REMINISCENCES OF MR T. P. O’CONNOR, M.P.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20703, 29 April 1929, Page 3

REMINISCENCES OF MR T. P. O’CONNOR, M.P.

MEMORIES OF “THE FATHER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.” Rights of Publication Secured by the Otago Daily Times. VOLUME I. CHAPTER VI (Continued). Up to the foundation of the Land League the Irish demand of land reform had not got beyond what were known as the “three F’s”—Fixity of tenure, Fair rent, and Free sale—and up till then any measure which offered those things to Ireland would have been joyfully accepted as almost the last word in the emancipation of the tenants. The Land League transformed this ancient demand into an anachronism which was mentioned only to be denounced and rejected, Parnell possibly began as an advocate of the “ three F's,” but bad been swept on by the Land League, and perhaps also by the tempestuous and wildly enthusiastic receptions which ho got at the crowded and tumultuous meetings through which he swept from one part of Ireland to the other. Everywhere the people prostrated themselves before him. The man who, but, a few mouths before, had been reluctantly and by a small majority elected as leader of a disunited partv was quickly raised by the tempestuous voices of the multitude into the irresistible and adored leader of a nationwide and revolutionary movement. In speech after speech he adopted the Land League programme, and rejected any form of compromise which still left rent and the landlord. It may be added that neither then nor at any other time did the Irish Party propose the expulsion of the landlords without full compensation, and their plan, after years of struggle, was' put forward aiid finally adopted—that the State should advance the purchase money to the landlords, and the tenants should pay back to the State the purchase money by instalments spreading over a certain number of years. There was no justification for any party in attributing the confiscation of estates and the “ expulsion ” of landlords as the aim of Parnell. Every speech he made at these wild gatherings and in this intoxicating atmosphere was severely scrutinised, especially with a view of convicting him of the encouragement of the crimes that were now beginning to lie daily move frequent and more terrible. Parnell treated accusation and appeal—especially from his political opponents in England—with a scorn that was characteristic of the man. Whether he in his heart liked or disliked the English people as a whole, it was always difficult to say. It was an Englishwoman, after all, whom he loved and who loved him, but the very core of Parnell’s being was pride, Satanic pride. He had a tremendous sense of his personal dignity, and with all his apparent imperturbability there were very tempestuous depths in his strange soul. He astounded me one day—it was in one of the dining rooms of the House of Commons, when lie was perfectly tranquil—by saying that he had made up his mind that if any policeman or any other official of the Crown were to make an assault upon him, lie would shoot hint. Another tragic ami sensational incident of the time which brought home to the world the gigantic iigu-o of Eevolui tion that was now stalking over Ireland ‘ "as of a very peculiar character. A ; gentleman named Captain Boycott oc- ; copied a large farm in County Mayo, , and was also the agent of Lord Erne, i One of the advices tendered by the Land ! League was that rack-rented tenants , should offer what they considered a fair i vent, and if this was refused thev should 1 pay nothing at all until the landlord 1 came to a better frame of mind. Lord Ernes tenantry acted on this advice, and Captain Boycott retorted by serving them with notices of eviction The people determined to bring him to his senses by a system to which ho after- ; wards 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 ; " 1 *“ bim, 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 not shoe his horse, the laundress returned his dirty linen ’ f lhc newspapers grasped the tragic picturesqneness of this lonely figure, and ; descriptive and sensational articles began to appear in all the papers—Entrmh as well as Irish. A body of mili- ; : , -Orangemen descended from Ulster 7^nn ll Ln° ,ief ’ under the protection of i°oo soldiers and police. In spite of all piobabilities, they were allowed to come < nd return without any interference beyond the boos of women and children. Iho .Orangemen remained a fortnight, and when they departed, amid the ostentatious indifference of the people, Capam Boycott and his family went with them, on his way to England, and Mayo knew him no more. Parnell calculated that every turnip saved'had cost the Government a shilling. The formidable display of cavalry and- foot for the protection of one farm had gone only to show what a losing battle the Government was fighting against the Land •League. T eech , 0f Parnell supposed to have helped to apply this new and most effective weapon to all people connected with the laud laws throughout the whole of Ireland. I„ the most famous of his speeches, that at imnis, he summed up this policy in these wordsi “We hay e been accused.” doctrinpa i° f Prenehiiig Communistic doctrines when we told the people not out r of tT f Uilj r t re . nt ’ a,ld the following out of that advice m a few of the Irish counties has shown the English Governnieiit_ the necessity for a radical alteration in the land laws. But how would they like it if we told the people some this (most lei * • 10t t 0 pay any rcnt until -his question is settled? . . it , v :n : be for the consideration of wiser heads than mine whether, if the landlords couf. “Son”' r ,KI refuse all J ,,st contr.ssio,,.-, I „e shall nqt he obliged to tell Snt PL Tmtil° tl VehllUl t 0 Stl ‘ ike a S a 'ust settled” l <• i llS i .T!f stion has been ■ nf am t St tI,G } O,O0 ° kandlords, I should like to se t . wnerc they would get police ..ml soldiers enough to make them pay.” *' hen a man,” he said, " takes a farm evicted* 1 " 011 an ? th u r has boen unjustly rido lii OU “ USt Shu “ bitn on s do when you meet him, yon miisr shun him in the streets or town, you 1 must shun him at the shop-counter .you must shun him at the fair, ami in the market-place, and even in the house of worship, by leaving him severely alone, by putting him into a moral Coventry, by isolating him from tbe rest ot his kind as if he wns a leper of old—- ; vou must show him your detestation oi I ” 1C crimo has committed; and you may depend upon it, if the population of a county m Ireland carry out this doctrine, that there will be no man so full of avarice, so lost to shame, as to dare the public opinion of all right-thinking men within the county, and to transgress your unwritten code of laws.” Thus, then, even the shallowest obj server of Irish conditions must have seen 1 tl,at fbc Government and the Parliament had to deal with a movement nation-wide, violent and, as it turned out, irresistible! The feeling in England mounted inevitably with the feeling in Ireland, and thus there were at the same time the cyclone of the Irish revolution and the .cyclone of

party passion in England. It looked os if the two nations were approaching to bloody conflict, which would he nothing short of civil war. It might perhaps lighten this tragic narrative if I toll a little anecdote of on„of these meetings in which. I took part. Parnell, I suppose, felt that he was under some obligation to mo for the very cnc>getic support I had given him in my first parliamentary session, and accordingly agreed to come and address a meeting of my constituents in Galway. He then used the phrase that ho would not haw taken off his coat to fight for the land, if he did not think he was fighting at the same time for Home Rule. It was on that occasion, too, that he lent his sanction to a nickname that had fast begun to be applied to Mr Forster. A police circular had been unearthed which recom the police not to use the deadly bullet in conflicts with the people, bor 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 (he unfortunate Chief Secretary. But there was another speech which attracted a great deal more attention. 1 Among the most effective, and zealous leaders of the tenantry in the West of Ireland was a man named Matt Harris. I knew him from my childhood, for he was a native of Athlono, like myself. He was a man of wide culture, of groat 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 which, curiously enough, at that time ruined him with sonic of the people, among whom he lived. 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 result 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, he, Matt Harris, would not say a word. Parnell and 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 on the platform, including the chairman; and the uncharitable view was taken—which was quite wrong—that Matt made th* speech in the hope that the new Coercion Act, already looming in the near future, would put him in gaol and add him to the martyrs of the cause. Parnell and I had retired to the back of the platform, having delivered our souls. “Whnt had wc better do?’’ said I to Parnell, for wc felt that controversy would only have aggravated the situation, and perhaps give more prominence to the wild speech. “Wc had better hook it.” said Parnell. The use of a popular phrase of that kind by Parnell always struck me in 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 of people, and priests among them, came to report to us this ugly incident. Parnell listened to them with an air of wellsimulated innocence, and most of them went away with the idea that he had not hoard the speech.