LAWLESSNESS IN IRELAND.

Colonist, Volume LI, Issue 12455, 3 February 1909, Page 1

LAWLESSNESS IN IRELAND.

The London "Times,'.' commenting in its issue of. December 15, on the state of . Ireland, remarks that in spite of Mr BirrelFs confident language, the condition of Ireland "is- now: worse than at any time since the defeat of the second Home Rule Bill. Scarcely a week passes without some new invasion of. private : rights and some new affront to public law. The land war is no longer confined to the agitation against the letting of grass lands for cattle-feed-ing, or to the prosecution of the organised attacks u£6n holdings from • which tenants have been . evicted many years ago. Individual liberties are threatened in all directions where ever persons do not immediately con- ; form to the "unwritten law;" Cases have recently occurred in which mobs have forcibly interfered to prevent people from getting married; atthough they and their families had made all arrangements for the cere- . mony. In one instance obstructions were placed along the road by which the wedding party waß returning and a fusillade was opened upon the guests, male and female, whose cars ■ were stopped. In another case the '■' funeral of a Protestant gentleman who was to' have been buried by the Church of Ireland clergyman in his ■own parish church, of which he' had. been for m.any years churchwarden, \\tas forcbily interrupted by a large gathering armed with sticks,:- who tore the coffin from the hands .of- his relatives, with threats, and Wows, refusing to allow him to be. buried as a Protestant. The ordinary law, on which Mr Birrell still professes to rely,, is treated with contempt, not only when prosecutions are initiated in Court, but when the police are sent out - with the object of res braining outrage or unlawful attacks "on -property. Patrols of constabulary nave more than- once lately been- attacked by ambushed •and armed peasants. . among whom, as some- of the judges '. have ■■' lately pointed out," the free possession and use of revolvers has become, since the repeal of the Arms Act, mare and more dangerously common. All this has been accompanied by a great and progressive ■ increase ,', of threatening letters and other forms of intimidation, including firing into dwelling houses. ' : ■ " : \. .. -V;.' ■/*'; . . . . ■>