THE O'CONNOR MEMOIRS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20243, 1 May 1929, Page 10

THE O'CONNOR MEMOIRS.

REMINISCENCES OF " T.l\"

STORY, OF CAPTAIN BOYCOTT.,

FAMOUS SPEECH BY PARNELL.

UNWRITTEN CODE! OF LAWS."

(Copyright.) No. XIV. 'Another incident of the time which brought, homo to the world the figure of Rovolutiou that was now stalking over Ireland was of a. very peculiar character. A gentleman named Captain Boycott occupied a large farm in County Mayo, and was also the agent of Lord Erne. One of the advices tendered by the Land League was that rack-rented tenants should offer what they considered a fair rent, and if this was refused they should pay nothing afc all until the landlord came to a better frame of mind. Lord Erne's tenantry acted on this advice and Captain' Boycott retorted by serving; them with notices of eviction.

The people determined to bring Captain Boycott to his senses by a systegi to which he afterwards gave his name and .which has passed into the practice, and also into the vocabulary, of all the countries of the world—namely, the boycott. Not a man would work for Captain Boycott, not a household servant would remain with him, not one would sow or reap or carry any of the fruits of his farm. The shopkeepers would not sell to him, the post-boy would not deliver his letters, the blacksmith would uot shoe his horse, the laundress returned his dirty linen.

A body of militant Orangemen descended from Ulster to Captain Boycott s relief, under the protection of seven thousand soldiers and police. In spite of all probabilities they were allowed to come * and return without any interference beyond the boos of women and children. ■The Orangemen remained a fortnight and when, they departed, amid the ostentatious indifference of the people, Captain Boycott and his family went with them, on his way to England, and Mayo knew him no more, , Parnell and Boycott Policy. It was a speech of Parnell that was supposed to have helped to apply this new and" most effective weapon to all people connected with the Land Laws throughout the whole of Ireland. In the most famous of his speeches, that at Ennis, he summed up this policy. "We have been accused," Parnell said, •'of preaching Communistic doctrines when we told the people not a pay an unjust rent, and the following out of that advice ina, few of the Irish counties has shown the English Government the necessity for a radical alteration in the Land Laws. But how would they like it if we told the people some day or other nob to pay any rent until (his question is settled ? We have not told thern that yet, and I suppose it may never be necessary for us to speak in that way. "I suppose the question will be settled peaceably, fairly and justly to all parties. If it should not be settled we cannot continue to allow this millstone to hang round the neck of our country, throttling its industry and preventing its progress. It will be for the consideration of wiser Jieads than mine whether, if the landlords continue obdurate and refuse all just concessions, we shall not be obliged to tell the people of Ireland to strike against rent until this question has been settled. . "And if," the Irish leader added, "the five hundred thousand tenant-farmers of Ireland struck, against the ten thousand landlords, I should like to see where they would get police and soldiers enough to make them pay, "Into a Moral Coventry." "Whe'n a man," Parnell said, "takes ft farm from which another has been unjustly evicted, you must shun him on the roadside when you meet him, you must shun him in tho streets or town, you must shun him at the shop-counter, you must shun him at the fair and in tho market-place, and even in the house of j worship, by leaving him severely alone, | by putting him into a moral Coventry, by isolating him from the rest of his kind as if he was a leper of old—you must show him your detestation of the crime he has committed; and yoa may depend upon it, if the population of a county in Ireland carry out this doctrine, that thero will be no man so full of avarice, so lost j to shame, as to dare the public opinion ! «f c'll tight-thinking men within the , county, and to transgress your unwritten code of law 3." It was on that occasion, too, that Parnell lent his sanction to a nickname that had just begun to be applied to Mr. Forster. A police circular had been unearthed which recommended the polics not to Use the deadly bullet in conflicts with the people, but buckshot. Granting that these collisions should take place at all—and, of course, they should not with proper and prompt legislation—the intention of the circular was undoubtedly humane;, but it was not so interpreted, and "Buckshot" Forster became the favourite appellation for the unfortunate Chief Secretary. Matt Harris' "Terrible Speech." But there was another speech which attracted a great deal more attention. Among the most effective and zealous leaders of the tenantry in the West of Ireland was a man named IWatfc Harris He was a man of wide culture, of great reading. He could have had a prosperous business as a builder, but the violence of his political opinions and his temperament drove him into politics. At an earlier date Harris had opposed the Ribbon lodges and their policy of assassination. But. for some reason or other he lost his head on this occasion, and having described how he had saved many a landlord's life in the old days, and having seen as the only rosult of this policy the eviction and . the expatriation of millions of Irishmen, he told the people that if they shot down the landlords like partridges in September, hp. Matt Harris, would not say a word. Parnell' arid I looked at each other blankly when we heard this terrible speech. I need not say that it was condemned by all the sane people 011 tho platform, including the chairman. . . Flight from the Platform. Parnell apd I had retired to the back Of tho platform, having delivered our souls. "What had we better do ?" said I to-Parnell, for wo felt that controversy would only have aggravated the situation, and perhaps give more prominence to the ; wild' speech. "We had better hook it," said Parnell. The:use of a popular phrase of that kind by Parnell always struck me iri strange contrast with the consummate dignity of his personality and demeanour. We dropped down from the platform and •went to our hotel. Within a few minutes crowds c>f people, and priest's among them, came to report to tits this ugly incident. Parnell listened to them with an air of well-simulated innocence, and most of them went away with the idea that hj& had riot heard the speech. Subsequently Matt Harris made a speech in which he made a complete apology for the violence of his language. Such, then, was how the session of 1880 and the recess passed. On both sides thfc forces were visibly gathering for a violent and fcrriblo struggle the moment tho doors of the House of Commons were again open. (To bo continued daily.)!