HOW ORANGEISM IS DEFAMED.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 11215, 10 September 1898, Page 8

HOW ORANGEISM IS DEFAMED.

' t<o the f.ditok. Sic, In a telegram '.vied London, June 9, j the following appear.-.d in your paper:— : "Rioting of a serious nature took place yes- ; lorday at Belfast, Ireland. ..The Orangemen : looted the liquor s!iop3, and wrecked ' the ; Nationalists' houses. The Riot i^ct was read.': A company of dragoons was called out, and order restored." The Belfast Weekly News, | commenting on the above, says: "Readers of ;. t'.io Belfast Weekly News noed not be told : how grossly.this misrepresents what took place ' ; on the 7th of June. The Attorney-general ;. for Ireland stated in the House of Commons j1 a few days ago that it was quito an error to", attribute the rioting in Belfast to the Orange- ■ men; it was the roughs of the city, who ; seized upon the Nationalists' procession in honour of rebellion as an excuse for riot-:' ing: AYe may also .odd that the roughs' were J " further aided and allotted in their design by | t!io provocative conduct of the rebel pieces-' I sinnists. In the course of the trials 'going on at the assizes for rioting, Police Inspector Stevenson, who was on duly at the spot where the riots broke out, said they were caused by tho disorderly and provocative conduct of the Nationalist processionists, who shouted at the sppct'ators parly cries, throw stones, and fired revolver shots. To say that the two public- ! muses which wero looted were sacked' by Orangemen is nothing less than a gross libel on Orangoisni. Not one of the prisoners arrested in connection with that aspect of the riots has been shown to be an Orangeman. As to Nationalists' houses being wrecked—well, that is news from London, via Australia, about Belfast, as to which Belfast peoole have been ignorant."—l am, etc., September 5. A. C.