Ireland's woes and Britain's wiles

Foreword

THE following sketches were written in the first instance, with very little thought that they would ever see light from the printed page.

Some of them are the substance of memoranda and diary jottings set down from time to time. Others are the gist of letters written during the storm and stress of the World War, and in the chaotic period subsequent to the Armistice and the Treaty of Peace. These letters were written indeed, for the most part, to my medical friend out west, who bears the significant patronymic of 'Dowd.' I tell him that his ancestors, five or six generations ago, dropped the prefix *0' from their name. This he stoutly and indignantly denies, but his protestations fail to be altogether convincing, for he is possessed of that grace and charm of character which the Irishman almost invariably acquires when at length he has been carried into the onflowing stream of Civilization.

These effusions in the midst of disturbing and forbidding National and World conditions, constitute in some measure, an effort to preserve a balance and a sanity of mind, not only in the writer, but in those upon whom they were inflicted as well.

To steer a straight and steady course and keep an even keel in the storm of German frightfulness and barbarity, when one's own flesh and blood was being choked with poison gas and torn to tatters by cruel

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shrapnel, called not only for a firm hand but also for a cheerful and jocund heart.

To 'carry on' in these post-bellum days, when the whole atmosphere is rank with the fetid exhalations of hate and prejudice, — of unreasoning spite and malicious misrepresentation of fact, requires an equal courage and a like buoyancy of spirit ; for it would indeed seem that the sullen bitterness and suspicious distrust of peace is more alarming and disconcerting than the violent antagonisms of war.

To wish to help in lifting a little of the depressing load, is an ambition not altogether unworthy, and gives some excuse for even the most modest endeavor.

We passed through a Presidential campaign in the summer of 1920, perhaps altogether unprecedented in the sordid selfishness and baseness of its appeal. It ought to be the purpose aud determination of all good citizens, that no such election will ever be possible again in this our beloved land. Hate and prejudice, ignorance and suspicion, malignant and racial animosities were capitalized to a degree that hardly could have been thought possible three hundred years after the Pilgrims signed their historic compact in the cabin of the Mayflower.

It has been our custom to brush aside with a wave of the hand and a toss of the head, nauseating charges and countercharges as so much election bluff, — as the necessary ammunition of the political spell-binder, but which mean nothing and are soon forgotten when all is over. But is this statement true ? Is it not rather true that while men easily forget in a literal way, it takes

FOREWORD

more than a wave of the hand or a flippant jest to brush away the spirit of ill-will and spite that has been branded upon the hearts and souls of men? Does this come to an end when the campaign is over? We may think it a harmless pastime to pour vials of vitriolic spite upon some nation or race across the sea. We may even imagine it to be something of an advantage to have the vitriol spued upon the further shore of the Atlantic rather than upon this ; but the heart that hates, that has been taught to hate, — that has been encouraged and countenanced in its hate, stays with us to become a plague-spot in our social and governmental life.

If we are beginnning to reap the result of this thing — • and we are, — we have ourselves, through our politicians, chiefly to blame. If serious minded investigators tell us that our country is rapidly becoming the most lawless among the nations, — that crimes of violence are on the increase, and in proportion to population, are more frequent than in any other civilized land, — if the city of Chicago has more than one hundred homicides in one year, while London a city of more than twice the population of Chicago, has only fourteen murders in the same twelve months, it is surely time to put smug complacency and conceit aside and set ourselves assiduously to search for a cause and a cure.

One wonders sometimes if it is this same inordinate conceit that starts some of us out to prate about winning the war. Of course we won the war; but so did little Belgium and gallant and unconquerable France. And so did Australia from the far away antipodes win

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the war. It would do us all good to sit down and contemplate the fact that Australia with her six or seven million of population, laid upon the altar of civilization as large a sacrifice of her young manhood as we did out of our hundred millions of people. It is surely almost time we had ceased to pray the prayer of the Pharisee who said : —

"Lord, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are."

The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly small, and what is more, — and more easily forgotten as well, — in the last long run, they do not go far a-field to get their grist. When a Greek or an Italian King is assassinated by one of his people, or a mis-guided Irish youth fires a pistol at Queen Victoria, we hold up our hands in holy horror and talk about the fruits of monarchial systems of government; and yet what civilized country, in modern times, has a record equal to our own in the killing of its rulers?

The bitterness and unwarranted abuse of party politicians, together with the gutter press of our yellow journalists has sent out madmen to shoot three of our Presidents ; and yet not one of these assassinations, nor the total of all of them combined, has exceeded in brutal cruelty and pathos, the martyrdom of Woodrow Wilson.

To try to place a finger lightly and gently here and there (and at the same time, without malice prepense,) upon some of the processes and considerations that underl}^ these things, is the purpose for which these pages are written.

CHAPTER I Sink Fein

WHEN Irish Paddy determined to pool issues with German Fritzie, he sailed away on an unknown and uncharted sea. To hobnob and forgather with the Superman was a new role for the man from the Emerald Isle to assume. No wonder men asked themselves, how will Patrick bear himself when he wipes his chin and proceeds to sit in counsel with the Kultur of ^'Deutschland Uber Alles." Will Cork or Coblentz dominate the situation? Will Potsdam or will Limerick impose its dictum upon the amalgamation? Will Fritz assimilate Pat and turn him into a helmeted warrior with a fierce mustache pointing sky-ward, or will Pat instead of doing the goosestep, train Fritz in the proper handling and use of the shillalah, alike in times of peace as in times of war? The experiment could not fail to be an interesting one and the outcome of the proposed compact problematical in the extreme.

Whether the exigencies of the situation demanded it or not, it may be impossible to ascertain with any degree of certainty, but it is true that when our old friend had himself inoculated

[il with the vaccine of German Kultur and refinement, he took to himself a new name. He called himself Sinn Fein. Whatever may have been the terms and secrets of the alliance however, it very soon became evident that Pat was to remain Pat in all the essentials that go to make up a man of free and independent judgment and mind, for the interesting old chap is more interesting than ever before.

'*A rose by any other name would smell as sweet, ' ' and the odor of Limburger is not impaired by a change in the nomenclature.

Just at this period in human affairs however, the thing we have in mind seems a little more pungent when we call it Prussianism. Nevertheless it is much the same entity wherever you find it or by whatever name you designate it. You may deck it out in any one of half a dozen fine phrases. It is the theory that might makes right,

— that the end justifies the means. It is the conviction that my place in the Sun is occupied by some other fellow and I must club him out of the way. It is the belief that true freedom is never found in equality, but only wiien the other man is on his back and I am on top. It is the dogma which declares that if there is a dollar in my neighbor's wallet there is one less in my pouch, and it is my business to see that it is transferred where it belongs. The Prussian hacks his way through while Sinn Fein whacks his way through,

— that is the chief distinction. The gait is much the same whether you find it on Courtmacksherry Bay or on the Spree.

Of all created things, the human is the most interesting and by far the most surpassingly queer; and among that elect portion of the fauna that creeps about upon the earth, — in pugnacity and perturbility, — in periodicity and physiognomy, the Prussian and Pat have all the rest of us their nearest competitors, skinned a mile in supplying the truest type of the missing link.

Hibernian spell-binders are accustomed to expatiate upon the 750 years of England's oppression and tyranny in Ireland, and the picture is not a cheering one. John Bull would do well to take note of the charges that are thrown upon his door step. But we also would do well to remember that 750 years form but a brief span in the tale of Ireland's woes. At the earliest dawn of history, Ireland was the abode of anarchy and strife, faction fights and tribal wars. The Donnybrook Fair is a national institution whose beginnings are lost in the mists of antiquity. They do indeed claim that King John brought it over from London. He probably only tried to improve it, but what Englishman could do that! It seems clear that the troubles of Ireland began when the second Irishman was born.

Well do I remember my first timorous excursion from home when I went to attend school in a big city. I had hardly made sure of my bearings, when my peace of mind was upset by an unhallowed commotion in the street back of the house where I was staying. To my rustic and unaccustomed ear it seemed that a massacre of the innocents was in progress. I feared that a cannibal feast was in preparation, and I made ready to hasten to the rescue of some bleeding and mutilated fellow-being. My new-found friends in the boarding house however laid a restraining hand on my shoulder, and I discovered that it was only a little bit of Ireland transplanted to this side of the sea. Had I meddled, it would have been a faithful and true epitome of the Irish problem set down in the streets of a young city in the New World. I soon learned to sit on the balcony with my fellow boarders to enjoy the show, and to applaud as heartily as they when Bridget admonished Barney: —

''You may bate me if you like, but no whalp of a son you ever raised, will ever lay hands on me again. ' *

Seven hundred and fifty years carry us back to the time of Henry II., who was the greatgrandson of William the Norman who conquered England. Henry ventured into Ireland about one hundred years after his great-grandfather invaded England. It was an age of invasion and conquest; and the Irish were not averse to doing a little invading on their own part, as the experience of Wales and Scotland and the Isle of Man can testify. The man from Erin was neither better nor worse than his contemporaries in this respect.

That he did not continue his depredations and aggressions nor hold his conquests, was not because he had reformed or had come to respect the rights of his neighbors any better than they did his, but partly because they proved stronger than he, and chiefly because he found cracking skulls at home a sufficiently lively and engaging occupation, without going abroad to seek for the sport.

So it happened that Henry Plantaganet invaded Ireland at the request and invitation of one of the warring factions that had experienced the worst of it in a recent scrap. Then too, the Pope of the day had given him a commission to look into the matter and see if he could do anything to help in bringing peace to the troubled land. It was a great mistake. Henry and Strongbow should have remained upon the balcony as spectators of the show, but they didn't. Armed with the Papal Bull and the pressing invitation of Dermod MacMurrough, — not a very savory character by the wa;;^, — the Norman-Saxon king crossed the Irish Sea, and as Harry Lauder would say: — ''Then the fun began." But it didn't begin then. It only became more varied and picturesque. Had England kept out of Ireland, the process of extermination might have gone on to its culmination, and Ireland and the world would have had peace; for the O'Connors of Connaught and the 'Brians of Munster, and the O'Neills of Ulster, seemed bent on making away with one another. This solution would have been effective, but it would have been deplorable and I shudder even now to contemplate it, for it would have robbed me of some of the best and warmest hearted friends I have ever known. Then too, the the world after all would have been a somber enough place if the music of the harp and the staccato of the shillalah had been silenced in the land. England to be sure, has not been altogether a saint in her relations with Ireland, but we might as well recognize the fact that England has done more for Ireland than Ireland has done for herself or ever would do in a thousand years. To mention one or two things that might be noted, — the British Government which of course includes Ireland, has given Ireland what is probably the best Land Act existing anywhere in the world today. There has also been provided one of the best old age pension systems, and it is financed by English money. Then too, undoubtedly England would have granted Home Rule long ago, if the Irish could have agreed among themselves as to the thing they would be pleased to accept. One has only to read of the bitter contentions into which the two great exponents of the Irish cause, — Grattan and Flood-fell, or to catch an echo of the passage at arms that such champions as Daniel O 'Connell and Grattan now and again indulged in, to understand how much Ireland's woes, and how much the failure to realize her dreams, have been due to the racial characteristic of steering into the inevitable fight.

There is no conception of peace or freedom in the thought of a Sinn Fein Irishman any more than in that of a Prussian, in equality of position or privilege. It is here that the settlement of the Irish Problem comes to grief every time, — not in the opposition, stubborness or tyranny of the Parliament at Westminster in the last analysis, but in the failure of the Irish to agree among themselves, and that apparently, from the strange twist in disposition which sees no way of coming to terms, but by the utter extinction of one faction by the other.

My own experience and observation however, has led me to feel that if a brood of agitators and demagogues, bitten by the rabies of a senseless hate and having neither love nor loyalty for any land or thing save their own gain or glory together with a mania for gratifying their enmity and their envy, had only left Ireland alone, long ere now she would have been a peaceful and happy land, and would have occupied a position of leadership in some measure like to that of Scotland in the counsels of the Empire.

To be sure Ireland did not find herself in a position to make available the advantages that attended the Reformation. It is not for me to argue or affirm the causes of this failure; but it is an incontrovertible historical fact, that those peoples and nations that were most profoundly touched by the Befonnation movement, leaped forward in all lines of learning, in scientific investigation and industrial activity. Naturally when she found herself lagging behind, Ireland became dissatisfied and ultimately suspicious and bitter towards those who were outstripping her. This is altogether natural. Step by step, individuals and communities under such conditions, if they are not careful, easily become envious of their more fortunate neighbors and will come to persuade themselves that they are not getting fair play, and that these same neighbors are in some way guilty of blocking their way to success.

One cannot but feel deeply sympathetic towards the dear old land, when the volcano that has been more or less active for twice 750 years breaks out in eruption, and he does not wonder that men of old said feelingly: —

''The old sod is the trembling sod."

It would seem that with one quarter of the population, and that the most progressive and advanced portion, bitterly opposed to, and ready to fight to the death any scheme that would separate them from that equal partnership in the Empire which they feel to be, not only their privilege, but to their incomparable advantage, — all the other factions would go slow, at least, until they are quite sure they can agree among themselves as to what they want.

And most of all, it would seem as if the policy of, — ''Hands off!" would dominate the agitators on both sides of the sea, who know little or nothing of* the situation, and who do not care to know anything beyond how to coddle and keep alive an ancient grudge that has become mouldy and rancid through the passing of the years.

It is astonishing my son, how much sweetness some folks can extract from a well-masticated mouthful of calico.

CHAPTER II English Pebfidy

NOT long ago a legal luminary of Sinn Fein proclivities was declaring in New York, that there can be no freedom in this old world till the monarchy of England has been put out of business. Some such sentiment was the burden of his oratory. Indeed a Sinn Fein protagonist would hardly be true to type if he failed to expound in fiery rhetoric, this proposition so evidently bound up with the well-being of the human race. He and the Prussian are twin brothers in their conception of freedom and of the causes that would hinder or that would help in the accomplishment of its attainment. The one would sweep into oblivion every Belgian who would presume to get in the way of his goosestepping to his place in the sun, and so to that wide freedom that is his right; the other would club into submission every native of the Emerald Isle who gets in the way of his struggle after the democratic ideal, and iDoth together they would annihilate John Bull for daring to prevent.

One wonders however, if after all there may not be some truth in the contention, for surely pesky old England has long practised the unpleasant habit of butting in to hinder persons and peoples from securing freedom to take away the freedom of other folk. With a strange and striking regularity, at intervals of a century or so, this arch-conspirator against human freedom has had to meddle in matters beyond her own domain.

Taking a glance backward over the years, we discover that our liistories tell us that four centuries ago, the ablest monarch in Europe was Philip the Second of Spain. This ruler had an exceedingly Kaiser-Sinn-Fein-like disposition, and wanted his place in the sun, as who does not ? He knew that he was the All-highest, — the anointed of God, and destined to rule the earth. He earnestly desired freedom to accomplish this, his mission. Therefore with the benediction of the Pope, he set out upon his humanitarian enterprise. The growth of democracy in his day, was a menace to the well-being of humanity.

Not only was Philip the ablest, but he was the most powerful prince in Europe. He was the super-man of four centuries ago. He had the greatest army and the most efficient equipment. It mattered not that he was cruel and tyrannical. Those were cruel and tyrannical times. With the aid of the Inquisition as his agent, he planned to make his word the only law to which men should give heed. The last vestige of any pestilential free institution, was to be extirpated in the interest of that broader freedom which he sought.

Old England had the bad taste and the bad grace to object and get in the way. The navy of England, that instrument of Anglo-Saxon tyranny, even at that early date got on the job, and the Invincible Armada was overwhelmed in calamitous grief. Philip was denied the freedom he set out to secure, and England was to blame ; but Philip had probably no more ardent sympathizers than those to be found in the Emerald Isle. It must be admitted however that England in spite of her disrespect for Philip and his ambitions, had saved the world and democracy; but for so doing she could never be forgiven, especially so in Ireland.

Moving forward one hundred years, we find another able man, the strongest and most powerful ruler in Europe, in the person of Louis XIV, of France. He also was a faithful prototype of the Hohenzollern. He also had the biggest, best drilled, best equipped army in Europe. He too was the All-highest and he was accustomed to speak of himself as 'The State.' The Divine Being and he were in league and the end to be ultimately attained, was the submission of all peoples and races to his beneficent rule. He sought freedom to attain this laudable end. Here again meddlesome England had to put in her oar. Her navy was again at hand to interfere with the freedom of the seas, and she sent her contemptible little army to measure swords, in presumptuous arrogance, with the finest troops in Europe, and with their king who because he had the might, unquestionably had the right to subdue Europe and in that way, bring to her freedom and peace. In some unaccountable manner, England again blocked the way, and of course, exasperated all true lovers of freedom. Perhaps it may be true that the spirit of the meddler had a little extra pep infused into it on this occasion, for it was but a short while previous to this that one of her own kings set out to be a pocket edition of Philip and Louis, so they chopped off his head ; and when his son, still more foolish and stubborn, refused to learn the lesson, they chased him out, and naturally he went to Ireland for sympathy and comfort in his woe. Even there obstinate old England followed him, and finally he had to seek refuge in the bosom of Louis, that superlative defender and seeker after freedom. So it happened that England blocked Louis as she had blocked Philip and in so doing saved the world and democracy, but for this too, she never could be forgiven, especially in the Emerald Isle.

Moving forward another century, we find Napoleon Bonaparte emulating Philip and Louis. With a genius as a soldier and a diplomat seldom equalled in history, he surely possessed the might that is right, and should have been allowed the freedom to dominate the race for the race 's good. His army in turn, was the strongest and the best equipped on earth, and he set himself to his heaven-appointed task. Once again England had the temerity to meddle in the affairs of other folk.

Her navy tampered with the freedom of the seas, and her diminutive skeleton of an army began to array itself in flesh and blood, and in the accoutrements of war. Soldiers from Ireland not a few, flocked to the standard of the great war-lord of the day ; but it was all in vain. The thin red line of hated Albion, presumptuously hurled back the legions of Bonaparte, and the ambitions and purposes of the greatest man on earth, in quest of freedom to exercise his own will over the wills of other people, were baffled and brought to naught. So it chanced that England had saved the world and democracy a third time. For doing so, she could never be forgiven, especially so, in Erin.

Moving forward still another century, we discover "William of Germany the greatest war-lord of them all, on the field of action. Where others have failed he will not fail; where others have yielded to circumstances, he will compel circumstances to yield to him. Might is and must be right, and the freedom others failed to attain, he will conquer with his good mailed fist and shining sword. The armies of Philip and Louis and Napoleon all put together, would barely serve as a nucleus for the mighty host which this latest exponent of Divine Right, has at his command. The supereman must rule the earth in order that freedom may be enjoyed, and with God as an ally, must brush aside every obstacle in the way. Will England have the assurance to attempt to cheat the world once more, out of the boon of freedom so greatly desired by those who really wish the world well ? The world does not wait long for an answer. No sooner has William stepped across the borders of Belgium, than England on the pretext of a treaty and a scrap of paper, and her assumed obligation thereto, pushes herself with meddlesome audacity, into the arena, where she has no business to be. Her fleet once more gets busy and her army begins to march.

Sympathy with and support of William as is natural, at once becomes the dominant sentiment in the circles of Sinn Fein on both sides of the sea. His and their ideals are one and the same. One is as autocratic and domineering and intolerant as the other. The weak should perish, only the strong should survive. The man whose skull can 't stand to be cracked, ought to have it cracked in the name of freedom and progress. So together they see the speedy downfall of the tyrant nation that has always stood in the way of the ambitions and aspirations of the superman. But somehow obstinate England weathered the storm. By all the rules of the game and by every principle of fair play and justice, it ought not to have been so, but so it proved to be. Once again England had saved the world and the democratic ideal, and the superman and all his satellites of every name and race and creed were furious, for why shouldn 't the monarchy of England be put out of business, and the most efficient and strong possess the freedom to rule all the rest? Of course for this

England could not be forgiven, and never will be in Ireland.

Two significant considerations emerge from a glance at these four incidents in European history. First, it was not the monarchy but the democracy of England that in each case, blocked the game of the autocrat. It was the democracy of England that was guilty of the crime, the type of which the Sinn Fein orator suggests and deplores.

Second; It has been the misfortune of Ireland that the vociferously articulate portion of her population that has claimed to speak for the whole, has always been on the side of the autocrat. Hence the Sinn Fein orator, with adroit and cunning sophistry distorts the facts of history, and dupes his unthinking followers by putting forth the claim that the people and principles of which he is at once the successor and the exponent, have been the supporters and defenders of freedom and democracy; whereas, invariably, consistently and persistently, they have given all the sympathy and help in their power to the autocrat in his assault upon freedom and the democratic ideal.

One wonders what will be the story when another century has run its course. Will another struggle on these same lines mark the close or the beginning of another hundred years! There are those who hold that the two ideals that locked horns in Europe in the late war, must somewhere, sometime, fight the fight out to a finish. God forbid that it should be on the battlefield ; but it mayhave to be so. Signs are not wanting that tyrannical England is getting a bit weary. Most of all perhaps, she is weary of being maligned and misrepresented. Heretofore she has gone her own way, rather independent and indifferent as to praise or blame. She has tried to be just and fair, and has succeeded almost as well as the rest of us would have done. In her old age I think, she is becoming just a little sentimental, like other folks, and I imagine, shrinks a bit from taking up the burden and responsibility that the rest of us selfish people have left her to shoulder, and when she did shoulder it, have scolded her for doing so.