IRELAND.

Taranaki Daily News, 21 September 1920, Page 7

IRELAND.

WcSWEENKY'S TREATMENT. SALLOWED USUAL PRIVILEGES, By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. London, Sept. 19 The Home Office, replying to a correspondent, states that there is no foundation for statements in the American Press regarding the prison treatment of the Lord Mayor of Cork. He has from the first been allowed the privileges granted to political prisoners, and has never been required to wear prison clothes. Since lie lias been refusing food and has reduced himself to a state of weakness he remains in bed in a large room in the hospital and enjoys the best medical attendance. Trained nurses are with him day and night, and everything possible is done for his comfort. Excellent food, suitable for his enfeebled condition, is kept constantly at the bedside, and the nurses have done their best to induce him to partake of this.—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.

PAST OF 40 DAYS PRACTICABLE. London, Sept. 19. Despite McSweeney's recognised spiritual honesty, there is increasing doubt concerning the genuineness of his hungerstrike. The Sunday Times recalls the fact that his relatives pronounced him to be dying a fortnight ago, and adds: "The prison officials certainly giving him no food, but visitors somehow are getting nourishment into his body." This criticism appears unwarranted to several doctors, -who declare that a fast of forty days under McSweeney's condition is practicable. McSweeney himself issued a message to the Irish people throughout the world, attributing the length of his fast to "spiritual strength received from daily communion, assisted' by the world of masses and prayers, the intensity of which is so apparent that I ami being sustained in a supernatural manner."—United Service.