What's the Matter with Ireland?

By Ruth Russell

1920

TO MY MOTHER

CONTENTS

 I. WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH IRELAND II. SINN FEIN AND REVOLUTIONIII. IRISH LABOR AND CLASS REVOLUTION IV. AE'S PEACEFUL REVOLUTION V. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND COMMUNISM VI. WHAT ABOUT BELFAST?

 ELECTED GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND (AMERICAN DELEGATION)

 January 29, 1920. 

 _Miss Ruth' Russell, Chicago, Illinois_. 

 Dear Miss Russell:

 I have read the advance copy of your book, "What's the Matter with Ireland?", with much interest. 

 I congratulate you on the rapidity with which you succeeded in understanding Irish conditions and grasped the Irish viewpoint. 

 I hope your book will be widely read. Your first chapter will be instructive to those who have been deceived by the recent cry of Irish prosperity. Cries of this sort are echoed without thought as to their truth, and gain credence as they pass from mouth to mouth. I hope we shall have many more impartial investigators, such as you, who will take the trouble to see things for themselves first hand, and who will not be imposed upon by half-truths. 

 Having visited Ireland, I feel you cannot doubt that the poet was right--

 "There never was a nation yet Could rule another well. "

 I imagine, too, that having seen the character of British rule there, you must realize better than before what it was your American patriots of '76 hastened to rid themselves of. In a country with such natural resources as Ireland, can you believe it possible that if government by the people obtained there could be such conditions of unemployment and misery as you found?

 Do you not think that if the elected Government of the Republic were left unhampered by foreign usurpation, we might in the coming years hope to rival the boast of Lord Clare in 1798:

 "There is not a nation on the face of the habitable globe which has advanced in cultivation, in manufactures, with the same rapidity in the same period as Ireland--from 1782 to 1798. "

 and that progress like this, with the present social outlook in Ireland, would mean the peace, contentment and happiness of millions of human beings?

 Yours very truly, (Signed) EÁMON DE VALÉRA. 

FOREWORD

"And tell us what is the matter with Ireland. "

This was the last injunction a fellow journalist, propagandized into testyimpatience with Ireland, gave me before I sailed for that bit of Europewhich lies closest to America. 

It became perfectly obvious that Ireland was poor; poor to ignorance, poorto starvation, poor to insanity and death. And that the cause of herpoverty is her exploitation by the world capitalist next door to her. 

In Ireland there is no disagreement as to the cause of her poverty. Thereis very little difference as to the best remedy--three-fourths of Irelandhave expressed their belief that the country can live only as a republic. Even the two great forces in Ireland that are said to be for the _statusquo_, I found in active sympathy with the republican cause. In theCatholic Church the young priests are eager workers for Sinn Fein, and inUlster the laborers are backing their leaders in a plea forself-determination. But there are, of course, those who say that a republicis not enough. In the cities where poverty is blackest, there are those whostate that the new republic must be a workers' republic. In the villagesand country places where the co-operative movement is growing strong, thereare those who believe that the new republic must be a co-operativecommonwealth. 

I

WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH IRELAND?

OUT OF A JOB

Is Ireland poor? I decided to base my answer to that question on personalinvestigation. I dressed myself as a working girl--it is to the workingclass that seven-eighths of the Irish people belong--and in a week in theslums of Dublin I found that lack of employment is continually driving thepeople to migration, low-wage slavery, or acceptance of charity. 

At the woman's employment bureau of the ministry of munitions, I discoveredthat 50, 000 Irish boys and girls are annually sent to the English harvests, and that during the war there were 80, 000 placements in the Englishmunition factories. 

"But I don't want to leave home, " I heard a little ex-fusemaker say as westood in queues at the chicken-wire hatch in the big bare room turned overby the ministry of munitions for the replacement of women who had worked onarmy supplies. Her voice trembled with the uncertainty of one who knew shecould not dictate. 

"Then you've got to be a servant, " said the direct young woman at thehatch. "There's nothing left in Ireland but domestic jobs. "

"Isn't--you told me there might be something in Belfast?"

"Linen mills are on part time now--no chance. There's only one place forgood jobs now--that's across the channel. "

The little girl bit her lip. She shook her head and went out the rear exitprovided for ex-war workers. Together we splashed into the broken-brickedalley that was sloppy with melting spring sleet. 

"Maybe she doesn't know everything, " said the little girl, fingering areligious medal that shone beneath her brown muffler. "Maybe some one'sdropped out. Let's say a prayer. "

Through the cutting sleet we bent our way to Dublin's largest factory--aplant where 1, 000 girls are employed at what are the best woman's wages inDublin, $4. 50 to $10 a week. 

"You gotta be pretty brassy to ask for work here, " said the little girl. "Everybody wants to work here. But you can't get anything unless you'reb-brassy, can you?"

We entered a big-windowed, red-bricked factory, and in response to ourtimid application, a black-clad woman shook her head wearily. Down apuddly, straw-strewn lane we were blown to one of the factories next insize--a fifty to 100 hand factory is considered big in Dublin. The sign onthe door was scrawled:

"No Hands Wanted. "

But in the courage of companionship we mounted the black, narrow-treadedwooden stairs to a box-littered room where white-aproned girls were nailingcandy containers together. While we waited for the manager to come out, westood with bowed heads so that the sleet could pool off our hats, andthrough a big crack in the plank floor we could see hard red candiesswirling below. Suddenly we heard a voice and looked up to see theticking-aproned manager spluttering:

"Well, can't you read?"

Up in a loft-like, saw-dusty room where girls were stuffing dolls anddaubing red paint on china cheeks, an excited manager declared he waslosing his own job. The new woman's trade union league wanted him to paymore than one dollar a week to his girls. He would show the union hisbooks. Wasn't it better to have some job than none at all?

Down the wet street, now glinting blindingly in the late sun, we walkedinto a grubby little tea shop for a sixpenny pot of tea between us. Out ofmy pocket I pulled a wage list of well-paying, imagination-stirring jobs inEngland. There were all sorts of jobs from toy-making at $8. 25 a week toglass-blowing at $20. On the face of the little girl as she told me thatshe would meet me at the ministry of munitions the next morning there was alook of worried indecision. 

That night along Gloucester street, past the Georgian mansion houses builtbefore the union of Ireland and England--great, flat-faced, uprisingstructures behind whose verdigrised knockers and shattered door fans comesthe murmur of tenements--I walked till I came to a much polished brassplate lettered "St. Anthony's Working Girls' Home. "

"Why don't you go to England?" was the first question the matron put to mewhen I told her that I could get no factory work. "All the girls aregoing. "

In the stone-flagged cellar the girls were cooking their individual dinnersat a stove deep set in the stone wall. A big, curly-haired girl was holdingbread on a fork above the red coals. 

"Last time I got lonesome, " she was admitting. "But the best parlor maidjob here is $60 a year. And over at Basingstoke in England I've one waitingfor me at $150 a year. If you want to live nowadays I suppose you've gottabe lonesome. "

Next day at the alley of the employment bureau, I met the little girl ofthe day before. She said a little dully:

"Well, I took--shirt-making--Edinburgh. "

Instead of migrating, a girl may marry. But her husband in most cases can'tmake enough money to support a family. To keep an average family of five, just going, on food alone, costs $370 a year. Some farm hands get only$100. An average unskilled worker obtains $260 a year. An organizedunskilled worker receives $367, and an organized skilled worker, $539. Therefore, if a girl marries, she has not only to bear children but to goout to work beside. Their constant toil makes the women of Irelandsomething less than well-cared-for slaves. 

Take the mother in Dublin. In Dublin there have long been too many casuallaborers. One-third of Dublin's population of 300, 000 are in this class. Now, while wages for some sorts of casual labor like dock work increasedduring the war, it has become almost impossible for Dublin laborers to geta day's job. For the unemployed are flocking for the good wages from thefour fields of Ireland. On the days the man is out of work the woman mustgo out to wash or "char. " I understood these conditions better after Ispent a night in a typical one-room home in the dockers' quarters near theLiffey. 

Widow Hannan was my hostess. The widow is a strong, black-haired youngwoman who took an active part in the rebellion of 1916, and whose husbandwas killed fighting under James Connolly. We slept in the first floorfront. In with the widow lay her three children, and in the cotcatty-corner from the bed I was bunked. Just when the night air wasthinning to gray there was a shattering rap on the ground-level window. Thehalf-dressed young factory daughter clambered over the others and rippeddown the rain coat that served as a night-time window curtain. Against thesquare-paned window was hunched a forward-shouldered woman. 

As she was being beckoned to the door, I rose, and to do my hair had towedge myself in between the breakfast-table and the filmy mirror that hungamong the half-tone pictures of the rebels of 1916. On the iron mantel, gray with coal dust, there was a family comb. 

"God save all here, " said the neighbor entering. "Mary, himself's had nowork for four days. Keep the young ones out of the grate for me. I've gotto go out washing. "

"My sister-in-law has a husband and seven children to support, " said thewidow in explanation to me. "During the war, he could do with her going outjust once in a while--now it's all the time. " Then to the sister-in-law:"I've a wash myself today. "

The big shoes that must once have belonged to the visitor's man, hit thefloor loosely as she walked slowly out. Then as lodger I was given the onlychair at the breakfast-table. The mother and girl sat at a plank bench andsupped their tea from their saucerless cups. As there was no place else tosit, the children took their bread and jam as they perched on the bed, andwhen they finished, surreptitiously wiped their fingers on thebrown-covered hay mattress. Before we were through, they had run to thestreet and back to warm their cold legs inside the fender till the floorwas tracked with mud from the street, ashes from the grate, and bits ofcrumbled bread. 

In the evening I heard the murmur of revolution. With the shawled motherswho line the lane on a pleasant evening, I stood between the widow and atwenty-year-old girl who held her tiny blind baby in her arms. Across thenarrow street with its water-filled gutters, barefoot children in holeysweaters or with burlap tied about their shoulders, slapped their feet asthey jigged, or jumped at hop-scotch. Back of them in typical Dublin decayrose the stables of an anciently prosperous shipping concern; in the v dipof the roofless walls, spiky grass grew and through the barred windows thewet gray sky was slotted. Suddenly the girl-mother spoke:

"Why, there's himself coming back, Mary. See him turning up from the timberon the quay. There was sorrow in his eyes like the submarine times when hecame to tell me no boat docked this morning. Baby or no baby, I'll have toget work for myself, for he's not given me a farthing for a fortnight. "

A big Danish-looking chap was homing towards the door. Without meeting thegirl's eyes, he slunk into the doorway. His broad shoulders sagged underhis sun-faded coat, and he blocked the light from the glassless window onthe staircase as he disappeared. When he slouched out again his handdropped from his hip pocket. 

"It's to drill he's going, " The young mother snugged her shawl in moretightly about her baby. Then she said with a little break in her voice:"Oh, it's very pleasant, just this, with the girls jigging and rattlingtheir legs of a spring evening. "

A girl's voice defiantly telling a soldier that if he didn't wear hiscivvies when he came to call he needn't come at all, rose clearly from adark doorway. A lamplighter streaked yellow flame into the square lamphanging from the stone shell opposite. A jarvey, hugging a bundle of hay, drove his horse clankingly over the cobblestones. Then grimly came thewhisper of the widow of the rebellion close to my ear:

"Oh, we'll have enough in the army this time. "

Difficult as the Irish worker's fight is, the able person is loath to giveup and accept charity. But whether she wants to or not, if she can't findwork she must go to the poorhouse. Before the war it was estimated thatover one-half the inmates of the Irish workhouses were employable. Duringthe war, when there were more jobs than usual to be had, there was a greatexodus from the hated poorhouse; there was a drop in workhouse wards from400, 000 to 250, 000. But now jobs are getting less again and there is amelancholy return back over the hills to the poorhouse. 

Night refuges, I found, are the last stage in this journey. There, withevery day out of work, women become more unemployable--clothes andconstitutions wear out; minds lose hope in effort and rely on luck. As Isat with a tableful of charwomen and general housework girls in a refuge inDublin, I read two ads from the paper. One offered a job for a generalservant with wages at $50 a year. The other ran: "Wanted: a strong humblegeneral housework girl to live out; $1. 25 a week. " I put the choice up tothe table. 

"If you haven't anybody of your own to live with, " advised a husky-voiced, mufflered girl next me as she warmed her fingers about her mug of tea andregarded me from under her cotton velvet hat with some suspicion, "youshould get the job living with the family. It takes five dollars a week tolive by yourself. " Then forestalling a protest she added: "You'll get twoearly evenings off--at eight o'clock. "

"Whatever you get, don't let it go. " A bird-faced woman leaned over thetable so that the green black plume of her charity bonnet wagged across thecenter of the table. With her little warning eyes still on my face shesettled back impressively. As she extracted a half sheet of newspaper fromunder her beaded cape and furtively wrapped up one of the two "hunks" ofbread that each refugee got, she continued: "Once I gave up a place becausethey let me have just potatoes and onions for dinner. No, hold on towhatever you get--whatever. " And after we had night prayers that were solong drawn out that someone moaned: "Do they want to scourge us withpraying?", the old charwoman repeated the hopeless words: "Hold on towhatever you get--whatever. "

In the pale gold light that flooded through the windows of the sixty-beddormitory, the women turned down the mussed toweling sheets from thebolsters across the reddish gray spreads. 

"My clothes dried on me after the rain, and I do be coughing till my chestis sore, " said the girl who had sat next me at the table and was next me inthe sleeping room. "There was too many at the dispensary to wait. "

Out of a sagging pocket in her creased mackintosh she took a clothes brush. She slipped her skirt from under her coat and with her blue-cold handpassed the flat brush back and forth over the muddy hem. 

"If I had a bit o' black for my shoes now--with your clothes I could get mea housemaid's job easy, " Her muffler covered the fact that she had noshirtwaist. Then she added encouragingly: "You'd better get a job quick. There's only one blanket on these beds and clothes run down using them forcovers at night. "

Opposite us a gray-cheeked mother was wrapping a black petticoat about thelegs of a small child. She tucked the little girl in the narrow bed theywere both to sleep in, and babbled softly to the drowsy child:

"No place yet. My heart do be falling out o' me. Well, I'm not to blamebecause it's you that keeps me from getting it. You--" she bent over thebed and ended sharply: "Oh, my darling, shall we die in Dublin?"

Through the dusk, above the sound of coughing and canvas stretching as thewomen settled themselves for the night, there rose the soft voices of twowomen telling welcome fairy stories to each other:

"It was a wild night, " said one. "She was going along the Liffey, and thewind coming up from the sea blew the cape about her face and she half fellinto the water. He caught her, they kept company for seven years and thenhe married her. Who do you suppose he turned out to be? Why, a wealthyLondon baker. Och, God send us all fortune. "

There was silence, then the whisper of the mother:

"Look up to the windows, darling. There's just a taste of daylight left. "

Gradually it grew dark and quiet in this vault of human misery. Then, faraway from some remote chapel in the house, there floated the triumphantwords of the practising choir:

"Alleluia! Alleluia!"

ILL. 

What do emigration and low wages do to Irish health? Social conditionsresult in an extraordinary percentage of tuberculosis and lunacy, and in ababy shortage in Ireland. Individual propensities to sexual excess orcommon crime are, incidentally, responsible for little of the ill health inIreland. 

Ireland's tuberculosis rate is higher than that of most of the countries inthe "civilized" world. Through Sir William Thompson, registrar-general ofIreland, I was given much material about tuberculosis in Ireland. Aninternational pre-war chart showed Ireland fourth on the tuberculosislist--it was exceeded only by Austria, Hungary, and Servia. [1] During thewar, Ireland's tuberculosis mortality rate showed a tendency to increase;in 1913, her death list from tuberculosis was 9, 387 and in 1917 it was9, 680. [2]

Emigration is heat to the tuberculosis thermometer. Why? Sir RobertMatheson, ex-registrar-general of Ireland, explained at a meeting of theWoman's National Health Association. The more fit, he said, emigrate, andthe less fit stay home and propagate weak children. Besides, emigrants whocontract the disease elsewhere come home to die. Many so return from theUnited States. Numbers of the 50, 000 annual migrants from the west coast ofIreland to the English harvests return to nurse the tuberculosis theycontracted across the channel. Dr. Birmingham, of the Westport Union, isquoted as saying that in September a disease known locally as the "Englishcold" is prevalent among the young men who have been harvesting in England. Sometimes it is simple bronchitis. Mostly it is incipent phthisis. It iseasily traced to the wretched sleeping places called "Paddy houses" inwhich Irish laborers are permitted to be housed in England. These "Paddyhouses" are often death traps--crowded, dark, unventilated barns in whichthe men have to sleep on coarse bags on the floor. [3]

The Irish wage causes tuberculosis to mount higher. Dr. Andrew Trimble, chief tuberculosis officer for Belfast, comments on the fact that the sexaffected proves that economic conditions are to blame. Under conditions ofpoverty, women become ill more quickly than men. Dr. Trimble writes: "InBelfast and in Ireland generally more females suffer from tuberculosis thanmales. In Great Britain, however, the reverse is the case.... In formeryears, however, they had much the same experience as we have in Ireland ... And it would be necessary to go back over twenty-five years to come to apoint where the mortality from tuberculosis among women equalled that nowobtaining with us. It would seem that the hardships associated with pooreconomic conditions--insufficient wages, bad housing and want of fresh air, good food and sufficient clothing--tell more heavily on the female than onthe male, and with the march of progress and better conditions of living... Tuberculosis amongst women is automatically reduced. "[4]

The Irish wage must choose a tuberculosis incubator for a home. Ireland isa one-room-home country. In the great "rural slum" districts, the one-roomcabin prevails. Country slums exist where homes cannot be supported by theland they are built on--they occur, for instance, in the rocky fields ofGalway and Donegal and in the stripped bog lands of Sligo. Galway andDonegal cabins are made of stones wrested from the ground; in Mayo, thewalls are piled sod--mud cabins. Roofing these western homes is the "skino' th' soil" or sod with the grass roots in it. Through the homemade roofsor barrel chimneys the wet Atlantic winds often pour streams of water thatpuddle on the earthen floors. At one end of the cabin is a smoky dent thatindicates the fireplace; and at the other there may be a stall or two. Thesmall, deep-set windows are, as a rule, "fixed. " Rural slums are rivaled bycity slums. Even in the capital of Ireland the poor are housed as badly asin the west of Ireland. Looking down on the city of Dublin from the towerof St. Patrick's cathedral, one can see roofs so smashed in that they lookas if some giant had walked over them; great areas so packed with buildingsthat there are only darts of passageways for light and air. In ancientplaster cabins, in high old edifices with pointed Huguenot roofs, inGeorgian mansion tenements, there are 25, 000 families whose homes areone-room homes. Dublin's proportion of those who live more than two to aroom is higher than that of any other city in the British Isles--London has16. 8; Edinburgh, 31. 1; Dublin, 37. 9. [5] In one-room homes tuberculosisbreeds fast. A table from the dispensary for tuberculosis patients, aninstitution built in Dublin as a memorial to the American, P. F. Collier, shows that out of 1, 176 cases 676 came from one-room homes. [6] As a typecase, the report instances this: "Nine members of the W---- family werefound living in one room together in a condition bordering on starvation. Both parents were very tubercular. The father had left the Sanatorium ofthe South Dublin Union on hearing of the mother's delicacy. He hoped toearn a little to support the family that had been driven to such a statethrough illness that, houseless, it had had to sleep on stairs. The onlyregular income was $1. 12 a week earned by the eldest girl, aged 16, in afactory. Owing to want of food and unhealthy surroundings, she was in sorun down a condition that it seemed certain she would become tubercular ifnot at once removed. "

The Irish wage can't buy the "good old diet. " Milk and stirabout andpotatoes once grew rosy-cheeked children. But bread and tea is the generaldiet now. War rations? Ireland was not put on war rations. To regulate theamount of butter and bacon per family would have been superfluous labor. Few families got even war rations. [7] Charitable organizations doubt ifthey should give relief to families who are able to have an occasional mealof potatoes in addition to their bread and tea. In a recent pamphlet[8] theSt. Vincent de Paul Society said: "A widow ... Who after paying the rent ofher room, has a shilling a day to feed herself and two, three, four or evenmore children, is considered a doubtful case by the society. Yet a shillinga day will only give the family bread and tea for every meal, with anoccasional dish of potatoes. By strict economy a little margarine may bepurchased, but by no process of reasoning may it be said that the familyhas enough to eat, or suitable food. " The Irish wage would have to be ahigh wage to buy the old diet. For that is not supplied by Ireland forIreland any more. When Ireland became a cow lot, cereal and vegetable cropsbecame few. But milk should be plentiful? The recent vice-regal milkcommission noted the lack of milk for the poor in Ireland. Why? The town ofNaas tells one reason. Naas is in the midst of a grazing country, but Naasbabies have died for want of milk, because Naas cattle are raised for beefexportation. The town of Ennis tells another reason. Ennis is also in thecenter of a grazing country. Until the Woman's National Health Associationestablished a depot, Ennis poor could not get retailed pitchersful of milk, for Ennis cows are raised to supply wholesale cansful to creameries whichmake the supply into dairy products for exportation. [9]

Bread-and-tea, and bread-and-tealess families get on the calling list oftuberculosis nurses. "The nurses often found, " writes the Woman's NationalHealth Association, "that a large number of cases committed to their carewere in an advanced stage of the disease ... In a number of cases familieshave been found entirely without food. This chronic state of lack ofnourishment ... Accounts in part for the fact that there are two andsometimes three persons affected in the same family. "[10]

Has mental as well as physical health been affected? Lunacy isextraordinarily prevalent in Ireland. In the lunacy inspectors' office inDublin castle, I was given the last comparison they had published of theinsanity rates in England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland. English andWelsh insanity per 10, 000 people was 40. 8; Scottish, 45. 4; Irish, 56. 2. TheIrish rate for 1916 showed an increase to 57. 1. [11]

Emigration, remark lunacy experts, fostered lunacy. Whole families withdrewfrom certain districts. Consanguineous marriages became more frequent. Weak-minded cousins wedded to bring forth weaker-minded children. 

And Irish living conditions are a nemesis. They affect those who go as wellas those who stay. Commenting on the fact that the Irish contribute thehighest proportion of the white foreign-born population to the Americanhospitals for the insane, as well as filling their own asylums, the lunacyinspectors write: "As to why this should be, we can offer no reasonedexplanation: but just as the Irish famine was, apart from its directeffects, responsible for so much physical and mental distress in thecountry, so it would seem not improbable that the innutritious dietary andother deprivations of the majority of the population of Ireland must, whenacting over many generations, have led to impaired nutrition of the nervoussystem, and in this way have developed in the race those neuropathic andpsychopathic tendencies which are precursors of insanity. "[12]

Babies don't like mentally and physically worn-out parents. Babies used tobe thought to have special predilection for Ireland. But as a matter offact, they come to the island less and less. Ireland has for some timeproduced fewer babies to the thousand people than Scotland. During thedecade 1907-1916 Scotland's annual average to every thousand people was25. 9;[13] Ireland's was 22. 8. From 1907 to 1917 Ireland's total number ofbabies fell from 101, 742 to 86, 370. [14]

But as was said in the beginning, it is not to individual excess that mostof the ill health in Ireland is due. It was not until recently thatvenereal disease as a factor in Irish ill health has been a factor worthmentioning. In 1906 a lunacy report read: "The statistics show that generalparalysis of the insane--a disease now almost unknown in Ireland--isincreasing in the more populous urban districts. At the same time thedisease is still much less prevalent than in other countries, and in therural districts it is practically non-existent. This is to a large extentdue to the high standard of sexual morality that prevails all overIreland. "[15]

Nor do the Irish suffer from the violence that accompanies commoncrime--for there is little crime under the most crime-provoking conditions. As the Countess of Aberdeen said: "In the past annual report by Sir CharlesCameron, the medical officer of health for Dublin, there are again somefigures that tell a strange tale of poverty so widespread, of destitutionso complete, of housing so unsanitary, of unemployment so little heeded, that one is amazed by the fact that no combined effort on the part of morefortunate citizens has been made toward bringing about a wholesome change, and this amazement is only lessened by the extraordinary freedom we inDublin enjoy from robberies, peculations, from crimes of violence and othermisdeeds that would sharpen our perception of miseries now borne with afortitude and a self-restraint that cannot but appeal strongly to any who, either from personal experience or philanthropic reading, know how crimeand vice are associated elsewhere with conditions not more distressing andoften less long-lived than ours. "[16]

SCHOOL CLOSED

There's small chance for the Irish to better their condition througheducation. Many Irish children don't go to school. It is estimated that outof 500, 000 school children, 150, 000 do not attend school. Why not? Here aretwo reasons advanced by the Vice-Regal Committee on Primary Education, Ireland, in its report published by His Majesty's Stationers, Dublin, 1919:

Many families are too poor. 

England does not encourage Irish education. 

Irish poverty is recognized in the school laws; the Irish Education actpassed by Parliament in 1892 is full of excuses for children who must go towork instead of to school. Thousands of Irish youngsters must availthemselves of these excuses. Ireland has 64, 000 children under the age of14 at work. But Scotland with virtually the same population has only37, 500. [17]

Eight-year-old Michael Mallin drags kelp out of a rush basket and packs itdown for fertilizer between the brown ridges of the little hand-spadedfield in Donegal. 

"Is there no school to be going to, Michael?"

"There do be a school, but to help my da' there is no one home but me. "

The act says that the following is a "reasonable excuse for thenon-attendance of a child, namely, ... Being engaged in necessaryoperations of husbandry. "[18]

Ten-year-old Margaret Duncan can be found sitting hunched up on a doorstepin a back street in Belfast. Her skirt and the step are webbed with threadsclipped from machine-embroidered linen, or pulled from handkerchiefs forhemstitching. A few doors away little Helen Keefe, all elbows, is scrubbingher front steps. 

"But school's on. "

"Aye, " responds Margaret, "but our mothers need us. "

The act plainly states that another reasonable excuse is "domesticnecessity or other work requiring to be done at a particular time orseason. "[19]

William Brady has a twelve-hour day in Dublin. He's out in the morning at5:30 to deliver papers. He's at school until three. He runs errands for thesweet shop till seven. 

"You get too tired for school work. How does your teacher like that?"

"Ash! She can't do anything. "

Intuitively he knows that he can protect himself behind the fortress ofwords in the school attendance act: "A person shall not be deemed to havetaken a child into his employment in contravention of this act if it isproved that the employment by reason of being during the hours when schoolis not in session does not interfere with the efficient elementaryinstruction of the child. "[20]

Nine-year-old Patrick Gallagher may go to the Letterkenny Hiring Fair andsell his baby services to a farmer. Some one may say to Paddy:

"Why aren't you at school?"

"Surely, I live over two miles away from school. "

The law thinks two miles are too far for him to walk. So he may be hired towork instead. Reads the education act: "A person shall not be deemed tohave taken a child into his employment in contravention of this act if itis proved to the satisfaction of the court that during the employment thereis not within two miles ... From the residence of the child any ... Schoolwhich the child can attend. "[21]

Incidentally England does not encourage Irish education. England does notprovide enough money to erect the best schools nor to attract the bestteachers. But England agreed to an Irish education grant. [22] Sheestablished a central board of education in Ireland, and promised thatthrough this board she would pay two-thirds of the school building bill andteachers' salaries to any one who was zealous enough to erect a school. Does England come through with the funds? Not, says the vice-regalcommittee, unless she feels like it. In 1900 she agreed with Ireland thatIreland's teachers should be paid higher salaries, but stipulated that theincrease in salaries would not mean an immediate increase in grants. 

New building grants were suspended altogether for a time. In 1902, anannual grant of £185, 000 was diverted from Irish primary education and usedfor quite extraneous purposes. And when England does give money for Irisheducation, she pays no heed to the requirements stated by the Irishcommissioners of education. [23] Instead she says: "This amount I happen tobe giving to English education; I will grant a proportionate amount toIrish education. "

"If English primary education happens to require financial aid from theTreasury, Irish primary education is to get some and in proportionthereto, " writes the committee. "If England happens not to require any, then, of course, neither does Ireland. A starving man is to be fed only ifsome one else is hungry.... It seems to us extraordinary that Irish primaryeducation should be financed on lines that have little relation to theneeds of the case. "[24]

So there are not enough schools to go to. Belfast teachers testified beforethe committee that in their city alone there were 15, 000 children withoutschool accommodations. Some of the number are on the streets. Others arepacked into educational holes of Calcutta. New schools, said the teachers, are needed not only for these pupils but also for those incarcerated inunsuitable schools--unheated schools or schools in whose dark rooms gasmust burn daily. On the point of unsuitability, the testimony of a specialinvestigator named F. H. Dale was quoted. He said:

"I have no hesitation in reporting that both in point of convenience forteachers and in the requirements necessary for the health of teachers andscholars, the average school buildings in Dublin and Belfast are markedlyinferior to the average school buildings now in use in English cities ofcorresponding size. "

So if unsuitable schools were removed, Belfast would have to provide forsome thousands of school children beyond the estimate of 15, 000, and otherlocalities according to their similar great need. [25]

Live, interesting primary teachers are few in Ireland. The low pay does notbegin to compensate Irish school teachers for the great sacrifices theymust make. Women teachers in Ireland begin at $405 a year; men at $500. Ifit were not for the fact that there are very few openings for educatedyoung men and women in a grazing country there would probably be evengreater scarcity. [26] Since three-fourths of the schools are rural thosewho determine to teach must resign themselves to social and professionalhermitage. What is the result of these factors on the teaching morale? The1918 report at the education office shows 13, 258 teachers, and only 3, 820of these are marked highly efficient. [27]

Thus the committee of the lord lieutenant. 

[Footnote 1: "Ireland's Crusade Against Tuberculosis. " Edited by Countessof Aberdeen. Maunsel and Company. Dublin. 1908. P. 32. ]

[Footnote 2: "Marriages, Births, and Deaths in Ireland, 1917. " HisMajesty's Stationery Office. Dublin. 1918. P. IX. ]

[Footnote 3: "Ireland's Crusade Against Tuberculosis. " P. 34-35. ]

[Footnote 4: "Report of Chief Tuberculosis Officer of Belfast for the ThreeYears Ended 31 March, 1917. " Hugh Adair. Belfast. 1917. P. 25. ]

[Footnote 5: "Appendix Report Housing Conditions of Dublin. " Alex Thorn. Dublin. 1914. P. 154. ]

[Footnote 6: "First Annual Report P. F. Collier Memorial Dispensary. "Dollard. Dublin. 1913. P. 24. ]

[Footnote 7: "Starvation in Dublin. " By Lionel Gordon-Smith and CruiseO'Brien. Wood Printing Works. Dublin. 1917. P. 14. ]

[Footnote 8: "The Poor in Dublin. " Pamphlet. St. Vincent de Paul Society. ]

[Footnote 9: "How Local Milk Depots in Ireland Are Worked. " Dollard. Dublin. 1915. P. 3-15. ]

[Footnote 10: "Second Annual Report of the Woman's National HealthAssociation. " Waller and Company. Dublin. 1909. P. 143. ]

[Footnote 11: "Supplement Fifty-fourth Report Inspectors of Lunacy. " AlexThorn. Dublin. 1906. P. VII. ]

[Footnote 12: _Ibid_. P. XXVII. ]

[Footnote 13: "Sixty-second Annual Report of the Registrar General forScotland, 1916. " His Majesty's Stationery Office. Edinburgh. 1918. P. LXVII. ]

[Footnote 14: "Marriages, Births, and Deaths in Ireland, 1917. " P. XII. ]

[Footnote 15: "Supplement Fifty-fourth Report Inspectors of Lunacy. " P. XXXII. ]

[Footnote 16: "The Woman's National Health Association and Infant Welfare. "The Child. June, 1911. P. 10. ]

[Footnote 17: Figures supplied by H. C. Ferguson, Superintendent of CharityOrganization Society, Belfast, 1919. ]

[Footnote 18: "Irish Education Act, 1892. " (55 & 56 Vict. ) Chap. 42. P. 1. ]

[Footnote 19: _Ibid_. P. 1. ]

[Footnote 20: _Ibid_. P. 4. ]

[Footnote 21: _Ibid_. P. 3. ]

[Footnote 22: _Ibid_. P. 8 et al. ]

[Footnote 23. "Vice-regal Committee of Enquiry into Primary Education, Ireland, 1918. " His Majesty's Stationery Office. Dublin. 1919. P. 22. ]

[Footnote 24: _Ibid_. P. 22. ]

[Footnote 25: _Ibid_. Martin Reservation. P. 27-30. ]

[Footnote 26: _Ibid_. P. 8. ]

[Footnote 27: _Ibid_. P. 39. ]

II

SINN FEIN AND REVOLUTION

WILL SOCIAL CONDITION LEAD TO IMMEDIATE REVOLUTION?

"Eamonn De Valera, the President of the Irish Republic, who has been inhiding since his escape from Lincoln jail, will be welcomed back to Dublinby a public reception. Tomorrow evening at seven o'clock he will be met atthe Mount street bridge by Lawrence O'Neill, Lord Mayor of Dublin.... "

The news note was in the morning papers. In small type it was hidden on theback pages--the Irish papers have a curious habit of six-pointing articlesin which the people are vitally interested and putting three-column headson such stuff as: "Do Dublin Girls Rouge?" That day the concern of thepeople was unquestionably not rouge but republics. For the question thatsibilated in Grafton street cafes and at the tram change at Nelson pillarwas: "Will Dublin Castle permit?"

Orders and gun enforcement. The empire did not deviate from the usualprogram of empires--action without discussion. In the crises that arealways occurring between organized revolt and the empire, there is neverany consideration of the physical agony that goads the people to revolt. There wasn't now. By early afternoon, the answer, on great, black-letteredposters, was swabbed to the sides of buildings all over town:

"DE VALERA RECEPTION FORBIDDEN!"

That was the headline, and after instructions warning the people not totake part in the ceremony, the government order ended:

"GOD SAVE THE KING!"

How would the revolutionaries reply? Rumors ran riot. The Sinn Feinvolunteers would pit themselves against His Majesty's troops. The streetswould be red again. The belief that the meeting would be held in spite ofthe proclamation was supported by a statement on green-lettered postersthat appeared later next the British dictum:

"LORD MAYOR REQUESTS GOOD ORDER AT RECEPTION!"

This plea was followed by a paragraph asking that the people attending thereception would not allow themselves to be provoked into disorder by theBritish military. Then there was the concluding exclamation:

"GOD SAVE IRELAND!"

On my way to the Sinn Fein headquarters in Harcourt street, I passed theMansion House of the Lord Mayor and found two long-coated Dublin MilitaryPolice stripping the new wet poster from the yellow walls. When I arrivedat Number 6, Harcourt street, I saw black-clad Mrs. Sheehy-Sheffington, insomewhat agitated absorption of thought, coming down the worn steps of theold Georgian house. In the upper back room, earnest young secretariesworked in swift silence. One of them, a curly-haired girl with her moutho-ed about a cigarette, puffed unceasingly. At last Harry Boland, secretaryof Sinn Fein, entered. 

"The council decides tonight, " he admitted. His eyes were bright andfaraway like one whose mind is on a coming crisis. When I told him I woulddrop in again to hear the decision, he protested that they would be at ittill late. On my counter protest that time made no difference to me, hepromised that if I would not come he would send me word at eleven thatnight. "But I think, " he added, "we won't know till morning. "

At ten that night, Boots knocked at my door. I concluded that there hadbeen a stampeded decision. But on going out I discovered the AssociatedPress correspondent there. He told me that he heard that I was to receivethe news and that he did not believe that there was any necessity ofbothering the Sinn Feiners twice for the same decision. 

"I think the reception is quite likely, " he volunteered. "This afternoon agood many of the Sinn Fein army were at University chapel at confession. Atthe girls' hostels of National University--which is regarded as a sort ofadolescent Sinn Fein headquarters--there have been strict orders that thegirls are to remain indoors tomorrow night. "

When the messenger arrived at eleven to say that no decision had beenreached, I made an appointment for an interview on the following day withDeValera. 

Electricity was in the air by morning. There were all sorts of sparks. Young men in civilian clothes ran for trams with their hands over their hippockets. A delightful girl whom I had met, boarded my car with a heavyparcel in her hands. As the British officer next me rose to give her hisseat, her cheeks became very pink. Sometime later she told me that, likethe rest of the Sinn Fein volunteers, she had received her mobilizationorders, and that the parcel the officer had relented for was--her rifle. 

At that time, her division of the woman's section of the Sinn Feinvolunteers was pressing a plan for the holding of the reception. In order, however, that no needed fighters would be killed, the girls had asked thatthey should be first to meet the president. Then, when the machine gunscommenced, "only girls" would fall. 

Into College Green a brute of a tank had cruised. The man in charge wasinviting people to have a look. Inside there were red-lipped munitionboxes, provender cases, and through the skewer-sized sight-holes next thejutting guns, there were glimpses of shoppers emerging from Grafton streetinto the Green. Over the city, against the silver-rimmed, Irish grayclouds, aeroplanes--there were sixteen in one formation--buzzedinsistently. Between the little stone columns of the roof railing ofTrinity College, machine guns poked out their cold snouts. 

"Smoke bombs were dropped over Mount street bridge today, " said HarryBoland with a shrug of his shoulders when I arrived at Sinn Feinheadquarters to ask if the reception would still be held. "What can we doagainst a force like theirs?"

But there was a strained feeling at headquarters as if the decision hadbeen made after a hard fight. Alderman Thomas Kelly, one of the oldest ofthe Sinn Feiners, told me that he had backed DeValera in his refusal tocountenance a needless loss of life, and that it was only after a goodstruggle that their point had won. 

"DeValera's just beyond the town, " whispered Harry Boland to me when hedecided that we would leave to see the president at seven--the hour theexecutive was due to appear at the bridge. "They're searching all the carsthat cross the canal bridges. If there is any trouble as we pass just saythat you are an American citizen--that'd get you through anywhere. "

Knots of still expectant people were gathered at the Mount street bridge. Squads of long-coated military police patrolled the place. Children calledat games. The starlight dripped into the canal. At Portobello bridge wemade our crossing. Nothing happened. The constables did not even punch thecushions of our car as they did with others to see if munitions wereconcealed therein. We swooped down curving roads between white walls hungwith masses of dark laurel. We stopped dead on a road arched with trees. Wegot out, clicked the car door softly shut, turned a corner, and walked somedistance in the cool night. As we walked I made I forget what request inregard to the interview from young Mr. Boland, and with the reverent regardand complete obedience to DeValera's wishes that is characteristic in theyoung Sinn Feiners--a state of mind that does not, however, prevent callingthe president "Dev"--he said simply: "But I must do what he tells me. " Atthe door of a modestly comfortable home whose steps we mounted, a thick-setman blocked my way for a moment. 

"You won't, " he asked, "say where you came?"

"I'm sure, " I returned, "I haven't an idea where I am. "

DeValera was giving rapid, almost breathless, orders in Irish to some oneas I entered his room. His thin frame towered above a dark plush-coveredtable. A fire behind him surrounded him with a soft yellow aura. His white, ascetic, young--he is thirty-seven--face was lined with determination. Doors and windows were hung with thick, dark-red portières, and the wallswere almost as white as DeValera's face. 

"Pardon us for speaking Irish, " he apologized. "We forget. Now first ofall, we will go over the questions you sent me. I have written the answers. They must appear as I have put them down. That is the condition on whichthe interview takes place. "

Did Sinn Fein plan immediate revolution? The president ran a fountain penunder the small, finely written lines as he remarked in an aside that hewas not a writer but a mathematician. No. The sudden set of the president'sjaw indicated that this man who had fought in the 1916 rebellion till evenhis enemies had praised him, was the man who had decided there would be noreception at the bridge. No. There would be no armed revolt till allpeaceable methods had failed. 

If Sinn Fein succeeded in getting separation, would it establish abolshevistic government? DeValera returned that he was not sure whatbolshevism is. As far as he understood bolshevism, Sinn Fein was notbolshevistic. But perhaps, by the way, bolshevism had been asmisrepresented in the American press as Sinn Fein. Right there, I tookexception and said that from his own point of view I did not see what goodslurring the American press would do his cause. Immediately he answered asif only the principal phase of the matter had occurred to him: "But it'strue. " Then he continued: The worker is unfairly treated. Whether it isbolshevistic or not, Sinn Fein hopes to bring about a government in whichthere will be juster conditions for the laboring classes. 

CAUSE AND REMEDY OF SOCIAL CONDITIONS. 

The empire does not consider the cause of revolt. [1] But the republic isinterested not only in the cause but also in the remedy. 

Relief, the republic has said, must come through Sinn Fein--ourselves. Neither the Sinn Fein leaders nor the people believe in the power of theIrish vote in the British House of Commons. At the last general electionsthe Sinn Fein party pledged that if its members were elected they would notgo to the British parliament, but would remain at home to form the Irishparliament, the governing body of the Irish republic. Dodgers explainingwhy Sinn Fein had decided to forego the House of Commons were widelydistributed. These read: "What good has parliamentarianism been? Forthirty-three years England has been considering Home Rule while Irishmembers pleaded for it. But in three weeks the English parliament passed aconscriptive act for Ireland, though the Irish party was solid against it. "On this platform, Sinn Fein won seventy-three out of 105 seats. 

If Sinn Fein is to relieve the social conditions in Ireland, it must, saySinn Feiners, find out the cause. So they have pondered on this question:What is the cause of the unemployment in Ireland today? The answer to thatquestion was the one point that the sharp-mustached, sardonic little ArthurGriffith, founder of Sinn Fein, wanted the American delegates from thePhiladelphia Race Convention to carry back to America. 

It was revealed at a meeting of the Irish parliament specially called forthe delegates. Cards were difficult to get for that meeting, and as eachone passed through the long dreary ante-room of the circular assembly hallof the Mansion House, he was subjected to close scrutiny by the two dozenIrish volunteers on guard. In the civilian audience there was a sprinklingof American and Australian officers. Up on the platform was the throne ofthe Lord Mayor, in front of which sat the delegates--Frank Walsh, Edward F. Dunne, and Michael Ryan. In a roped-off semi-circle below the platform weredeep upholstered chairs wherein rested the members of the Irish parliament. Countess Markewicz was, of course, the only woman there. White-haired, trembling-handed Laurence Ginnel, who is given long jail terms because herefuses to take his hat off in a British court, sat forward on his chair. The rich young Protestant named Robert Barton regarded the crowd throughhis shining eyeglasses. Keen, boyish Michael Collins, minister of finance, fingered the paper he was going to read. The last two men had recentlyescaped from prison and were wanted by the police--both, as they say inIreland, were "on the run. "

"England kills Irish industry, " said the succinct Arthur Griffith as herose from the right hand of DeValera to address the delegates. "Early inthe nineteenth century, England wanted a cheap meat supply center. Shetherefore made it more profitable for the landowners in Ireland to growcattle instead of crops. Only a few herders are required in cattle care. Soliterally millions of Irish, tillers of the soil and millers of grain, werethrown out of employment, and from 1841 to 1911 the population fell from8, 000, 000 to 4, 400, 000. Today, Ireland, capable of supporting 16, 000, 000, cannot maintain 4, 000, 000. "[2]

What is the Sinn Fein remedy for unemployment? Industry. Plans were thenunder way for DeValera to make his escape to America to obtain Americancapital to back Irish industry. But money was not to be his sole business. He was to work for the recognition of Irish consuls and Irish mercantilemarine. And inside Ireland the movement to establish industry on a soundbasis was going on. Irish banks, Irish courts, Irish schools are to sustainthe movement. At present the English-controlled Irish banks handicap Irishentrepreneurs by charging them one per cent more interest than Englishbanks charge English borrowers; therefore, a national bank is regarded asan imperative need. Decisions of British judges in Irish courts may hamperIrish industry; so in parts of the country perfectly legal courts ofarbitration manned by Irishmen have been established. School children underthe present system of education are trained neither to commerce nor to loveof the development of their native land; accordingly a Sinn Fein schoolfund is now being collected so that the Irish parliament may soon be ableto take over national education. 

Sinn Fein could develop industry more easily if Ireland were free. [3] Thereis hope. It lies in Ireland's very lack of jobs. British labor does notlike the competition of the cheap labor market next door. It ratherwelcomes the party that would push Irish industry. For with Irish industrydeveloped Irish labor would become scarce and high. Already the Britishlabor party has declared in favor of the self-determination of Ireland, andit is expected that with its accession to power there may be a finalgranting of self-determination to Ireland. 

As we were leaving the Mansion House--to which some of us were invited toreturn to a reception for the delegates that evening--I found intensereaction to the speakers of the day. I asked a young Americannon-commissioned officer how he liked DeValera. He seemed to be as stirredby the name as the young members of DeValera's regiment who besiege Mrs. DeValera for some little valueless possession of the "chief's. " The boydrew in his breath, and I expected him to let it out again in a flow ofpraise, but emotion seemed to get the better of him, and all he couldmanage was a fervent: "Oh, gee!" Then I came across young Sylvia Pankhurst, disowned by her family for her communist sympathies, and in Dublin for thepurpose of persuading the Irish parliament to become soviet. The Irishspeakers, she told me, were much to be preferred to the Americans. Theyused more figures and less figures of speech. And when I repeated herremark to Desmond Fitzgerald, a pink and fastidious member of parliament, he smilingly commented: "Well, we Irish are more sophisticated, aren't we?"

THE MAILED FIST

In the afternoon the curtain went up on a matinee performance of The MailedFist. 

The first act was in the home of Madame Gonne-McBride. It was, properly, anexposition of the power of the enemy. 

With Madame Gonne-McBride, once called the most beautiful woman in Europe, Sylvia Pankhurst, and the sister, of Robert Barton, I entered the big houseon Stephen's Green. Modern splashily vivid wall coloring. Japanese screens. Ancient carved madonnas. Two big Airedales thudded up and down in greetingto their mistress. I spoke of their unusual size. 

Madame Gonne-McBride, taking the head of one of them between her hands:"They won't let any one arrest me again, will they?"

She is tall and slim in her deep mourning--her husband was killed in therebellion of 1916. Her widow's bonnet is a soft silky guipure lace placedon her head like a Red Cross worker's coif. On the breast of her black gownthere hangs a large dull silver cross. Beggars and flower-sellers greet herby name. It is said that a large part of her popularity is due to her workin obtaining free school lunches. Anyway, there was great grief among thepeople when she was thrown into jail for supposed complicity in theunproved German plot. The arrest, she said, came one Sunday night. She waswalking unconcernedly from one of George Russell's weekly gatherings, whenfive husky constables blocked the bridge road and hurried her off to jail. At last, on account of her ill health, she was released from prison--veryweak and very pale. 

Enter seventeen-year-old Sean McBride. Places back against the door. Blueeyes wide. Breathlessly: "They're after Bob Barton and Michael Collins. They've surrounded the Mansion House. "

Hatless we raced across Stephen's Green--that little handkerchief of a parkthat never seemed so embroidered with turns and bridges and bandstands andduck ponds before. Through the crowd that had already gathered we edged ourway till we came to the double line of bayonets and batons that guarded theentrance to Dawson street. Over the broad, blue shoulder of the policemandirectly in front of me, I glimpsed a wicked-looking little whippet tankwith two very conscious British officers just head and shoulders out. Stillfurther down were three covered motor lorries that had been used to conveythe soldiers. 

Sean, for the especial benefit of constable just ahead: "Wars for democracyand small nations! And that's the only way they can keep us in the Britishempire. Brute force. Nice exhibition for the American journalists in town. "

Constable stalked Sean back to edge of crowd. Sean looked at him steadilywith slight twinkle in his eye. Miss Barton, Miss Pankhurst, and I climbedup a low stone wall that commanded the guarded street, and clung to theiron paling on top. Sean came and stood beneath. 

Miss Pankhurst, regarding crowd in puzzled manner: "Why do you all smile?When the suffragists were arrested we used to become furious. "

Sean looking up at her in kindly manner in which old rebel might glance atimpatient young rebel: "You forget. We're very used to this. "

Miss Pankhurst made an unexpected jump from her place. She wedged her wayto the line of soldiers. As she talked to two young Tommies they blushedand fiddled with their bayonets like girls with their first bouquets offlowers. Twice a British major admonished them. 

Miss Pankhurst, returning: "Welsh boys. Just babies. I asked them why theycame out armed to kill fellow workers. They said they had enlisted for thewar. If they had known they were to be sent to Ireland they would haverefused to go. I told them it was not too late to act. They could take offtheir uniforms. But they? They're weak--weak. "

As dusk fell, party capes and tulle mists of head dresses began to appearbetween the drab or tattered suits of the bystanders. Among the comingreception guests was Susan Mitchell, co-editor with George Russell on_The Irish Homestead_. 

Susan Mitchell, of constable: "Can't I go through? No? But there's to be aparty, and the tea will get all cold. "

In the courage of the crowd, the people began to sing The Soldiers' Song. It took courage. It was shortly after John O'Sheehan had been sentenced fortwo years for caroling another seditious lyric. A surge of sound broughtout the words: "The west's awake!" Dying yokes. And a suddenright-about-face movement of the throng. 

Crowd shouting: "Up the Americans!"

With Sinn Fein and American flags flying, the delegates' car rolled up tothe outskirts of the crowd. A sharp order. The crowd-fearing bayonetslunged forward. Frank Walsh, looking through his tortoise-rim glasses atthe steel fence, got out of his car. He walked up to the pointing bayonets, and asked for the man in charge. 

Frank Walsh: "What's the row?"

The casualness of the question must have disarmed Lieutenant-ColonelJohnstone of the Dublin Military Police. He laughed. Then conferred. Whilethe confab was on, the Countess Markewicz slipped from Mr. Walsh's car toour paling. She was, as usual, dressed in a "prepared" style. She had onher green tweed suit with biscuits in the pockets, "so if anythinghappened. "

Countess Markewicz, rubbing her hands: "Excellent propaganda! Excellentpropaganda!"

The motor lorries chugged. Soldiers broke line, and climbed in. The peoplescreamed, jumped, waved their hands, and hurrahed for Walsh. Mr. Walshreturned to his car. And in the path made by the heartily boohed motorlorries, the American's machine commenced its victorious passage to theMansion House. In order to get through the crowd to the reception we sprangto the rear of the motor. Clinging to the dusty mudguard, I remarked toMiss Pankhurst that we would not look very partified. And she, pushed aboutby the tattered people, said she did not mind. Long ago she had decided shewould never wear evening dresses because poor people never have them. 

Last act. Turkish-rugged and velvet-portièred reception room of the MansionHouse. Assorted people shaking hands with the delegates. Delegates filledwith boyish glee at the stagey turn of events. 

Frank Walsh: "Look! There's Bob Barton talking to his sister. Out there bythe portrait of Queen Victoria--see that man in a green uniform. That'sMichael Collins of the Irish Volunteers and minister of finance of theIrish Republic. The very men they're after. 

"Is this a play? Or a dream?"

[Footnote 1. British propaganda, on the contrary, states that the Irish arenot in the physical agony of extreme poverty. They are prosperous. Theymade money on munitions, and their exports increased enormously during thewar. 

"You could eat shell as easily as make it, " was one of the firstparliamentary rebuffs received by Irishmen asking the establishment ofnational munition factories at the beginning of the war, according toEdward J. Riordan. Mr. Riordan is secretary of the National IndustrialDevelopment Association. This is a non-political organization of which theCountess of Desart, the Earl of Carrick, and Colonel Sir Nugent Everard aresome of the executive members. It was not until 1916 that Ireland securedconsideration of her rights to a share in the war expenditure. In thatyear, an all-Ireland committee called on Lloyd George. He said: "It is fairthat Ireland, contributing as she does not only in money but in flesh andblood, should have her fair share of expenditure.... I should be preparedto utilize whatever opportunities we can to utilize the opportunity thisgives you to develop Ireland industrially. " After persistent effort, however, all that the all-Ireland committee was able to get was five smallmunition factories. _The insignificance of these plants may be realizedfrom the fact that at the time the armistice was declared there were only2, 250 workers in them. _

As to trade increase:--when I was in Ireland in 1919, the last exportstatistics given out by the government were for 1916. In 1914 exports werevalued at $386, 000, 000; in 1916, at $535, 000, 000. But, according to theBoard of Trade, prices had doubled in that time, so that _if exports hadremained stationary, their value should have doubled to_ $772, 000, 000. ]

[Footnote 2. That England controls this industrial situation was made clearduring the war. Then ship tonnage was scarce, and England's regularresources of agricultural supply were cut off. So England called on Irelandto revert to agriculture. Ireland's tillage acreage jumped from 2, 300, 000in 1914 to 3, 280, 000 in 1918. This change in policy brought prosperity tosome of the farmers, and Ireland's bank deposits rose from $310, 000, 000 in1913 to $455, 000, 000 in 1917. But England is reestablishing her formeragricultural trade connections. According to F. A. Smiddy, professor ofeconomics at University college, Cork, a return to grazing has alreadycommenced in Ireland, and _"prosperity" will last at most only twopost-war years. _]

[Footnote 3. British taxation saps Irish capital. The 1916 imperial annualtax took $125, 000, 000 put of Ireland and put back $65, 000, 000 into Irishadministration. Irishmen argue that the excess might better go to thedevelopment of Ireland. Figures supplied Department of Agriculture, 1919. ]

III

IRISH LABOR AND CLASS REVOLUTION

"A CHANGE OF FLAGS IS NOT ENOUGH. "

In the sputtering flare of the arc lamp in front of Liberty hall stoodsquads of boys. Some of them wore brass-buttoned, green woolen waists, andsome, ordinary cotton shirts. Some of them had on uniform knickers, andsome, long, unpressed trousers. On the opposite side of the street wereblocked similar squads of serious-eyed, high-chinned girls. Some of themwere in green tweed suits, and others as they had come from work. They werecompanies of the Citizens' Army recruited by the Irish Labor party, andassembled in honor of the return of the Countess Markewicz from jail. 

 "Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer, We'll keep the red flag flying here. "

Young voices, impatient of the interim of waiting, sang the socialist song. The burden was taken up by the laborers, whose constant movement to keep agood view was attested by the hollow sound of their wooden-soled boots onthe stone walks. And the refrain was hummed by the shawled, frayed-skirtedcreatures who were coming up from Talbot street, Gloucester street, Peterson's lane, and all the family-to-a-room districts in Dublin. On theskeletonish railroad crossing suspended over the Liffey, tin-hatted andbayonet-carrying British soldiers were silhouetted against themoon-whitened sky. Up to them floated the last oath of "The Red Flag":

 "With heads uncovered swear we all, To bear it onward till we fall. Come dungeon dark or gallows grim, This song shall be our parting hymn. "

Clattered over the bridge the horse-dragged brake. In the light of a searchlamp played on it from an automobile behind, a small figure in a slouch hatand a big black coat waved a bouquet of narcissus. There was a surge of theblock-long crowds and people who could not see lifted their hands andshouted: "Up the countess!"

As we waited in the light of the dim yellow bulbs threaded from the ceilingof the big bare upper front room of Liberty Hall, Susan Mitchell told me of"the chivalrous woman. " The countess is a daughter of the Gore-Booth familywhich owned its Sligo estate before America was discovered. As a girl thecountess used to ride fast horses like mad along the rocky western coast. Then she became a three-feathered débutante bowing at Dublin Castle. Latershe painted pictures in Paris and married her handsome Pole. But one daysome one put an Irish history in her hands. In a sudden whole-heartedconversion to the cause of the people, the countess turned to aid the Irishlabor organizers. She drilled boy scouts for the Citizens' Army. She fedstarving strikers during the labor troubles of 1913 with sheep sent dailyfrom her Sligo estate. In the rebellion of 1916 she fought and killed underMichael Mallin of the Citizens' Army. She was hardly out of jail forparticipation in the rebellion when she was clapped in again for allegedcomplicity in the never-to-be-proved German plot. While she was in jail, she was elected the first woman member of parliament. 

White from imprisonment, her small round steel-rimmed glasses dropping awayfrom her blue eyes, and her curly brown hair wisping out from under herblack felt hat, the countess embraced a few of the women in the room andexchanged handclasps with the men. Below the crowd was clamoring for herappearance at the window. 

"Fellow rebels!" she began as she leaned out into the mellow night. Thenwith the apparent desire to say everything at once that makes her publicspeech stuttery, she continued: "It's good to come out of jail to this. Itis good to come out again to work for a republic. Let us all join hands tomake the new republic a workers' republic. A change of flags is notenough!"

Two oil flares with orange flame throwing off red sparks on the crowd, werefastened to the brake below. It was the brake that was to carry "Madame" onher triumphal tour of Dublin. The boys of the Citizens' Army made a humanrope about the conveyance. In it I climbed with the countess, the plumplittle Mrs. James Connolly, the magisterial Countess Plunkett, CommandantO'Neill of the Citizens' Army, Sean Milroy, who escaped from Lincoln jailwith DeValera, and two or three others. Rows of constables were backedagainst the walls at irregular intervals. I asked Sean Milroy if he werenot afraid that he would be re-taken, and he responded comfortably that the"peelers" would never attempt to take a political prisoner out of agathering like that. As we neared the poverty-smelling Coombe district, thecountess remarked that this, St. Patrick's, was her constituency. At theshaft of St. James fountain, the brake was halted. Shedding her long coat, and standing straight in her green tweed suit, with the plush seat of thebrake for her floor, the countess told the cheering workers that she wasgoing to come down to live in the Coombe. Heated with the energy of talkingand throwing her body about so that her voice would carry over the crowdthat circled her, the countess sank down on the seat. As the brake droveon, motherly little Mrs. Connolly tried to slip the big coat over thecountess. But the countess, in one of those sudden meditative silencesduring which she seems to retain only a subconsciousness of hersurroundings, refused the offer of warmth with a shrug of her shoulders. Then, emerging from her pre-occupation, she demanded of Sean Milroy:

"What have you planned for your constituency? I'm going to have a soviet. "

THE WORKERS' REPUBLIC

Like the countess, the Irish Labor party wants a workers' republic. But itwants a republic first. 

The Irish Labor party has been accused of accepting Russian roubles, ofhiding bags of bolshevik gold in the basement of Liberty Hall. Whether ithas taken Russian gold or not, it is frankly desirous of possessing theRussian form of government. James Connolly, who is largely responsible forthe present Labor party in Ireland, was, like Lenin and Trotsky, a Marxiansocialist, and worked for government by the proletariat. The Irish Laborparty celebrated the Russian revolution by calling a "bolshevik" meetingand cheering under a red flag in the assembly room of the Mansion House. And in its last congress, it reaffirmed its "adherence to the principles offreedom, democracy, and peace enunciated in the Russian revolution. "

How strong are the revolutionaries? The Irish Labor party is new but italready contains about 300, 000 members. [1] It plans to include every workerfrom the "white collar" to the "muffler" labor. And the laborers alone makeup seven-eighths of the population. For while there are just 252, 000members of the professional and commercial classes, there are 4, 137, 000 whoare in agricultural, industrial and indefinite classes[2]--most of thefarmers are held to be laborers because outside the great estates, holdingsaverage at thirty acres and are worked by the holders themselves. [3]

There's the revolutionary rub. The Irish farmers make up the largest bodyof workers in Ireland. The Irish farmer sweated and bled for his land. Would he yield it now for nationalization? I put the question up to WilliamO'Brien, the lame, never-smiling tailor who is secretary of the Irish Laborparty. He said that the farm hand should be taken into consideration. 

The farm hand would profit by nationalization. At present he is condemnedto slavery. At a hiring fair--called a "slave market" by the laborunions--he stands between the mooing cows and snorting pigs and offers hisservices for sale for as little as $100 a year. He may wish to get moremoney. But his employer is also very often his landlord. What happens? Inthe spring of 1919, 35, 000 farm hands went on strike. Lord Bellew ofBallyragget and Lord Powerscourt of Enniskerry used the eviction threat toget the men back to work, and in Rhode, evictions actually took place. 

The small farmer on bad land would profit by re-distribution. Many suchlive in the west and northwest of Ireland. Take a farmer of Donegal. Therethere's stony, boggy land. Fires must be built about the stones so that thesoil will lose its grip upon them and they may be hauled away to help makefences. Immovable boulders are frequent, so frequent that the soil cannotbe ploughed but must be spaded by hand. Seaweed for fertilizer must beplucked from the rocks in the sea, carried up the mountain side and laidblack and thick in the sterile brown furrows. Near Dungloe in Donegal, oneholding of 600 acres was recently valued at $10. 50, and another of 400 at$3. 70. So the Labor party is confident of bringing over the farmers to itspoint of view. 

On the whole, it is said, the way of the labor propagandist is easy, forcapital in Ireland is very weak. First, there is very little of it. In 1917the total income tax of the British Isles was £300, 000, 000; Ireland withone-tenth the population contributed only one-fortieth of the tax. In thesame year, the total excess profits tax was £290, 000, 000 and Ireland'sproportion was slightly less than for the income tax. [4] Second, whatcapital there is, is not effectively organized. The first nationalcommercial association is just forming in Dublin. 

Whether the future prove the numerical strength of labor or not, theleaders are determined that labor will be organically strong. It isdeveloping a pyramid form of government. Irish labor fosters the "one bigunion. " In some towns all the labor, from teachers to dock-workers, havealready coalesced. These unions select their district heads. The districtheads are subsidiary to the general head in Dublin. When each union insidethe big union is ready to take over its industry, and their district andgeneral heads are ready to take over government there will be a generalstrike for this end. The strike will be supported by the army--theCitizens' Army of the workers. 

"There you have, " said James Connolly, who promoted the one big union, "notonly the most effective combination for industrial warfare, but also forthe social administration of the future. "[5]

"Certainly we mean to take over industry by force if necessary, " affirmedThomas Johnson, treasurer of the Irish Labor party. He is a big-browed manwith thick, pompadoured, gray hair, and the aspect of a live professor. Some people call him the coming leader of Ireland. In answer to mystatement that it wouldn't be a very hard job to take over Irish industry, he smiled and said: "That's why we welcome the entrance of outside capitalinto Ireland. The more industry is developed, the less we will have to doafterward. "

THE REPUBLIC FIRST

Labor agrees with Sinn Fein not only that Irish industry must be developedbut also that Ireland must have independence. After the national war, theclass war must come. First freedom from exploitation by capitalisticnations, and then freedom from capitalistic individuals. Many socialists, it is said, do not understand why Ireland should not plunge at once intothe class war. It was a matter of regret to James Connolly that many of hisfellow socialists the world over would never understand his participationin the rebellion of 1916. Nora Connolly, the smiling boy-like girl whosmokes and works by a grate in Liberty Hall, says that on the eve of hisexecution, when he lay in bed with his leg shattered by a gun wound, herfather said to her: "The socialists will never understand why I am here. They all forget I am an Irishman. "

But James Connolly's fellow socialists in Ireland understand "why he wasthere, " They back his participation in the national war. And they knowevery Irishman will. So they go to the workers and say: "Jim Connolly diedto make Ireland free. " Then while the workers cheer, they swiftly show whyConnolly advocated the class war, too: "Jim Connolly lived to make Irelandfree. He believed that the world is for the man who works in it, but inIreland he saw seven-eighths of the people in the working class, and heknew that to these people life means crowded one-room homes, endlessFridays, no schools or virtually none, and churches where resignation ispreached to them. So his life was a dangerous fight to organize workersthat they might become strong enough to take what is theirs. " At LibertyHall, one is told that the martyr's name is magnetizing the masses into theIrish Labor party. And, in order to propagate his ideas, the people arecontributing their coppers towards a fund for the permanent establishmentof the James Connolly Labor College. 

So labor fights for a republic first. At the last general elections itwithdrew all its labor party candidates that the Sinn Fein candidates mighthave a clear field to demonstrate to the world how unified is Irishsentiment in favor of a republic. And at the International Labor andSocialist conference held in Berne in 1919, Cathal O'Shannon, the brightyoung labor leader who goes about with his small frame swallowed up in anovercoat too big for him, made this declaration:

"Irish labor reaffirms its declaration in favor of free and absoluteself-determination of each and every people, the Irish included, inchoosing the sovereignty and form of government under which it shall live. It rejoices that this self-determination has now been assured to theJugo-Slavs, Czecho-Slovaks, Alsatians and Lorrainers, as well as to theFinns, Poles, Ukrainians, and now to the Arabs. This is not enough and itis not impartial. To be one and the other, this principle must also beapplied in the same sense and under the same conditions to the peoples ofIreland, India, Egypt, and to such other people as have not yet secured theexercise of the inherent right.... Irish labor claims no more and no lessfor Ireland than for the others. "

After the republic, a workers' republic? After Sinn Fein, the Labor party?Madame Markewicz is high in the councils of both Sinn Fein and Labor. Oneday, lost in one of her trance-like meditations in which she states herintuitions with absolute disregard of expediency, she said to me:

"Labor will swamp Sinn Fein. "

[Footnote 1. Figures supplied by William O'Brien, secretary Irish Laborparty and Trade Union congress, 1919. ]

[Footnote 2. Census of 1911. ]

[Footnote 3. Figures supplied by Department of Agriculture of Ireland, 1919. ]

[Footnote 4. Figures read by Thomas Lough, M. P. , in House of Commons, May14, 1918. ]

[Footnote 5. "Reconquest of Ireland, " By James Connolly. Maunsel andCompany. 1917. P. 328. ]

IV

AE'S PEACEFUL REVOLUTION

"THE CO-OPERATIVE COMMONWEALTH"

It was very dark. I could not find the number. The flat-faced little row ofhouses was set far back on the green. But at last I mounted some loftysteps, and entered a brown linoleum-covered hallway. In the front parlorsat the hostess. She was like some family portrait with her hair parted anddrawn over her ears, with her black taffeta gown surmounted by acameo-pinned lace collar. She poured tea. In a back parlor whose walls werehung with unframed paintings, a big brown-bearded man was passing teacupsto women who were lounging in chairs and to men who stood black against thered glow of the grate. The big man was George Russell, the famous AE, poet, painter and philosopher, the "north star of Ireland. "

At last he sat down on the edge of a chair--his blue eyes atwinkle as if heknew some good secret of the happy end of human struggling and was onlywaiting the proper moment to tell. This much he did reveal as he gesturedwith the pipe that was more often in his hand than in his mouth: it is hisbelief that all acts purposed for good work out towards good. He gives earto all sincere radicals, Sinn Feiners and "Reds. " But he states that hebelieves he is the only living pacifist, and disputes the value of bloodymethods. He advocates the peaceful revolution of co-operation. Hispowerfully gentle personality has an undoubted effect on therevolutionaries, and while neither element wants to embrace pacifism, bothwant AE's revolution to go forward with theirs. 

His gaiety at the little Sunday evenings which he holds quite regularly, goes far, I am told, towards easing the strain on the taut nerves of theSinn Fein intellectuals who attend them. On the Sunday evening I waspresent the subject of jail journals was broached. Darrell Figgis had justwritten one. In a dim corner of the room was miniatured the ivory face andthe red gold beard of the much imprisoned Figgis. 

"Why write a jail journal?" queried AE, smiling towards the corner. "Therare book, the book that bibliophiles will pray to find twenty years fromnow, will be written by an Irishman who never went to jail. "

Some one, I think that it was "Jimmy" Stephens, author of "The Crock ofGold, " who sat cross-legged on the end of a worn wicker chaise longue andtalked with all the facility with which he writes, mentioned the countess'splan of living in the Coombe district. AE returned that as far as he knewthe countess was the only member of parliament who felt called upon to livewith her constituency. 

Then suddenly the whole room seemed to join a chorus of protest againstPresident Wilson. At the Peace Conference all power was his. He was backedby the richest, greatest nation in the world. But he failed to keep hispromise of gaining the self-determination of small nations. Was he yieldingto the anti-Irish sentiment brought about by English control of the cablesand English propaganda in the United States--was he to let his greatrepublic be intellectually dependent on the ancient monarchy?

"Perhaps, " said AE to me after a few meditative puffs of his pipe, "youfeel like the American who was with us on a similar occasion a few weeksago. At last he burst out with: 'It's no conception which Americans have oftheir president that he should take the place and the duties of GodOmnipotent in the world, '"

One day I went to discuss Irish labor with AE. I climbed up to that mostcurious of all magazine offices--the _Irish Homestead_ office up underthe roof of Plunkett House. It is a semi-circular room whose walls arecovered with the lavender and purple people of AE's brush. AE was ambushedbehind piles of newspapers, and behind him in a grate filled withsmouldering peat blocks sat the black tea kettle. As a reporter, one of thefew things for which I am allowed to retain respect is the editorial deadline. So I assured AE that I would be glad to return when he had finishedwriting. But with a courtesy that is evidently founded on an inversion ofthe American rule that business should always come before people, heassured me that he could sit down at the fire with me at once. 

Now I knew that he had great sympathy with laborers. I recalled histerrible letter against Dublin employers in the great strike of 1913 whenhe foretold that the success of the employers in starving the Dublin poorwould necessarily lead to "red ruin and the breaking up of laws.... The menwhose manhood you have broken will loathe you, and will always be broodingand seeking to strike a new blow. The children will be taught to curse you. The infant being moulded in the womb will have breathed into its starvedbody the vitality of hate. It is not they--it is you who are pulling downthe pillars of the social order. "[1] But I knew, too, that he was opposedto violence, so I wondered what he would say to this:

"A labor leader just told me that it was his belief that industrialrevolution would take place in Ireland in two or three years. Labor waitsonly till it has secured greater unity between the north and south. Then itwill take over industry and government by force. "

"I had hoped--I am trying to convince the labor leaders here, " he saidfinally, "of the value of the Italian plan for the taking over of industry. The Italian seaman's union co-operatively purchased and ran boats on whichthey formerly had been merely workers. "

Russia he spoke of for a moment. People shortly over from Russia told him, as he had felt, that the soviet was not the dreadful thing it was made outto be. But a dictatorship of the workers he would not like. He wanted, hesaid with an upward movement of his big arms, he wanted to be free. 

"Now I am for the building of a co-operative commonwealth on co-operativesocieties. Ireland can and is developing her own industries throughco-operation. She is developing them without aid from England and in theface of opposition in Ireland. 

"England, you see, is used to dealing with problems of empire--with nationsand great metropolises. When we bring her plans that mean life or death tojust villages, the matter is too small to discuss. She is bored. 

"Ireland offers opposition in the person of the 'gombeen man. ' He is thelocal trader and money lender. And co-operative buying and selling takesaway his monopoly of business. 

"Paddy Gallagher up in Dungloe in the Rosses will give you an idea of thepoverty of the Irish countryside, of the extent that the poverty is due tothe gombeen men, 'the bosses of the Rosses, ' and of the ability of theco-operative society to develop and create industry even in such a locality. 

"Societies like Paddy Gallagher's are springing up all over Ireland. Therapid growth may be estimated from the fact that in 1902 their tradeturnover was $7, 500, 000, and in 1918, $50, 000, 000. These little units donot merely develop industry; they also bind up the economic and socialinterests of the people. 

"In a few years these new societies and others to be created will havedominated their districts, and political power will follow, and we willhave new political ideals based on a democratic control of agriculture andindustry, and states and people will move harmoniously to a given end. 

"Ireland might attain, by orderly evolution, to a co-operative commonwealthin fifty to two hundred years. 

"But these are dangerous times for prophecy. "

PADDY GALLAGHER: GIANT KILLER. 

From the dark niche under the gray boulder where the violets grow, aDonegal fairy flew to the mountain cabin to bring a birthday wish toPatrick Gallagher. The fairy designed not that great good would come toPaddy, but that great good would come to his people through him. At leastwhen Paddy grew up, he slew the child-eating giant, Poverty, who lived inDonegal. 

Paddy began to fight poverty when he could scarcely toddle. With hisfather, whose back was laden with a great rush basket, he used to pad inhis bare feet down the mountainside to the Dungloe harbor--down where thehills give the ocean a black embrace. Father and son would wade into theocean that was pink and lavender in the sunset. Above them, the whitecurlews swooped and curved and opened their pine wood beaks to squawk aprayer for dead fish. But the workers did not stop to watch. Their foodalso was in question. They must pluck the black seaweed to fertilize theirfield. 

When the early sun bronzed the bog, and streaked the dark pool below withgold, Paddy and his father began to feed the dried wavy strands of kelpbetween the hungry brown furrow lips. They packed the long groove near thestone fence; they rounded past the big boulder that could not be budged;last of all, they filled the short far row in the strangely shaped littlefield. At noon, Paddy's mother appeared at the half door of the cabin andcalled in the general direction of the field--it was difficult to see them, for their frieze suits had been dyed in bog water and she could not at oncedistinguish them from the brown earth. They were glad to come in to eattheir sugarless and creamless oatmeal. 

In the evening Paddy ran over the road to his cousin's. Western clouds wereblackening and his little cousin was pulling the pig into the cabin as aman puts other sort of treasure out of danger into a safe. Paddy listened amoment. He could hear the castanets of the tweed weaver's loom and the humof his uncle's deep voice as he sang at his work. He ran to the rear of thecabin and up the stone steps to the little addition. A lantern filled theroom he entered with black, harp-like shadows of the loom. While the unclestopped treadling and held the blue-tailed shuttle in his hand, thebreathless little boy told him that the field was finished. 

"God grant, " said the uncle with a solemnity that put fear into the heartof Paddy, "there may be a harvest for you. "

Paddy watched his mother work ceaselessly to aid in the fight that hisfather and he were making against poverty. During the month her needleswould click unending wool into socks, and then on Saturday she wouldtrudge--often in a stiff Atlantic gale--sixteen miles to the market inStrabane. There she sold the socks at a penny a pair. 

In spite of combined hopes, the potato plants were floppily yellow thatyear. Their stems felt like a dead man's fingers. No potatoes to eat. Noneto exchange for meal. What were they to do?

The gombeen man told them. As member of the county council, he said, hewould secure money for the repair of the roads. All those who worked on theroad would get paid in meal. 

"Let your da' not worry, " said the fat gombeen man pompously to Paddy. Paddy had brought the ticket that his father had obtained by a week's workto exchange for twenty-eight pounds of corn meal. "I'll keep famine fromthe parish. Charity's not dead yet. "

When Paddy lugged the meal into the cabin, he found his mother lying on thebed with her face averted from the bowl of milk that some less hungryneighbor had brought in. His father's gaunt frame was hunched over the peatblocks on the flat hearth. Paddy, full of desire to banish the broodingdiscouragement from the room, hastened to repeat the words of the gombeenman. But he felt that he had failed when his father, regarding the twostone sack, said hollowly:

"Charity? Small pay to the men who keep the roads open for his vans. "

In the spring, Paddy was nine, and had to go out in the world to fightpoverty alone. His father had confided to him that they were in great debtto the gombeen man. Paddy could help them get out. There was to be a hiringfair in Strabane. Paddy swung along the road to Strabane pretending he wasa man--he was to be hired out just like one. But when he arrived at thehiring field he shrank back. All the farm hands, big and little, stoodherded together in between the cattle pens. A man? A beast. One overseerfor a big estate came up to dicker for the boy, and said he would give himfifteen dollars for six months' work. Paddy was just about to muster upcourage to put the price up a bit, when a friend of the overseer came upwith the prearranged remark: "A fine boy! Well worth twelve dollars the sixmonths!"

"What do you want to know for?" asked the gombeen man, when at the end ofPaddy's back-breaking six months, Paddy and his father brought him thefifteen dollars and asked how much they still owed. The gombeen man refusesaccounts to everyone but the priest, magistrate, doctor and teacher. "Whatdo you want to know how much you owe for? Unless you want to pay me alloff?"

When Paddy was seventeen he made a still bigger fight against debt. Withthe sons of other "tied" men, he went to work in the Scottish harvests. Hisfamily was not as badly off as those of some of the boys. Some had run sofar behind that the gombeen man had served writs on them, obtained judgmentagainst their holdings, and could evict them at pleasure. 

When Paddy married and settled down in Dungloe he found the reason for theunpayableness of the debt. One day he and his father shopped at the gombeenstore together. They bought the same amount of meal. The father paidcash--seventeen shillings. Forty-four days later, Paddy brought his money. But the gombeen man presented him with a bill for twenty-one shillings andthree pence. It did no good to say how much the father had paid for thesame amount of meal. The gombeen man insisted that Paddy's father had giveneighteen shillings, and Paddy was being charged just three shillings andthree pence interest. Or only 144 per cent per annum!

"Why do we buy from him? Why don't we get together and do our own buying?"asked the insurgent Paddy. After much reflection he had decided on thetactics of his campaign against poverty and the recruiting for his armycommenced that night as the neighbors visited about his turf fire. Therewas doubt on the faces of those tied to the gombeen man. But Paddycontinued: "Let's try it out in a small way, say with fertilizer. Thatstuff he's selling us isn't as good as kelp, and he won't tell us what it'smade of. "

The recruits fell in. They scraped up enough money to buy a twenty-ton loadof rich manure from a neighboring co-operative society. The little dealsaved them $200 and brought them heavy crops. They organized. They needed astore. Up in a rocky boreen on his little farm, Paddy had an empty shed. Again the neighbors explored the toes of their money stockings, and foundenough to pay for filling the shed with flour, tea, sugar and meal. Then, if they were "free" men, they came boldly to shop on the nights the storewas open--moonlight or no moonlight. But if they were "tied" men, theycrept fearsomely tip the rocks on dark nights only. The recruits recruited. Financial and social returns began to come in. At the end of the first yearthere was a clear profit of over $500. In three years the society wasrecognized as one of the most efficient in Ireland and presented by thePembroke fund with a fine stucco hall. Jigs. Dances. Lectures. 

But the gombeen man wasn't "taking it lying down. " He called on hispolitical and religious friends to aid. First on the magistrate. When Paddybecame the political rival of the gombeen man for the county council, therewas a joint debate. Paddy used reduced prices as his argument. Questionswere hurled at him by the reddening trader. 

"Wait till I get through, " said Paddy. "Then I'll attend to you. "

That, said the trader, was a physical threat! So the gombeener's friend, the magistrate, threw Paddy into jail. Paddy went to prison full of fearthat dissension might be sown in the society's ranks. But on coming out hediscovered not only that he had won the election but that a committee waswaiting to present him with a gorgeous French gilt clock, and that fires, just as on St. John's eve, were blazing on the mountains. 

But the trader took another friend of his aside. This time it was thevillage priest. Bad dances, he said, were going on of nights in Templecronehall. What was Paddy's surprise on a Sunday in the windswept chapel by thesea to hear his beloved hall denounced as a place of sin. Paddy knew thepeople would not come any more. 

Then, the great inspiration. Paddy remembered how his mother used to try tohelp with her knitting. He saw girls at spinning wheels or looms workingfull eight hours a day and earning only $1. 25 to $1. 50 a week. So withpermission of the society, Paddy had two long tables placed in theentertainment hall, and along the edges of the tables he had the latesttype of knitting machines screwed. Soon there were about 300 girls workingon a seven and a half hour day. They were paid by the piece, and it was notlong before they were getting wages that ran from $17. 50 to $5. 25 a week. Incidentally, Mr. Gallagher, as manager, gave himself only $10. 00 a week. 

When I saw Patrick Gallagher in Dungloe, he was dressed in a blue suit anda soft gray cap, and looked not unlike the keen sort of business men onesees on an ocean liner. And indeed he gave the impression that if he hadnot been a co-operationist for Ireland, he might well have been acapitalist in America. He took me up the main street of Dungloe into easilythe busiest of the white plastered shops. He made plain the hints ofgrowing industry. The bacon cured in Dungloe. The egg-weighing--sinceweighing was introduced the farmers worked to increase the size of the eggsand the first year increased their sales $15, 000 worth. The rentable farmmachines. 

"Come out into this old cabin and meet our baker, " Paddy continued when wewent out the rear of the store. "We began to get bread from Londonderry, but the old Lough Swilly road is too uncertain. See the ancient Scotchoven--the coals are placed in the oven part and when they are still hotthey are scooped out and the bread is put in their place. Interesting, isn't it? But we are going to get a modern slide oven. "

After viewing the orchard and the beehives beneath the trees, I remarked onthe size of the plant, and its suitability for his purpose. He said:

"It used to belong to the gombeen man. "

The sea wind was blowing through the open windows of the mill. Barefootgirls--it's only on Sunday that Donegal country girls wear shoes and thenthey put them on only when they are quite near church--silently needledkhaki-worsted over the shining wire prongs. Others spindled wool for newwork. As they stood or sat at their work, the shy colleens told of an extraroom added to a cabin, or a plump sum to a dowry through the money earnedat the mill. None of them was planning, as their older sisters had had toplan, to go to Scotland or America. 

"As the parents of most of the girls are members in the society they wantthe best working conditions possible for them, " said Mr. Gallagher as hetook me out the back entrance of the knitting mill. "So we're building thisnew factory. See that hole where we blasted for granite; we got enough forthe entire mill in one blast. That motor is for the electricity to be usedin the plant. 

"Northern sky lights in the new building--the evenest light comes from thenorth. Cement floor--good for cleaning but bad for the girls, so we are tohave cork matting for them to stand on. Slide-in seats under thetables--that's so that a girl may stand or sit at her work. "

"Soon the hall will be free for entertainments again, " I suggested. "Won'tthe old cry be raised against it once more?"

"No. We're too strong for that now. "

At the Gallaghers' home, a sort of store-like place on the main street, Mrs. Gallagher with a soft shawl about her shoulders was waiting tointroduce me to Miss Hester. Miss Hester was brought to Dungloe by theco-operative society to care for the mothers at child-birth. She is thefirst nurse who ever came to work in Donegal. 

But Mr. Gallagher wanted to talk more of Dungloe's attainment and ambition. He compared the trade turnover of $5, 045 for the first year of the societywith $375, 000 for 1918. But there were more things to be done. The finestherring in the world swim the Donegal coast. Scots catch it. Irish buy it. Dungloe men wanted to fish, but the gombeen man would never lend money topromote industry. Other plans for the development of Dungloe werediscussed, but the expense of the cartage of surplus products on the toyLough Swilly road, and the impossibility of getting freight boats into theundredged harbor, were lead to rising ambition. 

"Parliament is not interested in public improvements for Dungloe, " smiledMr. Gallagher. "I suppose if I were a British member of parliament I wouldnot want to hand out funds for the projection of a harbor in a farawayplace like this. Irish transportation will not be taken in hand untilIreland can control her own economic policy. "

As the darkness closed in about our little fire the talk turned somehow totales of the fairies of Donegal, and Mr. Gallagher chuckled:

"Some persons about here still believe in the good people. "

Then gentle Mrs. Gallagher, conscious of a benevolent force close at hand, began simply:

"Well, don't you think perhaps--"

[Footnote 1. "To the Masters of Dublin--An Open Letter. " By AE. _TheIrish Times_, Oct. 17, 1913. ]

V

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND COMMUNISM

THE LIMERICK SOVIET

A soviet supported by the Catholic Church--that was the singular spectacleI found when I broke through the military cordon about the proclaimed cityof Limerick. 

The city had been proclaimed for this reason: Robert Byrne, son of aLimerick business man, had been imprisoned for political reasons. He fellill from the effects of a hunger strike, [1] and was sent to the hospital inthe Limerick workhouse. A "rescue party" was formed. In the mêlée thatfollowed, Robert Byrne and a constable were killed. Then according to amilitary order, Limerick was proclaimed because of "the attack by armed menon police constables and the brutal murder of one of them. "

At Limerick Junction we were locked in our compartments. There were few onthe train. Two or three school boys with their initialed school caps. Twoor three women drinking tea from the wicker train baskets supplied at thejunction. In the yards of the Limerick station, the train came to a deadstop. Then the conductor unlocked compartments, while a kilted Scotchofficer, with three bayonet-carrying soldiers behind him, asked forpermits. At last we were pulled into the station filled with empty freighttrucks and its guard of soldiers. Through the dusk beyond the rain wasslithering. 

"Sorry. No cab, miss, " said a constable. "The whole city's on strike. "

That explained my inability to get Limerick on the wire. From Kildare I hadbeen trying all morning to reach Limerick on the telephone. All theLimerick shops I passed were blinded or shuttered. In the gray light, blacklines of people moved desolately up and down, not allowed to congregate andapparently not wanting to remain in homes they were weary of. A few candlesflickered in windows. After leaving my suitcase at a hotel, I left for thestrike headquarters. On my way I neared Sarsfield bridge. Between it andme, there loomed a great black mass. Close to it, I found it was a tank, stenciled with the name of Scotch-and-Soda, and surrounded by massed barbedwire inside a wooden fence. On the bridge, the guards paraded up and downand called to the people:

"Step to the road!"

At the door of a river street house, I mounted gritty stone steps. Ared-badged man opened the door part way. As soon as I told him I was anAmerican journalist, the suspicious look on his face vanished. With muchcordiality he invited me to come upstairs. While he knocked on aconsultation door, he bade me wait. In the wavering hall light, the knotsin the worn wooden floor threw blots of shadow. On an invitation to comein, I entered a badly lit room where workingmen sat at a long blackscratched table. In the empty chair at the end of the table opposite thechairman, I was invited to sit down. As I asked my questions, every headwas turned down towards me as if the strike committee was having itspicture taken and everybody wanted to get in it. 

"Yes, this is a soviet, " said John Cronin, the carpenter who was father ofthe baby soviet. "Why did we form it? Why do we pit people's rule againstmilitary rule? Of course, as workers, we are against all military. But ourparticular grievance against the British military is this: when the townwas unjustly proclaimed, the cordon was drawn to leave out a factory partof town that lies beyond the bridges. We had to ask the soldiers forpermits to earn our daily bread. 

"You have seen how we have thrown the crank into production. But someactivities are permitted to continue. Bakers are working under our orders. The kept press is killed, but we have substituted our own paper. " He heldup a small sheet which said in large letters: The Workers' Bulletin Issuedby the Limerick Proletariat. 

"We've distributed food and slashed prices. The farmers send us theirproduce. The food committee has been able to cut down prices: eggs, forinstance, are down from a dollar to sixty-six cents a dozen and milk fromfourteen to six cents a quart. 

"In a few days we will engrave our own money. Beside there will be aninflux of money from England. About half the workers are affiliated toEnglish unions and entitled to strike pay. We have, by the way, felt thesympathy of the union men in the army sent to guard us. A whole Scotchregiment had to be sent home because it was letting workers go back andforth without passes. 

"And--we have told no one else--the national executive council of the IrishLabor party and Trade Union congress will change its headquarters fromDublin to Limerick. Then if military rule isn't abrogated, a general strikeof the entire country will be called. "

Just here a boy with imaginative brown eyes, who was, I discovered later, the editor of the _Workers' Bulletin_, said suddenly:

"There! Isn't that enough to tell the young lady? How do we know that sheis not from Scotland Yard?"

In order to send my wire on the all-Ireland strike, I stumbled along darkstreets till I came to the postoffice. Lantern light was streaming from ahatchway open in the big iron door in the rear. "Who comes?" challenged theguards. While I was giving a most conversational reply, a dashing officerran up and told me the password to the night telegraph room. Streets weredeserted when I attempted to find my way back to the hotel. At last I saw acloaked figure separate itself from the column post box against which itwas standing. I asked my way and discovered I was talking to a member ofthe Black Watch. Limerick is the only town in the British Isles thatretains the ancient custom of a civilian night guard. While the strike wason, there were, during the day, 600 special Royal Irish constables on dutyin Limerick. But, at night, in spite of unlit streets, the 600 constablesgave place to the sixty men of the Black Watch. 

"Priests preached sermons Sunday urging the people to withstand the enemywith the same spirit they did in the time of Sarsfield, " said youngAlphonsus O'Mara, the mayor of Limerick, whom I met at breakfast. His SinnFein beliefs had imprisoned him in his hotel, for his home was beyond thetown and he would not ask the British military for a pass. Opposite thebreakfast room we could see the drawn blue shades of Limerick's dry goodsstore. A woman staggered by with a burlap bag of coal on her shoulders. Adonkey cart with a movie poster reading: "Working Under Order of the StrikeCommittee: GOD AND MAN, " rolled past. A child hugging a pot of Easterlilies shuffled by. "There's no idea that the people want communism. Therecan't be. The people here are Catholics. "

But a little incident of the strike impressed me with the fact that therewere communists among these fervent Catholics. In order to pictorialize thepredicament of the Limerick workers to the world through the journalistswho were gathered in Limerick waiting the hoped-for arrival of the firsttransatlantic plane, the national executive council devised this plan. Onebright spring afternoon, the amusement committee placed posterannouncements of a hurling match that was to be held just outside ofLimerick at Caherdavin. About one thousand people, mostly Irish boys andgirls, left town. At sunset, two by two, girls with yellow primroses attheir waists, and boys with their hurling sticks in their hands, marcheddown the white-walled Caherdavin road towards the bridge. The bridge guardhooped his arm towards the boat house occupied by the military. Soldiers, strapping on cartridge belts, double-quicked to his aid. A machine gunsniffed the air from the upper story of the boat house. Scotch-and-Sodaveered heavily bridgewards. A squad of fifty helmeted constables marched tothe bridge, and marked time. But the boys and girls merely asked if theymight go home, and when they were refused, turned about again and kept up acircling tramp, requesting admission. Down near the Broken Treaty Stone, inSt. Munchin's Temperance hall, in a room half-filled with potatoes and eggsand milk, women who were to care for the exiles during their temporarybanishment, were working. A few of the workers' red-badged guards came toherald the approach of the workers, and then sat down on a settle outsidethe hall. 

St. Munchin's chapel bell struck the Angelus. 

The red-badged guards rose and blessed themselves. 

THE BISHOP ON COMMUNISM

Possibly, I thought, the clergymen of Limerick were hurried into support ofred labor. What was the attitude of those who had a perspective on thesituation towards communism?

Just outside Limerick, in the town of Ennis in the county of Clare--Clareas well as Kerry has the reputation of shooting down informers atsight--there dwells the most loved bishop in Ireland. The Lenten pastoralof the Right Reverend Michael Fogarty, bishop of Killaloe, was so ferventlynational that when it was twice mailed to the Friends of Irish Freedom inAmerica it was twice refused carriage by the British government. There wasno doubt that he was for Sinn Fein. But how did he stand towards labor?

Past an ancient Norman castle on which was whitewashed the legend "Up DeValera!" into the low-built little town of Ennis, I drove up to the modestcolonial home that is called the "episcopal palace, " Bishop Fogarty invitedme to take off my "wet, cold, ugly coat, " and to sit at a linen-coveredspot at the long plush-hung library table. As he rang a bell, he told me Imust be hungry after my drive. Then a maid brought in a piping-hot dinnerof delicious Irish stew. I sat down quite frankly hungry, but from a ratherresentful glance which the maid gave me, I have since suspicioned that Iate the bishop's dinner. 

First I told the bishop that I am a Catholic. Then I said I was informedthat there was a reaction against the Church in Ireland, against being whatAmerican Protestants call "priest-ridden. " The first reason of thereaction, I was told, was the fact that the people felt that the hierarchywas not in favor of a republic. Indeed I had it from an Irish-Americanpriest in Dublin that many of the Irish bishops were in a bad way, becauseneither the English government nor the people trusted them. 

"Priest-ridden?" The bishop smiled. "Priest-ridden? England would like usto control these people for her today. We couldn't if we would. Priest-ridden? Perhaps the other way about. "

The second reason, it was said, is due to the fact that the workers feelthat the Church is standing with the capitalists. A Dublin Catholic, wifeof an American correspondent stationed in that city, told me that socialismis so strong in the very poor parish of St. Mary's pro-cathedral in Dublinthat out of 40, 000 members, there were 16, 000 who were not practising theirreligion. 

"A lie!" exclaimed the bishop as his jaw shot out and his great muscularframe straightened as if to meet physical combat on the score. "It issimply not true. The loyalty of the Irish to the Catholic Church isunquestionable. "

And anyway, he indicated, if the people desired a communistic governmentthere is no essential opposition in the Catholic Church. 

In the past, said the bishop, the Church in Ireland had thrived undercommon ownership. When in the fifth century Patrick evangelized Ireland, the ancient Irish were practising a kind of socialism. There was a commonownership of land. Each freeman had a right to use a certain acreage. Butthe land of every man, from the king down, might be taken away by thestate. There was an elected king, and assemblies of nobles and freemen. There were arbitration courts where the lawgivers decided on penalties, andwhose decisions were enforced by the assemblies. One of the reasons, thebishop said, that England had found it difficult to rule the Irish, wasthat she attempted to force a feudal government on a socialistic people. 

Recently--to illustrate that the Irish still retain their instinct forcommon ownership--there had been, as the bishop mentioned, a successfulsocialistic experiment in Clare. On looking up this fact at a later time, Idiscovered that the experiment had points of resemblance to the ancientstate. [2] In 1823 the English socialist, Robert Owen, visited Ireland. Hisoutline of the possibilities of co-operation on socialistic lines inspiredthe foundation of the Hibernian Philanthropic Society. It was in 1831 thatArthur Vandeleur, one of the members of the society, decided he wouldestablish a socialist colony on his estate in Ralahine, Clare county. Alarge tract of land was to be possessed and developed by a group oftenants. This property was not, incidentally, a gift, but was to be held byMr. Vandeleur until the tenants were able to pay for it. An electedcommittee of nine, and a general assembly of all men and women members ofthe society, were the government. The committee's decision against anoffending member of society could be enforced or not by the members. Thesuccess of the society is acknowledged. Through it was introduced the firstreaping machine into Ireland. By it the condition of the toiler was muchraised, and might have been more greatly elevated but for the fact that thecommunity had to pay a very heavy annual rental in kind to Mr. Vandeleur. The experiment came to a premature end, however, because of the passing ofthe estate out of the hands of Mr. Vandeleur, and the non-recognition ofthe right of such a community to hold a lease or to act as tenants underthe land laws of Great Britain. 

"Why should there not be a modernized form of the ancient Gaelic state?"asked the bishop. 

When I spoke of the Russian soviet, and stated that I heard that the RomanCatholic church had spread in eight dioceses under the new government, thebishop nodded his head. The Church, he said, had nothing to fear from thesoviet. 

"Certainly not from the Limerick soviet, " I suggested. "It was there that Isaw a red-badged guard rise to say the Angelus. "

"Isn't it well, " smiled the bishop, "that communism is to beChristianized?"

[Footnote 1: Notice was given by the General Prison Board of Ireland onNovember 24, 1919, that no prisoner on hunger strike would obtain release. It was stated that the hunger-striker alone would be responsible for theconsequences of his refusal to take food. ]

[Footnote 2: "Labour in Irish History. " By James Connolly. Maunsel andCompany. 1917. P. 122. ]

VI

WHAT ABOUT BELFAST?

SICKNESS AND DEATH OF CARSONISM

The H. C. Of L. Has done an extraordinary thing. It is the high cost ofliving that has caused the sickness and death of Carsonism. Carsonism is asynonym for the division of the Ulsterites by political and religiouscries--there are 690, 000 Catholics and 888, 000 non-Catholics. [1]

The good work began during the war. Driven by the war cost of living, Unionist and Protestant organized with Sinn Fein and Catholic workers, andtogether they obtained increased pay. Now they no longer want division. Forthey believe what the labor leaders have long preached: "Carsonism with itscontinuance of the ancient cries of 'No Popery!' and 'No Home Rule!'operates for the good of the rich mill owners and against the good of theworkers. If the workers allow themselves to be divided on these scores, they can neither keep a union to get better wages nor elect men intent onsecuring industrial legislation. If the workers are really wise they willlay the Carson ghost by working with the south of Ireland towards asettlement of the political question. Why not? The workers of the north andsouth are bound by the tie of a common poverty. "

"All my life, " said Dawson Gordon, the Protestant president of the IrishTextile Federation, as we talked in the dark little union headquarterswhere shawled spinners and weavers were coming in with their big copperdues, "I have heard stories that were so much fuel on the prejudice pile. When I was small, I believed anything I was told about the Catholics. Iremember this tale that my mother repeated to me as she said hergrandmother had told it to her: 'A neighbor of grandmother's was alone inher cabin one night. There was a knock at the door. A Catholic woman beggedfor shelter. The neighbor could not bear to turn her back into the night. Then as there was only one bed, the two women shared it. Next morninggrandmother heard a moaning in the cabin. On entering, she saw the neighborlying alone on the bed, stabbed in the back. The neighbor's last wordswere: "Never trust a Catholic!"' As I grew a little older I found two otherProtestant friends whose grandmothers had had the same experience. Andsince I have been a labor organizer, I have run across Catholics who toldthe same story turned about. So I began to think that there was a hell of alot of great-grandmothers with stabbed friends--almost too many for belief. 

"But hysterical as they were, such stories served their purpose ofdivision. "

From a schoolish-looking cupboard in the back of the room, Mr. Gordonextracted a much-thumbed pamphlet on the linen and jute industry, publishedafter extended investigation by the United States in 1913. Mr. Gordonturned to a certain page, and pointed a finger at a significant line whichran:

"The wages of the linen workers in Ireland are the lowest received in anymills in the United Kingdom. "

Then Mr. Gordon added:

"Another pre-war report by Dr. H. W. Bailie, chief medical officer ofBelfast, commented on the low wage of the sweated home worker--the reporthas since been suppressed. I remember one woman he told about. Sheembroidered 300 dots for a penny. By working continuously all week shecould just make $1. 50. [2]

"Pay's not the only thing, " continued Mr. Gordon. "Working condition'sanother. Go to the mills and see the wet spinners. The air of the room theywork in is heavy with humidity. There are the women, waists open at thethroat, sleeves rolled up, hair pulled back to prevent the irritation ofloose ends on damp skins, bare feet on the cement floor. At noon theysnatch up their shawls and rush home for a hurried lunch. It's notsurprising that Dr. Bailie reported that poor working conditions wereresponsible for many premature births and many delicate children. Nor thatthe low pay of the workers made them easy prey to tuberculosis. He wrotethat, as in previous years, consumption was most prevalent among thepoor. [3]

"Why such pay and such working conditions?" asked Mr. Gordon. "Becausebefore the war there were only 400 of us organized. Labor organizer afterlabor organizer fought for the unity of the working people. But no soonerwould such a speaker rise oft a platform than there would be calls from allparts of the house: 'Are ye a Sinn Feiner?', 'What's yer religion?' or 'Doye vote unionist?' There was no way out. He had to declare himself. Thenone or the other half of his audience would rise and leave. With low wages, of course, the workers could not get a perspective on their battle. Theywere prisoners in Belfast. They never had money enough even for thetwo-hour trip to Dublin. Rail rates are high. Excursions almost unknown. Then came the war. At that time wages were:

"Spinners and preparers, $3. 00 a week. 

"Weavers and winders, $3. 08 a week. 

"General laborers, $4. 00 a week. 

"But how much did it cost to feed a family of five? Seven dollars a week. The workers had to get the difference. They couldn't without organization. With hunger at their heels, they forgot prejudices. Catholics began to goto meetings in Orange halls. Protestants attended similar meetings inHibernian assembly rooms; at a small town near Belfast there was a recentlabor procession in which one-half of the band was Orange and the otherhalf Hibernian, and yet there was perfect harmony. Other unions than ourswere at work. For instance, the Irish Transport and General Workers' unionbegan to gather men under the motto chosen from one of Thomas Davis' songs:

 "Then let the orange lily be a badge, my patriot brother, The orange for you, the green for me, and each for one another. '

"What happened? Take our union for example. From 400 in 1914, themembership mounted to 40, 000 in 1919--that is the number represented todayin the Irish Textile Federation. With the growth in strength the federationmade out its cost-of-living budget, and presented its case to the LinenTrade Employers. At last the federation succeeded in obtaining this rate:

"Spinners and preparers, $7. 50 a week. 

"Weavers and winders, $7. 50 a week. 

"General laborers, $10. 00 a week. "

But, say the leaders, there will always be chance of disunion until thepolitical question is settled. Ulster labor decided to assist in thatsettlement. So it killed Carsonism. And now it is trying to lay theCarsonistic ghost. 

This is the way labor killed Carsonism. I saw it done. I was in at thedeath. There was a parliamentary seat vacant in East Antrim. Carson, whosechoice had hitherto been law, backed a Canadian named Major Moore. Butlabor put up a sort of Bull Moose candidate named Hanna. The Carsonistsrealized the issue. During the campaign they reiterated that Carsonism wasto live or die by that vote. The dodgers for Major Moore ran:

 East Antrim Election WHAT The Enemies of Unionism WANT The Return of Hanna WHY? Because as _The Freeman's Journal_ of May 10, 1919, states: "IF HANNA WINS, HIS VICTORY WILL BE THE DEATH KNELL OF CARSONISM. " Are YOU going to be the one to bring this about? VOTE SOLID FOR MOORE and show our enemies EAST ANTRIM STANDS BY CARSON

At the meetings the Carsonists continually stressed the point that thiselection meant more than the election or defeat of Moore. It meant theelection or defeat of Carson and his ally, God. 

"God in His goodness, " declared a woman advocate at a meeting held forMoore at Carrickfergus, "has spared Sir Edward Carson to us, but the daymay come when we will see ourselves without him, and I want to be sure thatno one in Ulster will have caused him one pain or sorrow. "[4]

"It is owing to Sir Edward Carson under Almighty God, " stated D. M. Wilson, K. C. , M. P. , at a meeting at Whitehead, "that we have been saved from HomeRule, and the man that knows these things would rather that his right armwere paralyzed than be guilty of any act that would tend to weaken the workof Sir Edward Carson. "[5]

"I am fully persuaded, " added William Coote, M. P. , at the same meeting, "that the great country of the gun running will never be false to its greatleader. "[6]

One evening near a stuccoed golf club at a cross roads in Upper Green Isle, with the v of the Belfast Lough shining in the distance, I waited to hearMajor Moore address a crowd of workers. As the buzzing little audiencegathered, boys climbed up telegraph poles with the stickers "We WantHanna, " and a small, pale-faced man with a protruding jaw was the center ofa political argument for Hanna. At last the brake arrived. The major, atall, personable man, stood up in the cart. But all the good old Ulsterrallying cries he used, seemed to miss fire. 

"Sir Edward Carson's for me--"

"Stand on your own feet, Major Muir, " interrupted a worker. 

"Heart and soul, I'll fight Home Rule--"

"What aboot Canada, Major Muir?" The major did not reply as he had at aprevious meeting at Carrickfergus that he hoped that the time would comewhen there would be a "truly imperial parliament in London--one that wouldrepresent not only the three kingdoms but the whole empire. "[7] Instead hewent on:

"The Unionist party stands for improved social legislation. "

"What aboot old age pensions?" and "Why didn't the Unionist party vote forworking-men's compensation, Major Muir?"

As he was preparing to drive away from the booing crowd, one of hissupporters began to distribute dodgers. I had two in my hand when thesmall, pale-faced man with the jaw applied a match to them, and cried outas they flared in my hand:

"That's what we do with trash. "

Who won? When the election returns were made public in June, they read:Major Moore, 7, 549; Hanna, 8, 714. 

Laying the ghost of Carsonism by the permanent settlement of the Irishpolitical question was attempted last spring. It was then that Ulster laborbacked the rest of the Irish Labor party at Berne when it asked for the"free and absolute self-determination of each and every people in choosingthe sovereignty under which they shall live. "

THE SINN FEIN BABY IN BELFAST

The pacific endeavors of the high cost of living are greatly aided by thenatural kindliness of the people. I think I have never met simpler charityto strangers. For instance, in the little matter of appealing for streetdirections, I found the shawled women and the pale men would go far out oftheir ways to put me on the right path. Even when I inquired for the homeof Dennis McCullough, they looked at me quickly, said: "Oh, you mean thebig Sinn Feiner"? and readily directed me to his home. 

In the red brick home in the red brick row on the outskirts of the redbrick town of Belfast, Mrs. Dennis McCullough, daughter of the south ofIreland, gave testimony that the goodheartedness of her neighbors prevailsover their prejudice even in time of crisis. Her husband, a piano merchant, has been in some seven prisons for his political activities. He had told ofplank beds, of food he could not eat, of the quelling of prison outbreaksby hosing the prisoners and then letting them lie in their wet clothes oncold floors. He had spoken of evading prison at one time by availinghimself of the ancient privilege of "taking sanctuary": he went to thefamous pilgrimage center of Lough Derg, and though no sanctuary lawprevails, the military did not care or dare to violate the religiousfeelings of the inhabitants by seizing him there. And then he had told ofthe last time: before his last arrest he had taken great care not toprovoke the authorities because Mrs. McCullough was about to give birth toher first child; but one evening when the couple and friends were seatedabout a quiet Sunday evening tea table, six constables entered and hurriedhim off to jail without even presenting a warrant. It was at this pointthat Mrs. McCullough gave her testimony:

"Our house is just a little island of Sinn Fein in this district. Theneighbors knew my husband had been arrested. The papers told them that thearrests had been made in connection with that Jules Verne German submarineplot. But when my baby was born, my neighbors forgot everything but thefact that I was a human being who needed help. One neighbor came in to bakemy bread; another to sweep my house; another to cook my meals. They werevery good. 

"Often at five o'clock, I watch the girls coming home from the mills. Atsix o'clock they eat supper. At seven the boys and girls walk out together, two by two. " Mrs. McCullough laughed. "You know, I think that's all I haveagainst the Ulsterites--there's nothing queer about them. "

By the grate, Dennis McCullough held the baby in his arms with all the careone uses towards a treasure long withheld. His drawn white face was closeto the dimpled cheeks. 

The rank and file of the Belfastians, then, are joining the priests, co-operationists, labor unionists and Sinn Feiners in their fight forself-determination. For it is believed that as long as the Irish people, Irish or Scotch-Irish, remain under the domination of England, they willcontinue to suffer under exploitation by her capitalists. And the people ofthe north and the south are unanimous that English exploitation is what'sthe matter with Ireland. 

[Footnote 1: Census of 1911. ]

[Footnote 2: England passed an order in 1919 regulating the wages ofsweated women workers so that the minimum wage of a girl 18 working a48-hour week amounts to $6. 72. But the order concludes: "_This ordershall have effect in all districts of Great Britain but not inIreland_. " (Ministry of Labor. Statutory Rules and Orders. 1919. No. 357. )]

[Footnote 3: "Report Chief Medical Inspector, Belfast, 1909. "]

[Footnote 4: _Belfast Telegraph_, May 15, 1919. ]

[Footnote 5: _Northern Whig_, Belfast, May 17, 1919. ]

[Footnote 6: _Ibid_. ]

[Footnote 7: _Belfast Telegraph_, May 15, 1919. ]