed withthose of Mr O'Brien. Confounding all predictions of its early eclipse, and notwithstanding a thousand difficulties and discouragements, theLeague continued to make headway, and after eighteen months' Herculeanlabours Mr O'Brien and his friends were in a position to summon aProvincial Convention at Claremorris, in the autumn of 1899, to settlethe constitution of the organisation for Connaught. Two nights beforethe Convention Mr Dillon and Mr Davitt visited Mr O'Brien at MallowCottage to discuss his draft Constitution. It is instructive, havingin mind what has happened since, that Mr Dillon took exception to thevery first clause, defining the national claim to be "the largestmeasure of national self-government which circumstances may put it inour power to obtain. " This was the logical continuance of Parnell'sposition that no man had a right to set bounds to the march of anation, but Mr Dillon seemed to have descried in it some sinisterpurpose on the part of Mr O'Brien and Mr Davitt to abandon theconstitutional Home Rule demand in the interest of the physical forcemovement. Eventually a compromise was agreed on, but in regard toother points of the Constitution--particularly that which made theconstituencies autonomous and self-governing--Mr Dillon wasobstinately opposed to democratic innovation. It would appear to methat in these days was sown the seeds of those differences of opinionbetween those close friends of many years' standing which were laterto develop into a feeling of personal hostility which, on the part ofone of them (Mr Dillon) at least, was black and bitter in itsunforgivingness. The Claremorris Convention was such a success its"dimensions and character almost took my own breath away with wonder;all other feelings vanished from the minds of us all except one ofthankfulness and rapture in presence of this incredible spectacle ofthe foes of ten years' bitter wars now marching all one way 'in mutualand beseeming ranks, ' radiant with the life and hope of a nationalresurgence" (Mr O'Brien). 

The first test of the strength and power of the League was shortly tocome. Mr Davitt resigned his seat for South Mayo and proceeded toSouth Africa to give what aid he could to the Boers in their desperatestruggle for freedom. A peculiar situation arose over theParliamentary vacancy that was thus created. The enemies of the UnitedIrish League hit upon the astute political device of nominating MajorM'Bride, himself a Mayo man, who was at the moment fighting in theranks of the Irish Brigade in the Boer service. Mr O'Brien wasnaturally confronted with a cruel dilemma. To allow the seat to gouncontested was to confess a failure and to give joy to anotherbrigade--the Crowbar Brigade--who wished for nothing better than theearly overthrow of the League, which was the only serious menace totheir power in the country. To contest the seat was to have theaccusation hurled at his head that he was lacking in enthusiasm forthe Boer cause, which Nationalist Ireland to a man devotedly espoused. The question Mr O'Brien had to ask himself was what was his duty toIreland and to the oppressed peasantry of the West. It could notaffect the Boer cause by a hair's-breadth who was to be future memberfor South Mayo, but it meant everything to Irish interests whether theUnited Irish League was to make headway and to gain a grip on theimagination and sympathies of the people. And, influenced by the onlyconsideration which could be decisive in a situation of suchdifficulty, Mr O'Brien offered to the electors of South Mayo Mr JohnO'Donnell, the first secretary and organiser of the League, who wasthen lying in Castlebar Jail as the result of a Coercion prosecution. After a contest, in which all the odds seemed to lie on the side ofthe South African candidate, Mr O'Donnell was returned by anoverwhelming majority. 

The South Mayo election meant the end of one chapter of Irish historyand the opening of another in which the political imbecility andmadness which had distorted and disgraced the years since the ParnellSplit could no longer continue their vicious courses. The return of MrO'Donnell had focussed the attention of all Ireland on the programmeand policy of the League. Branches multiplied amazingly, until itwould be no exaggeration to say that they spread through the countrylike wildfire. The heather was ablaze with the joy of a resurgentpeople who had already almost forgotten the weary wars that hadsundered them and who blissfully joined hands in one more grand unitedendeavour for the old land. 

Having in several pitched battles defeated the forces of theRent-offices and the politicians and disposed of some of the vilestconspiracies which the police emissaries of the Castle could hatchagainst it, the League had to engage in more desperate encountersbefore it could claim its cause won. I have already remarked that whenthe Local Government Bill was receiving the benediction of all partiesin Parliament, except Mr Dillon, Mr Redmond promised that hisinfluence would be extended to an effort to return the landlord andascendancy class to the new Councils. The United Irish Leaguedetermined to take issue with him on this. When the elections underthe new Act were announced, Mr Redmond, honestly enough, proceeded togive effect to his promise. Mr O'Brien decided, and very rightly andproperly in my judgment, that it would be a fatal policy, and a weakone, to surrender to the enemy, whilst he was still unconquered andunrepentant, any of those new Councils which could be made citadels ofnational strength and a new fighting arm of the constitutionalmovement. It meant that having driven the landlords forth from thefortresses from which they had so long oppressed the people, theyshould be immediately readmitted to them, having made no submissionsand given no guarantees as to their future good behaviour. Mr Redmondand his followers made brave appeal from the landlord platforms totheir supporters "not to be bitten by the Unity dog. " Mr Healy'snewspaper and influence took a similar bent. Mr Dillon's majority, asusual helpless and indecisive, promulgated no particular policy. ForMr O'Brien and the United Irish League there could be no suchbalancings or doubts. It is good also to be able to say of Mr Davittthat he assisted in fighting the insidious attempt to denationalizethe County and District Councils. The League and its supporters wonall along the line. The few reverses they sustained were negligiblewhen compared with the mighty victories they obtained all overIreland, and when the elections were over the League was establishedin an impregnable position as the organisation of disinterested andgenuine nationality. 

The Parliamentarians, seeing how matters stood, and no doubt with awise thought of their own future, now proceeded to compose theirquarrels. They saw themselves forgotten of the people, but they wereresolved apparently that the people should not forget them. They tooktheir cue from a country no longer divided over sombre futilities, andunable to make up their minds for themselves they accepted thejudgment of the country once they were aware that it was irrevocablycome to. Mr Dillon after his re-election to the chair of his sectionin 1900 immediately announced his resignation of the office, andbeing, as we are assured on the authority of Mr O'Brien, alwayssincerely solicitous for peace with the Parnellites, he caused aresolution to be passed binding the majority party in case of reunionto elect as their chairman a member of the Parnellite Party, whichnumbered merely nine. 

Naturally Mr Redmond and his friends did not hesitate to close withthis piece of good fortune, which opened an honourable passage from aposition of comparative isolation to one of triumph and power. TheHealyites, whose quarrel appeared to be wholly with Mr Dillon, to whomMr Healy in sardonic mood had attached the sobriquet of "a melancholyhumbug, " made no difficulty about falling in with the new arrangement, and the three parties forthwith met and signed and sealed a pact forreunification without the country in the least expecting it or, indeed, caring about it. Probably the near approach of a GeneralElection had more to do with this hastily-made pact than any of thenobler promptings of patriotism. I believe myself the country wouldhave done much better had the United Irish League gone on with its ownblessed work of appeasement and national healing unhampered by what, as after knowledge conclusively proved to me, was nothing but ahypocritical unity for selfish salvation's sake. Mr O'Brien puts thewhole position in a nutshell when he says: "The Party was reunifiedrather than reformed. " The treaty of peace they entered into was atreaty to preserve their own vested interests in their Parliamentaryseats. 

But a generous and forgiving nation was only too delighted to have anend of the bickerings and divisions which had wrought such harm to thecause of the people, and accordingly it hailed with gratification thespectacle of a reunited Irish Party. 

It is probable, nevertheless, that had the process of educating thepeople into a knowledge of their own power gone on a little furtherthe United Irish League would have been able at the General Electionto secure a national representation which would more truly reflectnational dignity, duty and purpose. 

The first result of the Parliamentary treaty was the election of MrJohn E. Redmond to the chair. In the circumstances, the majority partyhaving pledged themselves to elect a Parnellite, no other choice waspossible. Mr Redmond possessed many of the most eminent qualificationsfor leadership. He had an unsurpassed knowledge of Parliamentaryprocedure and seemed intended by nature for a great Parliamentarycareer. He was uniformly dignified in bearing, had a distinguishedpresence, a voice of splendid quality, resonant and impressive intone, and an eloquence that always charmed his hearers. Had hepossessed will power and strength of character in any degreecorresponding to his other great gifts, there were no heights ofleadership to which he might not have reached. As it was, he lackedjust that leavening of inflexibility of purpose and principlewhich was required for positive greatness as distinct frommoderately-successful leadership. At any rate, he was the onlypossible selection, yet once again Mr Dillon exhibited a dispositionto show the cloven hoof. For some inscrutable reason he made up hismind to oppose Mr Redmond's election to the chair, but when Mr O'Brienand Mr Davitt (who had returned from the Transvaal) got word of theplot they wired urgent messages to their friends in Parliament that MrRedmond's selection was the only one that could give the leadershipanything better than a farcical character. Result--Mr Redmond waselected by a very considerable majority, and Mr Dillon had furtherreason for having his knife in his former friend and comrade, MrO'Brien. 

The three sectional organisations--the National Federation, theNational League and the People's Rights Association thereafter died anatural death. There were no ceremonial obsequies and none to singtheir requiem. 

The first National Convention of the reunited country was thensummoned by a joint committee consisting of representatives of theUnited Irish League and the Party in equal numbers, and it gave theLeague a constitution which made it possible for the constituencies tocontrol the organisation, to select their own Parliamentaryrepresentatives and generally to direct national affairs within theirborders. The conception of the Constitution was sound and democratic. But in any organisation it is not the constitution that counts, butthe men who control the movement. And the time came all too soon whenthis was sadly true of the United Irish League. 

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: To Dr Robert Ambrose belongs the credit for having firstintroduced, as a private member, in 1897, a Bill to confer upon theCongested Districts compulsory powers for land purchase. This wassubsequently adopted as an Irish Party measure. Dr Ambrose was alsothe author of a measure empowering the County Councils to acquirewaste lands for reclamation. He was one of the pioneers of theIndustrial Development Movement and wrote and lectured largely on thesubject. He was, with the late Bishop Clancy, prominent in promoting"the All-Red Route, " which would have given Ireland a great terminalport on its western coast at Blacksod Bay. He, at considerableprofessional sacrifice, entered the Party, at the request of Mr Dillonand Mr O'Brien, as Member for West Mayo. The reward he received forall his patriotic services was to find himself opposed in 1910 by theDillonite caucus because of his independent action on Irish questions. Mr Dillon had no toleration for the person of independent mind, andthus a man who had given distinguished service to public causes wasruthlessly driven out of public life. ]

 CHAPTER IX

 THE LAND QUESTION AND ITS SETTLEMENT

The General Election of 1900 witnessed a wonderful revival of nationalinterest in Ireland. Doubtless if the constituencies had been left totheir own devices they would have returned members responsive to themagnificent resolves of the people. But the Parliamentarians wereastute manipulators of the political machine: they had for the mostpart wormed themselves into the good graces of the local leaders, andarranged for their own re-election when the time came. But there wasnevertheless a considerable leavening of new members--young, enthusiastic and uncontaminated by the feuds and paltry personalitiesof an older generation. They brought, as it were, a whiff of the free, democratic air of the country to Parliament with them, and gave anexample of fine unselfishness and devotion to duty which did not failto have their influence on their elder and more cynical brethren. Thefeud between the Dillonites and Healyites had not, however, been endedwith the general treaty of peace. Mr Redmond did not want Mr Healyfought, but in the interests of internal peace Mr Dillon, Mr Davittand Mr O'Brien appear to have come to the conclusion that they couldnot have Mr Healy in the new Party. Accordingly, Mr Healy and hisfriends were fought wherever they allowed themselves to be nominated, and Mr Healy himself was the only one to survive after a desperatecontest full of exciting incidents in North Louth. 

I made my first bid for Parliamentary honours in the 1900 election, when I had my name put forward as Labour candidate at the South Corkconvention. I was not very strongly supported then, but the followingMay, on the death of Dr Tanner, I was nominated again as Labourcandidate for Mid-Cork, and after a memorable tussle at the DivisionalConvention I headed the poll by a substantial majority. Hence I writefrom now onward with what I may claim to be an intimate insideknowledge of affairs. 

The first few years after the 1900 election saw us a solidly unitedopposition in Parliament for the first time for ten years. Questiontime was a positive joy to us younger members, who developed almostdiabolical capacity for heckling Ministers on every conceivable topicunder the sun. Our hostility to the Boer War also brought us intoperennial conflict with the Government. The Irish members in a veryliteral sense once more occupied "the floor of the House, " and therewere some fierce passages-at-arms, resulting on one occasion in theforcible ejection of a large body of Nationalists by the police--anincident which had no relish for those who were jealous of theprestige and fair fame of the Mother of Parliaments. In Ireland thefight for constitutional reform went on with unabated energy. All theold engines of oppression and repression were at work, and the peopleproved that they had lost none of their wit or resource in thestruggle with the forces of the Crown. Mr George Wyndham, whom I liketo look back upon as one of the most courtly and graceful figures inthe public life of the past generation, was installed in Dublin Castleas Chief Secretary. I can imagine that nothing could have been moredistasteful to his generous spirit than to be obliged to use thehackneyed weapons of brute force in the pursuance of British policy. As an answer to the agitation for compulsory land purchase and asettlement of the western problem Mr Wyndham introduced in 1902 a LandPurchase Bill which fell deplorably short of the necessities of thesituation. It would have deprived the tenants of all free will in thematter of the price they would be obliged to sell at, and left themwholly at the mercy of two landlord nominees on the EstatesCommissioners, whilst it did not even pretend to find any remedy forthe two most crying national scandals of the western "congests" andthe homeless evicted tenants. No doubt there were many good andwell-meaning men in the Party, and out of it, who thought this Billshould have been accepted as "an instalment of justice. " But there aretimes when to be moderate is to be criminally weak, and this was oneof them. It is as certain as anything in life or politics can be thatif the Bill of 1902 had been accepted, the Irish tenants would bestill going gaily on under the old rent-paying conditions. The UnitedIrish League was still in the first blush of its pristine vigour, andwhen the delegates of the National Directory came up from the countryto Dublin they soon showed the mettle they were made of. They wantedno paltry compromises, and it was then and there decided to enter upona virile campaign against rack-renters, grazing monopolists andland-grabbers such as would convince the Government in a single winterhow grossly they had under-estimated the requirements of the country. 

Some of the older men of the Party were pessimistic about the newcampaign. Messrs Dillon, Davitt and T. P. O'Connor wrote a letter to MrO'Brien remonstrating with him, in a tone of gentle courtesy, on theextreme character of his speeches and actions. But Mr O'Brien was notto be deflected from his purpose by any friendly pipings of this kind. The country was with him. The country was roused to a pitch ofpassionate resistance to the Wyndham Bill, and the Government, seeingwhich way the wind blew, and realising that the time for half-measureswas past, withdrew their precious Purchase Bill. Then followed afierce conflict along the old lines. The Government sought to suppressthe popular agitation by the usual antiquated methods. Proclamationfollowed proclamation, until two-thirds of the Irish counties, and thecities of Dublin, Cork and Limerick, were proclaimed under theCoercion Act and the ordinary tribunals of justice abolished. Publicmeetings were suppressed. The leaders of the people were thrown intoprison: at one time no less than ten members of Parliament were injail. The country was seething with turmoil and discontent and therewas no knowing where the matter would end. The landlords, feeling thenecessity for counter-action of some kind, organised a Land Trust of£100, 000 to prosecute Messrs Redmond, Davitt, Dillon and O'Brien forconspiracy. The United Irish League replied by starting a Defence Fundand arranging that Messrs Redmond, Davitt and Dillon should go to theUnited States to make an appeal in its support. All the elements ofsocial convulsion were gathering their strength, when an unknowncountry gentleman wrote a letter to the Irish newspapers dated 2ndSeptember 1902, in the following terms:--

"For the last two hundred years the land war in this country has ragedfiercely and continuously, bearing in its train stagnation of trade, paralysis of commercial business and enterprise and producing hatredand bitterness between the various sections and classes of thecommunity. To-day the United Irish League is confronted by the IrishLand Trust, and we see both combinations eager and ready to renew theunending conflict. I do not believe there is an Irishman, whatever hispolitical feeling, creed or position, who does not yearn to see a truesettlement of the present chaotic, disastrous and ruinous struggle. Inthe best interests, therefore, of Ireland and my countrymen I beg mostearnestly to invite the Duke of Abercorn, Mr John Redmond, M. P. , LordBarrymore, Colonel Saunderson, M. P. , the Lord Mayor of Dublin, theO'Conor Don, Mr William O'Brien, M. P. , and Mr T. W. Russell, M. P. , to aConference to be held in Dublin within one month from this date. Anhonest, simple and practical suggestion will be submitted and I amconfident that a settlement will be arrived at. "

The country rubbed its eyes to see who it was that had put forwardthis audacious but not entirely original proposal. (It had beensuggested by Archbishop Walsh fifteen years before. ) Captain JohnShawe-Taylor's name suggested nothing to the Nationalist leaders. Theyhad never heard of him before. In the landlord camp he stood fornothing and had no authority--he was simply the young son of a Galwaysquire, with entire unselfishness and boundless patience, whoconceived that he had a mission to settle this tremendous problem thathad been rendered only the more keen by forty-two Acts of the ImperialParliament that had been vainly passed for its settlement. It issurely one of the strangest chances of history that where generationsof statesmen and parliaments had failed the _via media_ for afinal arrangement should have been made by an unknown officer whoprosecuted his purpose to such effect that he forced his way into thecounsels of the American Clan-na-Gael, and even, as we are told, "beyond the ante-chambers of royalty itself. " It is probable thatCaptain Shawe-Taylor's invitation would have been regarded as theusual Press squib had it not been followed two days later by a publiccommunication from Mr Wyndham in the following terms:--

"No Government can settle the Irish Land Question. It must be settledby the parties interested. The extent of useful action on the part ofany Government is limited to providing facilities, in so far as thatmay be possible, for giving effect to any settlement arrived at by theparties. It is not for the Government to express an opinion on theopportuneness of the moment chosen for holding a conference or on theselection of the persons invited to attend. Those who come togetherwill do so on their own initiative and responsibility. Any conferenceis a step in the right direction if it brings the prospect of asettlement between the parties near, and as far as it enlarges theprobable scope of operations under such a settlement. "

This official declaration gave an importance and a significance toCaptain Shawe-Taylor's letter which otherwise would never haveattached to it. The confession that "no Government can settle theIrish Land Question" was in itself a most momentous admission. It wasthe most ample justification of nationalism, which held that a foreignParliament was incompetent to legislate for Irish affairs, and now theaccredited mouthpiece of the Government in Ireland had formallysubscribed to this doctrine. This admission was in itself and in itsoutflowing an event comparable only to Gladstone's conversion to HomeRule. It amounted to a challenge to Irishmen to prove their competenceto settle the most sorely-beset difficulty that afflicted theircountry. Not only were Irishmen invited to settle this particularlyIrish question, but they were given what was practically an officialassurance that the Unionist Party would sponsor their agreement, within the limits of reason. 

Immediately Captain Shawe-Taylor's proposal became canvassed of thenewspapers and the politicians. Mr Dillon seemed to be sceptical ofit, as a transparent landlord dodge. It was, however, enthusiasticallywelcomed by the _Freeman_, whilst _The Daily Express_, theorgan of the more unbending of the territorialists, denounced itmercilessly, and no sooner did the Duke of Abercorn, Lord Barrymore, the O'Conor Don and Colonel Saunderson learn that Mr Redmond, the LordMayor of Dublin, Mr T. W. Russell and Mr O'Brien were willing to jointhe Conference than they wrote to Captain Shawe-Taylor declining hisinvitation. The Landowners Convention, the official landlordorganisation, also by an overwhelming majority decided against anypeace parley with the tenants' representatives. But the forces infavour of a conference were daily gaining force even amongst thelandlord class; whilst on the tenants' side a meeting of the IrishCatholic Hierarchy, attended by three archbishops and twenty-fourbishops, with Cardinal Logue in the chair, cordially approved the LandConference project and put on record their earnest hope "that allthose on whose co-operation the success of this most importantmovement depends may approach the consideration of it in the spirit ofconciliation in which it has been initiated. " The Irish Party, on themotion of Mr Dillon, also unanimously adopted a resolution approvingof the action taken by Messrs Redmond, O'Brien and Harrington inexpressing their willingness to meet the landlord representatives. Themass of the landlords were so far from submitting to the veto of theLandowners' Convention that, headed by men of such commanding positionand ability as the Earl of Dunraven, Lord Castletown, the Earl ofMeath, Lord Powerscourt, the Earl of Mayo, Colonel Hutcheson-Poë andMr Lindsay Talbot Crosbie, they formed a Conciliation Committee oftheir own to test the opinion of the landlords over the heads of theLandowners Convention. The plebiscite taken by this Committee morethan justified them. By a vote of 1128 to 578 the landlords of Irelanddeclared themselves in favour of a Conference, and empowered theConciliation Committee to nominate representatives on their behalf. 

Thus the first stage of the struggle for a settlement by consent wasvictoriously carried. 

The next stage was the discussion of the terms upon which thelandlords would allow themselves to be expropriated throughout thelength and breadth of the land. Here there were, unfortunately, violent divergences of opinion on the tenants' side. Mr O'Brienpostulated, as an essential ingredient of any settlement that couldhope for success, that the State should step in with a liberal bonusto bridge over the difference between what the tenants could afford togive and the landlords afford to take. When this proposal was firstmooted it was regarded as a counsel of perfection, and Mr O'Brien waslooked upon as a genial visionary or a well-meaning optimist. Butnobody thought it was a demand that the Government or Parliament wouldagree to. Happily, however, for the foresight of Mr O'Brien, it washis much-derided bonus scheme which became the very pivot of the LandConference Report. 

Meanwhile events were moving rapidly behind the scenes. It wasconveyed to Messrs Redmond, Davitt, Dillon and O'Brien that Mr Wyndhamhad offered the Under-Secretaryship for Ireland to Sir AntonyMacDonnell, who had lately retired from the position of Governor ofBengal. They were told by his brother, Dr Mark Antony MacDonnell, whowas one of the Nationalist members, that Sir Antony was hesitatingmuch as to his decision. Sir Antony conveyed that he had made it clearto Mr Wyndham that, as he was an Irish Nationalist and a believer inself-government, he could not think of going to Ireland to administera Coercion regime, and, further, that he favoured a bold and generoussettlement of the University difficulty. Mr Wyndham, it wasunderstood, had given the necessary assurances, and Sir Antony nowwished it to be conveyed to the Irish leaders that he would not acceptthe post against their will or without a certain measure, at least, ofbenevolent toleration on their part. 

All these happenings foreshadowed a joyous transformation of thepolitical scene, to the incalculable advantage of those who had madesuch a magnificent stand for Irish rights; but the Irish Party wasdetermined that until rumours had crystallised into realities theywere going to relax none of their extra-constitutional pressure uponthe Government. It was, for instance, resolved to begin the AutumnSession with a resounding protest against Coercion and to carry on theconflict in the country more determinedly than ever. 

The just and reasonable demand for a day to debate the administrationwas unaccountably avoided by the Government, whose reply was that aday would be granted if the demand came from the official LiberalOpposition. The Nationalists could not submit to this degradation oftheir independent position in Parliament, and when they attempted tosecure their end by a motion for the adjournment of the House theyfound that two Irish Unionists had "blocked" them by placing on theOrder Paper certain omnibus resolutions on the state of Ireland. Sincethe days of Parnellite obstruction such scenes were not witnessed asthose that followed. The Party defied all rules of law and order, worried the Government by all sort of lawless interruptions andirrelevant questions, flagrantly flouted the authority of the chairand, finally, after a week of Parliamentary anarchy, it was determinedthat even more extreme courses would be adopted unless theconstitutional right of Ireland to be heard in the Chamber wasconceded. Hint of this was conveyed to Mr Speaker Gully, who, regardful of the honour of the House, used his good offices with theGovernment to such effect that the blocking motions were incontinentlywithdrawn and the discussion in due course took place. 

Whilst these developments were taking place Mr O'Brien had taken everypossible precaution to guard himself against any charge of autocracyin the direction of the movement, whether in Parliament or in thecountry. At the request of his colleagues on the Land Conference hehad drafted a Memorandum containing the basis of settlement whichwould be acceptable to Nationalist opinion. This was submitted toMessrs Redmond, Davitt and Sexton, with an urgent entreaty for theirfreest criticism or any supplementary suggestions of their own. Noneof these could, therefore, complain that Mr O'Brien was attempting todo anything over their heads. And impartial judgment will declare thatif either Mr Sexton, Mr Dillon or Mr Davitt had views of their own, orhad any vital disagreements with Mr O'Brien's suggestions, now was thetime to declare them. Far from committing himself to any dissent, whenMr O'Brien, after a fortnight, wrote to Mr Sexton for the return ofhis Memorandum, Mr Sexton wrote:

"I have read the Memo. Carefully two or three times and now return itto you as you want to use it and have no other copy. It will take sometime to look into your proposals with anything like sufficient care. You will hear from me as soon as I think I can say anything that maypossibly be of use. "

Be it here noted that Mr Sexton never did communicate, even when hehad looked into Mr O'Brien's proposals "with sufficient care. " Laterhe waged implacable war on the Land Conference Report and the Land Actfrom his commanding position as Managing Director of _The Freeman'sJournal_ (the official National organ). He did so in violation ofthe promise on which the Party had entrusted him with that position, that he would never interfere in its political direction. 

Other informal meetings between Sir Antony MacDonnell and the Irishleaders followed, the purpose of Sir Antony being, before he acceptedoffice in the Irish Government, to gather the views of leadingIrishmen, especially as to the possibility of a genuine landsettlement, which he regarded as the foundation of all else. Subsequently it transpired that Mr Sexton had engaged in somenegotiations on his own account with Sir Antony MacDonnell, and it isnot improbable that part at least of his quarrel with the LandConference was that the settlement propounded by it superseded andsupplanted his own scheme. Neither Mr O'Brien nor his friends weremade aware of these private pourparlers, entered into without anyvestige of authority from the Party or its leader, and they onlylearnt of them casually afterwards. The incident is instructive of howthe path of the peacemaker is ever beset with difficulties, even fromamong his own household. 

After surmounting a whole host of obstacles the Land Conference atlong last assembled in the Mansion House, Dublin, on 20th December1902. Mr Redmond submitted the final selection of the tenants'representatives to a vote of the Irish Party and, with the exceptionof one member who declined to vote, the choice fell unanimously uponthose named in Captain Shawe-Taylor's letter. Although their findingswere subsequently subjected to much embittered attack, no one had anyright to impugn their authority, capacity, judgment or intimateknowledge of the tenants' case. 

The landlords' representatives were also fortunately chosen. The Earlof Dunraven was a man of the most statesmanlike comprehension, whosehigh patriotic purpose in all the intervening years has won for him anenduring and an honourable place in the history of his country. Hestrove to imbue his own landlord class with a new vision of their dutyand their destiny, and if only a few of the later converts to thenational claim of Ireland had supported him when he came forwardfirst, in favour of the policy of national reconciliation, manychapters of tragedy in our national life would never have beenwritten. With a close knowledge of his labours and his personality Ican write this of him--that a man more passionately devoted to hiscountry, more sincerely anxious to serve her highest interests, ormore intrepid in pursuing the courses and supporting the causes hedeems right, does not live. He has been a light in his generation andto his class, and he deserves well of all men who admire a moralcourage superior to all the shafts of shallow criticism and apatriotism which undoubtedly seeks the best, as he sees it, for thebenefit of his country. And more than this cannot be said of thegreatest patriot who ever lived. The Earl of Mayo also brought a fineidealism and high patriotism to the Conference Council Board. He had agenuine enthusiasm for the development of Irish industries and was themoving spirit in the Irish Arts and Crafts Exhibitions. ColonelHutcheson-Poë, a gallant soldier, who had lost a leg in Kitchener'sSoudan Campaign, a gentleman of sound judgment and excellent sense, was one of the moderating elements in the Conference. Finally, ColonelNugent Everard represented one of the oldest Anglo-Irish families ofthe Pale and the author of several projects tending to the bettermentof the people. The tenants' representatives presented a concise listof their own essential requirements as drafted by Mr O'Brien. It wasas follows:--

 BASIS. --ABOLITION OF DUAL OWNERSHIP

1. For landlords, net second-term income, less all outgoings. 

2. For occupiers, reduction of not less than 20 per cent. In second-term rents or first-term correspondingly reduced. Decennial reductions to be retained. 

3. Difference between landlords' terms and occupiers' terms to be made up by State bonus and reduced interest with, in addition, purchase money in cash and increased value for resale of mansion and demesne. 

4. Complete settlement of evicted tenants' question an indispensable condition. 

5. Special and drastic treatment for all congested districts in the country (as defined by the Bill of 1902). 

6. Sales to be between parties or through official commissioners as parties would prefer. 

7. Non-judicial and future tenants to be admitted. 

8. (Query. ) Sporting rights to be a matter of agreement. 

I do not propose to go into any detailed account of what transpired atthe sittings (six in number) of the Land Conference. All thisinformation is available in Mr O'Brien's _An Olive Branch inIreland_. Suffice it to say that seven out of eight of the tenants'requirements were conceded outright and the eighth was covered by acompromise which would have enabled any tenant in the country, whethernon-judicial or future tenants, to become the proprietor of his ownholding on reasonable terms. On 4th January 1903 a unanimous reportwas published. The country scarcely expected this, and its joy at thisever-memorable achievement was correspondingly greater. It wasinconceivable that the landlords should have, in solemn treaty, signedtheir own death warrant as territorialists, yet this was the amazingdeed to which they affixed their sign manual when their fourrepresentatives signed the Land Conference Report. 

Ever since the first Anglo-Norman set foot in Ireland and began todespoil the ancient clans of their land there has been trouble inconnection with the Irish Land Question. The new race of landlordsregarded their Irish land purely as a speculation, not as a home; theywere in great part absentees, having no aim in Ireland beyond drawingtheir rents. They had no duties to their tenants in the sense thatEnglish landlords have. They had no natural ties with the country andthey regarded themselves as free from all the duties or obligations ofownership. They never advanced capital for the improvement of the landor the erection of buildings, and never put a farthing into thecultivation of the soil. The tenant had to do everything out of hisown sweat and blood--build his home and out-offices, clean and drainthe land, make the fences, lay down the roads and, when he had doneall this and made the property more valuable, his rent was raised onhim, even beyond the value of the improvements he had effected. Woe tothe industrious man, for he was taxed upon his industry! And yet whois not familiar with the foolish and the ignorant tribe of scribblerswho, with no knowledge of the facts, prate about "the lazy Irish"? Andif they were lazy--which I entirely deny--who made them so? Had theyno justification for their "laziness"? Why should they wear theirlives out so that a rapacious landlord whom they never saw should livein riotousness and debauchery in the hells of London or the Continent?

"One could count on one's fingers, " said the Cowper Commission in1887, "the number of Irish estates on which the improvements have beenmade by the landlord. " The Irish landlord class never did a thing forIreland except to drain her of her life-blood--to rob and depopulateand destroy, to make exaction after exaction upon the industry of herpeasants, until their wrongs cried aloud for redress, if not forvengeance. In England it was estimated in 1897 that the landlord classhad spent in investments in landlord property a sum estimated at£700, 000, 000. These can justly claim some right in the land. InIreland the landlord was simply the owner of "the raw earth"--the bareproprietor of the soil, a dead weight upon the industry and honesttoil of the tenant, receiving a rent upon the values that the labourand the energy of generations of members of a particular family hadcreated. The Irish landlord and his horde of hangers-on--his agents, his bailiffs, his process-servers, his bog-rangers, hisrent-warners--created a system built upon corruption, maintained intyranny, and enforced with all the ruthless severities of foreign lawsenacted solely for the benefit of England's garrison. "I can imagineno fault, " said Mr Arthur Balfour, speaking as Prime Minister in theHouse of Commons, 4th May 1903, "attaching to any land system whichdoes not attach to the Irish system. " Evictions in Ireland came to beknown as "sentences of death, " so cruel and numerous were they untilthe popular agitation was strong enough to check them. 

Even the Gladstonian legislation of 1881, though it admittedly didsomething substantial towards redressing the balance between landlordand tenant by securing to the tenants what were known as "the threeF. 's "--viz. Fixity of Tenure, Fair Rent, and Free Sale--yet left thequestion in a wholly unsettled state. The fixing of fair rents, nodoubt, acted as a curb on landlord rapacity, but from the tenants'point of view it was a wholly vicious, indeterminate andunsatisfactory system. It was incentive to indifferent farming, sincethe commissioners who had the fixing of rents, and the inspectors whoexamined the farms, made their valuations upon the farms as they sawthem. True, the tenant could claim for his improvements, but inpractice this was no real safeguard. The more industrious the tenantthe higher the rent--the less industrious and the less capable thelower the figure to be paid. 

Hence, after the failure of countless Acts of Parliament, it was bornein upon all earnest land-reformers that there could be only one finaland satisfactory solution: that was the abolition of dualownership--in other words, the buying out of the landlord and theestablishment of the tenant in the single and undisputed ownership ofthe soil on fair and equitable terms. A tentative start had been madein land purchase by the Land Purchase Act of 1885--called, after itsauthor, the Ashbourne Act. This experiment had proved an immensesuccess, for in six years the ten millions sterling assigned for itsoperations were exhausted and 25, 867 tenants had been turned intoowners of their farms. 

It became clear that a scheme of purchase which would, within adefinite period, root out the last vestige of landlordism was the oneonly real and true solution for the land problem. And now, blessedday, and glory to the eyes that had lived to see it, and undyinghonour to the men whose genius and sacrifices had made it possible, the decree had gone forth that end there must be to landlordism. And, wonder of wonders, the landlords themselves had agreed to the fiatdecreeing their own extinction as a ruling caste. It was withheartfelt hope and relief, and with the sense of a great victoryachieved, that the country received the wondrous news of the successof the Land Conference. The dawn of a glorious promise had brokenthrough the long night of Ireland's suffering, but the mischief-makerswere already at work to see that the noonday sun of happiness did notshine too strongly or too steadily. 

 CHAPTER X

 LAND PURCHASE AND A DETERMINED CAMPAIGN TO KILL IT

I can only rapidly sketch the events that followed the publication ofthe Land Conference Report. Mr Sexton made it his business in _TheFreeman's Journal_ to decry its findings on the sinister groundthat they offered too much to the landlords and were not sufficientlyfavourable to the tenants, sneering at the proposal for a bonus, hinting that no Government would find money for this purpose. MrDavitt, who was an earnest disciple of Henry George's ideal of LandNationalisation, naturally enough found nothing to like in theproposals for land purchase, which would set up a race ofpeasant-proprietors who would never consent to surrender theirownership to the State and would consequently make the application ofthe principles of Land Nationalisation for ever impossible in Ireland. Besides, Michael Davitt had cause for personal hatred of landlordism, which exiled his parents after eviction, and incidentally meant theloss of an arm to himself, and a violence of language which would beexcusable in him would not be justifiable or allowable in the cases ofmen who had not suffered similarly, such as Messrs Dillon and Sexton. Yet the fault was not theirs if the Land Conference did not end inwreckage and such a glorious chance of national reconciliation andappeasement was not lost to Ireland. 

In the meantime Sir Antony MacDonnell, greatly daring and, I wouldlikewise say, greatly patriotic, accepted the offer of the IrishUnder-Secretaryship in a spirit of self-abnegation beyond praise. MrRedmond and Mr O'Brien had, at his request, met him, early inFebruary, 1903, to discuss the provisions of the contemplated PurchaseBill. It may be remarked that Messrs Dillon and Davitt were invited tomeet Sir Antony on the same occasion, but they declined. Theyapparently desired the position of greater freedom and lessresponsibility, from which they could deliver their attacks upon theirfriends. They received little support from the country in theirguerrilla warfare on the Land Conference findings. The StandingCommittee of the Catholic Hierarchy left no room for doubt as to theirviews. They declared the holding of the Land Conference "to be anevent of the best augury for the future welfare of both classes"(landlords and tenants), and they expressed the hope that itsunanimity would result in legislation which would settle the LandQuestion once for all "and give the Irish people of every class a fairopportunity to live and serve their native land. " The Irish Party andthe National Directory of the United Irish League, the two bodiesinvested with sovereign authority to declare the national policy, unanimously, at specially convened meetings, approved the findings ofthe Land Conference and accepted them as the basis of a satisfactorysettlement of the Land Question. Neither Mr Dillon nor Mr Davittattended either of these meetings. Indeed, Mr Dillon ostentatiouslytook his departure from Dublin on the morning the meetings were held, but strangely enough he attended an adjourned meeting of the Party atWestminster the following day and opposed a proposal to raise thequestion of the Land Conference Report on the Address. Mr Redmondentered a dignified protest against Mr Dillon's conduct, pointing outthat the previous day was Mr Dillon's proper opportunity forsubmitting any objections of his to his colleagues of the Party and ofthe National Directory. Mr Dillon did not find a single supporter forhis attitude, and he was obliged to disclaim, with some heat, that hehad any grievance in reference to the Conference. Next day he wentabroad for the benefit of his health. 

The debate on the Amendment to the Address had the most gratifyingresults. Mr Wyndham accepted, in principle, the Land ConferenceAgreement and announced that the Government would smooth theoperations of Land Purchase by a bonus of twelve millions sterling asa free grant to Ireland. The debate accomplished another strikingsuccess, that it elicited from all the men of light and leading in theLiberal Party--from Mr Morley, Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman, Sir E. Grey, Mr Haldane and Mr John Burns--expressions of cordial adhesion to thepolicy of pacification outlined by the Chief Secretary, thus effectingthe obliteration of all English Party distinctions for the first timewhere one of Ireland's supreme interests was concerned. It requiredonly the continuance of this spirit to give certain assurance ofIreland's early deliverance from all her woes and troubles. But anadverse fate, in the form of certain perverse politicians, ordained itotherwise. 

On 25th March 1903 Mr Wyndham introduced his Bill. It adopted fullythe fundamental principles of the Land Conference and undertook tofind Imperial funds for the complete extinction of landlordism inIreland within a period which Mr Wyndham estimated at fifteen years. Furthermore the tenants were to obtain the loans on cheaper terms thanhad ever been known before--viz. An interest of 2-3/4 per cent. And asinking fund of 1/2 per cent. , being a reduction in the tenants'annuity from £4 to £3, 5s. As compared with the best of the previousActs. In addition a State grant-in-aid to the extent of£12, 000, 000--roughly equivalent to three years' purchase--was producedto bridge the gap between what the tenants could afford to pay and thelandlords to accept. The Bill fell short of the requirements of theLand Conference in certain respects, notably in that it proposed towithhold one-eighth of the freehold from the tenants as an assertionof State right in the land, and that the clauses dealing with theEvicted Tenants and Congested questions were vague and inadequate. Other minor defects there also were, but nothing that might not beremedied in Committee by conciliatory adjustments. A NationalConvention was summoned for 16th April to consider whether the Billshould be accepted or otherwise. Previously there was muchsubterranean communication between Messrs Dillon, Davitt, Sexton andT. P. O'Connor, all with calculated intent to damage or destroy theBill. And it is also clear that certain members of the Irish Party(Messrs Dillon and T. P. O'Connor), who were pledge-bound to supportmajority rule "in or out of Parliament, " were carrying on officialnegotiations of their own with the Minister in charge of the Bill andwere using the organ of the Party to discredit principles andproposals to which the Party had given its unanimous assent. It wouldnot, in the circumstances, be unjust to stigmatise this conduct asdisloyalty, if not exactly treachery, to the recorded decisions of theParty. At any rate it was the source and origin of incredible mischiefand the most deplorable consequences to Ireland. The opponents of theBill made a concerted effort to stampede the National Convention fromarriving at any decision regarding the Bill. They wanted it topostpone judgment. But the Convention, in every sense magnificentlyrepresentative of all that was sound and sincere in the constitutionalmovement, was too much alive to all the glorious possibilities of thepolicy of national reconciliation which was taking shape and formbefore their eyes to brook any of the ill-advised counsels of thosewho had determined insidiously on the wreck of this policy. 

In all the great Convention there were only two voices raised insupport of the rejection of the Bill. And when Mr Davitt moved themotion, concerted between Mr T. P. O'Connor, Mr Sexton and himself, that the Convention should suspend judgment until it was brought inits amended Third Reading Form before an adjourned sitting of theConvention, he was so impressed by the enthusiastic unanimity of thedelegates that he offered, after some parley, to withdraw his motion, and thus this great and authoritative assembly pledged the faith ofthe Irish nation to the policy of national reconciliation and gave itsloyal adhesion to the authors of that policy. 

But this decision of the people, constitutionally and legitimatelyexpressed, was not long to remain unchallenged. Immediately after theConvention Mr Davitt waited upon Mr Redmond, at the Gresham Hotel, Dublin, and blandly told him: "I have had a wire from Dillon to-dayfrom the Piraeus, to say he is starting by the first boat for home andfrom this day forth O'Brien and yourself will have Dillon, T. P. Andmyself on your track. " Thus was set on foot what, with engagingcandour, Mr Davitt himself later described in an article hecontributed to _The Independent Review_ as "a determinedcampaign" against the national policy which had been authoritativelyendorsed and approved by every organisation in the country entitled tospeak on the subject. The country has had to pay much in misery, inthe postponement of its most cherished hopes and in the holding up ofland purchase over great areas owing to the folly, the madness and thetreachery of this "determined campaign. " Mr Dillon, at a later stage, with a certain Machiavellian cunning, raised the cry of "Unity" fromevery platform in the country against those who had never acted adisloyal part in all their lives, whilst his own political consciencenever seemed to trouble him when he was flagrantly and foully defyingthat very principle of unity which he had pledged himself to maintainand uphold "in or out of Parliament. "

The National Convention was followed by an event which might easilyhave been made a turning point in Ireland's good fortune had it beenproperly availed of. Lord Dunraven and his landlord ConciliationCommittee met the day after the Land Convention and resolved tosupport sixteen out of the seventeen Nationalist amendments. Theyfurthermore sent a message to Mr Redmond offering to co-operateactively with the members of the Irish Party throughout the Committeestage of the Wyndham Bill. Every consideration of national policy andprudence would seem to urge the acceptance of this generous offer. Itwould, if accepted, be the outward and visible sign of that new spiritof grace that had entered into Irish relations with the foregatheringof the Land Conference. But fear of what Mr Dillon and the_Freeman_ might do if this open association with a landlord--evenif a friendly landlord--interest took place apparently operated on MrRedmond's judgment. Although urged by Mr O'Brien, who made the utmostallowance for the leader's difficulties, to accept the offer of LordDunraven and his friends for continued co-operation, Mr Redmondtemporised, and the opportunity passed into the limbo of goldenpossibilities gone wrong. 

When Mr Dillon, in pursuance of his wire to Mr Davitt, returned fromhis holiday, he proceeded to make good the threat to be "on the trackof Redmond and O'Brien. " He made himself as troublesome as he couldduring the Committee stage of the Bill and did his utmost to force itsrejection. He sought to commit the Party to a policy which must havemeant the defeat or withdrawal of the measure. He made viciouspersonal attacks upon Lord Dunraven. He did everything in his power todelay and frustrate the passage of the Bill in Committee. And the mostgenerous construction that can be placed upon his actions is that hedid all this in support of the theory, which he is known to haveconsistently held, that Home Rule should precede the settlement of theLand Question, or any other Irish question. Notwithstanding MrDillon's criticisms, not then well understood either in the Party orthe country, the Bill at length emerged triumphantly from its ordeal, with the good will of all parties in Parliament. It should havecreated--and it would, if it had only been given a fair chance--a newheaven and a new earth in Ireland. As far as could be prognosticatedall the omens were favourable. Even the atmosphere of administration, so important a matter where any Irish Act is concerned, was of themost auspicious kind. The Lord-Lieutenant was Lord Dudley, who wasimmensely popular in Ireland, and who had made public proclamation ofhis desire that "Ireland should be governed in accordance with Irishideas. " Two out of the three Estates Commissioners, in whose hands theactual administration of the Act lay, were men of whose absoluteimpartiality the Nationalist opinion of the country was assured. SirAntony MacDonnell was the power in Dublin Castle, and not much likelyto be intimidated by the permanent gang there. All that was requiredwas that the Irish Party and the United Irish League should agree upona broad-based policy for combining the various classes affected toextract the best possible advantage from the provisions of the Act. Ameeting of the National Directory was summoned to formulate such apolicy, but shortly before it was held Mr Dillon went down to Swinfordand, from the board-room of the workhouse there, definitely raised thestandard of revolt against the new Land Act. Nothing could be saidagainst his action if he had come out from the Party and fulminatedagainst its authority, but to remain a member of the Party and then toindict its conduct of the nation's business was, to put it mildly, indefensible. He denounced the new spirit of conciliation that hadbeen so fast gaining ground, attacked the landlords, who had provedthemselves friendly to a settlement, in rather ferocious language, andspoke in violent terms of those who would "in a moment of weaknessmortgage the future of Ireland to an intolerable extent. " Clearly MrDillon intended carrying out his threat of "taking the field" againstMr Redmond and Mr O'Brien and of damning the consequences. But thecountry was not yet "rattled" into disaffection by Mr Dillon'smelancholy vaticinations and rather vulgar appeals to the baserpassions of greed and covetousness which are perhaps more firmlyrooted in the peasant than in any other class. 

The National Directory, unintimidated by Mr Dillon's pronouncement, metand calmly proceeded to formulate plans for the better working of thePurchase Act. A clear and definite plan of campaign was outlined for thetesting of the Act. Mr O'Brien was also in favour of handling thedisaffection of Mr Dillon and the _Freeman_ in straightforward mannerand of pointing out to them their duty of loyally supporting thedecisions of the Party and of the League. Mr Redmond shrank fromdecisive action. It was part of the weakness of his estimable characterthat he always favoured "the easier way. " He thought that when theDirectory spoke out the recalcitrant elements would subside. Little didhe understand the malignant temper of the powerful group who, with theaid of the supposedly national organ, were determined to kill theoperations of the Purchase Act and to destroy the policy of Conciliationwhich had promised such splendid fruit in other directions. Mr Dillonwent to Swinford again and he and his associates did everything in theirpower to stir up a national panic and to spread the impression that thePurchase Act was a public calamity, "a landlord swindle, " and that itwould lead straight to national bankruptcy. 

Even yet those who sought the wreck and ruin of land purchase might bemet with and fought outright if the announcement had not appeared inthe _Freeman_ that Mr Redmond had sold his Wexford estate at"24-1/2 years' purchase, " or over two years' purchase higher in thecase of second-term rents and four and a half years' purchase in thecase of first-term rents than the prices which the National Directoryhad a few weeks previously resolved to fight for, with all the forceof the tenants' organisation as a fair standard. True enough MrRedmond was able to plead later that these were not the terms finallyagreed upon between his tenants and himself, and beyond all questionhe made no profit out of the transaction. Where the mischief lay wasin the original publication, which gave a headline to the landlordsall over the country and, what was far more regrettable from thepurely national standpoint, irretrievably tied the hands of Mr Redmondso far as making any heroic stand against Mr Dillon and hisfellow-conspirators was concerned. Thus the country drifted along, bereft of firm leadership or strong guidance. Mr O'Brien had to holdhis hand whilst "the determined campaigners" were more boldly anddefiantly inveighing against the declared and adopted national policyand trampling upon every principle of Party discipline and loyalty. The situation might have been saved if Mr Redmond had taken hiscourage in both his hands, summoned the Party together and receivedfrom it an authoritative declaration defining anew the National policyand the danger that attended it from those who had set out recklesslyto destroy it; or if he sought an opportunity for publicly recallingthe country to its duty and its allegiance to himself and to the Partywhose chosen leader he was. Mr Redmond was fully alive to the danger, but he hesitated about taking that bold action which could alone bringthe recalcitrants to heel. He was afraid of doing anything which mightprovoke a fresh "split. " Later he delivered himself of theunstatesmanlike and unworthy apophthegm: "Better be united in supportof a short-sighted and foolish policy than divided in support of afar-sighted and wise one. " This was the fatuous attitude which led himdown the steep declivity that ended so tragically for him and hisreputation. In those fateful days, when so much was in the balance forthe future of Ireland, Mr O'Brien pressed his views earnestly upon MrRedmond that unless he exercised his authority, and that of the Partyand the Directory, it would be impossible for them to persevere intheir existing programme, and that the only alternative left for himwould be to retire and leave those who had opposed the policy ofConciliation a free stage for any more heroic projects they mightcontemplate. Mr Redmond still remained indecisive and MrO'Brien--whether wisely or unwisely will always remain a debatablepoint with his friends--quietly quitted the stage, resigning his seatin Parliament, withdrawing from the Directory of the United IrishLeague, and ceasing publication of his weekly newspaper on the ground, as he says himself, that "the authorised national policy having beenmade unworkable, nothing remained, in order to save the country fromdissension, except to leave its wreckers an absolutely free field forany alternative policy of their own. "

It is no exaggeration to say that the country was thrown into a stateof stupefaction by Mr O'Brien's retirement. It did not know the reasonof it. Very few members of the Party did. I was then a member ofit--perhaps a little on the outer fringe, but still an ordinarilyintelligent member--and I was not aware of the underground factors andforces which had caused this thunderbolt out of the blue, as it were. Needless to say, the country was in a state of more abysmal ignorancestill, and it is questionable whether outside of Munster, owing to ascandalous Press boycott of Mr O'Brien's speeches for many yearsafterwards, the masses of the people ever had an understanding of themotives which impelled him "to stand down and out" when he wasundoubtedly supreme in the Party and in the United Irish League andwhen he might easily have overborne "the determined campaigners" if hehad only knit the issue with them in a fair and square fight. This, however, was the thing of all others he wished to avoid. Perhaps if hecould have foreseen how barren in any alternative policy his sapientcritics were to be he might have acted otherwise, but the credit isdue to him of making dissension impossible by leaving no second partyto the quarrel. 

Speaking at Limerick a few days after his retirement, Mr Redmondavowed that Mr O'Brien's principles were his own, and added thesememorable words: "But for Mr William O'Brien there would have been noLand Conference and no Land Act. " Every effort was made to induce MrO'Brien to withdraw his resignation. A delegation of the leadingcitizens of Cork travelled all the way to Mayo to entreat him toreconsider his decision. To them he said: "There is not the smallestdanger of any split either in the Party, or in the League, or in thecountry. There will be a perfectly free field for the development ofany alternative policy; and I will not use my retirement in any waywhatever to criticise or obstruct; neither, I am certain, will anybodyin the country who has any regard for my wishes. "

But having got all they wanted, "the determined campaigners"mysteriously abandoned their determined campaign. Mr Dillon's healthagain required that he should bask 'neath the sunny southern skies ofItaly, whilst Mr Davitt betook himself to the United States, withouteither of them making a single speech or publishing a singlesuggestion to the tenants how they were to guard themselves againstthe "inflated prices" and the national insolvency they had beenthreatening them with. Having destroyed the plans of the NationalDirectory for testing the Purchase Act they had no guidance of theirown to offer. The tenants were left leaderless, to make their ownbargains as best they could, with the inevitable result that thelandlords, thanks to "the determined campaigners, " were able to forceup prices two years above the standard which the Directory of theLeague had decided to stand out and fight for. 

It used to be said of Daniel O'Connell that whenever _The Times_praised him he subjected himself to an examination of conscience tofind out wherein he had offended as against Ireland. Likewise onewould have supposed that when Mr Dillon found himself patted on theback by the extreme Orange gang he might have asked himself: "Whereinam I wrong to have earned the plaudits of these people?" For if MrDillon was rabid in his opposition to the policy of Conciliation theUlster Orangemen were ferocious in their denunciation of it, Mr Moore, K. C. , referred to it as "the cowardly, rotten, and sickening policy ofConciliation. " Small wonder that the Orange extremists should havedreaded this policy, since it had already been the means of creatingin the North an Independent Orange Order, who unhesitatingly declaredas the first article of their creed that they were "Irishmen first ofall, " and who had an honest and enthusiastic spokesman in the House ofCommons in the person of Mr Thomas Sloane, and an able and, indeed, abrilliant leader in Ireland in Mr Lindsay Crawford. But so itwas--every advance towards national reconciliation and mutualunderstanding was opposed by those two divergent forces as if they hada common interest in defeating it. 

Mr O'Brien having retired from Cork, the vacancy should, in theordinary course, have been filled in the course of a few weeks. Butthe Nationalists of "the City by the Lee" made it clear that theywanted no other representative than Mr O'Brien, and they forbade theissue of a writ for a new election. And so there was the extraordinaryspectacle of a people who voluntarily disfranchised themselves ratherthan give up the last hope of a policy of National Conciliation inwhich they descried a Home Rule settlement by Consent as surely as theabolition of landlordism already decreed. As an example of loyalty andpersonal devotion, as well as of patriotic foresight, it would bedifficult to parallel it. Towards the close of the session of 1904 MrJasper Tully, a more or less free lance member of the Party, took itupon himself to play them the trick of moving the writ for a newelection. And the Nationalists of Cork knew their own business so wellthat, without a line of communication with Mr O'Brien, they had himnominated and re-elected without anybody dreaming that anything elsewas humanly possible. There were no conditions attaching to MrO'Brien's re-election. He was free to rejoin the Irish Party if itshould resume its position of twelve months ago or to remain out of itif a policy of mere destruction were persisted in. He was re-electedbecause the people of Cork had the most absolute confidence in hisintegrity, good faith and political judgment, and because they wereconvinced that his return to public life represented the only hope ofthe resumption of the great policy in which their confidence never fora moment wavered. 

Within a week of Mr O'Brien's re-election an event took place which onceagain made it possible for him to take up the threads of his policywhere he had surrendered them. The landlords' Conference Committee, tothe number of three hundred of the leading Irish nobles and countrygentlemen, met in Dublin and resolved themselves into a new Association, under Lord Dunraven's leadership, which was named the Irish ReformAssociation. It immediately issued a manifesto proclaiming "a policy ofconciliation, of good will and of reform, " by means of "a union of allmoderate and progressive opinion irrespective of creed or classanimosities, " with the object of "the devolution to Ireland of a largemeasure of self-government" without disturbing the Parliamentary Unionbetween Great Britain and Ireland. 

Within three days of the publication of the manifesto Mr Redmond, whowas on a mission to the States pleading for Irish-American support, cabled: "The announcement [of the Irish Reform Association] is of theutmost importance. It is simply a declaration for Home Rule and is quitea wonderful thing. With these men with us Home Rule may come at anymoment. " It is known that the idea of the Irish Reform Association hadbeen talked over between Mr Wyndham, Lord Dunraven and Sir AntonyMacDonnell, but it is probable that it would never have emerged into theconcrete if the Cork election had not opened up the prospect of a fairand sympathetic national hearing for a project of self-government, nowadvocated for the first time by a body of Unionist Irishmen. MrRedmond's fervid message from America also was as plain a welcome to thenew movement for genuine national unity as words could express. But "thefly was in the ointment nevertheless. "

 CHAPTER XI

 THE MOVEMENT FOR DEVOLUTION AND ITS DEFEAT

The vital declaration of the objects of the Irish Reform Associationwas contained in the following passage:--

"While firmly maintaining that the Parliamentary Union between GreatBritain and Ireland is essential to the political stability of theEmpire and to the prosperity of the two islands, we believe that sucha Union is compatible with the devolution to Ireland of a largermeasure of self-government than she now possesses. We consider thatthis devolution, while avoiding matters of Imperial concern andsubjects of common interest to the kingdom as a whole, would bebeneficial to Ireland and would relieve the Imperial Parliament of amass of business with which it cannot now deal satisfactorily. Inparticular we consider the present system of financial administrationto be wasteful and inappropriate to the needs of the country. "

And then the manifesto proceeded to enumerate various questions ofnational reform "for whose solution we earnestly invite theco-operation of all Irishmen who have the highest interests of theircountry at heart. "

The enemies of Home Rule had no misconceptions either as to the purpose, scope or object of the Reform Association. They saw at once howabsolutely it menaced their position--how completely it embodied insubstance the main principle of the constitutional movement since thedays of Parnell--namely, the control of purely Irish affairs by an Irishassembly subject to the supremacy of the Imperial Parliament. Fromdebates which followed in the House of Lords (17th February 1905) itbecame clear that the new movement had no sinister origin--that it washonestly conceived and honestly intended for Ireland's nationaladvantage. But the Irish, whether of North or South, are a people towhom suspiciousness in politics is a sort of second nature. It is theinheritance of centuries of betrayals, treacheries andduplicities--broken treaties, crude diplomacies and shattered faiths. And thus we had a Unionist Attorney-General (now Lord Atkinson) asking"whether the Devolution scheme is not the price secretly arranged to bepaid for Nationalist acquiescence in the settlement of the Land Questionon gracious terms"; and _The Times_ declaring (1st September 1904):"What the Dunraven Devolution policy amounts to is nothing more nor lessthan the revival in a slightly weakened and thinly disguised form of MrGladstone's fatal enterprise of 1886"; whilst on the other hand thoseIrish Nationalists who followed Mr Dillon's lead attacked the newmovement with a ferocity that was as stupid as it was criminal. For atleast it did not require any unusual degree of political intelligence topostulate that if _The Times_, Sir Edward Carson, _The Northern Whig_and other Unionist and Orange bravoes and journals were denouncing theDevolution proposals as "worse than Home Rule, " Irish Nationalistsshould have long hesitated before they joined them in their campaign ofdestruction and became the abject tools of their insensate hate. SirEdward Carson wrote that, much as he detested the former proposals ofHome Rule, he preferred them to "the insidious scheme put forward by theso-called Reform Association. " So incorrigibly foolish were the attacksof Mr Dillon and his friends on the Reform Association that LordRathmore was able to say in the House of Lords: "Not only did theUnionist Party in Ireland denounce the Dunraven scheme as worse than theHome Rule of Mr Gladstone, but their language was mild in comparison tothe language of contempt which a great many of the Irish Nationalistpatriots showered upon the proposals of the noble earl. "

It is the mournful tragedy of all this period that a certain sectionof Nationalist opinion should have seen in every advance towards apolicy of conciliation, good will and understanding between brotherIrishmen, some deep and sinister conspiracy against the NationalCause, and in this unaccountable belief should have allowed themselvesto become the dupes and to play the game of the bitterest enemies ofIrish freedom. But so it was, to the bitter sorrow of Ireland; andmany a blood-stained chapter has been written because of it. Whether afatal blindness or an insatiate personal rancour dictated thisincomprehensible policy Providence alone knows, but oceans of woe, andmisery and malediction have flowed from it as surely as that the sunis in the heavens. 

After Mr O'Brien's retirement, as I have already remarked, the countrywas left without a policy or active national guidance. The leaders ofthe revolt against the authorised policy of the nation went abroad"for the benefit of their health. " (What a lot of humbug thisparticular phrase covers in political affairs only the initiated areaware of!) No sooner was the Cork election announced than Mr Dillonreturned from his holiday, ready "to take the field" against the IrishReform Association and anyone who dared to show it toleration orregard. He declared in a speech at Sligo that its one object was "tobreak national unity in Ireland and to block the advance of theNationalist Cause, " and he went on to deliver this definite threat:"Now I say that any attempt such as was made the other day in the cityof Cork to force on the branches of the national organisation, or onthe National Directory itself, any vote of confidence in Lord Dunravenor any declaration of satisfaction at the foundation of thisAssociation would tear the ranks of the Nationalists of Ireland topieces. "

Note Mr Dillon's extreme zeal for national unity--the man who, lessthan twelve months before, had set himself at the head of "adetermined campaign to defy the decisions of the Irish Party, theNational Directory and the United Irish League, " and who did not inthe least scruple whether or not he "would tear the ranks of theNationalists of Ireland to pieces" in the gratification of hispurpose! The "attempt made in the city of Cork" which called forth MrDillon's thunders was a resolution of the Cork branch of the UnitedIrish League which hailed with sympathy the establishment of the IrishReform Association as proof of the continuance of the spirit ofconciliation "among those classes of our countrymen who have hithertoheld aloof from us"--a spirit which had already led to such happyresults in the abolition of landlordism "by common consent, " and whichwas capable of "still wider and more blessed results in the directionof a National Parliament of our own. " The resolution also expressedgratification "at the statesmanlike spirit in which Mr Redmond hasgreeted the establishment of the new Association. " It will be observedthat there was here a clear line of demarcation. Mr O'Brien and hisfriends wanted, in moderate and guarded language, without in any waybinding themselves "to the particular views set forth in the programmeof the Irish Reform Association, " to give a message of encouragementto a body of Irish Unionists, who, as Sir Edward Carson, _TheTimes_ and every other enemy of Home Rule declared, had becomeconverts to the National demand for self-government and who lookedlikely to bring the bulk of the Protestant minority in Ireland withthem. Mr Dillon and those who thought with him savagely repelled thismovement towards a national unity which would embrace all classes andcreeds to the forgetfulness of past wrongs, animosities and deepdivisions. It seemed to have got into their minds that the appearanceof the Irish Reform Association covered some occult plot between LordDunraven, Mr Wyndham, Sir Antony MacDonnell and Mr O'Brien. Mr Davittdeclared that "No party or leader can consent to accept the Dunravensubstitute without betraying a national trust. " Others of lesser notedenounced the new movement and its authors with every circumstance ofinsult and used language of a coarseness that deserves the severestcondemnation. 

Mr Joseph Devlin, who had succeeded Mr John O'Donnell as Secretary ofthe United Irish League, now began to be a rather considerable figurein Irish politics on the Dillonite side. He told his constituents inNorth Kilkenny that they were not going to seek "the co-operation of afew aristocratic nobodies, " and he, quite unjustly, as I conceive, attributed to Lord Dunraven and his friends a desire to weaken thenational demand. 

During this time the Government had given no sign that the Devolutionmovement might not find favour in their sight. Had its main objectsmet with a more cordial reception from the arbiters of the nationalpolicy it is more than probable that the Unionist Government wouldhave stood sponsor for a large and generous instalment ofself-government which would have received the joyous assent of theLiberal Party and passed through both Houses of Parliament with theacclamations of everybody. In his first speech at Cork after hiselection Mr O'Brien sought to rouse the country to a real perceptionof the momentous issues that were at stake. He pointed out that theproposals of the Reform Association were only "mere preliminarymaterials for discussion and negotiation and that they are ratheraddressed towards the removal of the prejudices of Unionists than putforward as a final and unalterable answer to our national demand. " Andthen he went on to say: "Lord Dunraven and his friends may be all thatis diabolical, but at least they are not such born idiots as to expectus to surrender our own organisation, or, as it has been absurdly put, to coalesce with the new Association on such a programme. " As a matterof fact, Lord Dunraven had, in the most outspoken manner, stated thathe expected nothing from the Nationalists except friendly tolerationand fair play, whilst he and those associated with him were engaged inthe hard task of conquering the mass of racial prejudice and sectarianbigotry that had been for so long arrayed against the National claim. 

The efforts to induce in the intransigeant section of the Party aspirit of sweet reasonableness were, however, foredoomed to failure. Mr Dillon declined to address a meeting at Limerick, speciallysummoned to establish a concordat between the Irish leaders. MrRedmond and Mr O'Brien accepted the invitation, and the former made itclear that he still regarded the Land Conference policy as the policyof the nation. He said: "It has been stated in some newspapers of ourenemies that the Land Conference agreement, which was endorsed by theIrish Party, endorsed by the Directory of the League and endorsed bythe National Convention and accepted by the people, has been in someway repudiated recently by us. I deny that altogether.... I speakto-day only for the people and, so far as the people are concerned, Isay that the agreement, from the day it was entered upon down to thismoment, has never been repudiated by anybody entitled to speak intheir name. "

Had the spirit of the Limerick meeting and the unity which itsymbolised been allowed to prevail, all might yet have been well andthe national platform might have been broadened out so that all men ofgood will who wished to labour for an independent and self-governedIreland could stand upon it. But such a consummation was not to be. There was no arguing away the hostility of Mr Dillon, _The Freeman'sJournal_ and those others upon whom they imposed their will. MrDillon could give no better proof of statesmanship or generoussentiment than to refer to "Dunraven and his crowd" and to declarethat "Conciliation, so far as the landlords are concerned, was anothername for swindling. "

From the moment Mr Wyndham had placed his Purchase Act on the StatuteBook, with the assent of all parties in England and Ireland, his hopeswere undoubtedly set on the larger and nobler ambition of linking hisname with the grant of a generous measure of self-government. Theblood of a great Irish patriot, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, coursedthrough his veins, and it is not impossible that it influenced hisIrish outlook and stimulated his purpose to write his name largely onIrish affairs. And at this time nothing was beyond his capacity orpower. He was easily the most notable figure in the Cabinet, by reasonof the towering success that had attended his effort to remove fromthe arena of perennial contention a problem that had daunted anddefeated so many previous attempts at solution. In all quarters themost glorious future was prophesied for him. His star shone mostbrightly in the political firmament--and there were many in highplaces who were quite willing to hitch their wagon to it. He wasimmensely popular in the House and he had captured the publicimagination by his many gifts and graces of intellect and character. He had an exquisite personality, a wonderful charm of manner, a mosthandsome and distinguished presence and was a perfect courtier in anage which knew his kind not at all. His like was not in Parliament, nor, indeed, can I conceive his like to be elsewhere in these rougherdays, when the ancient courtesies seem to have vanished from ourpublic life. There can be no doubt about it that in his firsttentative approaches towards Home Rule Mr Wyndham receivedencouragement from leading members of the Cabinet, including LordLansdowne and Mr Balfour. Sir Antony MacDonnell had been the welcomeguest of Lord Lansdowne at his summer seat in Ireland, and the lattermade no secret of the fact that their conversation turned upon thelarger question of Irish self-government. When Lord Dunraven wasattacked in the House of Lords for his Devolution plans Lord Lansdowne"declined to follow Lord Rathmore in the trenchant vituperation LordDunraven's scheme had encountered, " and he admitted that Sir AntonyMacDonnell had been in the habit of conferring with Lord Dunraven onmany occasions, with the full knowledge and approval of the ChiefSecretary, and had collaborated with him "in working out proposals foran improved scheme of local government for Ireland. "

The Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, the Earl of Dudley, made open avowalof his sympathies and stated repeatedly that it was his earnest wishto see Ireland governed in accordance with Irish ideas. 

It was in this friendly atmosphere that the Irish Reform Associationpropounded its scheme of Devolution which Mr T. P. O'Connor (before hecame under the influence of Mr Dillon) happily described as "the Latinfor Home Rule, " and which Mr Redmond welcomed in the glowing termsalready quoted. The Convention of the United Irish League of America, representing the best Irish elements in the United States, alsoproclaimed the landlord concession as embodied in the Irish ReformAssociation to be "a victory unparalleled in the whole history ofmoral warfare. " Here was an opportunity such as Wolfe Tone, RobertEmmet, Thomas Davis and the other honoured patriots of Ireland's lovesighed for in vain, when, with the display of a generous and forgivingspirit on all sides, the best men of every creed and class could havebeen gathered together in support of an invincible demand for therestoration of Irish liberty. I do not know how any intelligent andimpartial student of the events of that historical cycle can fail tovisit the blame for the miscarriage of a great occasion, and thedefeat of the definite movement towards the widest national union uponMr Dillon and those who joined him in his "determined" and tragicallyfoolish campaign. As a humble participator in the activities of theperiod, I dare say it is not quite possible for me to divest myself ofa certain bias, but I cannot help saying that I am confirmed in theopinion that in addition to being the most melancholy figure in hisgeneration Mr John Dillon was also the most malignant in that at everystage of his career, when decisive action had to be taken his judgmentinvariably led him to take the course which brought most misfortuneupon his country and upon the hopes of its people. 

Attacked on front and flank, assailed by Sir Edward Carson and hisgang and denounced by Mr Dillon and his faithful henchmen, deserted byMr Balfour at the moment when his support was vital, Mr Wyndham weaklyallowed himself to be badgered into disowning Home Rule, thus sealinghis doom as a statesman and as potential leader of his own party. Thesecret history of this time when it is made public will disclose apitiful story of base intrigue and baser desertion and of a great andchivalrous spirit stretched on the rack of Ireland's ill-starreddestiny. I do not think it is any exaggeration of the facts to saythat Wyndham was done to death, physically as well as politically, inthose evil days. Driven from office, with the ruin of all his highhopes in shattered disorder around him, his proud soul was never ableto recover itself, and he drifted out of politics and into the greatervoid without--so fine a gentleman in such utter disarray that theangels must have wept his fall. 

That Mr William O'Brien did not meet a similar fate was due only tothe fact that he was made of sterner fighting stuff--that he possesseda more intrepid spirit and a more indomitable will. But the baseweapons of calumny and of viler innuendo were employed to injure himin the eyes of his fellow-countrymen, to whom he had devoted, in amanner never surely equalled or surpassed before, a life of serviceand sacrifice. _The Freeman's Journal_, whilst suppressing MrO'Brien's speeches and arguments, threw its columns open to ruffianlyattacks which no paper knowing his record should have published. Inone of these he was charged with "unnatural services to insatiablelandlordism. " He was charged by Mr Dillon and the _Freeman_ withbeing actively engaged with Mr Wyndham, Sir Antony MacDonnell and LordDunraven in a plot to break up the Irish Party, and to construct a newModerate Centre Party by selling eighteen Nationalist seats inParliament to Lord Dunraven and his friends, and he was furthercharged with being concerned in a conspiracy having for its object thedenationalisation of the _Freeman_. There were six libels in all, of so gross a character that Mr O'Brien, since reports of his speecheswere systematically suppressed in every newspaper outside of Munster, was obliged to take his libellers into court and, before a jury oftheir fellow-countrymen at Limerick, to convict them of uttering sixfalse, malicious and defamatory libels, and thus bring to the publicknowledge the guilt of his accusers. Asked what his "unnaturalservices to insatiable landlordism" were, Mr O'Brien made thismemorable reply: "To abolish it! All the Irish tenants had gained bythe land agitation of the previous twenty years was a reduction oftwenty per cent. My unnatural services under the Land ConferenceAgreement was to give them a reduction of _forty per cent. _ moreright away and the ownership of the soil of Ireland thrown in. "

Lord Dunraven on his own part took Mr Dillon publicly to task for hismisrepresentations of him. He said that Mr Dillon "mentioned him asbeing more or less connected with a great variety of conspiracies andplots and with general clandestine arrangements.... He and GeorgeWyndham were said to have been constantly plotting for the purpose ofdriving a wedge into the midst of the Nationalist Party. Well, as faras he was concerned, all these deals and all these conspiraciesexisted only in Mr Dillon's fervid imagination. " And Lord Dunravenwent on to express his sorrow that a man in Mr Dillon's positionshould have taken up so unworthy a line. 

Mr Dillon, when he had the opportunity of appearing before theLimerick jury, to justify himself, if he could, never did so. And henever expressed regret for having defamed his former friend andcolleague and for having vilified honourable men, honourably seekingIreland's welfare. Upon which I must content myself with saying thathistory will pass its own verdict on Mr Dillon's conduct. 

 CHAPTER XII

 THE LATER IRISH PARTY--ITS CHARACTER AND COMPOSITION

To enable our readers to have a clearer understanding of all that hasgone before and all that is to follow, I think it well at this stageto give a just impression of the Party, of its personnel, its methodof working and its general character and composition. 

The Irish Party, as we know it, was originally the creation ofParnell, and was, perhaps, his most signal achievement. It became, under the genius of his leadership, a mighty constitutionalforce--disciplined, united, efficient and vigilant. It had the meritof knowing its own mind. It kept aloof from British Partyentanglements. It was pledged to sit, act and vote together, and itsmembers loyally observed the pledge both in the spirit and the letter, and did not claim the right to place their own individualinterpretation upon it. Furthermore, it was a cardinal article ofhonour that members of the Party were to seek no favours from BritishMinisters, because it needs no argument to demonstrate that the Memberof Parliament who pleads for favours for himself or preferment for hisfriends can possess no individual independence. He is shackled inslavery to the Minister to whom his importunities are addressed. He issimply a patriot on the make, despised by himself and despised bythose to whom he addresses his subservient appeals. There was no placefor such a one in Parnell's Irish Party, which embodied as nearly aspossible that perfect political cohesion which is the dream of allgreat leaders. There were men of varying capacity and, no doubt, ofdiffering thought in Parnell's Party, but where Ireland's nationalinterests were concerned it was a united body, an undivided phalanxwhich faced the foe. And by the very boldness and directness ofParnell's policy, he won to his side in the country, not only all themoral and constitutional forces making for Nationalism, but therevolutionary forces--who yearned for an Irish Republic--as well. Hewas, therefore, not only the leader of a Party; he was much more--hewas the leader of a United Irish nation. His aim was eminently saneand practical--to obtain the largest possible measure of nationalautonomy, and he did not care very much what it was called. But hemade it clear that whatever he might accept in his time and generationwas not to be the last word on the Irish Question. He fought with theweapons that came to his hand--and he used them with incomparableskill and judgment--with popular agitation in Ireland, with "directaction" of a most forcible and audacious kind in Parliament. A greatleader has always the capacity for attracting capable lieutenants tohis side. We need only refer to the example of Napoleon asoverwhelming proof of this. And so out of what would ordinarily seemhumble and unpromising material Parnell brought to his banner a bandof young colleagues who have since imperishably fixed their place inIrish history. I am not writing the life-story of the members ofParnell's Party, but if I were it would be easy to show that most ofthe colleagues who have come to any measure of greatness since weremen of no antecedent notoriety (I use the word in its betterapplication), with possibly one exception, and it is somewhatremarkable that the son of John Blake Dillon, who owed perhaps not alittle to the fact that he was his father's son, should have been theone who first showed signs of recalcitrancy against Party rule anddiscipline when he inveighed against the Land Act of 1881 and betookhimself abroad for three years during the time when the nationalmovement was locked in bitterest conflict with the Spencer Coercionistregime. Let it be at once conceded that Parnell's lieutenants were menwhose gifts and talents would have in any circumstances carried themto eminent heights, but it might be said also they lost nothing fromtheir early association with so great a personality and from the factthat he brought them into the gladiatorial arena, where their mentalmuscles were, so to speak, trained and tested and extended in combatwith some of the finest minds of the age. 

In the days when the later Irish Party had entered upon itsdecrepitude some of its leaders sought to maintain a sorry unity byshouting incessantly from the house-tops, as if it were some sacredformula which none but the unholy or those predestined to politicaldamnation dare dispute: "Majority Rule. " And a country which they hadreduced to the somnambulistic state by the constant reiteration ofthis phrase unfortunately submitted to their quackery, and have hadgrave reason to regret it ever since. Parnell had very little respectfor shams--whether they were sham phrases or sham politicians. He wasa member of Butt's Home Rule Party but he was not to be intimidatedfrom pursuing the course he had mapped out for himself by any foolishtaunts about his "Policy of Exasperation"; he was a flagrant sinneragainst the principle of "majority rule, " but time has proved him tobe a sinner who was very much in the right. Mr Dillon used to hurlanother name of anathema at our heads--the heads of those of us whowere associated with Mr O'Brien in his policy of nationalreconciliation--he used to dub us "Factionists. " It was not fairfighting, nor honest warfare, nor decent politics. It was the baseweapon of a man who had no arguments of reason by which he couldoverwhelm an opponent, but who snatched a bludgeon from an armoury ofcertain evil associations which he knew would prevail where morelegitimate methods could not. 

I entered the Party in May 1901, having defeated their officialcandidate at a United Irish League Convention for the selection of aParliamentary candidate for Mid-Cork on the death of Dr Tanner. Inthose days I was not much of a politician. My heart was with theneglected labourer and I stood, accordingly, as a Labour candidate, myprogramme being the social elevation of the masses, particularly inthe vital matters of housing, employment and wages. I was not even amember of the United Irish League, being wholly concerned in buildingup the Irish Land and Labour Association, which was mainly anorganisation for the benefit, protection and the education in socialand citizen duty of the rural workers. Mr Joseph Devlin was sent downto the Convention to represent the Party and the League. It was soughtto exclude a considerable number of properly accredited Labourdelegates from the Convention, but after a stiff fight my friends andmyself compelled the admission of a number just barely sufficient tosecure me a majority. This was heralded as a tremendous triumph forthe Labour movement, and it spoke something for the democraticconstitution of the United Irish League, as drafted by Mr O'Brien, that it was possible for an outsider to beat its official nominee andthereby to become the officially adopted candidate of the Leaguehimself. In due course I entered the portals of the Irish Party, butthough in it was, to a certain extent, not of it, in that I was morean observer of its proceedings than an active participant in its work. My supreme purpose in public life was to make existence tolerable fora class who had few to espouse their claims and who were in thedeepest depths of poverty, distress and neglect. Hence, except whereLabour questions and the general interests of my constituents wereconcerned, I stood more or less aloof from the active labours of theParty. I was in the position of a looker-on and a critic, and I sawmany things that did not impress me at all too favourably. 

In the years immediately following the General Election of 1900 theParty had a splendid solidarity and a fine enthusiasm. There had beenjust sufficient new blood infused into it to counteract the jealoushumours and to minimise the weariness of spirit of those older memberswho had served in the halcyon days of Parnell and had gone through allthe squalidness and impotence of the years of the Split. Had the Partybeen rightly handled, and led by a man of strong will and inflexiblecharacter, it could have been made the mightiest constitutional powerfor Ireland's emancipation. Unfortunately Mr John Redmond was not astrong leader. He unquestionably possessed many of the attributes ofleadership--a dignified presence, distinguished deportment, a wideknowledge of affairs, a magnificent mastery of the forms and rules ofthe House of Commons, a noble eloquence and a sincere manner, but helacked the vital quality of strength of character and energeticresolve. He was not, as Parnell was, strong enough to impose his willon others if he found it easier to give way himself. And thus from thevery outset of his career as leader of the reunited Party he allowedhis conduct to be influenced by others--very often, let it be said, against his own better judgment. Mr Redmond had a matchless facultyfor stating the case of Ireland in sonorous sentences, but too oftenhe was content to take his marching orders from those powers behindthe throne who were the real manipulators of what passed for an Irishpolicy. In the shaping of this policy and in the general ordering ofaffairs, the rank and file of the members had very little say--theywere hopelessly invertebrate and pusillanimous. The majority of themwere mere automatons--very honest, very patriotic, exceedinglyrespectable, good, ordinary, decent and fairly intelligent Irishmen, but as Parliamentarians their only utility consisted in their capacityto find their way into the voting Lobby as they were ordered. To theirmeek submission, and to their rather selfish fear of losing theirseats if they asserted an independent opinion, I trace many if not allof the catastrophes and failures that overtook the Party in lateryears. Needless to say, neither the country nor the other parties inParliament had the least understanding of the real character andcomposition of the Nationalist Party. It had always a dozen or morecapable men who could dress the ranks and hold their own "on the floorof the House" as against the best intellects and debating power ofeither British party. Irish readiness and repartee made question timean overwhelmingly Irish _divertissement_. Our members had aunique faculty for bringing about spectacular scenes that read verywell in the newspapers and made the people at home think what finefellows they had representing them! All this might be very goodbusiness in its way if it had any special meaning, but I could neverfor the life of me see how taking the Sultanate of Morocco under ourwing could by any stretch of the imagination help forward the cause ofIreland. 

The policy of the Party, in the ultimate resort, was supposed to becontrolled by the United Irish League acting through its branches inConvention assembled. Inasmuch as the Party derived whatever strengthit possessed in Parliament from the virility and force of theagitation in Ireland, it was in the fitness of things that the countryshould have the right of ordering the tune. When he founded the UnitedIrish League Mr O'Brien unquestionably intended that this should bethe case--that the country should be the master of its own fate andthat the constituencies should be in the position of exercising awholesome check on the conduct of their Parliamentary representatives, who, in addition to the pledge to sit, act and vote with the Party, also entered into an equally binding undertaking to accept neitherfavour nor office from the Government. As the Party was for thegreater part made up of poor men or men of moderate means, membersreceived an indemnity from a special fund called "The ParliamentaryFund, " which was administered by three trustees. This fund wasspecially collected each year, and in principle, if the subscriptionscame from Ireland alone, was an excellent method of making members ofthe Party obey the mandate of the people, under the penalty offorfeiting their allowance. But in practice, most of the subscriptionswere collected in America, and we had in effect the extraordinarysituation of Irish representatives being maintained in Parliament bythe moneys of their American kith and kin. And the situation after1903 was rendered the more ludicrous by reason of the fact that theParty could never have dragged along its existence if it had beendependent upon Irish contributions to its funds. These were largelywithdrawn because the Party was delinquent in adhering to the policyof Conciliation. It is a phenomenon worth remarking that the Irishpeople never failed to contribute generously what Parnell had termed"the sinews of war" so long as the members of the Party deserved it ofthem. But when symptoms of demoralisation set in, or when contentionsdistracted their energies, the people cut off the supplies. This wouldundoubtedly have been an effective means of control in normalcircumstances, but when the Party, of its own volition, was able tosend "missions" to America and Australia to collect funds, it was nolonger dependent on the popular will, as expressed in terms ofmaterial support, and it became the masters of the people instead oftheir servants. 

Not that I want for one moment unnecessarily to disparage thepersonnel of the Party--it was probably the best that Ireland couldhave got in the circumstances--nor do I seek to diminish itsundoubtedly great services to Ireland in the days of Parnell andduring the period that it loyally adopted the policy of Conciliation. But what I do deplore is that a few men in the Party--not more thanthree or four all told--were able, by getting control of "themachine, " to destroy the fairest chance that Ireland ever had ofgaining a large measure of self-government. Knowing all that happenedwithin the Party in the years of which I am writing, knowing themethods that were employed, rather unscrupulously and with everycircumstance of pettiness, to bear down any member who showed theleast disposition to exercise legitimately an independentjudgment--knowing how the paid organisers of the League were at oncedispatched to his constituency to intrigue against him and to work uplocal enmities, I am not, and never was, surprised at the compelledsubmission of the body of the members to the decrees of the secretCabinet who controlled policy and directed affairs with an absoluteautocracy that few dared question. One member more courageous than hisfellows, Mr Thomas O'Donnell, B. L. , did come upon the platform with MrWm. O'Brien at Tralee, in his own constituency and had the manlinessto declare in favour of the policy of Conciliation, but the tragicconfession was wrung from him: "I know I shall suffer for it. " And hedid!

I mention these matters to explain what would otherwise beinexplicable--how it came to pass that a policy solemnly ratified bythe Party, by the Directory of the League, and by a NationalConvention was subsequently repudiated. Whilst Mr O'Brien remained inthe Party there was no question of the allegiance of these men tocorrect principle. Mr Joseph Devlin, who later was far and away themost powerful man in the Party, had not yet "arrived. " (It was theretirement of Mr O'Brien from public life and the resignation of MrJohn O'Donnell from the secretaryship of the United IrishLeague--under circumstances which Mr Devlin's admirers will scarcelycare to recall--which gave him his chance. ) Mr Dillon was a more orless negligible figure until Mr O'Brien made way for him by hisretirement. Right up to this there was only one man for the Party andthe country, and that man was William O'Brien. Let me say at once thatin those days I had no attachments and no personal predilections. JohnRedmond, William O'Brien and John Dillon were all, as we say inIreland, "one and the same to me. " If anything, because of myParnellite proclivities, I rather leaned to Mr Redmond's side, and hischairmanship of the Party had certainly my most loyal adherence. Otherwise I was positively indifferent to personalities, and to agreat extent also to policies, since I was in the Party for onepurpose, and one alone, of pushing the labourers' claims upon thenotice of the leaders and of ventilating their grievances in the Houseof Commons whenever occasion offered. Furthermore, I do not think Iever spoke to Mr O'Brien until after the Cork election in 1904, when, convinced of the rectitude of his policy and principles, I stood uponhis platform to give such humble support as I could to the cause headvocated, and thereafter, I am proud to say, never once turned aside, either in thought or action, from the thorny and difficult path I hadchosen to travel. I take no credit to myself for having taken my standon behalf of Mr O'Brien's policy. I knew him in all essential things, both then and thereafter, to be absolutely in the right. I was awarethat, had he so minded, in 1903, when he was easily the most powerfulman in the Party and the most popular in Ireland, he could havesmashed at one onslaught the conspiracy of "the determinedcampaigners" and driven its authors to a well-deserved doom. But themistake he made then, as mistake I believe it to be, was that he leftthe field to those men, who had no alternative policy of their own tooffer to the country, and who, instead of consolidating the nationalorganisation for the assertion of Irish right, consolidated it ratherin the interests of their own power and personal position. Thus ithappened that a movement conceived and intended as the adequateexpression of the people's will became, in the course of a shorttwelve months, everywhere outside of Munster, a mere machine forregistering the decrees of Mr Dillon and his co-conspirators. 

I do not think, if Mr T. M. Healy had been a member of the Party then, that Mr Dillon would have been able so successfully to entrenchhimself in power as he did. Mr Healy knew Mr Dillon inside out and hehad little respect for his qualities. He knew him to be vain, intractable, small-minded and abnormally ambitious of power. Parnellonce said of him: "Dillon is as vain as a peacock and as jealous as aschoolgirl. " And when he was not included as a member of the LandConference I am sure it does him no wrong to say that he made up hismind that somebody should suffer for the affront put upon him. It isever thus. Even the greatest men are human, with human emotions, feelings, likes and dislikes. And though it is far from my intentionto robe Mr Dillon in any garment of greatness, he was, unfortunately, put in a position to do irreparable mischief to great principles, as Iconceive, through motives of petty spite. Even if Mr Dillon had stoodalone I do not think he would have counted for very much, supportedthough he was by the suave personality of Mr T. P. O'Connor. But he hadwon to his side, in the person of Mr Devlin, one of great organisinggifts and considerable eloquence, who had now obtained control of theUnited Irish League and all its machinery and who knew how tomanipulate it as no other living person could. Without Mr Devlin'suncanny genius for organisation Mr Dillon's idiosyncrasies could havebeen easily combated. Mr Dillon's diatribes against "the black-bloodedCromwellians" at a time when the best of the landlord class weresteadily veering in the Nationalist direction, I could neverunderstand. Mr Devlin's detestation of the implacable spirit of UlsterOrangemen was a far more comprehensible feeling, but the years haveshown only too thoroughly that both passions, and the pursuit of them, have had the most disastrous consequences. 

Even when Mr Dillon was most powerful in the Party there were many menin it, to my knowledge, who secretly sympathised with the policy ofConciliation but who had not sufficient moral courage to come out inthe open in support of it, knowing that if they did they would bemarked down for destruction at the next General Election. It isevident that from a Party thus dominated and dragooned, and anorganisation which had its resolutions manufactured for it in theLeague offices in Dublin, no good fruit could come. 

Mr Redmond's position was pitiful in the extreme. Neither his judgmentnor his sense of statesmanship could approve the departure which MrDillon and his accomplices had initiated. He avowed again and again, publicly to the country and privately in the Party, that he was inentire agreement with Mr O'Brien up to the date of his resignation;and it is as morally certain as anything can be in this world that ifhe had not crippled his initiative by sanctioning, under his own hand, the announcement of the 24-1/2 years' purchase terms for his estate, he would never have allowed himself to be associated with what herather wearily and shamefacedly described as "a short-sighted andunwise policy. "

From the time that Mr Dillon and his friends got control of the Partyand the national organisation the country was never allowed toexercise an independent judgment of its own, for the simple reasonthat the facts were carefully kept from its knowledge by a Pressboycott unparalleled in the history of any other nation. Under thistyranny all independence and honest conviction were sapped. And with abrutal irony, which must compel a certain amazed admiration on thepart of the disinterested inquirer after truth, the men who set theParty pledge at defiance, who set themselves to destroy Party unityand to scoff at majority rule, were the men who at a later date, whenit suited their malevolent purpose, used the catch-cries of "Unity, ""Majority Rule" and "Factionists" with all their evil memories of thenine years of the Split to intimidate the people from listening to thearguments and reasonings of Mr O'Brien and his friends. And when theirkept Press and their subservient Parliamentarians did not prevail, they did not hesitate to use hired revolver gangs and to employ paidemissaries to prevent the gospel of Conciliation from being preachedto the people. 

With the entrance of false principles and the employment of perniciousand demoralising influences the _moral_ of the Party began to beat first vitiated and then utterly destroyed. It lost its independentcharacter and cohesive force. To a certain extent it became a party ofpetty tale-bearers. The men most in favour with the secret Cabinetwere the men who kept them informed of the sayings and doings of theirfellows. 

The members of lesser note simply dare not be seen speaking to anyonesuspected of a friendly feeling to Mr O'Brien or his policy. Woe tothem if they were! In the expressive phrase of Mr O'Donnell, they were"made to suffer for it. "

The proud independence and incorruptibility which the Party boasted inParnell's day of power now also began to give way. With the accessionof the Liberal Party to office in 1906 the Nationalist members beganto beseech favours. It may be it was only in the first instance thatthey sought J. P. -ships for their leading friends and supporters intheir several constituencies. But we all know how the temptation ofpatronage grows: it is so fine a thing to be able to do "a good turn"for one's friend or neighbour by merely inditing a letter to somecondescending Minister. And now, particularly since there was nocensure to be dreaded, it became one of the ordinary functions of theNationalist M. P. 's life. It was no secret that prominent leaders wereexercising a similar privilege, and the rank and file saw no reasonwhy they should not imitate so seductive an example. 

I once heard a keen student of personalities in Parliament observethat Mr Dillon and Mr T. P. O'Connor always appeared to him to besounder and more sincere Liberals than they were Irish Nationalists. Iagree, and no doubt much of Ireland's later misfortunes sprang fromthis circumstance. I confess I have always thought of Mr Dillon, in myown mind, as an English Radical first and an Irish Nationalistafterwards. I believe he was temperamentally incapable of adoptingParnell's position of independence of either British Party and ofsupporting only that Party which undertook to do most for Ireland. Then, again, Mr Dillon was more of an Internationalist than aNationalist. He delighted in mixing himself up in foreign affairs, andI am much mistaken if he did not take more pride in being regarded asan authority on the Egyptian rather than on the Irish question. MrT. P. O'Connor was so long out of Ireland, and had so completely losttouch with genuine Irish opinion that much might be forgiven to him. His ties with Liberalism were the outgrowth of years spent inconnection with the Liberal Press of London and of social associationswhich had their natural and inevitable influence on his politicalactions. 

With Messrs Dillon and O'Connor and--at this time, probably, in a moresecondary sense--Mr Devlin, in control of the Party, it can be wellunderstood how easy was the descent from an independence of allparties to an alliance with one. I believe that in all these things MrRedmond's judgment was overborne by his more resolute colleagues. Ibelieve also, as I have already said, that the weakness of hisposition was engendered by the unforgettable mistake he made in regardto the sale of his estate--that he felt this was held over him as asword of Damocles, and that he was never able to get away from itshaunting shadow sufficiently to assert his own authority in the mannerof an independent and resolute leader. 

I am at pains to set forth these matters to justify the living and, insome measure, to absolve the dead. I want to place the responsibilityfor grievous failures and criminal blunders on the right shoulders. Iseek to make it plain how the country was bamboozled and betrayed byParty machinations such as have not had their parallel in any otherperiod of Irish history. I state nothing in malice or for any ulteriormotive, since I have none. But I think it just and right that thechief events of the past twenty years should be set forth in theirtrue character so that impartial inquirers may know to what causes canbe traced the overwhelming tragedies of recent times. 

 CHAPTER XIII

 A TALE OF BAD LEADERSHIP AND BAD FAITH

It became a habit of the Irish Party, in its more decadent days, tospout out long litanies of its achievements and to claim credit, as asort of hereditament no doubt, for the reforms won under theleadership of Parnell. It was, when one comes to analyse it, a sorrymethod of appealing for public confidence--a sort of apology forpresent failures on the score of past successes. It was as if theysaid: "We may not be doing very well now, but think of what we did andtrust us. " And the time actually arrived when "Trust us" was theleading watchword of Mr Redmond and his Party. How little theydeserved that trust in regard to some important concerns I willproceed to explain. I have shown how they dished Devolution and droveMr Wyndham from office when he was feeling his way towards theconcession of Home Rule--or equivalent proposals under another name;and how they thus destroyed in their generation the last hope of asettlement by Consent of the Irish Question--although a settlementalong these lines was what Gladstone most desired. Writing to MrBalfour, so long ago as 20th December 1885, he thus expressed himself:

"On reflection I think what I said to you in our conversation at Eatonmay have amounted to the conveyance of a hope that the Governmentwould take a strong and early decision on the Irish Question. Thisbeing so, I wish, under the very peculiar circumstances of the case, to go a step further and say that I think it will be a public calamityif this great subject should fall into the lines of Party conflict. Ifeel sure that the question can only be dealt with by a Government, and I desire especially on grounds of public policy that it should bedealt with by the present Government. If, therefore, they bring in aproposal after settling the whole question of the future government ofIreland my desire will be, reserving, of course, necessary freedom, totreat it in the same spirit in which I have endeavoured to proceed inrespect to Afghanistan and with respect to the Balkan Peninsula. "

To this statesmanlike offer Mr Balfour immediately replied:

"I have had as yet no opportunity of showing your letter to LordSalisbury or of consulting him as to its contents, but I am sure hewill receive without any surprise the statement of your earnest hopethat the Irish Question should not fall into the lines of Partyconflict. If the ingenuity of any Ministry is sufficient to devisesome adequate and lasting remedy for the chronic ills of Ireland, I amcertain it will be the wish of the leaders of the Opposition, towhatever side they may belong, to treat the question as a national andnot as a Party one. "

And not less clear or emphatic were the views of Sir HenryCampbell-Bannerman, spoken on 23rd December 1885, as to thefeasibility of settling the Irish problem by Consent:

"On one point I may state my views with tolerable clearness. In myopinion the best plan of dealing with the Irish Question would be forthe leaders of the two great parties to confer together for thepurpose of ascertaining whether some _modus vivendi_ could not bearrived at by which the matter would be raised out of the area ofparty strife. "

It will thus be seen that at a very early stage indeed of thediscussions on Home Rule, distinguished statesmen were agreed that theideal way of settling the Irish Question was by an arrangement orunderstanding between the two great British parties--otherwise bythose methods of Conference, Conciliation and Consent which Mr WilliamO'Brien and Lord Dunraven were so violently and irrationally assailedby Mr Dillon and his supporters for advocating. The great land pactwas arranged by those methods of common agreement between all partiesin Parliament--it could never have been reached otherwise. And, asthese pages will conclusively show, the "factionism" of Mr O'Brien andthose associated with him consisted in pressing a settlement byConference methods consistently on the notice of the leaders of allparties. But Mr Wyndham was treated by the Dillonite section as "aprisoner in a condemned cell"--to use their own elegantmetaphor--because he showed a disposition to secure a settlement ofthe Irish difficulty on a non-party basis. He was ruthlessly exiledfrom office by methods which confer no credit on their authors, andthe Unionist Party retired at the close of the year 1905 with nothingaccomplished on the Home Rule issue. 

When the Liberals came back to power with an irresistible majorityIreland rang from end to end with glad promises of a great, a gloriousand a golden future. The Liberals had the reins of government in theirhands, and the tears were going to be wiped from the face of darkRosaleen. Never again was she to know the bitterness of sorrow or thathope of freedom so long deferred which maketh the heart sick. Mr T. P. O'Connor wrote to his American news agency that Home Rule was comingat a "not far distant date. " It was a fair hope, but the men whogambled on it did not take the House of Lords sufficiently into theircalculations. And they forgot also that Home Rule was not a concreteand definite issue before the country at the General Election. TheLiberal Party in 1906 had no Home Rule mandate. Its leaders wereavowedly in favour of what was known as "the step-by-step" programme. This policy was less than Lord Dunraven's scheme of Devolution, butbecause it was the Liberal plan it came in for no stern denunciationsfrom either Mr Dillon or Mr T. P. O'Connor. Even so staunch a HomeRuler as Mr John Morley insisted that Mr Redmond's Home Rule Amendmentto the Address should contain this important addendum: "subject to thesupreme authority of the Imperial Parliament. " The men who shouted inIreland: "No compromise, " who were clamant in their demand that there"should be no hauling down of the flag, " and who asked the country togo "back to the old methods" (though they made it clear they were notgoing to lead them if they did), showed no disinclination to havetheir own private negotiations with the Liberal leaders on a muchnarrower programme. 

Mr T. P. O'Connor, in his _Life of Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman, M. P. _, tells us exactly what happened, in the following words:--

"The Irish Nationalists had already become restive, for, while notopenly repudiating Home Rule as an ultimate solution, several of thefriends and adherents of Lord Rosebery among the leaders of theLiberal Party had proclaimed that they would not only not support, butwould resist any attempt to introduce a Home Rule measure in aParliament that was about to be elected. It was under thesecircumstances that I had an interview of any length withCampbell-Bannerman for the last time. He invited a friend and me tobreakfast with him.... This exchange of views was brief, for there wascomplete agreement as to both policy and tactics.... It was shortlyafter this that he made his historic speech in Stirling. That was thespeech in which he laid down the policy that while Ireland might notexpect to get at once a measure of complete Home Rule, any measurebrought in should be consistent with and leading up to a largerpolicy. Such a declaration was all that the Irish Nationalist Partycould have expected at that moment and it enabled them to give theirfull support at the elections to the Liberal Party. "

This is a very notable statement, because it shows that theNationalists, who poured out their vials of vituperation upon LordDunraven and the Irish Reform Association, were now eager to accept aninfinitely lesser instalment of Home Rule from their own Liberalfriends. And it also demonstrates that for a very meagre modicum ofthe Irish birth-right they were willing to sacrifice the position ofParliamentary independence, which was one of the greatest assets ofthe Party, and to enter into a formal alliance with the Liberals on amere contingent declaration that "any measure brought in" should be"consistent with and leading up to a larger policy. " Note, there wasno guarantee, no positive statement, that a measure would be broughtin, yet Mr T. P. O'Connor tells us that this declaration was "all thatthe Irish Nationalist Party could have expected, " and that it enabledthem "to give their full support at the elections to the LiberalParty. " I wonder what Parnell, had he been alive, would have thoughtof this offer of the Liberals and whether he would in return for itmake such an easy surrender of a nation's claims. And I wonder alsowhether a paltrier bargain was ever made in the whole history ofpolitical alliances. It does not require any special gift of vision todivine who was "the friend" who went with Mr O'Connor to Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman's breakfast-party and who was in "completeagreement as to both policy and tactics. " They were good Liberals bothof them, and for my own part I would find no fault with them for this, if only they had been better Nationalists. 

Mr Redmond publicly ratified the new policy--or rather, treaty, as itnow practically was--of Home Rule by instalments in a speech atMotherwell, in which he announced his readiness to accept anyconcession "which would shorten and smoothen the road to Home Rule. "But it is significant that although Mr Dillon was in completeagreement with the Liberals "as to both policy and tactics, " yet hedevoted, with a rather supercilious levity, his speeches in Ireland toa demand for "Boer Home Rule as a minimum. " This was the way in whichthe country was scandalously hoodwinked as to the real relations whichexisted between the Liberals and Nationalists. 

Mr O'Brien had at this time gone abroad and left the stage completelyto Mr Dillon and his friends, having, however, made it clear that hewas in favour of the Council Bill and suggested certain improvements, which the Government agreed to. His temporary withdrawal from thescene was dictated solely by the desire to give the utmost freedom ofaction to the Irish Party, seeing that they were acting in conformitywith the best national interests in the special circumstances of themoment. He was also aware that Mr Birrell, who had now accepted officeas Chief Secretary, was particularly acceptable to the Nationalistleaders and that they were in constant communication with him ondetails of the Bill, the safety of which seemed to be assured. Indeed, when it was introduced into Parliament, Mr Redmond spoke inappreciation of it, reserved in statement, no doubt, as befitting aleader who had yet to see the measure in print, but there is not ashadow of doubt that Messrs Redmond, Dillon and O'Connor werepractically pledged to the support of the principle of the Bill beforeever it was submitted to Parliament. 

When, however, they summoned a National Convention to consider theBill, to which they were committed by every principle of honour whichcould bind self-respecting men, to the amazement of everybody notbehind the scenes, the very men who had crossed over from Westminsterto recommend the acceptance of the measure were the first to move itsrejection. A more unworthy and degrading performance it is notpossible to imagine. It was an arrant piece of cowardice on the partof "the leaders, " who failed to lead and who shamefully broke faithwith Mr Birrell and their Liberal allies. True, the Irish Council Billwas not a very great or strikingly generous measure. It had seriousdefects, but these might be remedied in Committee, and it had thismerit, at least, that it did carry out the Liberal promise of being"consistent with and leading up to a larger policy. " Its purpose, broadly stated, was to consolidate Irish administration under thecontrol of an Irish Council, which would be elected on the popularfranchise. It contained no provision for a Statutory Legislative body. It was to confine itself to the purely administrative side ofGovernment. The various Irish administrative departments were to beregrouped, with a Minister (to be called Chairman) at the head ofeach, who would be responsible to the elected representatives of thepeople. The Council was to be provided with the full Imperial costs(the dearest in the world) of the departments they were to administer, and they were to receive in addition an additional yearly subsidy of£600, 000 to spend, with any savings they might effect on theadministrative side on the development of Irish resources. Finally, this limited incursion into the field of administrativeself-government was to last only for five years. Appeals to ignorantprejudice were long made by misquoting the title of the Irish CouncilBill as "The Irish _Councils_ Bill"--quite falsely, for one ofits main recommendations was that the Bill created _one_ nationalassembly for all Ireland, including the Six Counties which the Partysubsequently ceded to Carson. Do not these proposals justify thecomment of Mr O'Brien on them?--"If the experiment had been proved towork with the harmony of classes and the broad-mindedness ofpatriotism, of which the Land Conference had set the example, the endof the quinquennial period would have found all Ireland and allEngland ready with a heart and a half for 'the larger policy. ' Therewould even have been advantages which no thoughtful Irish Nationalistwill ignore, in accustoming our people to habits of self-government bya probationary period of smaller powers and of substantial premiumsupon self-restraint. "

Unfortunately, in addition to having no legislative functions, MrBirrell's Bill contained one other proposal which damned it from theoutset with a very powerful body of Irish thought and influence--itproposed to transfer the control of education to a Committeepreponderatingly composed of laymen. When dropping the Bill later SirH. Campbell-Bannerman declared: "We took what steps we could toascertain Irish feelings and we had good reason to believe that theBill would receive the most favourable reception. " One would like toknow how far the leaders of the Irish Party who were taken into theconfidence of the Government regarding the provisions of the Billconcurred in this clause. To anyone acquainted with clerical feelingin Ireland, whether Catholic or Protestant, it should be known thatsuch a proposal would be utterly inadmissible. But apparently theGovernment were not warned, although it is a matter of history thatthe Irish Party entertained Mr Birrell to a banquet in London thenight before they went over to Ireland for the National Convention, and it is equally well known, on the admissions of Mr Redmond, MrO'Connor and others, that they crossed with the express determinationto support the Irish Council Bill and in the full expectation thatthey would carry it. 

But they had not reckoned on Mr Devlin and on the younger priests, whohad now begun to assert themselves vigorously in politics. Mr Devlin, in addition to being Secretary of the United Irish League, had alsoobtained a position of dominating control in the Ancient Order ofHibernians (Board of Erin section), a secret and sectarianorganisation of which I will have much to say anon. For someinscrutable reason Mr Devlin set himself at the head of his delegatesto intrigue with the young and ardent priesthood against the Bill. MrRedmond, Mr T. P. O'Connor and their friends got to hear of the tempestthat was brewing when they reached Dublin. Mr Dillon, unfortunately, was suffering from a grievous domestic bereavement at the time, andwas naturally unable to attend the Convention. The others, instead ofstanding to their guns like men and courageously facing the oppositionwhich unexpectedly confronted them, and which was largely founded onmisunderstandings, basely ran away from all their honourableobligations--from what they owed in good faith to the Liberal Party, as a duty to their country, and as a matter of self-respect to theirown good name--and instead of standing by the Bill, defending it andexplaining whatever was not quite clear in its proposals, forestalledall criticism by putting up Mr Redmond to move its rejection. A morehumiliating attitude, a more callous betrayal, a more sorryperformance the whole history of political baseness and politicalineptitude cannot produce. The feeling that swept through Ireland onthe morrow of this Convention was one of disgust and shame, yet thepeople were so firmly shackled in the bonds of the Party that theystill sullenly submitted to their chains. And the worst of this bitterbusiness is that the shameful thing need never have occurred. If MrRedmond had boldly advocated the adoption of the measure instead ofmoving its rejection in a state of cowardly panic, there isincontestable evidence he would have carried the overwhelming majorityof the Convention with him. 

The truth is that the members of his Party had no love for the Bill. Sensible of their own imperfections, as many of them were, and wellaware that, whilst considered good enough by their constituents forservice at Westminster, it was quite possible they would not come upto the standard which national duty at home would set up, they werenaturally not very enthusiastic about any measure which would threatentheir vested interests. It may appear an extraordinary statement tomake to those who do not know their Ireland very well that the membersof the Party were not the best that could be got, the best that wouldbe got, under other conditions to serve in a representative capacity. But it is nevertheless true that the conditions of service atWestminster were not such as to tempt or induce the best men to leavetheir professions or their interests for seven or eight months of theyear, whereas it was and is to be hoped that when the time comes thecream of Irish intellect, ability and character will seek thehonourable duty of building up Irish destinies in Ireland. In justiceto those who did serve at Westminster let it be, however, said that itinvariably entailed loss and sacrifice even to the very least of them, and to very many, indeed, it meant ruined careers and broken lives. 

This apart. The Irish Council Bill was lost because of bad leadershipand bad faith, and the Irish Party continued to travel stumblinglyalong its pathway of disaster and disgrace. 

 CHAPTER XIV

 LAND AND LABOUR

The fortunes of every country, when one comes seriously to reflect onit, are to a great extent dependent on these two vital factors--Landand Labour. In a country so circumstanced as Ireland, practicallybereft of industries and manufactures, land and labour--and moreespecially the labour which is put into land--are the foundation ofits very being. They mean everything to it--whether its people be wellor ill off, whether its trade is good, its towns prosperous, itsnational economy secure. 

The history of Ireland, ever since the first Englishman set foot on itwith the eye of conquest, centres to a more or less degree around theland. We know how the ancient clans tenaciously clung to theirheritage and how ruthlessly they were deprived of it by thePlantations and the Penal Laws and by a series of confiscations, thememory of which even still chills the blood. Conquest, confiscation, eviction, persecution--this was the terrible story of Ireland forseven centuries--and the past century worst of all. At thecommencement of the nineteenth century Ireland was extensivelycultivated. The land had been parcelled out amongst the people;holdings were multiplied and tenancies for life increased amazinglybecause it meant a larger rent-roll for the landlord and a greatincrease in the voting power of his serfs. But there came the CornLaws, making cultivation unprofitable, and earlier the law of CatholicEmancipation, withdrawing the right of voting from the forty-shillingfreeholders, and the crisis was reached when the Great Famine appearedand was followed by the Great Clearances. The Famine lasted for threeyears, the Clearances endured for over thirty. Houses were demolished, fences levelled, the peasants swept out and the notices to quit keptfalling, as the well-known saying of Gladstone expressed it, as thickas snowflakes. Between 1849 and 1860, according to Mulhall, 373, 000Irish families were evicted, numbering just about 2, 000, 000 in all. "Ido not think the records of any country, civilised or barbarian, " saidSir Robert Peel, "ever presented such scenes of horror. "

Legislation became necessary to counteract the appalling evils arisingfrom such a state of things. It went on through the years with varyingfortune, never providing any real solution of the intolerablerelations between landlord and tenant, until the blessed LandConference pact was sealed and signed and the country finallydelivered from the haunting terror of landlordism. Now although theentire population may be said in Ireland to be either directly orindirectly dependent on the land, two classes were absolutelydependent on it for their very livelihood--namely, the farmers and theagricultural labourers. And through all the various agrarianagitations they made united cause against their common enemy, thelandlord. There was also in the days of my boyhood a far friendlierrelation between the farmers and labourers than unhappily exists atpresent. Their joint heritage of suffering and hardship had drawn themtogether in bonds of sympathy and friendship. The farmer often shared, in the bitterness of the winter months, something out of his own stockof necessities with his less fortunate labourer. And before thearrival of the Creameries the daily allowance of the gallon of"skimmed" milk was made to almost every labourer's family in thecountry by kind-hearted neighbouring farmers. In addition, in a landwhere few were rich, the ancient proverb held good: "The poor alwayshelp one another. " And it is true that, in the darkest days of theirsuffering, the farmers and labourers shouldered their troubles andtheir sorrows in a community of sympathy, which at least lessenedtheir intensity. It is only with the growth of a greater independenceamong either class that the old friendly bonds and relationships haveshown a loosening, and newer and more personal interests have tendedto divide them into distinctive bodies, with separate class interestsand class programmes. 

As a very little boy I remember trudging my way to school withchildren who knew not what the comfort of boots and stockings was onthe coldest winter's day; who shivered in insufficient rags and whosegaunt bodies never knew any nourishment save what could be got from"Indian meal stir-about" (a kind of weak and watery porridge made frommaize). And it was not the children of the labourers alone who enduredthis bleak and starved and sunless childhood; the offspring of thesmaller struggling farmers were often as badly off--they were all theprogeny of the poor, kept poor and impoverished by landlordism. Thisfurther bond of blood and even class relationship also bound thefarmers and labourers together--the labourers of to-day were, incountless cases, the farmers of yesterday, whom the Great Clearanceshad reduced to the lowest form of servitude and who dragged out anexistence of appalling wretchedness in sight of their former homes, now, alas, razed to the ground. My mind carries me back to the timewhen the agricultural labourer in Munster was working for fourshillings a week, and trying to rear a family on it! I vowed then thatif God ever gave me the chance to do anything for this woe-strickenclass I would strive for their betterment, according to the measure ofmy opportunity. And it happened, in the mysterious workings ofProvidence, that I was able to battle and plan and accomplish solidwork for the amelioration of the labourers' lot. 

When Mr William O'Brien was labouring for the wretched "congests" inthe West and founding the United Irish League to make the great finalonslaught on the ramparts of landlordism, a few of us in the Southwere engaged unpretentiously but earnestly to get houses andallotments for the agricultural labourers, and to provide them withwork on the roads during the winter months when they could not labouron the land. Ten years previously we had laid the foundations of whatwe hoped would be a widespread national movement for the regenerationof the working classes. The founder of that movement was the late MrP. J. Neilan, of Kanturk, a man of eminent talent and of a great heartthat throbbed with sympathy for the sufferings of the workers. I wasthen a schoolboy, with a youthful yearning of my own towards the poorand the needy, and I joined the new movement. Two others--the one JohnD. O'Shea, a local painter, and the other John L. O'Shea, a carman(the similarity of their names often led to amusing mistakes)--withsome humble town workers, formed the working vanguard of the newmovement, what I might term a sort of apostolate of rural democracy. Our organisation was first known as the Kanturk Trade and LabourAssociation. As we carried our flag, audaciously enough, as it seemedin those days, to neighbouring villages and towns, we enlarged ourtitle, and now came to be known as "the Duhallow Trade and LabourAssociation. " I was then trying some 'prentice flights in journalismand I managed to get reports of our meetings into the Cork Press, withthe result that demands for our evangelistic services began to flow inupon us from Kerry and Limerick and Tipperary. But, even as we grewand waxed stronger we still, with rather jealous exclusiveness, calledourselves "the parent branch" in Kanturk. We are, by the way, a veryproud people down there, proud of our old town and our old barony, which has produced some names distinguished in Irish history, such asJohn Philpot Curran, Barry Yelverton and the adored _fiancée_ ofRobert Emmet. 

In time we interested Michael Davitt in our movement, and we achievedthe glorious summit of our ambitions when we got him to preside at agreat Convention of our Labour branches in Cork, where we formallylaunched the movement on a national basis under the title of the IrishDemocratic Trade and Labour Federation. The credit of this achievementwas altogether and entirely due to Mr Neilan, who had founded themovement, watched over its progress, addressed its meetings, framedits programme and carried it triumphantly to this stage of success. Unfortunately, when all seemed favourable for the spread of themovement, though not in opposition to the National League but as asort of auxiliary force, moving in step with it, the disastrous Splitoccurred. It spelt ruin for our organisation because I think it willnot be denied that the workers are the most vehement and vitalelements in the national life, and they took sides more violently thanany other section of the population. After trying for a little whileto steer the Democratic Trade and Labour Federation clear of theshoals of disunion, and having failed, Mr Neilan and his friends gaveup the task in despair. Meanwhile, however, Mr Michael Austin of theCork United Trades, who was joint-secretary, with Mr Neilan, of theFederation, succeeded in getting himself absorbed into the IrishParty, and, having got the magic letters of M. P. After his name, notvery much was ever heard of him in the Labour movement afterwards. 

In the pursuit of journalistic experience I left Ireland for a fewyears, and on my return I found that a new Labour movement had beenfounded on the ruins of the old, under the title of the Irish Land andLabour Association. Mr James J. O'Shee, a young Carrick-on-Suirsolicitor, was the secretary and moving spirit in this--a man ofadvanced views, of intense sympathy with the labourer's position, andof a most earnest desire to improve their wretched lot. I obtained aneditorial position in West Cork which left me free to devote my sparetime to the Labour cause, which I again enthusiastically espoused, having as colleagues in County Cork Mr Cornelius Buckley, of Blarney, another of exactly the same name in Cork, my old friend Mr John L. O'Shea, of Kanturk, and Mr William Murphy, of Macroom--men whose namesdeserve to be for ever honourably associated with the movement whichdid as much in its own way for the emancipation and independence ofthe labourers as the National organisations did for the farmers. 

It is not my purpose here to recount the fierce opposition that wasgiven to the labourer's programme. It had at first no friends eitherin the Party or in the Press. I verily believe that there wereotherwise good and honest men who thought the labourers had no citizenrights and that it was the height of conscious daring for anybody tolift either hand or voice on their behalf. But those of us who hadtaken up the labourer's cause were well aware of all the difficultiesand obstacles that would confront us; and we knew that worst of all wehad to battle with the deadly torpor of the labourers themselves, whowere trained to shout all right for "the Land for the People" but whohad possibly no conception of their own divine right to an inheritancein that selfsame land. Furthermore, since the Land and LabourAssociation was an organisation entirely apart from the Trade andLabour movement of the cities and larger corporate towns we receivedlittle support or assistance from what I may term, without offence, the aristocracy of labour. We nevertheless simply went our way, building up our branches, extending knowledge of the labourers'claims, educating these humble folk into a sense of their civic rightsand citizen responsibilities and making thinking men out of what werepreviously little better than soulless serfs. It was all desperatelyhard, uphill work, with little to encourage and no reward beyond theconsciousness that one was reaching out a helping hand to the mostneglected, despised, and unregarded class in the community. Thepassage of the Local Government Act of 1898 was that which gave powerand importance to our movement. The labourers were granted votes forthe new County and District Councils and Poor Law Guardians as well asfor Members of parliament. They were no longer a people to be kickedand cuffed and ordered about by the shoneens and squireens of thedistrict: they became a very worthy class, indeed, to be courted andflattered at election times and wheedled with all sorts of fairpromises of what would be done for them. The grant of Local Governmentenabled the labourers to take a mighty stride in the assertion oftheir independent claims to a better social position and more constantand remunerative employment. The programme that we put forward ontheir behalf was a modest one. It was our aim to keep within theimmediately practical and attainable and the plainly justifiable andreasonable. In the towns and in the country they had to live in hovelsand mud-wall cabins which bred death and disease and all the woefulmiseries of mankind. One would not kennel a dog or house any of thelower animals in the vile abominations called human dwellings in whichtens of thousands of God's comfortless creatures were huddled togetherin indiscriminate wretchedness. Added to that, most of them had not a"haggart" (a few perches of garden) on which to grow any householdvegetables. They were landless and starving, the last word in pitifulrags and bare bones. They were in a far greater and more intensedegree than the farmers the victims of capricious harvests, whilsttheir winters were recurrent periods of the most awful andunbelievable distress and hunger and want. The first man to noticetheir degraded position was Parnell, who, early in the eighties, got aLabourers' Act passed for the provision of houses and half-acreallotments of land. But as the administration of this Act wasentrusted to the Poor Law Boards, as it imposed a tax upon theratepayers, and as the labourers had then no votes and could secure noconsideration for their demands, needless to say, very few cottageswere built. With the advent of the Local Government Act and theextension of the franchise, the labourer was now able to insist on aspeeding-up of building operations. But the Labourers' Act needed manyamendments, a simplification and cheapening of procedure, an extensionof taxing powers, an enlargement of the allotment up to an acre and, where the existing abode of the labourers was insanitary, anundeniable claim to a new home. Moderate and just and necessary to thenational welfare as these claims were, it took us years of unweariedagitation before we were able to get them legislatively recognised. What we did, however, more promptly achieve was the smashing of thecontract system by which the roads of the country were farmed out tocontractors, mostly drawn from the big farming and grazier classeswho, by devious dodges, known to all, were able to make verycomfortable incomes out of them. We insisted--and after some exemplarydisplays of a resolute physical force we carried our point--that inthe case of the main roads, particularly, these should be worked underthe system known as "direct labour"--that is, by the county and deputysurveyors directly employing the labourers on them and paying them adecent living wage. In this way we removed at one stroke the blackshadow of want that troubled their winters and made these dark monthsa horror for them and their families. But we had still to remove themud-wall cabins and the foetid dens in the villages and towns in whichfamilies were huddled together anyhow, and in our effort to bringabout this most necessary of social reforms we received little or noassistance from public men or popular movements. We were left to ourown unaided resources and our own persistent agitation. As I havealready stated, I was elected Member of Parliament for Mid-Cork on thedeath of Dr Tanner in 1901, and Mr O'Shee had been previously electedfor West Waterford, but not strictly on the Land and Labour platformas I was. Nevertheless, we heartily co-operated in and out ofParliament in making the Labour organisation a real and vital force, and our relations for many useful years, as I am happy to think, wereof the most cordial and kindly character. 

In the Land Purchase Act of 1903 Mr Wyndham included a fewinsignificant clauses bearing on the labourer's grievances, butdropped them on the suggestion of Mr O'Brien, to whom he gave anundertaking at the same time to bring in a comprehensive Labourers'Bill in the succeeding session. When that session came Mr Wyndham had, however, other fish to fry. The Irish Party and the Orange gang werehowling for his head, and his days of useful service in Ireland werereduced to nothingness. Meanwhile we kept pressing our demands asenergetically as we could on the public notice, but we weresystematically boycotted in the Press and by the Nationalist leadersuntil a happy circumstance changed the whole outlook for us. It wasour custom to invite to all our great Labour demonstrations thevarious Nationalist leaders, without any regard to their differencesof opinion on the main national issue. The way we looked at it wasthis--that we wanted the support of all parties in Ireland, Unionistas well as Nationalist, for our programme, which was of a purelynon-partisan character, and we were ready to welcome support from anyquarter whence it came. 

Our invitations were, however, sent out in vain until, on Mr O'Brien'sre-election for Cork in October 1904, a delegation from the Land andLabour Association approached him and requested him to come upon ourplatform and to specifically advocate the labourers' claims, now longoverdue. Without any hesitation, nay, even with a readiness which madehis acceptance of our request doubly gracious, Mr O'Brien replied thatnow that the tenants' question was on the high road to a settlement heconsidered that the labourers had next call on the national energiesand that, for his part, he would hold himself at our disposal. 

What followed is so faithfully and impartially related in Mr O'Brien'sbook, _An Olive Branch in Ireland, _ that I reproduce it:

"One of our first cares on my return to Cork was to restore vitalityto the labourer's cause, and formulate for the first time a preciselegislative scheme on which they might take their stand as theircharter. This scheme was placed before the country at a memorablemeeting in Macroom on December 10, 1904, and whoever will take thetrouble of reading it will find therein all the main principles andeven details of the great measure subsequently carried into law in1906. The Irish Land and Labour Association, which was theorganisation of the labourers, unanimously adopted the scheme, andcommissioned their Secretary, Mr J. J. Shee, M. P. , in their name, tosolicit the co-operation of the Directory of the United Irish Leaguein convening a friendly Conference of all Irish parties and sectionsfor the purpose of securing the enactment of a Labourers' Bill onthese lines as a non-contentious measure. If common ground was to befound anywhere on which all Irishmen, or at the worst allNationalists, might safely grasp hands, and with a most noble aim, itwas surely here. But once more Mr Dillon scented some new plot againstthe unity and authority of the Irish Party, and at the Directorymeeting of the secretary of the Land and Labour Association wasinduced without any authority from his principals to abandon theirinvitation, and thus take the first step to the disruption of his ownassociation. 

"I bowed and held my peace, to see what another year might bring forththrough the efforts of those who had made a national agreement upon thesubject impracticable. Another year dragged along without a Labourers'Bill, or any effort of the Irish Party to bring it within the domain ofpractical politics. The Land and Labour Association determined to rousethe Government and the country to the urgency of the question by anagitation of an unmistakable character. Mr Redmond, Mr Dillon and alltheir chief supporters were invariably invited to these demonstrations;but the moment they learned that Mr Harrington, Mr Healy and myself hadbeen invited as well, a rigorous decree of boycott went forth againstthe Labour demonstrations, and as a matter of fact no representative ofthe Irish Party figured on the Labourers' platform throughout theagitation. This, unfortunately, was not the most inexcusable of theirservices to the Labourers' cause. When the Land and Labour Associationheld their annual Convention, the secretary, who had infringed theirinstructions at the Directory meeting, finding himself hopelesslyoutnumbered, seceded from the organisation and formed a rivalassociation of his own; and sad and even shocking though the fact is, itis beyond dispute that this split in the ranks of the unhappy labourers, in the very crisis of their cause, was organised with the aid of themoneys of the National Organisation administered by the men who were atthat very moment deafening the country with their indignation againstdissension-mongers and their zeal for majority rule. 

"It was all over again the dog-in-the-manger policy which had alreadykept the evicted tenants for years out in the cold. They would neitherstand on a non-contentious platform with myself nor organise a singleLabourers' demonstration of their own. It has been repeatedly statedby members who were constant attendants at the meetings of the IrishParty that the subject of the Labourers' grievances was never oncediscussed at any meeting of the party until the agitation in Irelandhad first compelled the introduction of Mr Bryce's Bill. Then, indeed, when the battle was won, and there was only question of the booty, MrRedmond made the public boast that he and Mr Dillon "were in almostdaily communications with Mr Bryce upon the subject. " The excuse wasas unavailing as his plea that the finally revised terms of sale ofhis Wexford estate left him without a penny of profit. What concernedthe country was the first announcement of 24-1/2 years' purchaseauthorised under his own hand which had 'given a headline' to everylandlord in the country. In the same way, whatever obsequiousattendance he might dance on Mr Bryce, when the die was cast and theBill safe, the ineffaceable facts remain that neither he nor anybodyin his party whom he could influence had stood on a Labour platform, or touched upon the subject at the party meeting, while the intentionsof the Government were, as we shall see in a moment, undecided in theextreme, but on the contrary were (it may be hoped unconscious butnone the less indispensable) parties to an organised effort to splitthe Labourers' Association asunder while their fate was trembling inthe balance. 

"Their war upon the Land and Labour Association was all the morewanton, because Mr Dillon's persuasion, which gave rise to it that theAssociation had been brigaded into my secret service for somenefarious purpose of my own, was as absurdly astray as all the rest ofhis troubled dreams of my Machiavellian ambitions. To avoid giving anypretext for such a suspicion, I declined to accept any office orhonour or even to become a member of the Land and Labour Association, attended no meeting to which Mr Redmond and Mr Dillon were not invitedas well as I; and beyond my speeches at those meetings, never in theremotest degree interfered in the business or counsels of theAssociation. A number of men on the governing council of theAssociation were to my knowledge, and continued to be, sympathiserswith my critics. Beyond the fact that their president, Mr Sheehan, M. P. , happened to be the most successful practiser of my Land Purchaseplans in the county of Cork, as well as by far the ablest advocate theLabourers' agitation had called into action, I know of no shadow ofexcuse for the extraordinary folly which led responsible Irishmen, with the cry of 'Unity' on their lips, not only to decline to meet meon a common platform, but to make tens of thousands of absolutelyunoffending labourers the victims of their differences with me. 

"Despite their aloofness and their attempts to divide the Labourers'body, the agitation swept throughout the south of Ireland with anintensity which nothing could withstand. Demonstrations of amazingextent and still more remarkable resoluteness of spirit were addressedby my friends and myself in Charleville and Macroom, County Cork;Kilfinane and Drumcolliher, County Limerick; Tralee and Castle Island, County Kerry; Scariff, County Clare; Goolds Cross, County Tipperary;and Ballycullane, County Wexford; and by the time they were over, thefield was fought and won. One last difficulty remained; but it was aformidable difficulty. So far from Mr Redmond's 'almost dailycommunications with Mr Bryce' reaching back to the critical days ofthe problem, we were already in the first days of summer in thesession of 1906 when a communication was made to me from a highofficial quarter that the Irish Government were so deeply immersed inthe Irish Council Bill of the following year that they shrank from thelabour and the financial difficulties of a Labourers' Bill in thecurrent session, and an appeal was diplomatically hinted as to whetherthere was any possibility of slowing down the Labourers' agitation soas to make a postponement to the following session practicable. Myreply was undiplomatically clear:--that, if the Government wanted todeprive the Irish Council Bill of all chance of a hearing, they couldnot take a better means of making the country too hot for themselvesthan by proposing to fob off the labourers for another year, and thatnot only would I not, if I could, but could not if I would, moderatetheir insistence upon immediate redress. 

"A short time afterwards, I met Sir Antony MacDonnell in the House ofCommons, and he asked 'What is your labourers' minimum?' I gave him abrief outline of the Macroom programme. 'No rational being couldobject, ' he said, 'but what does it mean in hard cash?' I replied, 'Roughly, four millions. ' And the great Irishman--'the worst enemythat ever came to Ireland' of Mr Dillon's nightmare hours--ended theinterview with these laconic words: 'The thing ought to be done and Ithink can be. ' At the period of the session at which the Bill wasintroduced, the opposition of even half-a-dozen determined men couldhave at any stage achieved its ruin. Thanks, however, to the goodfeeling the precedent of the Act of 1903 and the admirablyconciliatory temper displayed by the labourers themselves in theiragitation had engendered, the Bill went triumphantly through and hasbeen crowned with glory in its practical application. I never passthrough any of the southern counties now and feast my eyes on thelabourers' cottages which dot the landscape--prettier than thefarmers' own homes--honeysuckles or jasmines generally trailing aroundthe portico--an acre of potato ground sufficient to be a sempiternalinsurance against starvation, stretching out behind--the pig and thepoultry--perhaps a plot of snowdrops or daffodils for the Englishmarket, certainly a bunch of roses in the cheeks of the childrenclustering about the doorsteps--without thankfully acknowledging thatCork was right in thinking such conquests were worth a great deal ofevil speech from angry politicians. "

 CHAPTER XV

 SOME FURTHER SALVAGE FROM THE WRECKAGE

When Mr O'Brien retired in 1903 the majority of the members of theParty scarcely knew what to make of it, and I have to confess myselfamong those who were lost in wonder and amazement at the suddenness ofthe event and the reasons that caused it. This knowledge came later, but until I got to a comprehension of the entire facts I refused tomix myself up with either side. When, however, Mr O'Brien returned topublic life in 1904, I saw my way clear to associate myself with hispolicy and to give it such humble and independent support as I could. It will be remembered that one of Mr O'Brien's proposals for testingthe Purchase Act was to select suitable estates, parish by parish, where for one reason or another the landlords could be induced toagree to a reasonable number of years' purchase and thus to set up astandard which, with the strength of the National organisation to backit up, could be enforced all over the country. The "determinedcampaigners" defeated this plan but failed to provide any machinery oftheir own to protect the tenant purchasers or to assist them in theirnegotiations. On Mr O'Brien's re-election he took immediate steps toform an Advisory Committee composed of delegates from the eightdivisional executives of the city and county of Cork. This Committeeadopted as its watchword, "Conciliation plus Business, " and as itshonorary secretary I can vouch for it that when the methods ofConciliation failed we were not slow about putting into operation thebusiness side of our programme. Thus the landlord who could not beinduced to listen to reason around a table was compelled to come toterms by an agitation which was none the less forceful and effectivebecause it was directed and controlled by men of conciliatory temperwhom circumstances obliged to resort to extreme action. 

The fruits of the work of the Advisory Committee, ranging over anumber of years, are blazoned in the official statistics. They make itclear that if only a similar policy had been working elsewhere thetenant purchasers all over Ireland would have got infinitely betterterms than they did. The bare fact is that in County Cork, where wehad proportionately the largest number of tenant purchasers (inMid-Cork, I am glad to say, there was scarcely a tenant who did notpurchase, and in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred through myintervention), the prices are, roughly, two years' purchase lower thanthe average all over the rest of Ireland. 

In Cork, where Mr O'Brien's policy prevailed, we had, outside theCongested Districts, from 1st November 1903 to 31st March 1909, atotal of 16, 159 tenant purchasers, and the amount of the purchasemoney was £7, 994, 591; whilst in Mayo, one of whose divisions Mr Dillonrepresented in Parliament, and where his doctrines held sway, thenumber of tenant purchasers in the same period was 774, and the amountof the purchase money only £181, 256. And be it noted what theseunfortunate and misguided Mayo men have to be grateful for: that theyhave remained for all these years, since the Act of 1903 was placed onthe Statute Book, under the old inexorable rent-paying conditions, whilst down in Cork the tenants are almost to a man the proprietors oftheir own holdings, owning their own improvements, knowing that everyyear that passes brings the time nearer when their land will be freeof annuities, and having all that sweet content and satisfaction thatflow from personal ownership. Up in Mayo, in a famous speech deliveredat Swinford, 12th September 1906, three years after the Land PurchaseAct was passed, Mr Dillon declared:

"Attempts have been made to throw the blame on Michael Davitt, _TheFreeman's Journal_ and myself, and it has been said that we havedelayed the reinstatement of the evicted tenants and obstructed thesmooth working of the Act more than we have done. It has worked toosmoothly--far too smoothly, to my mind. Some men have complainedwithin the past year that the Land Act was not working smooth enough. For my part I look upon it as working a great deal too fast. Its pacehas been ruinous to the people. "

There, in a nutshell and sufficiently stated, are the two policies. MrO'Brien wanted to expedite land purchase by every means in his power, but he wished that the tenants should have proper advisers and shouldact under the skilled guidance of their own organisation, so that theymay make no bad bargains. Mr Dillon, on his part, sought to kill landpurchase outright, but why he should have had this mad infatuationagainst the most beneficent Act that was passed for Ireland in ourgeneration, I am at a loss to know, if it is not that he allowed hispersonal feeling against Mr O'Brien to cloud the operations of hisintellect. It is a curious commentary, however, on the good faith ofthe Party leaders, that whilst Mr Dillon was making the speech I havequoted to his constituents at Swinford, his bosom friend andconfidant, Mr T. P. O'Connor, who was seeking the shekels in New York, was telling his audience that "the Irish landlords were on the run, and, if they continued to yield, in fifteen years the very name oflandlordism would be unknown. I say to the British power:--after sevencenturies we have beaten you; the land belongs now to the Irish; theland is going back to the old race. "

What is one to say of the manhood or honour of the men who spent theirdays denouncing the policy of Conciliation in Ireland, but who, whenthey went across the Atlantic, and wanted to coax the money out of theexiles' pockets, spoke the sort of stuff that Mr O'Connor sosoothingly "slithered" out at New York?

I say it with full and perfect knowledge of the facts, that it was thedishonest policy of Mr Dillon, Mr T. P. O'Connor and the men who, blindly and weakly, and with an abominable lack of moral courage, followed their leadership, which has kept one hundred thousand tenantsstill under the heel of landlordism in Ireland. These men, in drivinga nail into the policy of Conciliation, drove a nail far more deeplyinto their own coffin. In burying the Land Act of 1903 they were onlyopening graves for themselves, but, in the words of Mr Redmond, theywere "so short-sighted and unwise" they could not see the inevitableresult of their malicious side-stepping. 

I know of no greater glory that any man, or Party, or organisationcould aspire to than to be, in any way, however humble, associatedwith the policy which made three hundred thousand of the farmers ofIreland the owners of their own hearths and fields. Where the LandPurchase Act operated it gave birth to a new race of peasant owners, who were frugal, industrious, thrifty, and assiduous in thecultivation and improvement of the soil. In a few years the face ofthe country was transformed. A new life and energy were springing intobeing. The old tumble-down farm-houses and out-offices began to bereplaced by substantial, comfortable, and commodious buildings. Personal indebtedness became almost a thing of the past, and thegombeen man--one of Ireland's national curses--was fast fading out ofsight. The tenant purchasers, against whose solvency the "determinedcampaigners" issued every form of threat, took a pride in paying theirpurchase instalments as they fell due. The banks began to swell outinto a plethoric affluence on their deposits. And who can estimate thesocial sweetness that followed on land purchase--the sense of peaceand security that it gave to the tenant and his family, the fallingfrom him of the numbing shadows of unrest and discontent? Also withthe disappearance of agrarian troubles and the unsettlement thatattended them there has been a notable decline in the consumption ofalcohol. To reverse an old saying: "Ireland sober is Ireland free"--itmay be said that "Ireland free (of landlordism) is Ireland sober. " Andthen the happiness of being the master of one's own homestead! No racein the world clings so lovingly to the soil as the Irish. We have theclan feeling of a personal love and affection for the spot of earthwhere we were born, and when the shadows of evening begin to fallathwart our lives, do we not wish to lay ourselves down in thathallowed spot where the bones of our forefathers mingle with the dustof ages? Truly we love the land of our birth--every stone of it, everyblade of grass that grows in it, its lakes, its valleys, and itsstreams, each mountain that in rugged grandeur stands sentinel overit, each rivulet that whispers its beautiful story to us--and becausewe would yet own it for our very own, we grudge not the sacrificesthat its final deliverance demands, for it will be all the dearer inthat its liberty was dearly purchased with the tears and the blood ofour best!

The settlement of the Evicted Tenants Question was another of thevital issues salved from the wreckage. There were from eight to tenthousand evicted tenants--"the wounded soldiers of the Land War" asthey were termed--to whom the Irish Party and the NationalOrganisation were pledged by every tie of honour that could bind allbut the basest. The Land Conference Report made an equitablesettlement of the Evicted Tenants problem an essential portion oftheir treaty of peace. But the revival of an evil spirit amongst theworst landlords and the interpretations of hostile law officersreduced the Evicted Tenants clause in the Act of 1903 almost to anullity. In this extremity the Cork evicted tenants requested the LandConference to reassemble and specify in precise language thesettlement which they regarded as essential. All the representativesof the landlords and of the tenants on the Conference accepted theinvitation, with the single exception of Mr Redmond. Eventually, despite these and other discouragements, the Conference met in Dublinin October 1906, sat for three days, and agreed upon lines ofsettlement which were given effect to in legislation by Mr Bryce thefollowing year. True, the restoration of these unhappy men did notproceed as rapidly as their sacrifices or interests demanded. Theywere also the victims of the malign opposition extended to the policyof Conciliation, even when it embraced a deed so essentiallycharitable as the relief of the families who had borne the burden andthe heat of the day in the fierce agrarian wars. Lamentable to relate, Mr Dillon tried to intimidate Mr T. W. Russell and Mr Harrington fromjoining the Conference, and when he failed, publicly denounced theirReport. And if there are still some of them "on the roadside, " as Iregret to think they are, the blame does not lie with theConciliationists, but with those who persistently opposed theirlabours. 

In the settlement of the University Question Cork also took the leadwhen its prospects were in a very bad way. This had been for over acentury a vexed and perplexing problem. I have dealt cursorily withprimary education, which is even still in a deplorably backward statein Ireland. Secondary education has not yet been placed on ascientific basis, and is not that natural stepping-stone between theprimary school and the university that it ought to be. There is nointelligent co-ordination of studies in Ireland and we suffer as noother country from ignorantly imposed "systems" which have had fortheir object, not the development of Irish brains but theAnglicisation of Irish youth, who were drenched with the mire of"foreign" learning when they should have been bathed in the purestream of Irish thought and culture. 

It would require a volume in itself to deal with all the evils, notonly intellectual and educational, but social, economic and political, which Ireland has suffered owing to the absence of a higher educationdirected to the development of her special psychological and materialneeds. It took eighty years of agitation before anything likeeducational equality in the higher realms of study was established. The Protestants had in Trinity College a university with a nobletradition and a great historic past. The Catholics had only UniversityCollege and a Royal University, which conferred degrees withoutcompulsion of residence. In hounding Mr Wyndham from office andkilling him (in the political sense, though one would be sorelytempted to add, also in the physical sense), the Irish Party alsodestroyed, amongst other things, the prospects of a Universitysettlement in 1904. A University Bill had, as a matter of fact, beenpromised as the principal business for that session. The question wasin a practically quiescent state, nobody taking any particularinterest in it, when the Catholic laity of Cork, supported by the massof the Protestant laity as well (as was now become the custom on allgreat questions in the leading Irish county), came together in amighty and most representative gathering, which instantly impressedstatesmen that this educational disability on religious grounds couldno longer be tolerated. Mr Birrell, who failed in most other thingsduring his ill-starred Irish administration, was admirably energeticand suave in getting his University proposals through. And it was byemploying wisely the methods of conciliation and winning over to hisside men of opposite political views, like Mr Balfour, Mr Wyndham, SirEdward Carson, and Professor Butcher that he piloted the Bill safelythrough its various Parliamentary stages. 

With the success of Land Purchase, with the introduction and passageof the Labourers and University Acts, with the settlement of theEvicted Tenants Question, and with the offering of any resistance tothe effort made to remove the embargo on Canadian cattle, which wouldseriously have affected the prospects of the farmers, the Irish Partyhad exercised no initiative and could not legitimately claim one atomof credit in respect of them. Yet when their Parliamentary prestigebegan to shake and show unmistakable signs of an approaching collapse, it was ever their habit to group these among their achievements in thesame way that they appropriated the fruits of Parnell's genius--it was"the Party" that did everything, and so they demanded that the peopleshould sing eternal Hosannas to its glory. 

In justice to the Party, or, more correctly, to Mr J. J. Clancy, M. P. , who stood sponsor for the measures and watched over their progresswith paternal care, they did get inscribed on the Statute Book twoActs of considerable importance--the Town Tenants Act and the Housingof the Working Classes Act, but beyond these the less said of theirParliamentary conquests from 1903 onward the better. Theirachievements were rather of the destructive and mischievous than theconstructive and beneficent. 

 CHAPTER XVI

 REUNION AND TREACHERY

It may be said that whilst all these things were going on in Irelandand the Party marching with steady purpose to its irretrievable doom, the British people were in the most profound state of ignorance as towhat was actually happening. And the same may be said of the Irish inAmerica, Australia, and all the other distant lands to which themissionary Celts have betaken themselves. They were all fed with thesame newspaper pap. The various London Correspondents took their cuefrom Mr T. P. O'Connor and the _Freeman_. These and the Whips keptthem supplied with the tit-bits that were in due course served up totheir several readers. And thus it never got to be known that it wasMr William O'Brien and his friends who were the true repositories ofParty loyalty and discipline, the only men who were faithful to thepledge, who had never departed from the policy of Conference, Conciliation and Consent, upon which the great Land Act of 1903 wasbased and to which the Party, the United Irish League, and Nationalistopinion stood committed in the most solemn manner. 

When the General Election of 1906 took place those of us in CountyCork and elsewhere who had taken our stand by Mr O'Brien were markedout for opposition by the Party chiefs. But a truce was arrangedthrough the intervention of Mr George Crosbie, editor of _The CorkExaminer_, who generously sought to avert a fight between brotherNationalists, which, whatever its effects at home, would be bound tohave grave results abroad, where the only thing that would bestrikingly apparent was that brother Nationalists were at oneanother's throats. So we all came back, if not exactly a happy familyat least outwardly in a certain state of grace. 

This state of things was not, however, to last. Without rhyme orreason, without cause stated or charge alleged, with no intimation ofany sort or kind that I was acting contrary to any of the Partytenets, I was, so to speak, quietly dropped overboard from the Partyship in November 1906. I did not get any official intimation that Iwas dismissed the Party or that I had in any way violated my pledge tosit, act and vote with it. I was simply cut off from the Party Whipsand the Parliamentary allowance and, without a word spoken or written, thus politely, as it were, told to go about my business. The matterseemed inconceivable and I wrote a firm letter of remonstrance to MrRedmond. It drew from him merely a formal acknowledgment--an adding ofinsult to injury. To test the matter I immediately resigned my seatfor Mid-Cork, placed the whole facts before my constituents, publishedmy letter and Mr Redmond's acknowledgment and challenged the Party tofight me on the issue they had themselves deliberately raised--namely, as to whether in supporting the policy of Conciliation I was in anyway faithless to my pledge. Wise in their generation, the men who werecourageous enough to expel me from the Party, to which I belonged byas good a title as they, were not brave enough to meet me in the openin a fair fight and, where there could be no shirking a plain issue, and accordingly I had a bloodless victory. It was satisfactory to knowI had the practically unanimous support and confidence of the electorsof Mid-Cork. It would have been more satisfactory still if we had thepolicy of Conciliation affirmed, as we undoubtedly would have, by anoverwhelming vote in a genuine trial of strength. There were at thistime outside of the Party, besides myself, Mr William O'Brien, Mr T. M. Healy, M. P. For North Louth (who had not been readmitted after1900), Sir Thomas Esmonde, M. P. For North Wexford, Mr John O'Donnell, M. P. For South Mayo, Mr Charles Dolan, M. P. For South Leitrim, and MrAugustine Roche (Mr O'Brien's colleague in the representation ofCork). 

The Party were now in a rather parlous state. The country wasdisgusted with their mismanagement of the Irish Council Bill. Branchesof the United Irish League had ceased to subscribe to the Party fundsand it was evident that a temper distinctly hostile to the Partymanagers was widely springing up. Furthermore, an irresistiblemovement of popular opinion set in, demanding that there should be areunion of all the Nationalist forces and "Unity" demonstrations ofhuge dimensions were held in Kerry, Limerick, Cork, Clare and Wexford. There was no denying the intensity of the demand that there should bean end of those differences which divided brother Nationalists anddissipated their strength. Finally, at Ballycullane, in Mr Redmond'snative constituency, Mr O'Brien formulated proposals for reunion, thefirst of which is so notable as a declaration of Nationalist principlethat I quote it fully:

"No man or party has authority to circumscribe the inalienable rightof Ireland to the largest measure of national self-government it maybe in her power to obtain. "

Further conditions declared that it was the duty of Nationalistrepresentatives to devote themselves honestly to working for everymeasure of practical amelioration which it may be possible to obtainfrom "either English Party, or from both, " and that the co-operationof Irishmen of all creeds and classes willing to aid in the attainmentof any or all of those objects should be cordially welcomed. Within aweek Mr Redmond conveyed to Mr O'Brien his desire for a Conference onunity. It was duly held. Mr O'Brien's proposals were substantiallyagreed to. It will be observed that they were a solemn reiteration ofthe principles of Conference and Conciliation, which was the bed-rockbasis of the Party policy in its most useful and memorable year, 1903. It is possible that if Mr O'Brien's suggestion for a NationalConvention to give the new Unity an enthusiastic "send-off" had beenagreed to, many things might have been different to-day. But Mr Dillonnever wanted, in those days, if he could help it, to appear before agreat assemblage of his countrymen in company with Mr O'Brien. He knewhis own limitations for popular appeal too well to risk comparisonwith the most persuasive Irish orator since the days of O'Connell. 

The six of us who rejoined the Party under the foregoing peace treatywere sincerely anxious that the reunion should be cordial and thorough. We saw, however, no manifestations of a similar spirit on the part of MrDillon or his special coterie of friends. Mr O'Brien published in hisown paper, _The Irish People, _ a _communique_ in which he said:

"I am certain the universal Irish instinct will be, frankly andcompletely, to drop all disputes as to the past and have no rivalriesexcept as to who shall do most to create good will and a commonpatriotism among Irishmen of all shades and schools of thought. Let usturn with high hearts from the tragedies of the past to the gloriouspossibilities of the future. "

Our optimism was sadly disappointed when the first occasion came fortesting the sincerity of the reunion. A Treasury Report was issuedcontaining proposals for lessening the landlords' bonus under thePurchase Act of 1903 and for increasing the tenants' annuities. (Theseproposals were later embodied in Mr Birrell's Land Act of 1909 andpractically put an end to land purchase and to the beneficentoperations of the Act of 1903. ) A meeting of the reunited Party wassummoned for the Mansion House, Dublin (29th April 1908), to deal withthis grave situation, rendered all the more serious by reason of thefact that the Treasury proposals were openly advocated by _TheFreeman's Journal. _ One of the clauses of the articles of reuniondeclared that the co-operation of Irishmen of all classes and creedswilling to aid in the attainment of, among other things, "thecompletion of the abolition of landlordism" is cordially welcomed. When Mr O'Brien moved, in order that the demands of the Treasuryshould be met with a united and resolute Irish front, that the Partywas prepared to appoint representatives to confer with representativesof the landlords, Mr Dillon at once showed that on no account would beagree to any Conference, and he proposed an amendment that the wholematter should be referred to a Committee of the Irish Partyexclusively. This was a fatal blow at the principle on which the Partyhad been reunited. Whilst the controversy raged around the Conferenceidea, Mr Redmond spoke never a word, though he saw that "theshort-sighted and unwise policy" was again getting the upper hand. MrDillon carried his amendment by 45 votes to 15, and thus the treaty onwhich the Party was reunited was practically torn to pieces before theink was scarce dry on it. 

One further effort was made to try to preserve the Act of 1903 frombeing ham-strung by the Treasury. A short time previously a deputationof the foremost landed men and representative bodies of Cork had savedIreland from the importation of Canadian cattle into Britain. It wasdecided to organise now a still more powerful deputation from theprovince of Munster to warn the Government of the fatal effects of theproposed Birrell Bill. I had a great deal to do with the preliminariesof the meeting at which this deputation was selected, and I can saywith all certainty that if we had had only the most moderate displayof political wisdom from Mr Dillon and his friends we could have thegreat mass of the landlords in Ireland agreeing to the full concessionof the constitutional demand for Irish liberty. The Cork meeting wasbeyond all doubt or question the most remarkable held in Ireland for acentury. It was summoned by a Joint Committee drawn from theNationalist and landlord ranks. On its platform were assembled all themen, either on the landlord or the tenant side, who had been thefiercest antagonists in the agrarian wars of the previous twenty-fiveyears--men who had literally taken their lives in their hands infighting for their respective causes. It is but the barest truth tosay that the evictors and the evicted--the leading actors in the mostawful of Ireland's tragedies--stood for the first time in Irishhistory side by side to join hands in a noble effort to obliterate thepast and to redeem the future. It was one of the greatest scenes oftrue emotion and tremendous hope that ever was witnessed in any landor any time. If its brave and joyous spirit could only have beencaught up and passed along, we would have seen long before now thatvision glorious which inspired the deeds and sacrifices of Tone andEmmet and the other magnificent line of martyrs for Irish liberty--wewould have witnessed that brotherhood of class and creed which isIreland's greatest need, and upon which alone can her eventualhappiness and liberty rest. And, most striking incident of all, herehad met, in a blessed forgetfulness of past rancours and of fierceblows given and received, the two most redoubtable champions of thelandlords and the tenants--Lord Barrymore and Mr William O'Brien, themen whose sword blows upon each other's shields still reverberated inthe minds of everyone present. What a study for a painter, or poet, orphilosopher! The most dauntless defender of landlordism, in a generousimpulse of what I believe to be the most genuine patriotism, stood ona platform with Mr William O'Brien, whom he had fought so resolutelyin the Plan of Campaign days, to declare in effect that landlordismcould no longer be defended and to agree as to the terms on which itcould be ended, with advantage to every section of the Irish nation. It was only magnanimous men--men of fine fibre and a noble moralcourage--who could stretch their hands across the yawning chasm of thebad and bitter years, with all their evil memories of hates and woundsand scars and defy the yelpings of the malicious minds who were onlytoo glad to lead on the pack, to shout afterwards at Mr O'Brien:"Barrymore!" when of a truth, of all the achievements of Mr O'Brien'scrowded life of effort and accomplishment there is not one that shouldbring more balm to his soul or consolation to his war-worn heart thanthat he should have induced the enemy of other days to pay thishighest of all tributes to his honesty and worth. He had convinced hisenemy of his rectitude, and what greater deed than this! I confess itmade my ears tingle with shame when I used to hear unthinkingscoundrels, egged on by others who should have known better, shout"Barrymore!" at Mr O'Brien in their attempts to hold him up to publicodium for an act which might easily have been made the most benign inhis life, as it certainly was one of the most noble. 

This memorable meeting of the erstwhile warring hosts agreedabsolutely as to the main conditions on which the Land Settlement of1903 ought to be preserved--viz. That the abolition of landlordismshould be completed in the briefest possible time, that the rate oftenant purchasers' annuity should remain undisturbed, and that theState bonus to the landlords should not be altered. If there were tobe losses on the notation of land loans the loss should be borne bythe Imperial Treasury for the greatest of all Imperial purposes. Adeputation of unequalled strength and unrivalled representativecharacter was appointed to submit these views to the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Chief Secretary for Ireland. But jealous and perverse and, I must add, blindly malignant, influences had been at work, and a deputation which comprised sixpeers, eleven Members of Parliament, and some of the leading publicmen in Munster was refused a hearing by Mr Birrell. Though the act wasthe act of Mr Birrell, all the world knew that the sinister figure inthe background was Mr Dillon. And they have both paid the penaltysince then of their follies, not to say crimes--though a nation stillsuffers for them. 

 CHAPTER XVII

 A NEW POWER ARISES IN IRELAND

The Party manipulators had now got their stranglehold on the country. The people, where they were not chloroformed into insensibility, weredoped into a state of corrupt acquiescence. All power was in the handsof the Party. The orthodox daily Press was wholly on their side. TheBritish public and the English newspaper writers were impressed only, as always, by the big battalions. The Irish Party had numbers, andnumbers count in Parliament as nothing else does. Whatever informationwent through to the American Press passed through tainted sources. Aninfluential Irish-American priest, Father Eamon Duffy, writing sometime since in the great American Catholic magazine, _TheMonitor_, said:

"We really never understood the situation in America. Ireland was inthe grip of the Party machine and of one great daily paper, and thesewere our sources of information. It was only the great upheaval thatawakened us from our dream and showed us that something had beenwrong, and that the Party no longer represented the country. "

This is a remarkable admission from an independent and unprejudicedauthority. He candidly declares they never understood the situation inAmerica. Neither was it understood in England, and the House ofCommons is the last place which tries to understand anything exceptparty or personal interests. There is just about as much freedom ofopinion and individual independence in Parliament as there could be ina slave state. In Ireland, as I have said, outside Munster the truthwas never allowed to reach the people. Even the great nationalmovement which Mr William O'Brien re-created in the United IrishLeague had almost ceased to function. It was gradually superseded by asecret sectarian organisation which was the absolute antithesis of allfree development of democratic opinion and the complete negation ofliberty and fair play. 

Up in the north of Ireland there existed an organisation of a secretand sworn character which was an evil inheritance of an evilgeneration. From the fact that the Ribbonmen used to meet in a shebeenowned by one Molly Maguire, with the Irish adaptability for attachingnicknames to anything short of what is sacred, they became known as"Molly Maguires, " or, for short, "the Mollies. " In some ill-omened daybranches of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, which had seceded fromthe American order of that name, began to interest themselves inUlster in political affairs. They called themselves the Board of Erin, but they were, as I have said, more generally known as "the Mollies. "They were a narrowly sectarian institution and they had the almostblasphemous rule that nobody but a Catholic frequenting the Sacramentscould remain a member. They had their own ritual and initiationceremony, founded on the Orange and Masonic precedents, and had theirsecret signs and passwords. It is possible that they were at firstintended to be a Catholic protection society in Ulster at the end ofthe eighteenth century to combat the aggressiveness and the fanaticalintolerance of the Orange Order, who sought nothing less than thecomplete extermination of the Catholic tenantry. A Catholic Defenceorganisation was a necessity in those circumstances, but when theoccasion that gave it justification and sanction had passed it wouldhave been better if it were likewise allowed to pass. Any organisationwhich fans the flames of sectarianism and feeds the fires of religiousbigotry should have no place in a community which claims the sacredright of freedom. It was the endeavour of Mr O'Brien and his friendsfinally to close this bitter chapter of Irish history by reconcilingthe ancient differences of the sects and inducing all Irishmen of goodintent to meet upon a common platform in which there should be norivalries except the noble emulations of men seeking the weal of thewhole by the combined effort of all. 

Whatever unfortunate circumstance or combination of circumstances gaveimpulse to "the Board of Erin, " I know not-whether it arose out of avainglorious purpose to meet the Orangemen with a weapon of importsimilar to their own, or whether it was merely the love of youngpeople to have association with the occult, I can merelyconjecture--but it was only when Mr Joseph Devlin assumed theleadership of it that it began to acquire an influence in politicswhich could have no other ending than a disastrous one. 

Never before was the cause of Irish liberty associated withsectarianism. Wolfe Tone, Robert Emmet and Thomas Davis are regardedas the most inspired apostles and confessors of Irish nationality. Itwas a profanation of their memory and an insult to their creed that inthe first decade of the twentieth century any man or band of menshould have been audacious enough to superimpose upon the structure ofthe national movement an organisation which in addition to beingsecret and sectarian was grossly sordid and selfish in its aims. 

Stealthily and insidiously "the Board of Erin" got its grip in theUnited Irish League. It "bossed, " by establishing a superiority ofnumbers, the Standing Committee. Then by "getting hold" of theofficers of Divisional Executives and branches it acquired controlover the entire machinery of the movement, and thus, in an amazinglyshort space of time, it secured an ascendancy of a most deadly andmenacing character. Its first overt act of authority was to stranglefreedom of speech and to kill land purchase. What Mr John Dillon hadbeen unable to do through his control of the Party and his collusionwith _The Freeman's Journal_ the Board of Erin most effectivelyaccomplished by an energetic use of boxwood batons and, at a latertime, weapons of a more lethal character. 

A National Convention had been summoned to pronounce on the BirrellLand Bill of 1909--a measure which, with incomparable meanness, wasdesigned "to save the Treasury" by ridding it of the honourableobligations imposed by the Wyndham Act of 1903. This Bill, on theground that the finance of the Act of 1903 had broken down, proposedto increase the rate of interest on land loans from 2-3/4 to 3-1/4 percent. , and to transform the bonus from a free Imperial grant to aTreasury debt against Ireland. Apparently it should require noargument to prove that this was a treacherous repeal of an existingtreaty, guaranteed by considered legislative enactment, and that itwas a proposal which no Irishman with any sense of the duty he owedhis country could for one moment entertain. But it was the unthinkableand the unbelievable thing which happened. Mr Dillon was determined, at all costs--and how heavy these costs were, one hundred thousandunpurchased tenants in Ireland to-day have weighty reason to know--towreak his spite against the Wyndham Act, which he had over and overagain declared was working too smoothly, and prayed that he might havethe power to stop it. Mr Redmond I regard in all this wretchedbusiness as the unwilling victim of the forces which held him, as avice in their power. Yet from the sin of a weak compliancy in theunwise decrees of others he cannot be justly acquitted. Although theParty had rejected the proposal for a new Land Conference, and therebybroken the articles of reunion under which Mr O'Brien and his friendsre-entered it, we continued to remain within its fold. We could not, for one thing, believe that the country was so steeped in ignoranceand blindness that if the facts were once allowed to reach it, or thearguments to be temperately addressed to any free assembly ofIrishmen, they would not see where national interests lay. AccordinglyMr O'Brien and his friends determined to submit, in constitutionalfashion, the overwhelming objections to Mr Birrell's Bill to thejudgment of the National Convention which was to consider whether theBill would expedite or destroy land purchase. It was conveyed to MrO'Brien beforehand that it was madness on his part to attempt to get ahearing at the Convention, that this was the last thing "the powersthat be" would allow, and that as he valued his own safety it would bebetter for him to remain away. 

Just as he had never submitted to intimidation when it was backed bythe whole force of the British Government, Mr O'Brien was equallyresolved that the arrogance of the new masters of the Irish democracywas not going to compel him to a mood of easy yielding and he properlydecided to submit his arguments to a Convention which, though he waswell aware it would be "packed" against him, yet he had hopes might beswayed by the invincibility of his arguments. In the ordinary coursethe stewards for managing and regulating the Convention would be drawnfrom Dublin Nationalists. On this occasion, however, they came byspecial train from Belfast and were marched in military order to theMansion House, where some sackfuls of policemen's brand-new batonswere distributed amongst them. They were the "Special Constables" ofthe Molly Maguires recruited for the first time by an Irishorganisation to kill the right of free speech for which Irishmen hadbeen contending with their lives through the generations. It would bequite a comedy of Irish topsy-turvydom were it not, in fact, such adisastrous tragedy. 

The favourite cry of the enemies of Conciliation was that the PurchaseAct would bankrupt the Irish ratepayers. By means which it is notnecessary to develop or inquire into, the British Treasury was inducedon the very eve of the Convention to present to a number of the IrishCounty Councils claims for thousands of pounds on foot of expenses forthe flotation of land loans. A base political trick of this kind istoo contemptible for words. It, however, gave Mr Redmond one of themain arguments for impressing the Convention that the Birrell Billcould alone save the ratepayers from the imminence of this burden. Itwould have been easy to demolish the contention had the reply beenallowed to be made. But this was just the one thing "the bosses" weredetermined not to allow--Mr O'Brien had given notice of an amendment, the justification of which is attested by the facts of the succeedingtwelve years. It expressed the view that the Birrell Land Bill wouldlead to the stoppage of land purchase, that it would impose anintolerable penalty upon the tenant purchasers whose purchase moneythe Treasury had failed to provide, and that it would postpone forfifty years any complete solution of the problem of the West and ofthe redistribution of the untenanted grass lands of the country. Themoment Mr O'Brien stood up to move this, at a concerted signal, pandemonium was let loose. I was never the witness of a moredisgraceful incident--that an Irishman whose life had been given inso full and generous a fashion to the people should, by secret andsubsidised arrangement, be howled down by an imported gang andprevented from presenting his views in rational fashion to men themajority of whom at least were present for honest consideration ofarguments. It is a thing not easily forgotten or forgiven for theIrishmen who engineered it, that such a ferocious and foolish displayof truculent cowardice should have taken place. For an hour Mr O'Brienmanfully faced the obscene chorus of cat-cries and disorder. Hedescribes one of the incidents that occurred in the following words:--

"While I was endeavouring, by the aid of a fairly powerful voice, todominate the air-splitting clamour around me, Mr Crean, M. P. , on thesuggestion of Father Clancy, attempted to reach me, in order to urgeme to give up the unequal struggle. He was no sooner on his legs thanhe was pounced upon by a group of brawny Belfast Mollies and draggedback by main force, while Mr Devlin, with a face blazing with passion, rushed towards his colleague in the Irish Party, shouting to hislodgemen: 'Put the fellow out. ' At the same time Father Clancy, MrSheehan, M. P. , and Mr Gilhooly, M. P. , having interposed to remonstratewith Mr Crean's assailants, found themselves in the midst of adisgraceful mêlée of curses, blows and uplifted sticks, Mr Sheehanbeing violently struck in the face, and one of the Molly Maguirebatonmen swinging his baton over Mr Gilhooly's head to a favouriteBelfast battle-cry: 'I'll slaughter you if you say another word. '"

So does this Convention go down to history as the beginning of aninfamous period when the sanctity of free speech was a thing to beruthlessly smashed by the hireling or misguided mobs of anorganisation professing democratic principles. The miracle of theEaster Rising was that it put an end to the rule of the thug and thebludgeonman. But many things were to happen in between. 

Certain police court proceedings followed, in which Mr Crean, M. P. , was the plaintiff. The only comment on these that need now be made isthat Mr Crean's summons for assault was dismissed, and he was orderedto pay £150 costs or to go to gaol for two months, whilst the policemagistrate who tried the case was shortly afterwards rewarded with theChief Magistracy of Dublin!

The Board of Erin now began to march south of the Boyne and to usurpthe functions of the United Irish League wherever it got a footing. Itwas frankly out for jobs, preferments and patronage of all kinds, sothat even the dirty crew of place-hunting lawyers which Dublin Castlehad plentifully spoon-fed for over a century became its leaders andgospellers, seeing that through it alone could they carve their way tothose goodly plums that maketh easy the path of the unctuous crawlersin life--the creed of the Mollies, and it gained them followersgalore, being that nobody who was not a member of "the Ancient Order"was eligible for even the meanest public office in the gift of theGovernment or the elected of the people. Even a Crown Prosecutor, oneof the Castle "Cawtholic" tribe whose record of life-long antipathy tothe vital creed of Irish Nationality was notorious, now became a piousfollower of the new Order and was in due course "saved" by receivingan exalted position in the judicial establishment of the country, which owed nothing to his honour or his honesty. Under the auspices ofthe Board of Erin "the shoneen"--the most contemptible of all ourIrish types--began to flourish amain. It was a great thing to be a"Jay Pay" in the Irish country-side. It added inches to one's girthand one's stature, and to the importance of one's "lady. " It wasgreatly coveted by the thousands who always pine to swagger in alittle brief authority, and thus the Board of Erin drew its adherentsfrom every low fellow who had an interest to serve, a dirty ambitionto satisfy, an office to gain or probably even a petty score to payoff. No doubt there were many sincere and honest and enthusiasticyoung men attracted to it by the charm of the secret sign andpassword, and others who believed that its Catholic pomp and parademade for the religious uplift of the people. But taken all in all, itwas unquestionably an evil influence in the lives of the people and itdegraded the fine inspiration of Nationality to a base sectarianscramble for place and power. 

Gone were the glorious ideals of a nobler day wherever it pushed outits pernicious grip. Surrendered were the sterner principles whichinstructed and enacted that the man who sought office or prefermentfrom a British Minister unfitted himself as a standard-bearer or evena raw recruit in the ranks of Irish Nationality. The Irish birth-rightwas bartered for a mess of pottage and, worst of all, the fineinstincts of Ireland's glorious youth were being corrupted andperverted. The cry of "Up the Mollies!" became the watchword of thenew movement and the creed of selfishness and sectarianism supplantedthe evangel of self-denial and self-sacrifice. It was a time whenclear-sighted and earnest men almost lost hope, if they did not losefaith. To be held in subjection by the tyranny of a stronger power wasa calamity of destiny to be resisted, but that the people shouldthemselves bind the chains of a more sordid tyranny of selfishnessaround their spirits was wholly damnable and heart-breaking. 

It was to fight this thing that Mr William O'Brien proposed yetanother crusade of light and liberty. As he founded the United IrishLeague when the country was sunk in the uttermost depths of despairand indifference, he now made a first gallant effort to establish anew national organisation to preach a nobler creed of brotherhood andreconciliation among all Irishmen, and to this he gave the appropriatetitle of the All-for-Ireland League. The city and county of Corkrallied to his side, with all the old-time fervour of Rebel Cork. Theinaugural meeting of the League was held in my native town, Kanturk, and was splendidly attended by as gallant a body of Irishmen as couldbe found in all Ireland--men who knew, as none others better, how tofight, when fighting was the right policy, but who knew also, in itsproper season, when it was good to make peace. The Press, however, shut its pages to the new movement and a complaisant Irish Party, nowutterly at the mercy of the Board of Erin, at a meeting speciallysummoned for the purpose, passed a resolution of excommunicationagainst the new League and against every Member of Parliament whoshould venture upon its platform, on the ground that it was usurpingthe functions and authority of the United Irish League, which was nownothing more than a cloak for the operations of the Board of Erin. 

No human being could struggle under the mountain weight ofresponsibility that now rested on the shoulders of Mr O'Brien. Weariedby the monstrous labours and fights of many years, deserted by his owncolleague in the representation of Cork City, with the NationalistPress engaged in a policy of suppression and a system of secretintimidation springing up all over the country, it would have beenmadness for him to attempt to continue. 

Accordingly he decided to quit the field again and to leave the cleverpolitical manipulators in possession. After he had sent in hisapplication for the Chiltern Hundreds I came across specially fromIreland to meet him at the Westminster Palace Hotel. It were meet notto dwell upon our interview, for there are some things too sacred forwords. I know that he had then no intention of ever returning topublic life, and though he was obviously a man very, very ill, in thephysical sense, yet I could see it was the deeper wounds of the soulthat really mattered. 

I have had sorrows in my life and deep afflictions, the scars of whichnothing on this earth can cure, yet I can say I never felt parting sopoignantly as with this friend, whom I loved most and venerated moston earth. I returned to Ireland that night, not knowing whether Ishould ever see the well-beloved face again. He went to Italy on themorrow to seek peace and healing, away from the land to which he hadgiven more than a life's labour and devotion. He enjoined his friendsnot to communicate with him, but he promised to watch from a distance, and that if the occasion ever arose he would not see them cast todestruction without effort of his duty made. 

How well and generously he kept that promise these pages will show. 

 CHAPTER XVIII

 A CAMPAIGN OF EXTERMINATION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES

Mr O'Brien went abroad in March 1909, leaving his friends inmembership of the Irish Party. His last injunction to us was that weshould do nothing unnecessarily to draw down the wrath of "the bosses"upon us and to work as well as we might in the circumstancesconscientiously for the Irish cause. I had some reputation, whetherdeserved or otherwise, as a successful organiser, and I wrote to MrRedmond offering my services to re-establish the United Irish Leaguein my own constituency or in any other place where it was practicallymoribund. I received a formal note of acknowledgment and heard not aword more, nor was my offer ever availed of. On the contrary, the fiatwent forth that the constituencies of those who had for five yearsremained staunch and steadfast to the policy of Conciliation should beorganised against them and that not a friend of Mr O'Brien should beallowed to remain in public life. We were not yet actually cut offfrom the Party or its financial perquisites, but in all other ways wewere treated as political pariahs and outcasts and made to feel thatthere was a rod in pickle for us. 

In the autumn of 1909 I was attending my law lectures in Dublin whenit was conveyed to me that a raid on my constituency was contemplated, that the officials at the League headquarters in Dublin were, withoutrhyme or reason, returning the affiliation fees of branches which wereknown to be friendly to me, and that a Divisional Conference of myenemies was summoned for the purpose of "organising" me out ofMid-Cork. I immediately resolved that if the issue were to be knit atall the sooner the better, and I took my own steps to circumvent themachinations of those who were out, so to speak, for my blood. Hencewhen the bogus delegates were brought together in Macroom one Saturdayafternoon a little surprise awaited them, for as they proceeded to theTown Hall to deliberate their plans for my overthrow, another and amore determined militant body, with myself at their head, also marchedon the same venue. There was a short and sharp encounter forpossession of the hall: the plotters put up a sorry fight; they weresoon routed, and my friends and myself held our meeting on the chosenground of our opponents. Moreover, Mr Denis Johnston, the ChiefOrganiser of the League, who had come down from Dublin with all hisplans for my extermination cut and dried, dared not take the trainthat evening in the ordinary course from the Macroom station, but, like a thief in the night, stole out of the town in a covered car anddrove to a station farther on. 

Thus began the foul attempt to exterminate Mr O'Brien's friends, who, be it noted, were still members of the Irish Party, against whom nocrime was alleged or any charge of Party disloyalty preferred. Thefunds of the League, its organisers and its executive machinery, instead of being used for the advancement of the Irish movement alongconstitutional lines, were brutally directed to the politicalexecution of Mr O'Brien's friends, who, now that he had gone for good, and was reported to be in that state of physical breakdown which wouldprevent him from ever again taking an active part in Irish affairs, were supposed to be at the mercy of the big "pots" and their bigbattalions. 

Mr Maurice Healy, who had been elected for Cork City by anoverwhelming majority over the nominee of "the leaders" after MrO'Brien's retirement, was unconstitutionally and improperly refusedadmission to the Party, although he was quite prepared to sign thepledge to sit, act, and vote with it. There was scarcely a thing wrongthey could do which these blind leaders of the blind did not clumsilyattempt at this juncture. They might have shown us, whose only crimewas loyalty to principle and to a policy which had been signallyratified by the repeated mandates of the people, a reasonable measureof generosity and a frank fellowship and all would be well. 

But no; we had committed the cardinal offence of preferring a policyto a personality and, in famous phrase, we were marked down to "sufferfor it. " Hordes of organisers were dispatched to our constituencies to"pull the strings" against us. I can aver, with a certain malicioussatisfaction, that wherever they made their appearance in Cork, we metthem and we routed them. This may appear an ill way to conduct apolitical campaign, but be it remembered that we were fighting for ourlives, almost resourceless, and that the aggressors had practicallylimitless powers, financially and otherwise. I will mention oneincident to explain many. It was announced that Mr Redmond was tospeak at Banteer, on the borders of my constituency. I could not allowthat challenge to pass unnoticed without surrendering ground which itwould be impossible to recover; and so I took the earliest opportunityof proclaiming that if Mr Redmond came to Banteer my friends and Iwould be there to meet him. He never came! Meanwhile through a privatesource--for none of his colleagues were in communication with him--MrO'Brien heard of the nefarious attempts that were being made toexterminate his friends and he broke silence for the first time sincehis retirement by despatching the following message to the PressAssociation:--

"If these people are wise they will drop their campaign of vengeanceagainst my friends. "

Doubtless "these people" thought this the threat of a man helplessthrough illness, and not to be seriously noticed, for they went onwith their preparations, surreptitious and otherwise, for ourdestruction, in suitable time and form. I will ever remember it withpride and gratitude that the labourers of the south, the President ofwhose Association I was, were gloriously staunch and loyal and thatthere never was a demand I made upon them for support andencouragement they did not magnificently respond to. They gaverepayment, in full measure and flowing over, for whatever little I wasable to accomplish in my lifetime for the alleviation of their lot andthe brightening of their lives. 

Meanwhile the Party had matters all their own way, yet their only"great" achievement was to get the Birrell Land Bill passed into lawand to put an end to the operations of the Purchase Act of 1903 whichwas so rapidly transforming the face of the country. They also passedfor Mr Lloyd George what Mr Dillon termed "the great and good" Budget, but which really added enormously to the direct taxation ofIreland--imposing an additional burden of something not far from threemillions sterling on the backs of an already overtaxed country. But ifthe people were plundered the place-hunters were placated. The IrishParty had now become little better than an annexe of Liberalism. Theysat in Opposition because it was the tradition to do so, but inreality they were the obsequious followers of a British Party andbrowsing on its pasturage in the hope of better things to come. 

Not far off were heard the rumblings of an approaching GeneralElection. There were the usual flutterings of the "ins" who wanted toremain in, and of the "outs" who were anxious to taste the socialsweets and the personal pomp of the successful politician, who had gotthe magic letters "M. P. " to his name. It is wonderful what an appealit makes to the man who has made his "pile" somehow or anyhow (or whowants to make it) to have the right to enter the sacred portals ofWestminster, but it is more wonderful still to see him when he getsthere become the mere puppet of the Party Whips, without an atom ofindividual independence or a grain of useful initiative. The systemabsorbs them and they become cogs in a machine, whose movements theyhave little power of controlling or directing. 

It was pretended by the leaders of the Nationalists that theirsubservient surrender to the Liberal Party was a far-sighted move tocompel Mr Asquith and his friends to make Home Rule "the dominantissue, " as they termed it, at the General Election. The veto of theHouse of Lords, the hitherto one intractable element of opposition toHome Rule, was to go before long and the House of Commons, withincertain limits, would be in a position to impose its will as thesovereign authority in the State. Yet it is the scarcely believablefact that in all these precious months, and after all the servilesycophancy they had given to the Liberals, neither Mr Redmond northose true-blue Liberals, Mr Dillon and Mr O'Connor, had ever soughtto extract from Mr Asquith an irrefragable statement of his intentionsregarding the Irish Question, or whether he and his Governmentintended to make it a prime plank in the Liberal platform at thepolls. The rejection of the Budget by the Lords was made the realissue before the electors, and little was heard of Home Rule, eitheron the platform or in the Press. True, Mr Asquith made a vague andnon-committal reference to it at the Albert Hall on the eve of theelection, but the Liberal candidates, with extraordinary unanimity, fought shy of it in every constituency, except where there was aconsiderable Irish vote to be played up to, and one of the LiberalParty Whips even went so far as to declare there was no Home Ruleengagement at all. Far different was it in other days, when Parnellwas in power. He would have pinned the Party to whom he was giving hissupport down to a written compact, which could not be broken withoutdishonour, and he would leave nothing to the mere emergencies andexpediencies of politics, which are only the gambler's dice in adevil's game. 

But the men of lesser calibre who had now the destiny of a nation intheir hands "trusted" in the good faith of the Liberals and in returnasked the country to "trust" them. There never was such a puckish gameplayed in history. Criticism was stifled and the people were told, andno doubt in their innocence believed it, that Home Rule was already asgood as carried and that the dream of all the years was come true. MrDillon was audaciously flying the flag of "Boer Home Rule as aminimum, " although he had not a scrap of authority or a line ofsanction for his pronouncements. 

It seemed as if every friend of Mr O'Brien was to go under in thecampaign of opposition that was being elaborately carried out againstthem. Our constituencies were swarming with paid organisers and menand money galore were pouring in from outside, so that our downfalland defeat should be made an absolute certainty. 

It was in this crisis that the generous spirit of Mr O'Brien impelledhim to come to our assistance. For my own part I never had a doubtthat when the hour struck the champion of so many noble causes wouldbe found once again stoutly defending the men who had staked all forthe sake of principle, but who, without his aid, must be mercilesslythrown to the wolves. We were in a most benighted state, without anytrace of organisation of our own (except that I had the Land andLabour Association unflinchingly on my side), without any newspaper toreport our speeches, and with only the bravest of the brave to comeupon our platforms and say a good word for us. The outlook was asbleak as it well could be, when suddenly, towards the end of December1909, the joyous news reached us that "the hero of a hundred fights"was about to throw himself into the breach on our behalf. Our enemieslaughed the rumour to scorn, but we knew better and we bided inpatience the coming of our man. 

One stipulation, indeed, Mr O'Brien did make, that in coming to ourassistance it was not implied that he was to be a candidate himselfand that he was merely to deliver three speeches in Cork City to putthe issue clearly before the people. Matters had now reached so gravea pitch that not only were Mr O'Brien's own friends to be attacked bythe "Board of Erin, " which was now in complete control of themachinery of the national organisation, but that every other Member ofParliament who had not bent the knee to its occult omnipotence was tobe run out of public life without cause assigned. All this while therewas rumour and counter-rumour about Mr O'Brien's return. TheDillonites up to the last moment believed we were playing a game ofbluff and went on right merrily with their preparations for making aclean sweep of every man who was "suspect" of possessing anindependent mind. Then on one winter's night, shortly before theelection writs were issued, the doubters and the scoffers were onceand for all confounded. Mr O'Brien arrived in the city which wasalways proud to do him honour, but which never more proudly did himhonour than on this occasion, when they mustered in their thousands atthe station and lined the streets, a frantic, cheering, enthusiasticand madly joyous people, to see him back amongst them once again, neither bent nor broken nor physically spent, but gloriously erect, acknowledging the thunderous salutations of the tens of thousands wholoved him, even to the little children, with a love which was surelycompensation for many a bitter wound of injustice and ingratitude. 

 CHAPTER XIX

 A GENERAL ELECTION THAT LEADS TO A "HOME RULE" BILL!

It boots not to dwell at any great length on the contests thatfollowed. Suffice it to say that Irish manhood and Irish honestymagnificently asserted itself against the audacious and unscrupuloustactics of the Party plotters. Mr O'Brien, by a destiny there was noresisting, was forced into the fight in Cork City and emergedvictoriously from the ordeal, as well as winning also in North-EastCork. In my own case, except for the splendid and most generousassistance given me by Mr Jeremiah O'Leary, the leading citizen ofMacroom, who shared all the labours and all the anxieties of mycampaign, I was left to fight my battle almost single-handed, havingarrayed against me two canons of my Church and every Catholicclergyman in the constituency, with two or three notable exceptions. The odds seemed hopeless, but the result provides the all-sufficientanswer to those who say that the Irish Catholic vote can be controlledunder all circumstances by the priests, for I scored a surprisingmajority of 825 in a total poll of about 4500, and I have good reasonfor stating that 95 per cent. Of the illiterate votes were cast in myfavour, although a most powerful personal canvass was made of everyvote in the constituency by the clergy. 

I consider this incident worthy of special emphasis in view of theignorant and malicious statements of English and Unionist publicists, who make it a stock argument against the grant of independence toIreland that the Catholics will vote as they are bidden by theirpriests. I have sufficient experience and knowledge of my countrymento say that whilst in troublous times the Irish soggarths were thenatural leaders and protectors of their flocks, even to the peril oftheir lives, yet in these times, when other conditions prevail, whilstin religion remaining staunchly loyal to their faith and its teachers, when it comes to a question of political principle there is no man inall the world who can be so independently self-assertive as the IrishCatholic. There is nothing to fear for Ireland, either now or in thefuture, from what I may term clericalism in politics, whilst on theother hand it is earnestly to be hoped that nothing will ever happento intrude unnecessarily the question or authority of religion in thedomain of more mundane affairs. 

Mr O'Brien sums up the result of the General Election briefly thus:

"When the smoke of battle cleared away, nevertheless, every friend ofmine, against whom this pitiless cannonade of vengeance had beendirected, stood victorious on the field, and it was the conspiratorswho a few weeks before deemed themselves unshakable in the mastery ofIreland who, to their almost comic bewilderment and dismay, foundthemselves and their boasts rolled in the dust. Not only did every manfor whose destruction they had thrown all prudence to the winds findhis way back to Parliament in their despite, but in at least eighteenother constituencies their plots to replace members under anysuspicion of independence with reliables absolutely amenable to thesigns and passwords of the Order resulted in their being blownsky-high with their own petards.... Messrs Dillon and Devlin led theirdemoralised forces back, seventy in place of eighty-three, and for thefirst time since 1885 they went back a minority of the Nationalistvotes actually cast as between the policy of Conciliation and thepolicy of _Væ Victis_. "

Mr O'Brien had established a campaign sheet during the election called_The Cork Accent_ (as a sort of reminder of the "Baton"Convention, at which the order was given that no one with a "Corkaccent" should be allowed near the platform), and surely never didpaper render more brilliant service in an exceptional emergency. Itwas his intention that his attitude in the new Parliament should beone of "patient observation" and of steady but unaggressive allegianceto the principles of national reconciliation. But such a rôle wasrendered impossible by the active hostility of Mr Dillon and hisfollowers. The doors of the Party were shut and banged against everyman who was independently elected by the voters. It was proclaimedthat we would be helpless in the country without organisation ornewspaper to support us and that we would be left even without themeans of travelling to London to represent our constituents. 

We could not sit inactively under this decree of annihilation. It wasdecided to continue _The Cork Accent_ in a permanent form as adaily journal under the title of _The Cork Free Press_, which wasfounded at a public meeting presided over by the Lord Mayor. TheAll-for-Ireland League was also established to advocate and expoundthe principles for which we stood in Irish life. Its purposes areclearly stated in the resolution which gave it birth--viz. :

"That inasmuch as we regard self-Government in purely Irish affairs, the transfer of the soil to the cultivators upon just terms, and therelief of Ireland from intolerable over-taxation as essentialconditions of happiness and prosperity for our country, and furtherinasmuch as we believe the surest means of effecting these objects tobe a combination of all the elements of the Irish population in aspirit of mutual tolerance and patriotic good will, such as willguarantee to the Protestant minority of our fellow-countrymeninviolable security for all their rights and liberties and win thefriendship of the entire people of Great Britain, this representativemeeting of the City and County of Cork hereby establishes anAssociation to be called the All-for-Ireland League, whose primaryobject shall be the union and active co-operation in every departmentof our national life of all Irish men and women who believe in theprinciple of domestic self-government for Ireland. "

The All-for-Ireland League made memorable progress in a brief space oftime. Mr O'Brien's return to public life was hailed even by the lateW. T. Stead in _The Westminster Gazette_ as nothing short of agreat political resurrection. The noble appeal of the League'sprogramme to the chivalrous instincts of the race attracted the youngmen to its side with an enthusiasm amounting to an inspiration. TheProtestant minority in Southern Ireland were being gradually won overto a genuine confidence in our motives and generous intentions tosafeguard fully their interests and position and to secure them anadequate part in the future government of our common country. Even thegreat British parties began to see in the new movement hopes of thatpeace and reconciliation between Great Britain and Ireland which mustbe the hope of all just and broad-minded statesmanship. 

It was in these circumstances that the Party surrendered "at discretion"to the expediencies of Liberalism, abjectly waiving their position as anindependent entity in Parliament, with no shadow of the pride and spiritof the Parnell period left, seeming to exist for the favours and bonusesthat came their way, and for the rest playing to the gallery in Irelandby telling them that Home Rule was coming "at no far distant date, " andthat they had only to trust to Asquith and all would be well. Never hada Party such a combination of favourable circumstances to commandsuccess. They possessed a strategical advantage such as Parnell wouldhave given his life for--they held the balance of power and they couldorder the Government to do their bidding or quit. Yet instead ofregarding themselves as the ambassadors of a nation claiming its libertythey seemed to be obsessed with a criminal selfishness passing allpossible belief. When it was proposed to make Members of Parliamentstipendiaries of the State, they at first protested vehemently againstthe application of this principle to the Irish representatives, andtherein they were right. From a purely democratic standpoint noreasonable objection can be urged against the payment of those who givetheir time and talent to the public service, but Ireland was indifferent case. Her representatives were at Westminster unwillingly, not to assist in the government of the Empire with gracious intent, butrather definitely to obstruct, impede and hamper this government untilIreland's inalienable right to self-government was conceded, andtherefore it was their clear duty to say that they would accept paymentonly from the country and the people they served and that they cast backthis Treasury bribe in the teeth of those who offered it. But havingostentatiously resolved that they would never accept a Parliamentarystipend, they finally allowed their virtuous resistance to temptation tobe overcome and voted for "payment of members, " which, without theirvotes, would never have been adopted by the House of Commons. There wereplacemen now in Parliament, and place-hunting was no longer a pastime tobe proscribed amongst Nationalists. It may be there was no wilfulcorruption in thus accepting from the common purse of the United Kingdompayment which was made to all Members of Parliament alike, but itdeprived the Irish people of control of their representatives and handedthem over to the control of the English Treasury, and thus opened theway to the downfall of Parliamentarianism in Ireland that rapidly setin. Abandoned all too lightly was the rigid principle that to acceptfavours from England was to betray Ireland, and the pursuit of place andpatronage was esteemed as not being inconsistent with a pure patriotism. 

Furthermore, as if to cap the climax of their imbecilities andblunders, the Irish Party allowed the first precious year of theirmastery of Parliament to be devoted to the passage of an Insurance Actwhich nobody in Ireland outside the job-seekers wanted, which everyindependent voice in the country, including a unanimous Bench ofBishops, protested against, and whose only recommendation was that itprovided a regular deluge of well-paid positions for the votaries ofthe secret sectarian society that had the country in its vicious grip. Such a debauch of sham Nationalism as now ensued was never paralleledin the worst period of Ireland's history, and that this should be donein the name of patriotism was not its least degrading feature. Nemesiscould not fail to overtake this conscious sin against the nationalideal. It met with its own condign punishment before many years wereover. To show the veritable depths of baseness to which the so-calledNational Movement had fallen it need only be stated that it wascharged against their official organ--_The Freeman's Journal_--that no less than eighteen members of its staff had obtainedpositions of profit under the Crown, including a Lord Chancellorship, an Under-secretaryship, Judgeships, Crown Prosecutorships, UniversityProfessorships, Resident Magistracies, Local GovernmentInspectorships, etc. In this connection it is also worthy of mentionthat when the premises of this concern were burnt out in the course ofthe Easter Week Rebellion it was reendowed for "national" purposes, with a Treasury grant of £60, 000, being twice the amount which thethen directors of the _Freeman_ confessed to be the businessvalue of the property. 

Thus did the "Board of Erin" attract to its side all the most selfishand disreputable elements in Irish Catholic life, and thus also did itrepel and disgust the more broad-minded and tolerant Protestantpatriots whom the All-for-Ireland programme, under happiercircumstances, would have undoubtedly won over to the side of HomeRule. Much might even yet be forgiven to the men who had the destinyof Ireland in their hands if they had shown any striking capacity toexact a measure of self-government sufficiently big and broad tojustify the national demand as then understood. But they showedneither strength nor wisdom, neither courage nor sagacity in theirdealings with the English Liberal leaders and old Parliamentary handsagainst whom they were pitted. They were hopelessly out-manoeuvred andovermatched at every stage of the game. It is but just to state thatthe members of the Party as a whole had scarcely an atom ofresponsibility for these miserable failures and defects of policy. They owed their election to "the machine. " They were the complaisantbondsmen of the secret Order. Whatever they felt they dared not uttera word which would bring the wrath of "the Bosses" upon their heads. They were never candidly consulted as to tactics or strategy, or evenfirst principles. 

The decisions of the little ring of three or four who dominated thesituation within the Party were sometimes, it may be, submitted tothem for their formal approval, but more often than otherwise thisshow of formal courtesy was not shown them. The position of Mr Redmondwas most humiliating of all. He did not lack many of the qualitieswhich might have made for greatness in leadership, but he didundoubtedly lack the quality of backbone and that strength ofcharacter to assert himself and to maintain his own position withoutwhich no man can be truly considered great. Whenever it came to anissue between them it is well known he had to submit his judgment andto bend his will to the decision of the three others--Messrs Dillon, Devlin and T. P. O'Connor--who must historically be held responsiblefor the mistakes and weaknesses and horrible blunders of those years, which no self-respecting Irishman of the future can ever look backupon without a shudder of horror. 

The Home Rule Bill, which was the product of those shameful years ofdebility and disgrace, was so poor and paltry a thing as to be almostan insult to Irish patriotism and intelligence. It proposed toestablish merely a nominal Parliament in Dublin. It was financiallyunsound, besides being a denial of Ireland's right to fix and levy herown taxes. As a matter of fact, the power of taxation was rigorouslymaintained at Westminster with a reduced Irish representation oftwo-thirds. And this was the measure which was proclaimed to begreater than Grattan's Parliament or than any of the previous HomeRule Bills! Furthermore, it made no provision for the completion ofland purchase, but Mr Asquith was not really to be blamed for this, asMr Dillon proclaimed that one of the great attractions of the Bill wasthat it would leave the remnant of the landlords to be dealt with byhim and his obedient henchmen. Finally, neither the Liberal Party northeir faithful Irish supporters would hear of any concessions toUlster. 

These people were now so arrogant in the fancied security and strengthof their position to do just as they pleased that Mr Redmond rashlyundertook "to put down Ulster with the strong hand" and ratherprematurely declared: "There is no longer an Ulster difficulty. " Onefurther financial infamy the Bill perpetrated. The twenty millionssterling which were, under the Land Purchase Act of 1903, to have beena free Imperial grant to lubricate the wheels of agrarian settlement, was henceforth and by a "Home Rule Government" to be audaciouslycharged as a debt against Ireland. And this, be it noted, was part ofthe pact come to with the "Nationalist" leaders at the Downing Streetbreakfast-table, where Ireland's fate was sealed, and which theyjoyously supported in the House of Commons against such opposition asthe All-for-Ireland minority was allowed to give it by the ruthlessapplication of the guillotine. 

The Independent Nationalist members were willing to make the best of avery "bad bargain, " if only they could succeed in getting adoptedthree amendments which they regarded as vital to the success of themeasure: (1) A new financial plan; (2) the completion of landpurchase, and (3) such concessions as would win the consent of Ulster. But our reward for thus endeavouring to make the Bill adaptable toIrish requirements and acceptable to the whole of Ireland was to bedubbed "factionists" and "traitors" by the official Irish Party, whonever once during three years' debates in Parliament made theslightest attempt to amend or improve the Bill, but who remainedsilent and impotent as graven images on the Irish benches whilst theway was being paved for all the ruin and desolation and accumulatedhorrors that have since come to Ireland through their compliant andcriminal imbecility. 

They had a perfect Parliamentary unity; they certainly seemed to havethe most perfect understanding with their Liberal friends, but theyhad no more claim to represent an independent, vigilant, self-respecting nation than they had to represent, say, "Morocco"!

 CHAPTER XX

 THE RISE OF SIR EDWARD CARSON

"The question I put to myself is this: In the years of failure, wherehave we gone wrong? What are the mistakes we have made? What has beenthe root cause of our failure? The Lord Chancellor was perfectly frankso far as the Unionists were concerned. He said, indeed, that he wasstill a Unionist, but he had come to the conclusion that themaintenance of the Union was impossible. What lesson have we who havebeen Home Rulers to draw from the past? I think the mistake we made inthe beginning was that we did not sufficiently realise the absolutenecessity of taking into consideration the feeling of Ulster. "

These notable words were spoken by Viscount Grey of Falloden in thedebate in the House of Lords on the Partition Bill on 24th November1920. A more remarkable vindication of All-for-Ireland principles anda more utter condemnation of the egregious folly of our opponents itis not possible to imagine, coming especially from so clear andcalm-minded a statesman as the former Liberal Foreign Secretary. Theroot principles upon which Mr O'Brien and his friends proceeded fromthe start were that success was to be had by making an Irishsettlement depend, in the first place, upon the co-operation of amillion of our Protestant countrymen, and next by enlisting theco-operation of both British parties, instead of making the IrishQuestion the exclusive possession of one English Party. These twoprinciples are now universally acknowledged to be the wise ones, yetwhen we were urging them in the Home Rule debates we could find nosupport from the Liberal-Irish cohorts, and although we sedulouslydevoted ourselves to urging a non-party programme and the conciliationof the Protestant minority--about which all parties are now agreed--weonly received vilification and calumny for our portion. 

Great play is being made by distinguished converts within the past fewyears of Dominion Rule as if they were the discoverers of this blessedpanacea for Ireland's ills, but it is proper to recall that theAll-for-Ireland Party specifically proposed Dominion Home Rule in aletter to Mr Asquith in 1911 as the wisest of all solutions. Scantattention was paid to our recommendation then and it is not evenremembered for us by the protagonists of a later time. In all ourefforts to conciliate Ulster and to allay the alarms it undoubtedlyfelt owing to the growth and aggressiveness of the Catholic Order ofOrangeism, we never received encouragement or support from theGovernment or the Irish Party. On the contrary, they denounced astreason to Ireland the proposal made by us that for an experimentalterm of five years the Ulster Party, which would remain in theImperial Parliament, should have the right of appeal as against anyIrish Bill of which they did not approve, the decision to be givenwithin one month. This, we held, would have been a more effectualsafeguard than any proposed since to satisfy Irish Unionists thatlegislative oppression would have been impossible. 

Other proposals of a representation in the Irish Parliamentproportioned to their numbers and of guarantees against theestablishment of any Tammany system of spoils in favour of the secretsectarian association were also submitted. But all our overtures for apeace based on reasonable concessions were repudiated by the officialParty and contemptuously rejected by them and we were held up topublic obloquy as proposing to subject Ireland to the veto of fourteenOrangemen. 

In the early stages of the opposition to Home Rule, curiously enoughSir Edward Carson did not count as a figure of any particular power ormalignancy. True, he had his early period of notoriety in Ireland whenhe acted as a Crown Prosecutor under the Crimes Act. But when hetransferred his legal and political ambition to England it is allegedthat he was for a season a member of the National Liberal Club and wasthus entitled to be ranked as a Liberal in politics. Whether throughconviction or otherwise, his allegiance appears to have been promptlyand permanently transferred to the Unionist Party, but even then hewas in no sense regarded as an Ulster Member--he is himself a SouthernIrishman by birth--and in the House of Commons comported himself as agood Unionist, holding office as such. It was only when the IrishParty set their faces sternly against any concessions to Ulster thatSir Edward Carson stepped into the breach and came to the front as theduly elected leader of the Ulster Party. It is the sheerest nonsenseand pure ignorance of the facts to say that Sir Edward Carson createdthe Ulster difficulty. It was created by the statesmen and politicianswho, in the words of Viscount Grey, "did not sufficiently realise theabsolute necessity of taking into consideration the feeling ofUlster. " When the full history of this period is written, and whendocuments at present confidential are available, I believe it will beshown that if the concessions and safeguards suggested by theAll-for-Ireland Party had been offered by the Government or the IrishParty in the earlier stages of the Home Rule controversy they wouldhave been, in the main, acceptable to Ulster Unionist opinion. I wellremember Mr (now Mr Justice) Moore declaring, from his place on theUlster benches:

"My friends and myself have always marvelled at the fatuity of theIrish Party in throwing over the member for the City of Cork (MrWilliam O'Brien) when he had all the cards in his hands. "

Where we preached all reasonable concession and conciliation ouropponents proclaimed that Ulster must submit itself unconditionally tothe law and that it must content itself in the knowledge that"minorities must suffer. " And all this while the Board of ErinHibernians were consolidating their position as the ascendantauthority in Irish life, from whom the Protestant minority might not, without some reason, in looking back on their own bad past, expectthat it would be taken out of them when the Catholics got into power. Thus in very real fear and terror of their disabilities under an IrishParliament, which would be elected and dominated by a secret sectarianorganisation, they entered into the famous Ulster Covenant andsolemnly swore to resist Home Rule and to raise a Volunteer Army forthe purpose of giving force and effect to their resistance. The visitof Mr Winston Churchill to Belfast early in 1912 to address aNationalist meeting there was an aggravation of the situation andthere was a time during his progress through the city when his motorcar was in imminent danger of being upset and when it was surroundedby a howling and enraged mob of Orangemen, who shouted the fiercestcurses and threats at him. As a result of this experience Mr Churchillwas never afterwards a very enthusiastic supporter of what came to becalled "the coercion of Ulster. "

Meanwhile Mr Churchill's most ill-advised visit, from the point ofview of political tactics, was just the thing required to raise allthe worst elements of Orangeism and to give its best fillip to thesigning of the Covenant, which proceeded apace, not only in Ulster, but in Great Britain, even to the extent that the army was said to behoney-combed with sworn Covenanters, contrary to all the rules anddoctrines of military law and discipline. And in due course, in replyto the challenge of Mr Churchill's visit the leader of the UnionistParty, Mr Bonar Law, visited Balmoral, near Belfast, and reviewed from80, 000 to 100, 000 Ulster Volunteers, who marched past him in militaryorder, and saluted. Sir Edward Carson made the meeting repeat afterhim the pledge: "We will never in any circumstances submit to HomeRule. "

The Unionist Party was now solidly and assertively on the side ofUlster in its opposition to Home Rule. They held a demonstration atBlenheim on 27th July 1912, when some three thousand delegates frompolitical associations, invited by the Duke of Marlborough, werepresent. Mr Bonar Law described the Liberal Ministry as arevolutionary committee which had seized by fraud on despotic power, and declared that the Unionist Party would use whatever means seemedlikely to be most effective. He made the declaration that Ireland wastwo nations, a theory which, strangely enough, Mr Lloyd George, asCoalition Premier, advocated eight years later. He went on to say thatthe Ulster people would submit to no ascendancy and "he could imagineno lengths of resistance to which they might go in which he would notbe ready to support them" and in which they would not be supported bythe overwhelming majority of the British people. 

In Parliament a few weeks later Mr Asquith described Mr Bonar Law'sspeech as a declaration of war against Constitutional Government, butthe Ulstermen went on calmly making their preparations for levying warand Sir Edward Carson and his friends coolly delivered speeches whichreeked of sedition and treason against the State. Sir Edward Carsondeclared (27th July 1912): "We will shortly challenge the Government. They shall us if they like it is treason. We are prepared to take theconsequences. " And again he said (1st October 1912): "TheAttorney-General says that my doctrines and the course I am takinglead to anarchy. Does he not think I know that?" And that fineexemplar of constitutional law, Mr F. E. Smith (now Lord Chancellor ofEngland) said: "Supposing the Government gave such an order theconsequences can only be described in the words of Mr Bonar Law whenhe said: 'If they did so it would not be a matter of argument but thepopulation of London would lynch you on the lamp-posts. '" Ulsterscarcely needed these incitements to encourage it in its definitepurpose of armed resistance to Home Rule. It began to organise anddiscipline its army of Volunteers under able military leaders whosubsequently demonstrated their capacity in no uncertain fashion, under the tests of actual warfare on many fields of battle. With theknowledge we now possess it seems scarcely believable that Mr Redmondand his friends should have professed to treat what was happening inUlster as "a gigantic game of bluff. " They joked pleasantly over thedrilling of the Ulster Volunteers with "wooden guns, " and they onlyasked that the Government should "Let the police and soldiers standaside and make a ring and you will hear no more of the wooden gunmen. "Ribaldry and gibes of this sort in the face of open and avowed treasonwas but a poor substitute for that firm statesmanship which shouldhave grappled with the Ulster difficulty in either of two ways--tocome to terms with it or, in the alternative, beat all unrulyopposition to the ground. 

Mr Asquith is blamed because he did not put the law in operationagainst Sir Edward Carson, proclaim his illegal organisation ofVolunteers and deal with him and his friends as a people seditious anddisaffected towards the State, who, by their acts and conduct, hadinvited and merited the traitors' doom. But Mr Devlin declared notlong after in Parliament that the reason why Mr Asquith did not movewas because he and his friends would not allow him. Whence thisextraordinary tenderness for the man who was thwarting and defyingthem at every point, it is not possible to say. No doubt the Ministryknew themselves in the wrong in that they had not considered theposition of Ulster and had not attempted to legislate for their justfears. It is beyond question that there were conditions upon which theconsent of Ulster could have been secured. If, these conditions beingoffered, this consent was unreasonably withheld, then the Governmentwould have been absolutely justified in throttling Sir Edward Carson'spreparations for rebellion before they had gained any ground oreffective shape. But the weakness of the Liberal-Irish position wasthat they would not bring themselves to admit that the All-for-Irelandpolicy of Conciliation and a settlement by Conference and Consent wasright. 

Meanwhile, with a weak Irish administration in charge of Mr Birrell asChief Secretary--most amiable of _litterateurs_, but mostimbecile of politicians--the Ulster opposition was allowed to hardeninto potential violence and civil war. "Engagements" between theOrangemen and the Hibernians began to form a sort of politicalamusement in the north of Ireland. The cries of religious and racehatred were allowed to devour the sweeter gospel of reconciliation andthe recognition of a common country and that communion of right andinterest between all classes and creeds which was the evangel of WolfeTone and other northern Protestant patriots in sublimer days. Matterswere drifting from bad to worse under the fatal weakness andirresolution of the Government. So little fear had Sir Edward Carsonof any penal consequences to himself that he declared, on the 7thSeptember 1913:

"We will set up a Government [of their own as provided for in theUlster Covenant]. I am told it will be illegal. Of course it will. Drilling is illegal. The Government dare not interfere. "

And he was right! It did not interfere. And the Ulster Volunteersbegan to provide themselves with arms and ammunition and to organisethemselves for actual war conditions. There were no more feeble jokesabout "wooden guns" and "making a free ring"--as if it were to beonly an ordinary pugilistic encounter and of no account. In 1913 theUlster Volunteer Force was said to be well armed and probably betterdrilled than the northern regiments at the outbreak of the AmericanWar of Secession. 

Official nationalism was, though it knew it not, passing through thegates of disaster. It was still able to maintain its hold on the oldstagers who were grafted on to it for various reasons, and the Boardof Erin was still able to count on the fidelity of those who believedin the secret sign and watchword as the avenue to place andpreferment. 

The Government of Ireland Bill was merrily pursuing its three years'course through Parliament--passed by the House of Commons and rejectedby the House of Lords after the usual farce and formality of debateswhich had very little reality in them. What counted was that Ulsterwas in arms and determined to resist and that "the Home RuleGovernment" had proved themselves incapable either of conceding or ofresisting. Other things began to count also in Ireland. The youngmanhood of Nationalist Ireland, seeing the liberties of their countrymenaced by force, decided to organise themselves into a corps of IrishVolunteers to defend these liberties from wanton aggression. TheTransport Workers' Strike in Dublin, in 1913, under Mr James Larkin, also showed the existence of a powerful body of organised opinion, which cared little for ordinary political methods and which wasclearly disaffected to the Party leaders. Forces were being loosedthat had long been held in check by the power of the place-hunting andsectarian "constitutional" movement asserting and enforcing itsauthority, through unscrupulous methods already described, to speakand act on behalf of the people. If Sir Edward Carson had risen topower through open and flagrant defiance of all constituted right andauthority, there were others who were not slow to copy his methods. The Irish Party may denounce him in Parliament as a disloyal subjectof the Crown, but there were young Nationalists in Southern Ireland, aye, even in Rebel Cork, who sincerely raised cheers for him becausehe had shown them, as they believed, the better way "to save Ireland. "The Government could not make one law for the North and another forthe South. If it allowed the Orangemen to drill and arm it could notwell interfere with the Nationalists if they took a leaf out of theirbook and proceeded to act in like manner. And thus are the destiniesof people and the fate of nations decided. In preparing for civil warSir Edward Carson gave that spur of encouragement to Germany that itjust needed to rush it into a world war. And for how much else he isresponsible in Ireland every faithful student of current historyknows!

 CHAPTER XXI

 SINN FEIN--ITS ORIGINAL MEANING AND PURPOSE

Sinn Fein had a comparatively small and unimportant beginning. It wasnot heralded into existence by any great flourish of trumpets nor formany years had it any considerable following among the masses of theNationalists. It is more than doubtful, if there had been normalpolitical progress in Ireland, whether Sinn Fein would ever have madeitself into a great movement. It was, in the first instance, thedisappointments and humiliations which the debilitated Irish Party hadbrought to the national movement and the utter disrepute into whichParliamentarianism had fallen as a consequence that moved the thoughtsof Ireland's young manhood to some nobler and better way of servingthe Motherland. But it was the rebellion of Easter Week whichcrystallised and fused all these various thoughts and ideals into onedirect channel of action and made Sinn Fein the mightiest nationalforce that has perhaps arisen in Ireland since first the English setfoot upon our shores for purposes of conquest. 

Sinn Fein, as a political organisation, did not exist until 1905, butthe originator of it, Mr Arthur Griffith, had established in Dublin, in 1899, a weekly paper called _The United Irishman_. This wasthe title of the paper which John Mitchell had founded to advocate thepolicy of the Young Irelanders and was, therefore, supposed to favourto some extent a movement along those lines. Its appeal was mainly tothe young and intellectual and to those extremists who were out ofharmony with the moderate demands of the Parliamentary Party. Itsfirst editorial gave an index to its teachings and aims. "Thereexists, " it declared, "has existed for centuries and will continue toexist in Ireland a conviction hostile to the subjection or dependenceof the fortunes of this country to the necessities of any other; weintend to voice that conviction. We bear no ill-will to any section ofthe Irish political body, whether its flag be green or orange, whichholds that tortuous paths are the safest for Irishmen to tread; butknowing we are governed by a nation which religiously adheres to 'thegood old rule, the simple plan, that those may take who have the powerand those may keep who can, ' we, with all respect for our friends wholove the devious ways, are convinced that an occasional exhibition ofthe naked truth will not shock the modesty of Irishmen and that areturn to the straight road will not lead us to politicaldestruction.... In these later days we have been diligently taughtthat, by the law of God, of Nature and of Nations, we are rightfullyentitled to the establishment in Dublin of a legislative assembly, with an expunging angel watching over its actions from the ViceregalLodge. We do not deprecate the institution of any such body, but we doassert that the whole duty of an Irishman is not comprised inutilising all the forces of his nature to procure its inception. " Itcontinued: "With the present-day movements outside politics we are inmore or less sympathy, " and it particularly specified the FinancialReformers and the Gaelic League, adding, however: "We would regret anyinsistence on a knowledge of Gaelic as a test of patriotism. " Finallyit said: "Lest there might be any doubt in any mind, we will say thatwe accept the Nationalism of '98, '48 and '67 as the true Nationalism, and Grattan's cry 'Live Ireland. Perish the Empire' as the watchwordof patriotism. " Thus its creed was the absolute independence ofIreland, and though it did not advocate the methods of armedrevolution, it opened its columns to those Nationalists who did. Itpreached particularly the doctrine of self-reliance and independence. It attached more importance to moral qualities than to mere politicalaction. It was free in its criticism of persons or parties who itconsidered were setting up false standards for the guidance of thepeople. It derided the policy of the Irish Party as "half-bluster andhalf-whine, " and when Mr Redmond spoke rhetorically of "wringing fromwhatever Government may be in power the full measure of a nation'srights, " it bluntly told him he was talking "arrant humbug. " It madethe development of Irish industries one of the foremost objects of itsadvocacy. It courageously attacked the Catholic clergy for the faultsit saw, or thought it saw, in them. They were told they took noeffective steps to arrest emigration--that they next to the BritishGovernment were responsible for the depopulation of the country; thatthey failed to encourage Irish trade and manufactures and that they"made life dull and unendurable for the people. " And so on and soforth it continued its criticisms with remarkable candour andconsistency. 

It came early into conflict with the Castle authorities on account ofits vigorous propaganda against recruiting for the army and itpublished the text of an anti-recruiting pamphlet for the distributionof which prosecutions were instituted. It was found difficult, however, to obtain convictions against those who distributed thesepamphlets, and even in Belfast a jury refused to bring in a convictionon this charge at the instance of the Crown. _The UnitedIrishman_ was seized by the authorities and only got an excellentadvertisement into the bargain. 

Meanwhile an organisation of Irishmen who shared the views of thepaper was being gradually evolved, and in 1900 the first steps weretaken in the foundation of Cumann na n Gaedhal. Its objects were toadvance the cause of Ireland's national independence by (1)cultivating a fraternal spirit amongst Irishmen; (2) diffusingknowledge of Ireland's resources and supporting Irish industries; (3)the study and teaching of Irish history, literature, language, musicand art; (4) the assiduous cultivation and encouragement of Irishgames, pastimes and characteristics; (5) the discountenancing ofanything tending towards the Anglicisation of Ireland; (6) thephysical and intellectual training of the young; (7) the developmentof an Irish foreign policy; (8) extending to each other friendlyadvice and aid, socially and politically; (9) the nationalisation ofpublic boards. It was felt, however, that the ends of Cumann na nGaedhal were remote and that something more was needed to bring thenew policy into more intimate connection with political facts. Thiswas supplied by Mr A. Griffith when he outlined, in October, 1902, what came to be known afterwards as the Hungarian policy. This policywas, in effect, a demand that the members of the Irish Parliamentaryshould abstain from attendance at Westminster, which was declared tobe "useless, degrading and demoralising, " and should adopt the policyof the Hungarian Deputies of 1861 and, "refusing to attend the BritishParliament or to recognise its right to legislate for Ireland, remainat home to help in promoting Ireland's interests and to aid inguarding its national rights. "

A pamphlet by Mr Griffith, entitled _The Resurrection ofHungary_, was prepared and published, which expounded the details ofthe new policy. Mr R. M. Henry, in his admirable book, _TheEvolution of Sinn Fein_ (to which I express my indebtedness formuch of what appears in this chapter), tells us that the pamphlet, asa piece of propaganda, was a failure, and produced no immediate orwidespread response. Mr Henry also takes exception to the fact of MrGriffith putting forward the Hungarian policy as an original idea. "Ithad, " he writes, "been advocated and to a certain extent practised inIreland long before the Hungarian Deputies adopted it, " and he quotesmatter to show that Thomas Davis was the real author of the policy ofParliamentary abstention and wonders why the credit was not given tothe Irishman instead of the Hungarian Franz Deák. 

The claim of Mr Griffith at this stage was that the independence ofIreland was to be based not upon force but upon law and theconstitution of 1782: "His claim was not a Republic, but a nationalconstitution under an Irish Crown" (Mr R. M. Henry). Finally _SinnFein_, which, literally translated, means "Ourselves, " was formallyinaugurated at a meeting held in Dublin on 28th November 1905, underthe chairmanship of Mr Edward Martyn and was defined as: "Nationalself-development through the recognition of the rights and duties ofcitizenship on the part of the individual and by the aid and supportof all movements originating from within Ireland, instinct withnational tradition and not looking outside Ireland for theaccomplishment of their aims. "

Sinn Fein had now formally constituted itself into a distinct Party, with a definite policy of its own, and _The United Irishman_ceasing to exist, a new organ was established, called _SinnFein_. But though Mr Griffith may found a Party, he was not sofortunate in getting followers. The Parliamentarians had not yet begunto make that mess of their position which they did so lamentablylater. That self-reliant spirit was not abroad which came when amanlier generation arose to take their stand for Ireland. 

Canon Hannay paints a peculiarly unpleasant picture of the state ofIreland at this time. "Never, " he writes, "in her history was Irelandless inclined to self-reliance. The soul of the country was debauchedwith doles and charities. An English statesman might quite truthfullyhave boasted that Ireland would eat out of his hand. The only thingwhich troubled most of us was that the hand, whether we licked it orsnarled at it, was never full enough. The idea of self-help wasintensely unpleasant, and as for self-sacrifice!" The note ofexclamation sufficiently conveys the writer's meaning. 

The Sinn Fein organisation as a national movement made very littleprogress and exercised no considerable influence in affairs. But itsprinciples undoubtedly spread, particularly among the more earnest andenthusiastic young men in the towns. The one Parliamentary election itcontested--that of North Leitrim, where the sitting member, Mr C. J. Dolan, resigned, declared himself a convert to the new movement andoffered himself for re-election--proved a costly failure. Itestablished a daily edition of _Sinn Fein_, but this also had nosuccess and had to be dropped. For some following years Sinn Feincould be said merely to exist as a name and nothing more. The countryhad dangled before it the project of the triumph of Parliamentarianismand it discouraged all criticism of "the Party, " no matter how just, honest or well-intended. In April 1910, _Sinn Fein_ announced, onbehalf of its Party, that Mr John Redmond, having now the chance of alifetime to obtain Home Rule, "will be given a free hand, without aword said to embarrass him. " Sinn Fein took no part in the electionsof 1910. "This, " says Mr Henry, "was not purely an act ofself-sacrifice. In fact, Sinn Fein was never at so low an ebb. " Itsattitude towards the Home Rule, which now seemed inevitable, wasstated as follows:--"No scheme which the English Parliament may passin the near future will satisfy Sinn Fein--no legislature created inIreland which is not supreme and absolute will offer a basis forconcluding a final settlement with the foreigners who usurp theGovernment of this country. But any measure which gives genuine, ifeven partial, control of their own affairs to Irishmen shall meet withno opposition from us and should meet with no opposition from anysection of Irishmen. "

From now onward until 1914 the Sinn Fein Movement was practicallymoribund and its name was scarcely heard of. When it appeared again asan active force it was not the old Sinn Fein Movement that was there. As Canon Hannay justly remarks: "It cannot be said with any accuracythat Sinn Fein won Ireland. Ireland took over Sinn Fein. Indeed, Ireland took over very little of Sinn Fein except the name. " And thisis the literal truth. 

 CHAPTER XXII

 LABOUR BECOMES A POWER IN IRISH LIFE

In the play and interplay of movements and events at this time inIreland we cannot leave out of account the Labour Movement--that is, the official Trade Union organisation as distinct from the Labourers'Association. Hitherto it had mainly concerned itself with industrialand social questions and had not made politics or nationalism anobject of direct activity. The workers had their politics, so tospeak, apart from their Trade Unions, and the toilers from Belfastwere able to meet the moilers from Cork for the consideration of theircommon programme and common lot without infringing on the vexed issueof Home Rule, on which they held widely divergent views--often enoughwithout understanding the reason why. They were a good deal concernedabout municipal government and how many men they were able to returnto the Dublin, Belfast and Cork corporations, but they had not countedhighly and, indeed, scarcely at all in the scheme of national affairs. The Parliamentarians were too strong for them. Yet it was the workerswho always provided the soundest leaders of nationality and its mostincorruptible and self-sacrificing body-guard. The thinkers expressedthe ideals of Irish nationhood; they lived them and were even preparedto suffer for them. But the time had come when this parochialism oflabour in Ireland was to end. To the enthusiasm and impetuous force ofJames Larkin and the fine brain of James Connolly Irish labour owesmost for its awakening. The rise of Larkin was almost meteoric. He wasone day organising the workers of Cork into a Transport Workers Union;almost the next he was marshalling a strike in Dublin, which made himan international democratic figure of extraordinary power. He was aman of amazing personality, who exercised a compelling influence overthe workers. He shook them out of their deadly stupor, lectured themin a manner that they were not accustomed to, brow-beat them and, though he made them suffer in body over the weary months of thestrike, he infused a spirit into them they had not known before. Hemade the world ring with the shame of Dublin's slums and he did muchto make men of those who were little better than dumb-driven animals. He united the Capitalists of Ireland against him in a powerfulorganisation, and though they broke his strike they did not break thespirit that was behind it. Some men will say the Rebellion of EasterWeek had its beginnings in the Dublin Strike of 1913; others thatCarson was the cause of it; whilst many ascribe it to the criminalfolly and short-sightedness of Redmond and his followers, who allowedBritish politicians to bully and betray them at every point and madeParliamentarianism of their type intolerable to the young soul ofIreland. History in due course will assign each its due meed ofresponsibility, but of this we are certain, that the men who came outin Easter Week and bore arms were largely the men whom Larkin hadorganised and whom Connolly's doctrine had influenced. From the pointof view of mental calibre Connolly was by far the abler man. He wasnot as well known outside Labour circles in Dublin as he has come tobe since his death, but to anyone who has given any thought or studyto his life and writings he must appear a person of single-mindedpurpose, great ability, ordered methods of thought and a fineNationalism, which was rooted in the principles of Wolfe Tone and theUnited Irishmen. Connolly preached the gospel of social democracy witha fine and almost inspired fervour. He was an internationalist in thefull Socialist sense, but seeing the harrowing sights that beset himevery day in the abominable slums of Dublin City he was an IrishReformer above all else. Mr Robert Lynd writes of him, in hisIntroduction to Connolly's _Labour in Ireland_:

"To Connolly Dublin was in one respect a vast charnel-house of thepoor. He quotes figures showing that in 1908 the death-rate in DublinCity was 23 per 1000 as compared with a mean death-rate of 15. 8 in theseventy-six largest English towns. He then quotes other figures, showing that while among the professional and independent classes ofDublin children under five die at a rate of 0. 9 per 1000 of thepopulation of the class the rate among the labouring poor is 27. 7. Toacquiesce in conditions such as are revealed in these figures is to beguilty of something like child murder. We endure such things becauseit is the tradition of comfortable people to endure them. But it wouldbe impossible for any people that had its social conscience awakenedto endure them for a day. Connolly was the pioneer of the socialconscience in Ireland. "

In the chapter on "Labour in Dublin" Connolly himself thus refers tothe Dublin Strike and what it meant:

"Out of all this turmoil and fighting the Irish working class movementhas evolved, is evolving, amongst its members a higher conception ofmutual life, a realisation of their duties to each other and tosociety at large, and are thus building for the future a way thatought to gladden the hearts of all lovers of the race. In contrast tothe narrow, restricted outlook of the Capitalist class and even ofcertain old-fashioned trade unionists, with their perpetual insistenceupon 'rights, ' it insists, almost fiercely, that there are no rightswithout duties, and the first duty is to help one another. This is, indeed, revolutionary and disturbing, but not half as much as would bea practical following out of the moral precepts of Christianity. "

Here we get some measure of the man and of his creed. To the part heplayed in the Easter Week Rebellion I must refer in its own properplace. That the Dublin Strike and its consequences had a profoundeffect on later events, this quotation from "Æ" will show. In a famous"open letter" to the employers he declared:

"The men whose manhood you have broken will loathe you and will bealways brooding and scheming to strike a fresh blow. The children willbe taught to curse you. The infant being moulded in the womb will havebreathed into its starved body the vitality of hate. It is notthey--it is you who are blind Samsons pulling down the pillars of thesocial order. "

The poet oftentimes has the vision to see in clear outline what thepolitician and the Pharisee cannot even glimpse. 

At any rate this may be asserted, that from the year of the DublinStrike dates the uprise of Labour in Ireland. Connolly became a martyrfor his principles, whilst Larkin has been hunted from one end of theworld to the other because of his doctrines, undoubtedly of anextremely revolutionary character. But able men have arisen tocontinue the work they inaugurated and Labour in Ireland has nowformally insisted on its right to be a political Party as well as asocial organisation. It no longer circumscribes its aspirations topurely industrial issues and social concerns, but it takes its placeon the stage of larger happenings and events and is like to play agreat part in the moulding of the Ireland that will arise when the oldvicious systems and forms are shattered for evermore. 

 CHAPTER XXIII

 CARSON, ULSTER AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS

With the nearness of the time when Home Rule must automatically becomelaw, unless something happened to interfere, events began to moverapidly. The Tory Party, largely, I believe, through politicalconsiderations, had unalterably taken sides with Ulster. The LiberalParty were irresolute, wavering, pusillanimous. Mr Redmond's followersbegan to be uneasy--they commenced to falter in their blind faith thatthey had only to trust Asquith and all would be well. 

"In the Ancient Order of Hibernians, " Mr Henry tells us, "all sectionsof Sinn Fein, as well as the Labour Party, saw a menace to anyprospect of an accommodation with Ulster. This strictly sectariansociety, as sectarian and often as violent in its methods as theOrange Lodges, evoked their determined hostility. "

"This narrowing down, " wrote _Irish Freedom_ (the organ of Mr P. H. Pearse and his friends), "of Nationalism to the members of onecreed is the most fatal thing that has taken place in Irish politicssince the days of the Pope's Brass Band, " and the Ancient Order wasfurther referred to as "a job-getting and job-cornering organisation, "as "a silent, practical riveting of sectarianism on the nation. "_The Irish Worker_ was equally emphatic. "Were it not for theexistence of the Board of Erin the Orange Society would have longsince ceased to exist. To Brother Devlin and not to Brother Carson ismainly due the progress of the Covenanter Movement in Ulster. "

Though no doubt in Ireland religion exercises a considerableinfluence, it is nevertheless a mistake to think that it was purely aquestion of religion with those redoubtable Northern Unionists whomSir Edward Carson led. They attached more importance to theirpolitical rights and independent commercial position, which theybelieved to be endangered; corruption in matters of administration waswhat they were most in dread of. The Irish Party used to point proudlyto the number of Protestants who had been elected as members of theirParty. The reply of Ulster was that they owed their election to theiraccommodating spirit in accepting the Parliamentary policy and notbecause of their rigid adherence to Protestant principles. 

Then came the Lame gun-running expedition, when the _Fanny_sailed across from Hamburg, under the noses of English destroyers andmen-of-war, and, it is said, with the knowledge and connivance of theofficers commanding them, safely landed 50, 000 German rifles andseveral million rounds of ammunition, which were distributed withintwenty-four hours to the Covenanters throughout the Province. It isclear that at this time extensive negotiations were going on betweenGermany and the Ulster extremists. The Ulster Provisional Governmentwere leaving nothing to chance. History is entitled to know the fullstory of all that happened at this most fateful period--what"discussions" took place between the Ulster leaders and the Kaiser, how far Sir Edward Carson was implicated in these matters and how realand positive is his responsibility for the world war that ensued. Andit should be borne in mind that these seditious traffickings with aforeign state were going on at a time when there was no Sinn Fein armyin existence, and that the man who first showed a readiness not aloneto invoke German aid but actually to avail himself of it, was not anySouthern Nationalist rebel leader but Sir Edward Carson, the leaderand, as he was called, "the Uncrowned King" of Ulster. When criticscondemn the Nationalists of the South for their alleged communicationswith Germany, let them not, in all fairness, forget Sir Edward Carsonwas the man who first showed the way. To whom then--if guilt therebe--does the greater guilt belong? When the news of this audaciousgun-running expedition was published, Ireland waited breathless toknow what was going to happen. Warships were posted on the Ulstercoast, ostensibly to stop further gun-running, and the Prime Ministerannounced in the House of Commons that "in view of this grave andunprecedented outrage the Government would take appropriate stepswithout delay to vindicate the authority of the law. "

But in view of what _The Westminster Gazette_ termed "the abjectsurrender to the Army" of the Government over the Curragh incident, when officers were declared to have refused to serve against Ulster, not much in the way of stern measures was to be expected now. TheGovernment on the occasion of the Curragh incident had declared: "HisMajesty's Government must retain their right to use all the forces ofthe Crown in Ireland or elsewhere to maintain law and order and tosupport the civil power in the ordinary execution of its duty. Butthey have no intention whatever of taking advantage of this right tocrush political opposition to the policy or principles of the HomeRule Bill. "

As Mr Balfour was not slow in pointing out, this statement made "itimpossible to coerce Ulster. " The officers who had refused to obeyorders, including General Gough, were in effect patted on the back, told they were splendid fellows, and that they would not be asked tomarch against Ulster. It was the same thing over again in the case ofthe _Fanny_ exploit, Sir Edward Carson unblushingly improving theoccasion by laying stress on the weakening of Great Britain's positionabroad that followed as a consequence of his own acts. The Irish Partyleaders, who had a few months before still persisted in describing theUlster preparations as "a masquerade" and "a sham, " were now in astate of funk and panic. They found the solid ground they thought theyhad stood on rapidly slipping from under them. There was to be noprosecution of the Ulster leaders, no proclamation of theirorganisation, nothing to compel them to surrender the arms they had sobrazenly and illegally imported. 

Why was not Carson arrested at this crisis, as he surely ought to havebeen by any Government which respected its constitutional forms andauthority, not to speak of its dignity? Captain Wedgwood Benn havingin the Parliamentary Session of 1919 taunted Sir Edward Carson withhis threat that if Ulster was coerced he intended to break every lawthat was possible, there followed this interchange:

Sir E. Carson: I agree that these words are perfectly correct. 

A Labour Member: Anyone else would have been in prison. 

Sir E. Carson: Why was I not put in prison?

Mr Devlin: Because I was against it. 

Well may Mr Devlin take all the credit that is due to him forpreventing Sir Edward Carson's arrest, considering that he and hisOrder had been mainly the cause of bringing Carson to the verge ofrebellion, but that gentleman himself seems to have a differentopinion about it if we are to put any credence in the followingextract from Colonel Repington's _Diary of the First World War_, under date 19th November 1915:

"Had a talk with Carson about the Ulster business. He was very amusingand outspoken. He told me how near we were to an explosion, that theGovernment had determined to arrest the chief leaders; that he hadarranged to send the one word H. X. Over the wire to Belfast and thatthis was to be the signal for the seizure of the Customs throughoutUlster. He called to see the King and told Stamfordham exactly whatwas going to happen and the arrest of the leaders was promptlystopped. "

Note the scandalous implication here! What does it amount to? That SirEdward Carson went to Buckingham Palace, held the threat of civil warover the King, and intimidated His Majesty into using his exaltedoffice to screen the Orange leader and his chief advisers fromprosecution! If it does not bear this meaning, what other can it bear?And what are we to think of its relation to constitutional authorityand right usage?

But this is not the only occasion on which Sir Edward Carson shows upin Colonel Repington's pages. Under date 19th October 1916:

"Carson told me that a man who had been on board the _Fanny_ waswriting the story of the famous voyage and the gun-running exploit. "

We have not got that story yet. When it is published it would be anadvantage if we could also have the full account of the circumstancesunder which Baron von Kuhlman went over to Ireland to prospect as tothe imminence of civil war, who it was he saw in Ulster, whatarrangements and interviews he had with the Ulster Volunteers andtheir leaders, who were the other prominent people he met there and, above all, how the _Fanny's_ cargo of German rifles was arrangedand paid for? Surely these are questions vital to an understanding ofthe extent of Sir Edward Carson's culpability for the outbreak of war. 

Loyalist Ulster--the Ulster of law and order--was now openly defiantof the law. Mr P. H. Pearse summed up the situation rather neatly in anarticle in _Irish Freedom_:

"One great source of misunderstanding" (he wrote) "has nowdisappeared; it has become clear within the last few years that theOrangeman is no more loyal to England than we are. He wants the Unionbecause he imagines it secures his prosperity, but he is ready to fireon the Union flag the moment it threatens his prosperity.... The casemight be put thus: Hitherto England has governed Ireland through theOrange Lodges--she now proposes to govern Ireland through the AncientOrder of Hibernians. You object: so do we. Why not unite and get ridof the English? They are the real difficulty; their presence here thereal incongruity. "

I quote this to show it was not the All-for-Irelanders alone who sawthat the Board of Erin was the real stumbling-block in the way of anational settlement. And now when matters were to be put to the testthe Government showed a monstrous culpability. It does not avail themto say that the Irish Party had been guilty of treachery to Ireland, that it misled the Ministry as to the extent and depth of Ulster'sirreconcilability, and that it had betrayed its own supporters byreposing a childish faith in Liberal promises. The Government mustbear their own responsibility for allowing Sir Edward Carson and theUlster Covenanters to defy and thwart them at every point, forpermitting what amounted to a mutiny in the army, for ordering theChannel Fleet and the soldiers to Ulster "to put these grave mattersto the test even if the red blood should flow, " and then withdrawingthem again, for issuing a proclamation forbidding the importation ofarms and allowing the Covenanters to spit at it in mockery, andfinally for admitting, in the famous Army Order I have quoted, theRight of Rebellion as part of the constitutional machinery of theState. 

"The gigantic game of bluff"--as the Ulster preparations weretermed--had won outright. The political gamesters, who would notsurrender an inch to Ulster when it could be negotiated with, were nowwilling to surrender everything, including the principle of anindivisible Irish nationhood. "Conversations" between the variousleaders went on during the early months of 1914 to arrange a compromiseand a settlement, the gigantic crime of Partition as a substitute forIrish Freedom was traitorously perpetrated by Ireland's own"representatives" and by the so-called "Home Rule Government, " andIreland woke up one fine morning to find that the Home Rule Act evenwhen on the Statute Book might as well not be there--all the bonfiresthat were lighted in Ireland to hail its enactmentnothwithstanding--that "Dark Rosaleen, " the mother that they loved sowell, was to be brutally dismembered, and that "A Nation Once Again" wasto mean, in the words of Sir Horace Plunkett: "Half Home Rule forthree-quarters of Ireland. " The Prime Minister had proposed thepartition of Ireland--three-fourths to go to the Nationalists andone-fourth to the Orangemen--and the Irish Party had accepted theproposal, nay, more, they summoned a Conference of Northern Nationalistsand compelled them to pass a resolution, strongly against theirinclination, in favour of the proposal, under threat of the resignationof Messrs Redmond, Dillon and Devlin if the resolution were not adopted. 

An Amending Bill was immediately introduced into Parliament (23rd June1914), which provided for the exclusion of such Ulster counties asmight avail themselves of it. This measure was transformed by theHouse of Lords so as permanently to exclude the whole of Ulster fromthe operations of the Home Rule Act. 

By people forgetful of the facts, it is sometimes supposed that thePartition was agreed to by the Irish Party under the pressure of warconditions. This is not so. The Party have not even this poor excuseto justify their betrayal, which was the culminating point in thesteep declivity of their downfall. The All-for-Ireland Party resistedwith all the strength at their command the violation of Ireland'snational unity. We spoke against it, voted against it, did all wecould to rouse the conscience of the people as to its unparallelediniquity. But though a proposal more offensive to every instinct ofnational feeling could not be submitted, the Irish Party determined tosee the thing through--they seemed anxious to catch at any straw thatwould save them from an irretrievable doom. On account of the deadlockbetween the Lords and Commons on the question of exclusion, and with aview to the adjustment of differences, it was announced that the Kinghad summoned a Conference of two representatives from eachParty--eight in all--to meet at Buckingham Palace. It is believed thatthis Conference was initiated by His Majesty but taken with theknowledge and consent of the Ministry. Messrs Redmond and Dillonrepresented the Irish Party, and thus the man (Mr Dillon) who had beenfor ten years denouncing any Conference with his own countrymen wentblithely into a Conference at Buckingham Palace, where the only issueto be discussed was as to whether Sir Edward Carson should have fouror six counties for his kingdom in the North. On this point theConference for the moment disagreed, but nothing can ever undo thefact that a body of Irishmen claiming to be Nationalists had not onlyignobly agreed to the Partition of their native land but, after twelvemonths for deliberation, agreed to surrender six counties, instead offour, to the Covenanters. And the time came when it was remembered forthem in an Ireland which had worthier concepts of Nationality thanpartition and plunder. 

 CHAPTER XXIV

 FORMATION OF IRISH VOLUNTEERS AND OUTBREAK OF WAR

Meanwhile Nationalist Ireland was deep in its heart revolted by theway the Parliamentary Party was managing its affairs. They soughtstill to delude it with the cry that "the Act" was on the Statute Bookand that all would be well. My experience of my own people is thatonce confidence is yielded to a person or party they are trustful toan amazing degree; let that confidence once be disturbed, thendistrust and suspicion are quickly bred--and to anyone who knows theCeltic psychology a suspicious Irishman is not a very pleasant personto deal with. This the Party were to find out in suitable time. Meanwhile the young men of the South saw no reason why, Ulster beingarmed and insolent, they might not become armed and self-reliant. Andaccordingly, without any petty distinctions of party, or class, orcreed, they decided to band themselves into a body of volunteers andthey adopted a title sanctioned in Irish history--namely, the IrishVolunteers. 

The movement was publicly inaugurated at a meeting held in theRotunda, Dublin, on 25th November 1913, the leading spirits in theorganisation being Captain White, D. S. O. , and Sir Roger Casement, aNorthern Protestant who, knighted by England for his consular anddiplomatic services, was later to meet the death penalty at her handsfor his loyalty to his own country. The new body drew its supportersfrom Parliamentarians, Sinn Feiners, Republicans and every other classof Irish Nationalist. The manifesto it issued stated: "The objectproposed for the Irish Volunteers is to secure and maintain the rightsand liberties common to all the people of Ireland. Their duties willbe defensive and protective and they will not attempt eitheraggression or domination. Their ranks are open to all able-bodiedIrishmen without distinction of creed, politics, or social grade. " Andthen it appealed "in the name of national unity, of national dignity, of national and individual liberty, of manly citizenship to ourcountrymen to recognise and accept without hesitation the opportunitythat has been granted to them to join the ranks of the IrishVolunteers and to make the movement now begun not unworthy of thehistoric title which it has adopted. " The president of the Volunteerswas Professor John MacNeill, who had borne an honourable anddistinguished part in the Gaelic League Revival. They declared theyhad nothing to fear from the Ulster Volunteers nor the UlsterVolunteers from them. They acknowledged that the Northern body hadopened the way for a National Volunteer movement, but whilst at firstthey were willing to cheer Sir Edward Carson because he had shown themthe way to arm, it was not long before they recognised that whilstextending courtesy to Ulster, their supreme duty was the defence ofIrish liberty. For this they drilled and armed in quiet but firmdetermination. When Partition became part of the policy of the IrishParty, Mr Redmond and his friends had many warnings that the IrishVolunteers were not in existence to support the mutilation of Ireland. They proclaimed their intention originally of placing themselves atthe disposal of an Irish Parliament, but not of the kind contemplatedby the Home Rule Bill. The Irish Party saw in the Volunteers aformidable menace to their power, if not to their continued existence. They must either control them or suppress them. Mr Redmond demandedthe right to nominate a committee of twenty-five "true-blue"supporters of his own policy. The Volunteer Committee had either todeclare war on Mr Redmond or submit to his demand. They submitted. TheGovernment, who were supposed to have instigated and inspired MrRedmond's demand, were satisfied. The reconstituted Committee calledthe new body the National Volunteers. 

But though the Redmondites got control of the Committee they did notsucceed in curbing the spirit of the Volunteers. And besides there wasin Dublin an independent body of Volunteers entitled the Citizen Army, under the control of Messrs Connolly and Larkin. This was purely drawnfrom the workers of the metropolis and was fiercely antagonistic tothe Ancient Order of Hibernians, which _The Irish Worker_declared to be "the foulest growth that ever cursed this land, " andagain as "a gang of place-hunters and political thugs. "

It appears Mr Redmond's nominees gave little assistance in arming theVolunteers, but the original members of the Committee got arms ontheir own responsibility and, imitating the exploit of the_Fanny_, they ran a cargo of rifles into Howth. The forces of theCrown, which winked at the Larne gun-running, made themselves activeat Howth. The Volunteers were intercepted on their way back by amilitary force, but succeeded in getting away with their rifles. Thesoldiers, on returning to Dublin, irritated at their failure to getthe arms and provoked by a jeering crowd, fired on them, killing three(including one woman) and wounding thirty-two. "It was, " writes MrRobert Lynd, "Sir Edward Carson and Mr Bonar Law who introduced thebloody rule of the revolver into modern Ireland and the first victimswere the Dublin citizens shot down in Bachelor's Walk on the eve ofthe war. "

Hardly had the echoes of the Dublin street firing died down before thethunders of war were heard on the Continent. Germany had temporarilycut through the entanglements of the Irish situation, and from theisland drama across the Irish Sea the thoughts of all flew to theworld tragedy that was commencing with an entire continent for abattlefield. 

If the situation created by the war had been properly handled, itcould, with the exercise of a little tact and management and, it maybe, with the application of a certain pressure upon Ulster, have beenturned to magnificent account for the settlement of Ireland'sdifficulties and disagreements. The Home Rule Bill had not yet passedinto law. Anything was possible in regard to it. Again, however--andwith the utmost regret it must be set down--the wrong turning wastaken. 

Confronted with a common peril, all British parties drew together in aunited effort to support the war. The Irish Party had to declarethemselves. Mr Redmond spoke in Parliament with restraint andqualification, but he made a sensation, at which probably nobody wasmore surprised than himself, when he said that the Government mightwithdraw all her troops from Ireland; her coasts would be defended byher armed sons and the National Volunteers would gladly co-operatewith those of Ulster in doing so. Mr Redmond might have bargained forthe immediate enactment of Home Rule or he might have remainedneutral. Instead he gave a half-hearted offer of service at home, "todefend the shores of Ireland, " and forthwith Sir Edward Greyproclaimed, with an applauding Empire to support him, that "Irelandwas the one bright spot. " Yes, but at what a cost to Ireland herself!It is a fallacy, widely believed in, that Mr Redmond proposed adefinite war policy. He did not. He did not at first promise a singlerecruit for the front. He did not put England upon her honour even togrant "full self-government" in return for Irish service. Admittedthat the Home Rule Act was on the Statute Book; but it was accompaniedby a Suspensory Bill postponing its operation, and the Governmentlikewise gave a guarantee that an Amending Bill would be introduced tomake the measure acceptable to Ulster according to the bargain agreedto by the Irish Party surrendering the Six Counties to Carson. 

The Ulster Party, on the other hand, were determined to extract thelast ounce of advantage they could out of the situation. They made nopromises and gave no guarantees until they knew where they stood. Whenit was seen, after the war had been for a month running its untowardcourse against the Allies, that they had nothing to fear from HomeRule, they told the Ulster Volunteers they were free to enlist. 

The official organ of Sinn Fein and _The Irish Worker_ wereagainst any Irish offer of service, but the bulk of Nationalistopinion undoubtedly favoured the Allied course on the broad grounds ofits justice and righteousness. Mr William O'Brien sought to unite allIrish parties on a definite war policy. He held the view that "howeverlegitimate would have been the policy of compelling England to fulfilher pledges by holding sternly aloof in her hour of necessity, thepolicy of frank and instant friendship on condition of that fulfilmentwould have been greatly the more effectual to make Home Rule anecessity that could not be parried, as well as to start it underevery condition of cordiality all round. "

But Mr Redmond and his friends missed the tide of the war opportunityas they missed all other tides. They were neither one thing nor theother. Mr Redmond spoke in Ireland in halting and hesitating fashion, publicly asking the National Volunteers to stay at home, and againmade half-hearted speeches in favour of recruiting. Mr Redmond'ssupporters in Cork were not, however, as politically obtuse as heappeared to be, or perhaps as his associations with Mr Dilloncompelled him to be. Through the writer they asked Mr O'Brien to setforth a plan of united action. Mr O'Brien did so in a memorandum whichsuggested that Mr Redmond should take the initiative in inviting aConference with the Irish Unionists to devise a programme of commonaction for the double purpose of drawing up an agreement for Home Ruleon a basis beyond cavil in the matter of generosity to the IrishUnionists, and, on the strength of this agreement, undertaking a jointcampaign to raise an Irish Army Corps, with its reserves, which was MrAsquith's own measure of Ireland's just contribution. Mr O'Brien wasin a position to assure Mr Redmond, and did in fact assure him, thatif he took the initiative in summoning this Conference, he would havethe ready co-operation of some of the most eminent Irish Unionists whofollowed Lord Midleton three years afterwards. To this Memorandum MrO'Brien never received any reply, and I have reason to believe thatall the reply received by Mr Redmond's own supporters in Cork, whosubmitted the Memorandum to him with an expression of their ownapproval of its terms, was a mere formal acknowledgment. 

I am confident that Mr Redmond's own judgment favoured this proposal, as it did the policy of Conference and Conciliation in 1909, but thathe was overborne by the other bosses, who had him completely at theirmercy and who had not the wisdom to see that this gave them a gloriousand honourable way out of their manifold difficulties. 

There were, meanwhile, differences at the headquarters of the NationalVolunteers over Mr Redmond's offer of their services "for the defenceof the shores of Ireland, " which was made without their knowledge orconsent. They, however, passed a resolution declaring "the completereadiness of the Irish Volunteers to take joint action with the UlsterVolunteer Force for the defence of Ireland. " The Prime Ministerpromised in Parliament that the Secretary for War would "do everythingin his power after consultation with gentlemen in Ireland, to arrangefor the full equipment and organisation of the Irish Volunteers. " Butthe War Office had other views in the matter, and though a scheme wasdrawn up by General Sir Arthur Paget, Commanding the Forces inIreland, "by which the War Office may be supplied from the IrishVolunteers with a force for the defence of Ireland, " this scheme wasimmediately rejected by the War Office authorities who, in theirefforts to gain Irish recruits--and I write with perfect knowledge ofthe facts--were guilty of every imaginable blunder and every possibleinsult to Irish sentiment and Irish ideals. 

The Ulster Volunteers, on the other hand, were allowed to retain theirown officers and their own tests of admission, and were taken over, holus-bolus, as they stood; were trained in camps of their own, hadtheir own banners, were kept compactly together and were recognised inevery way as a distinct unit of Army organisation. All of theseprivileges were insolently refused to the Nationalists of theSouth--they were for a time employed in the paltry duty of mindingbridges, but they were withdrawn from even this humiliatingperformance after a short period. 

Meanwhile an Irish Division was called for to be composed of SouthernNationalists, and with the Government guarantee that "it would bemanned by Irishmen and officered by Irishmen. " I had my own strong andearnest conviction about the war and the justice and righteousness ofthe Allied cause. I felt, if service was offered at all, it should notbe confined to "defence of the shores of Ireland, " but should be givenabroad where, under battle conditions, the actual issue between rightand wrong would be decided. I made my own offer of service in November1914, and all the claim I make was that I was actuated by one desireand one only--to advance, humbly as may be, in myself the cause ofIrish freedom. For the rest, I served and I suffered, and Isacrificed, and if the results were not all that we intended let thiscredit at least be given to those of us who joined up then, that weenlisted for worthy and honourable motives and that we sought, andsought alone, the ultimate good of Ireland in doing so. Mr Redmond'sfamily bore their own honourable and distinguished part in "The IrishBrigade, " as it came to be known, and Major "Willie" Redmond, when hedied on the field of France, offered his life as surely for Ireland asany man who ever died for Irish liberty. 

Faith was not kept with "The Irish Brigade" in either the manning orthe officering of it by Irishmen, and the time came when, throughfailure of reserves, it was Irish more in name than in anything else, and when the gaps caused by casualties had to be filled by Englishrecruits. A disgusted and disappointed country turned its thoughtsaway from constitutional channels; and the betrayals of Ireland'shopes, and dignity and honour, which had gone on during the years, were fast leading to their natural and inevitable Nemesis. 

 CHAPTER XXV

 THE EASTER WEEK REBELLION AND AFTERWARDS

A world preoccupied with the tremendous movements of mighty armieswoke up one morning and rubbed its eyes in amazement to read that arebellion had broken out in the capital of Ireland. How did it happen?What did it mean? What was the cause of it? These and similarquestions were being asked, and those who were ready with an answerwere very few indeed. The marvellous thing, a matter almost incredibleof belief, is that it caught the Irish Government absolutely unawares. Their Secret Service Department might as well not have been inexistence. For the first time probably in Irish history an Irishmovement had come into being which had not a single "informer" in itsranks. This in itself was a remarkable thing and to be noted. Theleaders and their officers had accomplished the remarkable achievementof discriminating against the Secret Service agent. 

Although everything was clouded in a mist of conjecture and obscurityat the time, the causes of the Rebellion of Easter Week are now fairlyclear, and may be shortly summarised. From the moment that theRedmondite Party had imposed their conditions on the Committee of theIrish Volunteers the vast bulk of the Volunteers who were not also"Mollies" were thoroughly dissatisfied with the arrangement. Thisdiscontent increased when the recruiting campaign in Ireland wasconducted with calculated offence to Nationalist sentiment andself-respect, and eventually developed into a split. The members ofthe original Committee as a result summoned a Volunteer Convention for25th November 1914, at which it was decided to declare: "That Irelandcannot with honour or safety take part in foreign quarrels otherwisethan through the free action of a National Government of her own; andto repudiate the claim of any man to offer up the blood and lives ofthe sons of Irishmen and Irishwomen to the service of the BritishEmpire while no National Government which could act and speak for thepeople of Ireland is allowed to exist. "

The new body, or rather the old, resumed the original title of theIrish Volunteers. There were also a number of other bodies entirelyout of harmony with the policy of the Parliamentary Party, such asSinn Feiners, the Republicans, and the Citizen Army of Dublin'sworkers organised in connection with Liberty Hall. These were allopposed to recruiting, and the extremists amongst them advocated totalseparation from England as the cardinal article of their faith. A newSeparatist daily newspaper was published in Dublin under the title_Eire--Ireland_. Its attitude towards the war was that Irelandhad no cause of quarrel with the German people, or just cause ofoffence against them; and it was not long before the Irish Volunteerscame to be regarded by the British authorities as a "disaffected"organisation. Its organs in the Press were promptly suppressed, onlyfor others as promptly to take their place. Its officers began to bedeported without charge preferred or investigation of any sort. Fenianteachings became popular once more and "the Old Guard" of Ireland, whohad remained ever loyal to their early Fenian faith, must have felt apulsing of their veins when they saw the doctrines of their hot youthtake shape again. The eyes of a small but resolute minority of IrishNationalists began to see in red revolution the only hope of Irishfreedom. Physical force may appear a hopeless policy but it was atleast worth preparing for, and it may be also it would be worth thetrial. This was their creed and this the purpose that animated them. There can be no doubt that through the medium of the old IrishRepublican Brotherhood, which had never quite died out in Ireland, communications were kept up with the Clan-na-Gael and other extremeorganisations in the United States, and through these avenues alsoprobably with Germany. Indeed the German Foreign Office, quite earlyin the war, at the instigation of Sir Roger Casement had declaredformally "that Germany would not invade Ireland with any intentions ofconquest or of the destruction of any institutions. " If they did landin the course of the war, they would come "inspired by good willtowards a land and a people for whom Germany only wishes nationalprosperity and freedom. "

The avowedly revolutionary party gained a great accession of strengthwhen Mr P. H. Pearse and Mr James Connolly composed certain differencesand united the workers in the Citizen Army with the Irish Volunteers. Mr Pearse was now the leader of the latter organisation--a man of highintellectual attainments, single-minded purpose, and austerecharacter. "For many years, " writes Mr Henry, "his life seems to havebeen passed in the grave shadow of the sacrifice he felt that he wascalled upon to make for Ireland. He believed that he was appointed totread the path that Robert Emmet and Wolfe Tone had trodden beforehim, and his life was shaped so that it might be worthy of its end. "

Separation as the only road to independence was the burden of Pearse'steaching. It was his definite purpose to do something which, by thesplendour of the sacrifice involved, would rouse Ireland out of itsnational apathy and national stupor. He and his associates believed, as a writer in _Nationality_ declared: "We have the material, themen and stuff of war, the faith and purpose and cause forrevolution.... We shall have Ireland illumined with a light beforewhich even the Martyrs' will pale: the light of Freedom, of a deeddone and action taken and a blow struck for the Old Land. " It was inthis faith they went forth to their sacrifice. "On Palm Sunday 1916, "writes Mr Henry, "the Union of Irish Labour and Irish Nationality wasproclaimed in a striking fashion. In the evening of that day Connollyhoisted over Liberty Hall, the headquarters of the Citizen Army, theIrish tricolour of orange, white, and green, the flag designed by theYoung Irelanders in 1848 to symbolise the union of the Orange andGreen by the white bond of a common brotherhood. On Easter Monday theIrish Republic was proclaimed in Arms in Dublin. "

Now there are many considerations that could be usefully discussed inrelation to the Easter Week Rebellion, but this is not the time orplace for them. Let it be made clear, however, that the Rising was notthe work of Sinn Fein, but of the leaders of the Irish Volunteers andthe Citizen Army. It would be a pretty subject of inquiry to know howSinn Fein got the credit for the Rising and why the title was given tothe new movement that came into being afterwards. My own view is thatthe British journalists who swarmed into Ireland are chieflyresponsible for the designation. _Sinn Fein_ was a fine mouthfulfor their British readers to swallow, and so they gave it to them. Bethis as it may, the Rebellion came to be referred to as the Sinn FeinRebellion, and the movement to which it gave birth has ever sinceassumed the same name. It is not my intention to dwell on the graveincidents that followed, the prolonged agony of "the shootings of theRebel leaders, " the assassination of Mr Sheehy-Skeffington, theindecent scenes in the House of Commons when the Nationalist membersbehaved themselves with sad lack of restraint--cheering Mr Birrell'sprediction that "the Irish people would never regard the DublinRebellion with the same feelings with which they regarded previousrebellions, " cheering still more loudly when, in response to SirEdward Carson's invitation to Mr Redmond to join him in "denouncingand putting down those Rebels for evermore, " Mr Redmond expressed, tothe amazement of all Nationalist Ireland, his "horror and detestation"of Irishmen who, however mistaken they may be--and history has yet todecide this--at least "poured out their blood like heroes--as theybelieved and as millions of their countrymen now believe for Ireland"(Mr William O'Brien). Mr Dillon, needless to say, flung his leaderoverboard on this occasion without the slightest truth. He declared hehad never stood on a recruiting platform (which was not true!) andthat he never would do so, and accused the Government and the soldiersof washing out the life-work of the Nationalists in "a sea of blood. "

The Government were at their wits' end what to do. Mr Birrell, theamiable and inefficient Chief Secretary, had to go. Mr Asquith wentover to Ireland on a tour of investigation and returned to Westminsterwith two dominant impressions: (1) the breakdown of the existingmachinery of Irish Government; (2) the strength and depth, almost theuniversality, of the feeling in Ireland that there was a uniqueopportunity for the settlement of outstanding problems and for acombined effort to obtain an agreement as to the way in which thegovernment of Ireland was to be carried on for the future. Heannounced that Mr Lloyd George had undertaken, at the request of hiscolleagues, to devote his time and energy to the promotion of an Irishsettlement. 

Undoubtedly "the machinery of Government had broken down. " But theGovernment of England had taken no account of what was happening inIreland--of the veritable wave of passion that swept the countryafter, the "executions" of the Rebel leaders, of the manner in whichthis passion was fanned and flamed by the arrest and deportation ofthousands of young men all over the country, who were believed to beprominently identified with the Volunteer Movement, of the unrest thatwas caused by the reports that a number of the peaceable citizens ofDublin were deliberately shot without cause by the troops during themilitary occupation of the city. What wonder that there was a strongand even fierce revulsion of feeling! And this was not reservedaltogether for the Government. The Irish Parliamentarians had theirown fair share of it. The process of disillusionment now rapidly setin. That portion of the country that had not already completely lostfaith in the Party and in Parliamentary methods was fast losing it. Itonly required that the Party should once again give its unqualifiedassent, as it did, to Mr Lloyd George's "Headings of Agreement, " whichprovided for the partition of Ireland and the definite exclusion ofthe six counties of Down, Antrim, Londonderry, Armagh, Monaghan andTyrone, to send it down into the nethermost depths of popular favourand the whole-hearted contempt of every self-respecting man of theIrish race. The collapse of Parliamentarianism was now complete. Therewas no Nationalist of independent spirit left in Ireland who wouldeven yield it lip service. Irish public bodies which a year or twopreviously were the obedient vehicles of Party manipulation were nowunanimous in denouncing any form of partition. The proposals forsettlement definitely failed, and the machinery of Irish Governmentwhich had "broken down" was set up afresh and the discreditedadministration of Dublin Castle fully restored by the appointment ofMr Duke, a Unionist, as Chief Secretary for Ireland. 

The war was not going at all well for the Allies. America was stillhesitating on the brink as to whether she would come in or remainsteadfastly aloof. The Asquithian Ministry had been manoeuvred out ofoffice under circumstances which it will be the joy of the historianto deal with when all the documents and facts are available. Thatinteresting and candid diarist, Colonel Repington, under date 3rdDecember 1916, writes:

"Last Friday began a great internal crisis, when L. G. [Lloyd George]wrote to the P. M. [Asquith] that he could not go on unless our methodsof waging war were speeded up. He proposed a War Council of three, including himself, Bonar Law and Carson. The two latter are with him, which means the Unionists too. "

Asquith resigned, the Coalition Ministry was formed, and it isprobably more than a surmise that the part played by Sir Edward Carsonin bringing about this result and in elevating Mr Lloyd George intothe Premiership explains much of the power he has exercised over himever since. Mr Redmond and Sir Edward Carson were both invited to jointhe Coalition. The former declined, the latter accepted, and from hisposition of power within the Cabinet was able to torpedo Home Rule atwill. 

And thus came to an end in Ireland as gross a tyranny perpetrated inthe sacred name of Nationality as ever disgraced our annals. The Partywhich had so long held power had destroyed themselves by years ofselfish blundering. The country was growing weary of the men whokilled land purchase, constituted themselves the mere dependents of anEnglish Party in exchange for boundless jobbery, intensified the alarmof Ulster by transferring all power and patronage to a pseudo-Catholicsecret organisation, and crowned their incompetence by accepting amiserably inadequate Home Rule Bill (with Partition twice over thrownin). The country which had been shackled into silence by the terroristmethods of the Board of Erin (which made the right of free meetingimpossible by the use of their batons, bludgeons and revolvers) wasemancipated by the Dublin Rising. And in the scale of things it mustbe counted, for the young men who risked their lives in Easter Week, not the least of their performances that they gave back to the peopleof Ireland the right of thinking and acting for themselves. How wellthey used this right to exact a full measure of retribution from theParty that had betrayed them the General Election of 1918 abundantlyshows. 

 CHAPTER XXVI

 THE IRISH CONVENTION AND THE CONSCRIPTION OF IRELAND

The time had now come when the Irish Party had to taste all thebitterness of actual and anticipated defeat. Several Irish newspapershad gone over to Sinn Fein. _The Irish Independent_ had beenpreviously a fearless critic of the Party, and the defeat of thePartition proposals was largely due to the manner in which they haddenounced them and exposed their real character. 

A bye-election took place in North Roscommon. There was a straightfight between the Parliamentary Party and Sinn Fein and the formerwere defeated by an overwhelming majority. Another trial of strengthcame soon afterwards, and the Party again bit the dust. TheCoalitionists had now turned a cold shoulder to the Party. They couldget along very well without them. They had got all they could out ofthem for war purposes. They foresaw their approaching defeat, and theydid not, therefore, count on their scheme of things as a force to beconciliated or to be afraid of. And as if to ensure the completedownfall and overthrow of the Party the Government continued theirarrests and deportations. 

The Party had to "demonstrate" in some way and they hit upon the deviceof withdrawing from Parliament and sending a Manifesto to the UnitedStates and the self-governing dominions. But whilst they paid _SinnFein_ the compliment of adopting their policy of Parliamentaryabstention, they neither honestly kept away nor openly remained--askingquestions and sending ambassadors from time to time. _Sinn Fein_ was notinactive either. It summoned a Convention to meet in Dublin to assertthe independence of Ireland, its status as a nation and its right torepresentation at the Peace Conference. 

The Government was still faced with a reluctant and undecided America, and it became essential for "propaganda purposes" to do something offair seeming on the Irish Question. The Prime Minister accordinglyrevived the old Partition proposals, but these were now dead anddamned by all parties, the Roscommon, Longford and East Clarevictories of Sinn Fein having brought the Irish Party to disown theirtwice-repeated bargain for Partition. He then proposed as analternative that an Irish Convention, composed of representativeIrishmen, should assemble to deliberate upon the best means ofgoverning their own country. 

The All-for-Ireland Party were asked to nominate representatives tothis Convention, as were also Sinn Fein. In reply Mr O'Brien statedfour essential conditions of success: (1) a Conference of ten or adozen persons known to intend peace; (2) a prompt agreement, makingevery conceivable concession to Ulster, with the one reservation thatpartition in any shape or form was inadmissible and unthinkable; (3)the immediate submission of the agreement to a Referendum of the Irishpeople (never before consulted upon a definite proposal); (4) if anyconsiderable minority of irreconcilables still uttered threats of anUlster rebellion a bold appeal of the Government to the Britishelectorate at a General Election to declare once and for all betweenthe claims of reason and justice and the incorrigibility of Ulster. 

One panel of names which Mr O'Brien submitted to the Cabinet at theirrequest was: The Lord Mayor of Dublin, the Protestant Primate, theCatholic Archbishop of Dublin, the Marquess of Londonderry, theMarquess of Ormonde, General Sir Hubert Gough, Major "Willie" Redmond, M. P. , the Earl of Shaftesbury, the Earl of Dunraven, ViscountNorthcliffe, Mr William Martin Murphy, Mr Hugh Barrie, M. P. , and tworepresentatives of Sinn Fein. Mr O'Brien was in a position toguarantee that at a Conference thus constituted Sinn Fein would not beunrepresented. Instead of setting up a Conference of this character, which it is now clear would not have separated without coming to anagreement, the proposal was set aside--whether by Mr Lloyd George orby Mr Redmond's advisers has yet to be revealed--and an IrishConvention composed of nominated representatives was constituted, which had no possibility of agreement except an agreement on the linesof Partition and which was doubtless planned and conceived for thepurpose of fooling Ireland and America and keeping the Convention"talking" for nine months until America was wiled into the war. 

The Convention could by no possibility succeed, and my belief is itwas never intended to succeed. It was numerically unwieldy. Nine-tenths of its representation was drawn from the Ulster Party'sand the Irish Party's supporters, both of whom were pledged in advanceto the Partition settlement, and as far as the Irish Partyrepresentation was concerned the last thing that could be said of itwas that it was representative. Of the seventy-five Redmondites whocomposed three-fourths of the Convention only one escaped rejection byhis constituents as soon as the electors had their say! The Conventionlaboured under the still further disadvantage of being at the mercy ofan Orange veto, which makes one wonder how it was that Mr Redmond orhis party ever submitted to it. The Ulster delegates to the Conventionwere under the control of an outside body--the Ulster Orange Council. They could decide nothing without reference to this body, and hencethe Convention was in the perfectly humiliating position of carryingon its proceedings subject to an outside Orange veto. 

Neither the All-for-Ireland Party nor Sinn Fein was represented at theConvention, although Mr Lloyd George made a second appeal to MrO'Brien to assist in its deliberations. It says something for thewisdom of Mr O'Brien's proposal for a small Conference that afterdebating the matter for months the Convention decided to transmittheir powers to a Committee of Nine to draw up terms of agreement. This Committee did actually reach agreement, only to have it squelchedinstantly by the veto of the Ulster Council when the Ulster nomineesreported the terms of it to them. Lord MacDonnell, in a letter to_The Times_, dated 2nd November 1919, makes the followingdisclosure regarding Mr Redmond's view of this matter:--

"In regard to this episode I well remember the late Mr Redmond sayingin conversation that if he had foreseen the possibility of a proposalmade there being submitted for judgment to men who had notparticipated in the Convention's proceedings, and were removed fromits pervading atmosphere of good will, he would never have consentedto enter it. "

Mr O'Brien, however, saw this danger in advance and drew publicattention to it. In a speech in the House of Commons he also foretoldwhat the failure of the Convention meant: the destruction of theconstitutional movement and the setting up of "the right of rebellion, whether from the Covenanters or Sinn Feiners as the only arbiter leftin Irish affairs. You will justly make Parliamentary methods moredespised and detested than they are at the present moment by the youngmen of Ireland. "

The Convention failed to reach unanimity. It presented variousreports, and the Government, glad of so easy a way out, simply didnothing. The Convention served the Ministerial purpose, and there wasan end of it. The proceedings were, however, notable for one tragicincident. Mr Redmond sought to rally the majority of the Convention insupport of a compromise which, whilst falling short of Dominion HomeRule, avoided partition and would have been acceptable to SouthernUnionist opinion. Mr Devlin and the Catholic Bishops opposed MrRedmond's motion and the Irish leader, feeling himself deserted at themost critical moment, did not move, and withdrew from the Conventionto his death, adding another to the long list of tragic figures inIrish history. 

The only practical outcome of the Convention was the acceptance ofDominion Home Rule by a minority, which included Mr Devlin. As if tomake matters as impracticable as possible for the Parliamentarians, MrLloyd George introduced a Bill to conscript Ireland at the very timethe Convention proposals were before Parliament. A more callousindifference to Irish psychology could scarcely be imagined. A seriesof Sinn Fein victories at the polls had decided the fate of Partitiononce and for all. But the war exigencies of the Government were sogreat, the military situation on the Continent was so hazardous, theyseemed determined to risk even civil war in their resolve to getIrishmen to serve. They must have fighting men at any cost. The menacewas very real, and the whole of Nationalist Ireland came together asone man to resist it. The representatives of the Irish Party, ofLabour, of Sinn Fein and of the All-for-Irelanders met in Conferenceat the Mansion House, Dublin, to concert measures of Irish defence. The Mansion House Conference, at its first meeting, on 18th April, issued the following declaration:--

"Taking our stand on Ireland's separate and distinct nationhood, andaffirming the principle of liberty, that the Governments of nationsderive their just powers from the consent of the governed, we deny theright of the British Government or any external authority to imposecompulsory military service in Ireland against the clearly expressedwill of the Irish people. The passing of the Conscription Bill by theBritish House of Commons must be regarded as a declaration of war onthe Irish nation. The alternative to accepting it as such is tosurrender our liberties and to acknowledge ourselves slaves. It is indirect violation of the rights of small nationalities toself-determination, which even the Prime Minister of England--nowpreparing to employ naked militarism and force his Act uponIreland--himself announced as an essential condition for peace at thePeace Congress. The attempt to enforce it is an unwarrantableaggression, which we call upon all Irishmen to resist by the mosteffective means at their disposal. "

The Irish Catholic Bishops on the same day received a deputation fromthe Mansion House Conference, and, having heard them, issued amanifesto, in the course of which they said:

"In view especially of the historic relations between the twocountries from the very beginning up to this moment, we consider thatConscription forced in this way upon Ireland is an oppressive andinhuman law, which the Irish people have a right to resist by everymeans that are consonant with the law of God. "

The Irish Labour Party called a one-day strike on 23rd April as "ademonstration of fealty to the cause of labour and Ireland. "

The Government went on with its preparations for enforcingConscription. The Lord-Lieutenant, who was known to be opposed to thepolicy of the Ministry, was recalled, and Field-Marshal Lord Frenchwas put in his place. A "German plot, " which the late Viceroy declaredhad no existence in fact, was supposed to be discovered, and inconnection with it Messrs de Valera and A. Griffith, the two Sinn Feinmembers of the Mansion House Conference, were arrested and deported. The Sinn Fein, the Gaelic League and allied organisations weredeclared to be "dangerous associations. " Concerts, hurling matches, etc. , were prohibited, and Ireland was frankly treated as an occupiedterritory. A bye-election occurred in East Cavan and MrGriffith--England's prisoner--was returned, defeating a nominee of theIrish Party. This gave the death-blow to Conscription, though Irelandstill stood sternly on guard. 

The Mansion House Conference during its existence held a position ofunique authority in the country. During its sittings a proposal wasmade to initiate negotiations with a view to combined action betweenSinn Fein, the two sections of Parliamentary Nationalists and theIrish Labour bodies, on the basis of the concession of Dominion HomeRule, while the war was still proceeding with the alternative, if theconcession were refused, of combined action to enforce the claims ofIreland at the Peace Conference. There was reason to believe Sinn Feinwould agree to this proposal, and that the Cabinet would have invitedthe Dominion Premiers' Conference to intervene in favour of an Irishsettlement, limited only by the formula: "within the Empire. "

Mr Dillon blocked the way with the technical objection that theConference was called to discuss Conscription alone and that no othertopic must be permitted to go further. Could stupid malignancy orblind perversity go further?

This fair chance was lost, with so many others. The war came to an endand a few weeks afterwards the Irish Parliamentary Party, which had solong played shuttlecock with the national destinies of Ireland, wentto crashing doom and disaster at the polls. The country had found themout for what they were, and it cast them into that outer darkness fromwhich, for them, there is no returning. 

 CHAPTER XXVII

 "THE TIMES" AND IRISH SETTLEMENT

No volume, professing to deal however cursorily with the events of theperiod, can ignore the profound influence of _The Times_ as afactor in promoting an Irish settlement. That this powerful organ ofopinion--so long arrayed in deadly hostility to Ireland--should havein recent years given sympathetic ear to her sufferings anddisabilities is an event of the most tremendous significance, and itis not improbable that the Irish administration in these troubledyears would have been even more deplorably vicious than it has beenwere it not that _The Times_ showed the way to other independentjournals in England in vigilant criticism and fearless exposure ofofficial wrongdoing. 

When, on St Patrick's Day, 1917, Lord Northcliffe spoke at the IrishClub in London on the urgency of an Irish settlement and on the needfor the economic and industrial development of the country, and whenhe proclaimed himself an Irish-born man with "a strong strain of Irishblood" in him, he did a sounder day's work for Ireland than heimagined, for he shattered a tradition of evil association which forgenerations had linked the name of a great English newspaper withunrelenting opposition to Ireland's historic claim for independence. If Ireland had been then approached in the generous spirit of LordNorthcliffe's speech, if the investigation into Irish self-governmentfor which he pleaded had then taken place, if British statesmen hadmade "a supreme effort, " as he begged them to do, "to find goodgovernment for Ireland, " I am convinced that all the horrors andmanifold disasters of the past four years would have been avoided, andthe Irish people would be at this moment in happiness and contentmentadministering their own affairs. But the voice of sweet reasonablenessand statesmanlike admonition was not hearkened unto. The neglect ofIreland and of her industrial concerns, of which Lord Northcliffe sojustly made complaint, continued, and instead of the counsels of peaceprevailing all the follies of wrong methods and repressive courseswere committed which will leave enduring memories of bitterness andbroken faith long after a settlement is reached. Meanwhile _TheTimes_ devoted itself earnestly and assiduously to the cause ofpeace and justice. It opened its columns to the expression of reasonedopinion on the Irish case. The problem of settlement was admittedlyone of extreme difficulty--it welcomed discussion and consideration ofevery feasible plan in the hope that some _via media_ might befound which would constitute a basis of comparative agreement betweenthe various warring factors. It even instituted independent inquiriesof its own and gave an exhaustive and splendidly impartial survey ofthe whole Irish situation and of the various influences, psychological, religious and material, that made the question one ofsuch complexity and so implacably unyielding in many of its features. Its pressure upon the Government was continuous and consistent, butthe Government was deaf to wisdom and dumb to a generous importunity. Not content with appeal, remonstrance and exhortation, _TheTimes_, in the summer of 1919, boldly, and with a courage that wasgreatly daring in the circumstances of the moment, set forth in alldetail, and with a vigorous clearness that was most praiseworthy, itsown plan of settlement. As it was upon this model that the Ministrylater built its Government of Ireland Act, I think it well to quote_The Times_, own summary of its scheme, though it is but properto say that whilst the Government adapted the model it discardedeverything else that was useful and workmanlike in the structure:

 _Legislatures_

Creation by an Act of Settlement of two State Legislatures for

(a) The whole of Ulster, (b) The rest of Ireland, with full powers of legislation in all matters affecting the internalaffairs of their respective States. In each State there will be aState Executive responsible to the State Legislature. 

By the same Act of Settlement, the creation of an All-IrelandParliament on the basis of equal representation of the twoStates--_i. E. , _ Ulster is to have as many representatives as therest of Ireland. 

The All-Ireland Parliament to be a Single Chamber which may sitalternately at Dublin and Belfast. 

 _Powers_

Governing powers not conferred on the State Legislatures will bedivided between the All-Ireland and the Imperial Parliament. 

The Imperial Parliament will retain such powers as those involving theCrown and the Succession; peace and war; the armed forces. 

To the All-Ireland Parliament may be delegated, _inter alia_, thepowers involving direct taxation, Customs and Excise, commercialtreaties (with possible exceptions), land purchase, and education. Thedelegation may take place by stages. 

 _Executive_

Upon the assumption of the Irish Parliament of any or all of thepowers transferred from the Imperial Parliament, an All-IrelandExecutive, responsible to the All-Ireland Parliament, will come intobeing. The Office of Lord Lieutenant, shorn of its politicalcharacter, will continue. The Lord Lieutenant will have the right ofveto on Irish and State legislation, and may be assisted by the IrishPrivy Council. 

 _Safeguards_

To safeguard the liberties of both States, each State Legislature isto have a permanent veto upon the application of its own State of anylegislation passed by an All-Ireland Parliament. 

 _Representation at Westminster_

Ireland will be still represented at Westminster by direct election. The number of representatives to the Commons is to be determined onthe basis of population relative to that of Great Britain. Irishrepresentative peers will retain their seats in the House of Lords. 

 _Constitutional Disputes_

Constitutional disputes between the Imperial and Irish Parliament willbe decided by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council; thosebetween the Irish Parliament and State Legislatures by an IrishSupreme Court. 

 _Finance_

In the financial section of the scheme, the case for the over-taxationof Ireland is considered, but it is urged that, while due accountshould be taken of this circumstance in any plan for financialreconstruction, Ireland ought not to be relieved of her proper shareof the cost of the war or of liability for her share of the NationalDebt. 

Ireland is to contribute an annual sum to the Imperial Exchequer, calculated on the relative taxable capacity of Ireland. This willcover interest on the Irish share of the National Debt and acontribution to the Sinking Fund, as well as to defence and otherImperial expenditure. 

I do not intend to subject the foregoing scheme to any detailedcriticism. The method of constituting the All-Ireland Parliament wasopen to grave objection. It was to be a single chamber legislature andwas to be selected or nominated rather than elected. This damned itright away from the democratic standpoint, and the defence of _TheTimes_ that "the system of delegations would probably have theadvantage of being the simplest inasmuch as it would avoidcomplicating the electoral machinery" was not very forceful. Thesupreme test to be applied to any plan of Irish Government is whetherit provides, beyond yea or nay, for the absolute unity of Ireland asone distinct nation. Unless this essential unity is recognised allproposals for settlement, no matter how generous in intent otherwise, must fail. Mr Lloyd George grossly offended Irish sentiment when heflippantly declared that Ireland was not one nation but two nations. This is the kind of foolishness that makes one despair at times ofBritish good sense, not to speak of British statesmanship. Mr Asquith, whatever his political blunderings--and they were many and grievous inthe case of Ireland--declared in 1912:--"I have always maintained andI maintain as strongly to-day that Ireland is a nation--not twonations but one nation. " And those Prime Ministers of another day--MrGladstone and Mr Disraeli--were equally emphatic in recognising thatIreland was one distinct nation. 

_The Times_ itself saw the folly of partition, for it wrote(24th July 1919):

"The burden of finding a solution rests squarely upon the shoulders ofthe British Government, and they must bear it until at least thebeginnings have been found. Some expedients have found favour amongthose who realise the urgency of an Irish settlement, but have neitheropportunity nor inclination closely to study the intricacies of thequestion. One such expedient is partition in the form of the totalexclusion from the operations of any Irish settlement of the whole ora part of Ulster. Far more cogent reasons than any yet adduced, andfar more certainty that every other path had been explored to the end, would be needed to render this expedient other than superficiallyplausible. Politically there are acute differences between Ulster andthe rest of Ireland; economically they are closely interwoven. Economic bonds are stronger than constitutional devices. The partitionof Ireland would limit the powers of a Southern parliament soseverely, and would leave so little room for development, that itwould preclude any adequate realisation of Nationalist hopes. Forinstance, fiscal autonomy for the Southern provinces could be enjoyedat the price of a Customs barrier round the excluded Ulster Counties. Yet to Irish Nationalists fiscal autonomy is the symbol of freedom. However speciously it may be attired, partition offers no hope of apermanent settlement. "

Although _The Times_ specifically denounced partition itsproposals undoubtedly perpetuated the partition idea and were thusrepugnant to national opinion. Its plan also suggested a settlement byprocess of gradual evolution, but Ireland had progressed far beyondthe point when any step-by-step scheme stood the slightest chance ofsuccess. Credit must, however, be given to it for its generousintentions, for the magnificent spirit of fair play it has shown eversince towards a sadly stricken land and for what it has done and isstill doing to find peace and healing for the wrongs and sufferings ofan afflicted race. For all these things Ireland is deeply grateful, with the gratitude that does not readily forget, and it may be thatwhen all this storm and stress, and the turbulent passions of an evilepoch have passed away, it will be remembered then for Englishmen thattheir greatest organ in the Press maintained a fine tradition ofindependence, and thus did much to redeem the good name of Britainwhen "the Black and Tans" were dragging it woefully in the mire. 

 CHAPTER XXVIII

 THE ISSUES NOW AT STAKE

And now my appointed task draws to its close. In the pages I havewritten I have set nothing down in malice nor have I sought otherwisethan to make a just presentment of facts as they are within myknowledge. It may be that, being a protagonist of one Party in thestruggles and vicissitudes of these years, I may sometimes see thingstoo much from the standpoint of my own preconceived opinions andnotions. But on the whole it has been my endeavour to give an honestand fair-minded narrative of the main events and movements of Irishhistory over a period in which I believe I can claim I am the firstexplorer. There are some subjects which would come properly within thepurview of my title, such as the power, province and influence ofclericalism in politics, but I have thought it best at this stage, when so many matters are in process of readjustment in Ireland, andwhen our people are adapting themselves to a new form of citizen dutyand responsibility, to leave certain aspects of our public lifeuntouched. It may be, however, if this book meets with the success Ihope for it, that my researches and labours in this field ofenterprise are not at an end. 

All I have now to do in this my final chapter is to summarise some ofthe issues that present themselves for our consideration. I do notpropose to deal with the activities of Sinn Fein since it won itsredoubtable victory over the forces of Parliamentarianism asrepresented by the Irish Party at the General Election. The countryturned to it as its only avenue of salvation from a reign ofcorruption, incompetence and helplessness unparalleled in history. MrO'Brien and his friends of the All-for-Ireland League, of their ownvolition, effaced themselves at the General Election. They had striventhrough fifteen long years, against overwhelming odds and mostunscrupulous and malignant forces, for a policy of reason and for theprinciples of Conference, Conciliation and Consent, as between allIrish-born men and a combination of all parties, Irish and British, for the purpose of effecting a broad and generous National settlement. Had they received that support which the events of the last two yearsdemonstrates could have been had--had the moderate Irish Unionists, and especially the Southern Irish Unionists, the moral courage todeclare their views, temperately but unequivocally, as Lord Midletonand others have recently declared them, the tide might easily havebeen turned and wiser counsels and policies prevailed. 

If the great peace pronouncement of Cork City merchants and professionalmen, made a few months ago on the initiative of Alderman Beamish, hadonly been arranged when the All-for-Ireland League was founded; if LordBandon had then held the meeting of Deputy-Lieutenants he recentlyconvened to declare for Home Rule; if Lord Shaftesbury, three times LordMayor of Belfast, had then made the speech he made at the Dublin PeaceConference last year, nothing could have resisted the triumph of thepolicy of Conciliation, and Ireland would be now in enjoyment ofresponsible self-government instead of being ravaged as it is by thesavagery of a civil war, in which all the usages of modern warfare havebeen ruthlessly abandoned. It is also to be deplored that Sir HoracePlunkett, who is now the enthusiastic advocate of Dominion Home Rule(and, indeed, believes himself to be the discoverer of it), did not, during all the years when he could potently influence certain channelsof opinion in England, raise his voice either for the agrariansettlement or for Home Rule and refused his support, when he wasChairman of the Irish Convention, to Mr W. M. Murphy's well-meant effortsto get Dominion Home Rule adopted or even discussed by the Convention. 

Of course this much must be said for the Unionists who have pronouncedin favour of Home Rule within the past few years, that they could pleadfairly enough that every man like Lord Dunraven, Mr Moreton Frewen, LordRossmore, Colonel Hutcheson-Poë, and Mr Lindsay Crawford, who came uponthe All-for-Ireland platform from the first, was foully assailed andtraduced and had his motives impugned by the Board of Erin bosses, andother Unionists, more timid, naturally enough, shrank from incurring asimilar fate. 

But these things are of the past, and we would turn our thoughts tothe present and the future. 

The country, at the General Election of 1918, by a vote sooverwhelming as to be practically unanimous, gave the guardianship ofits national faith and honour into the keeping of Sinn Fein. This isthe dominant fact of the situation from the Irish standpoint. Otherconsiderations there are, but any which leave this out of account failto grip the vital factor which must influence our march towards a justand durable Irish settlement. Another fact that cannot be lost sightof is that there is a Home Rule Act on the Statute Book. With thisSouthern Ireland will have nothing to do! Unionists and Nationalistsalike condemn it as a mockery of their national rights. But theOrangeman of the Six Counties are first seriously going to work theirregional autonomy--they are going to set up their Parliament inBelfast. And once set up it will be a new and vital complication ofthe situation preceding a settlement which will embrace the whole ofIreland. 

So far as Ireland is concerned the public mind is occupied at themoment of my writing with the question of "reprisals. " Various effortshave been made to bring about peace. They have failed because, in myview, they have been reluctant to recognise and make allowance forcertain essential facts. The whole blame for the existing state ofcivil war--for, repudiate it as the Government may, such itundoubtedly is--is thrown on the shoulders of the Irish RepublicanArmy by those who take their ethical standard from Sir HamarGreenwood. It is forgotten that for two or three years before theattacks on the Royal Irish Constabulary began there were no murders, no assassinations and no civil war in Ireland. There was, however, acampaign of gross provocation by Dublin Castle for two reasons: (1) byway of vengeance for their defeat on the Conscription issue; (2) as aretaliation on Sinn Fein, because it had succeeded in peacefullysupplanting English rule by a system of Volunteer Police, Sinn FeinCourts, Sinn Fein Local Government, etc. The only pretext on whichthis provocation was pursued was on account of a mythical "Germanplot, " which Lord Wimbourne never heard of, which Sir Bryan Mahon, Commander-in-Chief, told Lord French he flatly disbelieved in, andwhich, when, after more than two years, the documents are produced, proves to be a stale rehash of negotiations before the Easter WeekRising, with some sham "German Irish Society" in Berlin. On thispretext the Sinn Fein leaders, Messrs de Valera and Griffith (whomthere is not a shadow of proof to connect with the German plot), werearrested and deported, with many hundreds of the most responsibleleaders. Furthermore, an endless series of prosecutions wereinstituted and savage sentences imposed for the most paltrycharges-such as drilling, wearing uniform, singing _The Soldiers'Song_, having portraits of Rebel leaders, taking part in theArbitration Courts which had superseded the Petty Sessions Courts, andsuch like. All this, with suppression of newspapers and of all publicmeetings, went on for many months before Sinn Fein, deprived of itsleaders, was goaded at last into attacking the Royal IrishConstabulary. Whatever the juridical status of the guerrilla warfarethus entered upon (which it is not improbable England would haveapplauded if employed against any other Empire than her own), it wasconducted on honourable lines by the Sinn Feiners. The policemen andsoldiers, including General Lewis, who surrendered, were treated withcourtesy, and not one of them wounded or insulted. Their wives andchildren were also carefully preserved from danger until the police"reprisals" in the Thurles neighbourhood--the wrecking of villages andthe savage murders of young men--ended by producing equally ruthless"reprisals" on the other side. In Dublin, since the DublinMetropolitan Police declined to go about armed, not one of them hasbeen fired upon. 

The real ferocity on both sides began when the "Black and Tans" wereimported to take the place of the R. I. C. , who were resigning inbatches. It is indisputable--independent investigation by theCommittee of the British Labour Party and the daily messages offearless British journalists, such as Mr Hugh Martin, establish itbeyond possibility of contradiction--that when the "Black and Tans"were let loose on the Irish people they began a villainous campaign ofcowardly murder, arson, robbery and drunken outrage, which should havemade all decent Englishmen and Englishwomen shudder for the deedscommitted in their name. Whenever the particulars are fully disclosedthey will, I venture to say, horrify every honest man in the Empire. Not the least disgraceful feature of this black business was themanner in which the Chief Secretary sought to brazen things out andthe audacious lies that he fathered, such as that Lord Mayor M'Curtainwas murdered by the Sinn Feiners, that it was Sinn Feiners who raidedthe Bishop of Killaloe's house at midnight and searched for him(unquestionably with intent to shoot him), that it was the SinnFeiners who burned down the City Hall, Public Library and theprincipal streets of Cork, etc. 

And then the utter failure of all this "frightfulness"! Several monthsago Sir Hamar Greenwood declared that Sinn Fein was on the run, andthe Prime Minister declared they had "murder by the throat, " the factbeing that the young men they sought to terrorise were made moreresolute in their defiance of the Government. The only people at allterrorised were the invalids, the nuns whose cloisters were violatedby night, the women and children whose homes were invaded at night bymiscreants masquerading in the British uniform, maddened with drinkand uttering the filthiest obscenities. And does England take accountof what all this is going to mean to her--that the young generationwill grow up with never-to-be-forgotten memories of these atrocities, while the thousands of young men herded together in the internmentcamps and convict prisons are being manufactured into life-longenemies of the Empire? Might not Englishmen pause and ask themselveswhether it is worth it all, apart from other considerations, toimplant this legacy of bitter hatred in Irish breasts?

Let it be admitted that since the Government have been shamed intodropping their denials of "reprisals" and taken them in handthemselves the military destruction has at least been carried on withsome show of reluctance and humanity by the regular army, but itcannot be too strongly emphasised that the disbandment and deportationof "the Black and Tans" is the first condition of any return tocivilised warfare or to any respect for the good name of England orher army. 

If I were asked to state some of the essentials of peace I would sayit must depend first of all on the re-establishment of a belief in thegood faith of England. This belief, and for the reasons which I haveattempted to outline in the preceding chapters, has been shatteredinto fragments. There is a strong feeling in Ireland that the PrimeMinister's recent peace "explorations" are not honestly meant--thatthey are intended to rouse the "sane and moderate" elements inopposition to Sinn Fein. Whilst this feeling exists no real headwaycan be made by those who seek a genuine peace along rational andreasoned lines. The Prime Minister must be aware that when heprofesses his readiness to meet those who can "deliver the goods" heis talking rhetorical rubbish. "Delivering the goods" is not a matterfor Irishmen, but for British politicians, who have spent the lasttwenty years cheating Ireland of the "goods" of Home Rule, which theyhad solemnly covenanted again and again to "deliver. "

Mr Lloyd George's conditions for a meeting with "Dail Eireann" are soimpossible that one wonders he took the trouble to state them--viz. (1) that "Dail Eireann" must give up to be tried (and we presumehanged) a certain unspecified number of their own colleagues; (2) thatthey must recant their Republicanism and proclaim their allegiance tothe Empire; (3) that negotiations must proceed on the basis of thePartition Act and the surrender of one-fourth of their country to thenew Orange ascendancy. 

No section of honest Irishmen will dream of negotiating on such abasis, and any attempt to make use of "sane and moderate" elements todivide and discredit the elected representatives of the people will bemet by the universal declaration that the "Dail Eireann" alone isentitled to speak for Ireland. Until this primary fact is recognisedthe fight in Ireland must go on, and many black chapters of itshistory will have to be written before some British statesman comesalong who is prepared to treat with the Irish nation in a spirit ofjustice and generosity. 

Peace is still perfectly possible if right methods are employed toensure it. It is futile to ask Sinn Fein to lay down arms and to abjuretheir opinions as a preliminary condition to negotiations. I doubtwhether the Sinn Fein leaders could impose such a condition upon theirfollowers, even if they were so inclined--which they are not and neverwill be. Let there, then, to start with, be no preliminary tying ofhands. The initiative must come from the Government. They shouldannounce the largest measure of Home Rule they will pledge themselves topass. They should accompany this with a public promise to submit it toan immediate plebiscite or referendum of the whole Irish people on theplain issue "Yes" or "No. " All they can ask of the Sinn Fein leaders isthat they will leave the Irish people absolutely free to record theirjudgment. I can imagine that, in such circumstances, the attitude of theSinn Fein leaders would be: "We do not surrender our Republicanopinions, but if the Government offer full New Zealand Home Rule (let ussay) and pledge themselves to enforce it if Ireland accepts it, SinnFein would be justified before all National Republicans in saying: 'Thisis a prospect so magnificent for our country we shall do nothing in thesmallest degree to prejudice the opinion of the people against itsacceptance or to fetter the free and honest working of the newinstitutions. '" Beyond this no person desiring a real peace ought toexpect Sinn Fein to go, and I am convinced that if this were theattitude of Sinn Fein and if the offer were made by the Government assuggested, the majority for acceptance, on a plebiscite being taken, would be so great that there would be no further shadow of oppositioneven in Ulster, where nobody would object that it should have localautonomy in all necessary particulars. 

I can conceive only one man standing in the way of a settlement on theselines--a settlement which would be just to Ireland and honourable toBritain. So long as Sir Edward Carson remains the powerful figure heis--dictating and directing the policy of the Cabinet--it is improbablethat he will consent to have the opinion of "the six counties" taken bya plebiscite. But if Sir Edward Carson were to quit politics, as one mayhope he can see a thousand good reasons for doing, I can well imaginethat Mr Lloyd George would be very glad to come to a satisfactoryarrangement. 

Whatever happens this much is certain, there is only one road to peacein Ireland--the recognition of her nationhood, one and indivisible, and of the right of Irishmen to manage their own affairs in accordancewith Irish ideals. 

 THE END

 POSTSCRIPT

Since this book went to press, the appointment of Sir Edward Carson asLord of Appeal and the interview between Mr de Valera and Sir JamesCraig are developments of a more hopeful character which, it is devoutlyto be hoped, will bring about the longed-for _rapprochement_ between thetwo countries.