UNIQUE RACIAL RENDEZVOUS.

Grey River Argus, 29 March 1922, Page 6

UNIQUE RACIAL RENDEZVOUS.

CONFEBENCE OF THE IRISH RACE AT I’ARJs. (By Jessie Mackay). January 21 1922. Whatever developments may take place in the reconstruction of her life, social a.nd official, there is no doubt whatever that Ireland this wee K became a “nation onco again.” <in Monday, .January 16, Mr Mh-nael Collins, on behalf of the Provisional Government, took over Dublin Castle from Lord Fitzalan, the last Viceroy of Ireland, whife two other members of the Irish Cabinet. Mr Duggan ana ,\|r O Higgins, left tor London to meet Mr Winston Churchill and his British Cabinet Committee. It has doubtless been cabled tha.t the taking over of Dublin Castle, symbolising the end of •even centuries of political subordination, was carried out in the same quiet business.like way as most other administrative transactions of the Irish Government up to date. But, Ireland being Ireland, it was impossible that Fate should not provide some striking in a sense, indeed cosmopolitan memento of events, the chief participants in which had so firmly resisted the temptation to la spectacular. Whenever and however the idea of a conference of representatives of th< Irish rate from all over the wo'dd originated, no one on earth could have forseen that this great, ]>earefu| racial rendezvous of her far-sundered . hil dren should assemble four days aftei the Irish Free State took li< r plan among ruling nations. Though the formal opening of the conference doe not take place until to-hrorrow. th< bulk of the dolejatcs are alreadv in Paris and have formed a Preliminary Committee to prejnire the ground for the General Committee which will direct a session which may be judged un ique in modern history. Only extra ordinary circumstances joined to extraordinary national temperament could have cal'ed an assembly of this kind from the four quarters of the globe n.t a d ’v’s notice, so to speak and with absolute no scheme of agenda the world tic unalterable solidarity of the Irish race. Even a rationalist of letters must admit that, whatever forces control the machinery that makes history, they have a fashion of doing the right thing obviously at the right time in the end. Of all countries and of. all races, Ireland and the f 'its :»r.» the least rationalistic, and it is under a genuine sense of immediate overruling that this avenue of sp’oeb and contnnst opens fo i t he representatives of the Irish race overseas. AVliat occasion, if any, it recalls to the Irish conscioustrrone cannot say; to a Scot taking part in the proceedings, it is curiously and compvllingly reminiscent of the signing of the (’ovenant. i Eighteen countries are represented and it is exited that something like one hundred delegates will answer to the roll-call. Considering that, with the Irish in Ireland, and those of Irish origin outside Ireland, some fifty millions are represented, it will be seen that moderation has been exercised in appointing delegates. New Zealand, sending three, is more prodigal than the Commonwealth, which ha,s limiter its quota to one tor each State. <H these, Tasmania appointee a Sydney physician alreadv bound for Paris, Di Moran, and Queensland cabled to ask Mr Patrick Dillon, already domociled two or three yea.rs in London as secretary in the Queensland office. The Queensland Government at once gave its consent, to Mr Dillon’s attendance ns a delegate, an omen the more pleasing since he has been a successTiil leader of the Gaelic study movement, noth in Australia, and in London. Other Australian delegates a.rie Mr O’Dea. of Western Australia., Mr Ryan, of Melbourne, Mr Clery. a well-known jour-

nalist, and Dr M. J. 0 Reilly, me big ,eniaJ, and always adequate rector ol St. John’s College, Sydney University, o whom the other Australasians naturally look lo|’ a. load in. this strange 1 , ’oaring, beautiful, bewildering Paris. Curiously enough, seeing that tno first ■lea of the Conference sprang sponaneously out of South Africa, that State has only sent one representative \lr Barrington. The North American ml South American delegates are nut Hiived in force yet. Mr Hall Skelton, the big, youthful-looking Auckli.ul delegate, oddly, much more like i- squatter that a successful lawyer, ins, we hear, been taking a. canny look ound his native Ulster, and renewing amily ties with the (Angelica.il) Church f Ireland Mr J. McGrath, of Welingtnn, we also hear, cannot arrive till ho end of the Conference, whereas Mr Hall Skelton will be ready for Committee duty to-morrow. The (Hand Hotel 1 , huge, contra] and veil appointed, where for some time »ast conference' organisation has boon arried on. proves an ideal preliminary ■'•endezvous, though it has been found id vi.sable to secure a larger hall in ho Quai d’Orsay Hotel for subsequent sessions. To tho few representatives already in. Paris it seems as if the cuiference had forgotten its approaching i •xis’te'nce. Suddenly] from (every piai'ter it rains Irish delegates . The great warm corridors that bid winter lefianre whether it snows or bails without give a velvety welcome to hurrying Irish feet; the gigantic salle-a-m.anager, festooned with fights and shaded with graceful palms, beyond which the musicians ewcupy a raised stand clear of the maze of little snowy tables, constitutes; one imagines, a iglit well pleasing to hungry Irish eyes 'hit dietieally speaking, five o’clock s about the middle of a, Parisian afernoon, and this fortuitous concourse if Cekic atoms has at once to range itself into a certa.in form of order, hat even so. maintains much more he (haractee of a huge family ( hHstnas party than a world-conference. This congress may or may not bp a uccess; the first national 1 Government >f Ireland may or may not lie a SUC•ess, but the spirit that has evolved both in such unconsciously dramatic -(injunction will certainly move to mis of ultimate utter success. Emeison. with his sober resonance !;caks of the one unfailing remance of meting superior people. The a'r is hick with it already. This cheerful voting student, oil’, one imagines, for a vacation tramp, gives his name airilv as “Hayes from Dublin.” After va'ds one recognises one Ifis been ferociously nudging the new Irish Minister for Education for dropped* sen ten ces This fairish, slim-built man in glasses who looks like a boy v itb graying hair is the great Professor John McNeil. And this biggish man with the courtly air, ami the long da.rk hair over the collar, the domed brow and the deep set eye. the out-waved moustache and th,' out questing r-osc ■of the seeker- a faughing, jolly seeker of the. perfect thing.