THE EVIL DAYS OF OLD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VII, Issue 393, 22 October 1880, Page 19

THE EVIL DAYS OF OLD.

(A recently republished letter of J. K. L. to Spring Rice, Lord Monteagle). Cablow, October 30, 1827. My Dear Sib, — I wish to state to you something of the impression with which I returned from a late visit to the counties of Kilkenny, Cork, and Tipperary, especially as I delayed some days in the county last mentioned, where barbarous scenes are frequently occurring. You are also well acquainted with the state of this country, especially of the south, with the several events which happen there, and you know so well the character of those who furnish information to the Government that no general lem.irks can be valuable to you. It is quite true that the present murders, burnings, strife and hatred arise from precisely the same causes as similar and and greater atrocities arose in times past. The two parties are still struggling ; the character of the warfare is changed, but the animus of those eugaged in it is the same. The people are oppressed beyond all endurance, and great portions of them, but not by any means the majority, are savage. The gentry, great and small, with a few excep-

tions are not less savage. Some of them are like fiends ; they would devour the people and insist that they are all lost to every sense of morals and humanity. Whilst the truth, as far as I can ascertain it, is : — the peasantry are generally industrious and peaceable, rendered outrageous and cruel only by oppression which human nature cannot — another person would say ought not — to bear. William C k, who was murdered lately, and from whose murder arose several others, he, T was told, after a series of cruelties set fire to a widow's house, who with her little children were ill of fever, in order by that process to eject them from their tenement. He was only more cruel and rash than many others of the same spirit ; and I sincerely believe, if the influence of the Catholic clergy did not arrest the people, you would have murders, military executions, martial law, or insurrections throughout one half of the counties in Ireland. A great number of the real disturbers of the public peace, under the name of magistrates, assembled lately at Thurles, and, as is reported, prayed the Government for the Insurrection Act, etc. If you grant it to them, you assist them to depopulate the country and starve the people ; but you also alienate the affection of those who now hope you will extend the strong arm of power, not for their oppression but protection. If we ever are to he blessed with a change of system, begin now ; give no aid to the real and efficient instigators of the barbarities which occur ; tell them to spare the peasantry, not to instigate them, and no extraordinary aid will be required to curb their passions. If they be only taught that oppression will not be sustained, tear will make them moderate, for they have no resource but in the Government. Good feeling may then, succeed, for fear often introduces charity to the beart, particularly of the high-minded. And as to the peasantry I am fully satisfied that if permitted to be humane, industrious, and benevolent they will be so, and even contented so far as is consistent -with the deep feeling of dissatisfaction generated in them by the penal laws and the daily parade of ascendancy. If on the other hand, you abet and support by power the tyranny now prevailing, you only claim the passions of the multitude, and every sigh they heave to heaven will be for vengeance against you and your proteges. ****** Pardon, my dear Bir, the almost unpardonable length, of this letter. I shall not again trespass on you for a long time, and remain, etc., >J< J. Doyle.