Dublin Notes.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 1, 3 October 1890, Page 21

Dublin Notes.

The Daily Empress baa sent a most amusing young man down as a whole " Special Commission of Inquiry " in himself to ascertain the truth of Judge Harrison's strictures at Galway. We assume of course (though it is a somewhat violent assumption), that the lucubrations dated respectively Portumna and Ballinasloe are not written in the back offices in Parliament-street. It is, indeed, hard to suppose that anyone had been on the spot. The account of the adventures and discoveries of this gentleman in the mystic regions beyond the Shannon is, to anyone who knows the place and people, as comical M Mr. Verdant Green's life and adventures at the University. It is plain that the Daily Exprets is deeply mortified at the candid confession of the abject failure of Coercion into which it was betrayed at the first blush by the charge of Judge Harrison. The duty of the Special Commission was to discover traces of the triumph of Law and Order in East Galway. He did his work with a will. He was fortuqate io being able to begin with an accurate announcement that " there has been no serious outrage in the district lately." But when he passes to bis proof that Coercion has crushed the League, and broken up the Plan of Campaign in that district, his zeal outruns bis discretion, and he proves entirely two much. He proves that Lord Clanricard's rents are regularly paid, and that his •gent, whom the well-informed " Commission " amusingly describes as « " Mr. Tennant," is quite a popular character amongst the tenants. One amusing illustration of the triumph of " law and order " in the district must serve as a sample for the rest. He gravely writes that thirteen tenants on one townland (names of tenants and townland judiciously omitted) have been compelled by the agent to pay up, not merely their rents and arrears in full, but £300 law costs. Of course the story is a very palpable flam. All tne same, it has its value, as showing the kind of thing which the Daily Express conceives to be the triumph of good government in Ireland. It is regarded as the most glorious achievement for the " resolute administration of the law," that it enables the agent of the Marquis of Glanricarde to extort from his miserable tenants, not merely their rackrents and arrears in full, bat exorbitant law costs to the amount of *300. What a confession is here that "government •' exists in Ireland only for the benefit of the rack-renters and evictors, and that it is in their sole interest Coercion is mercilessly enforced I The drunken sub-constables, Murphy and White, whom even Becorder Henn and Pether the Packer himself felt constiained to mulct in damages for misconduct, are to have their costs and damages paid for them by the public. 80 Mr. Balf our decrees. It is necessary to keep up the spirit of the force. It would be fatal to discipline if a constable felt that, under any circumstances, he wonld be made to suffer for illegality or misconduct. It would take all the dash out of a baton charge on an unarmed people, for example, if the penalties of an action for assault were looming in the background. A gallant young constable would not perhaps strike with the same vigour at the heads of unarmed men, woman, and children if there were any fear that he might afterwards be made pay for his sport. Mr. Ba four relieves him of all such apprehension. He promises him reward instead of punishment ; be ib to have the pleasant excitement and importance of an action at law, the holiday, the little trip to Galway or Dublin, as the case may be, with the pleasurable assurance that it will cost him not one farthing— that bis costs, expenses, and damages, will be paid by a grattful country, and promotion will be, doubtless more rapid on account ofihis active service to law and order. Here is direct incitement and encourgement to misconduct. It is good news for the other drunken policeman recently arrested in Cork. The police are now declared absolutely irresponsible. When any piece of brutality is perpetrated by the Force, all Government explanation or investigation is invariably refused. Mr. Balfour reads out an impudent denial from the criminated policeman, whoEe name is carefully withheld. If any party has been aggrieved he declares with airy insolence his ligal remedy is open to them. To facilitate that legal remedy every precaution is taken to conceal the identity of the police. But euppose a man does catch his policeman, dues bring bis action, does succeed in spite of partisan tribunals in bringing him to justice, what is the result 1 The wrong-doer walks off 6cot free, the State paying his costs mid damages. The Nationalists who have the audacity to briog actions, and, above all, successful actions, are reviled and calumniated in the House of Commons by the brave Mr. Balf oar under the secure protection of his Parliamentary privilege, which he tested and found strong in the libel action by Peggy Dillon, of which, by the way, the costs were also pbid by the public. The rule is now fully established ; police may do ac they like. Whether they murder, as at Mitchelstown and Youghal, or attempt murder, as at Charlevllle, or merely arre&t and imprison from sheer wantonness, *b at Port umna, they are entitled to impunity and reward. Not a hair o! their heads, not a coin in their pockets, shall be disturbed. It the authorities cannot always protect them from civil proceedings, they will at least take care that their costs and damages shall fall on the public, not themselves. Tbe rule is absolute. The police, like tbe king, can do no wrong ; which means they can do as much wrong as they choose without punishment.

(From the National papers.)

Clanricarde is on the war-path again ; and is, of course,beingl assisted and encouraged by the Government. Thirteen addition* families have been recently evicted— about sixty-five hum in beings made homeless— near Woodford, the district where Judge Harrison recommends Lynch Law should be resorted to. There was a special correspondent of the Daily Express on the spot to chronicle tbe evictions in tbe interest of law hnd order. He manifestly thought it a great point in favour of tbe Government that there is no longer any resistance, aud that tbe evictions are carried out with regularity and despatch. " The result of the new state of things," he writes, triumphantly, " is that in a couple of hours halt-a'dozen families living miles apart had been dispossessed.'' Surely it is a proud boast for

a Government that it has improved by practice in the art of clearing a countryside of its peaceful and industrious inhabitants at the bidding of a monster, greedy and cruel, like the most coble the Marquis of Clanricarde. The Daily Express man is plainly there on an express mission to viudicate the Government and the evictor ; but he should have left all humane feeling behind him when he started on such a mission. "It was impossible," he writes, " not to feel pity for some of the families of the men who were dispossessed. They endeavoured to maintain an indifferent front while the agent and sheriff were about, but once they departed the poor victims gave way to tears. I asked one of the tenants, who stood againßt the padlocked door cf bis late dwelling in a dazed state, heedless of the pelting rain, while his wife and children, of whom there were ten, chiefly girls, and ranging from one to seventeen years of age, sought shelter under the eaves of some out-houses, what he mean to do. ' What can Ido ? ' was the answer. ' Where do you mean to go 1 ' "To the workhouse, I suppose.' " It seems amazing that any Government can encourage outrages like these, still more amazing that any people can endure them with patience. If Judge Harrison had such outrages in his mind his allusions to Lynch law would have some meaning. Only the strong curb of self-restraint put upon them by their leaders restrains the people from rising up in revolt against this merciless tyranny . At Coolroe the work of extermination has been resumed and completed. It was on this estate, it may be remembered, that the district magistrate, struck by the fairness of the terms offered by the tenants, pressed their acceptance Btrongly, but in vain, on the acceptance of tbe vindictive and besotted old evictor, Mr. Byrne. One hundred and twenty policemen engaged in the work of destruction. The public will have the pleasure of paying the cost later on. It is not possible to gauge the mad folly of the evictors who still persist in this wanton, purposeless persecution of their tenants or of the Government that encourages them. The wild hope of planting evicted farms has long since disappeared. The profitless scarecrows on the Coolgreany and MaSsereene estates, and the ruinous expenses in which the owners have been involved, are warning sufficient to all whom it may concern. The tenants will not be allowed to suffer, no matter how long the struggle may continue, To this the Irish leader has solemnly pledged himself, and Mr. Parnell is not a man whose word is lightly given or lightly broken. The one hope of the exterminator, his one back door to escape from ruin, is the submission to arbitration. The basis of any form of arbitration mast be the reinstatement of the evicted. The folly of the Government, whose grand hope is the settling of the Irish land question in encouraging evictions, each one of which further embarrasses the question, passeth all understanding. The tenants and their friends have this consolation —the mad blunders of their enemies must in the long run redound to their benefit. The longer the struggle and tbe more desperate, the better the terms they will ultimately obtain. The Duke of Westminster has decided that the Dublin Corporation shall not be permitted to collect its own rates. What do the Irish people want of Home Bule when the Duke of Westminster is kind enough to manage their affaire 1 We should like any honest and intelligent British Unionist (always supposing there is such a thing) to listen attentively to the following facts, and let us know what he thinks of them. Tbe Coiporation of Dublin, including its Coercion minority, unanimously adopted a certain Bill for the better management of city affairs and finances. The citizens of Dublin, in public meeting assembled, by an overwhelming majority, approved of the proposals. Under the beneficent Union it was necessary to have the consent of a Committee of the British Parliament, who, for the most part, knew nothing about Dublin except the name. To make matters still more promising, the majority of tbe Committee and its chairman were politically bitterly opposed to the Corporation and the great majority of the citizens of Dublin. But the proposals were themselves so transcendentally fair and reasonable, that the hostile committee adopted them. Next, under the glorious system, tbe Dublin Corporation Bill went before a Committee of the House of Lords, presided over by the Duke of Westminster. The Lcrds, on whose crass prejudices no reason has e£f>ct, and whose prejudice was only equalled by its ignorance of the question, rejected the measure. Even to the Coercion Government this seemed a strong step — an unanswerable argument in all reasonable minds in favonr of Home Bule. So the Government which had hitherto resisted the Bill proposed a compromise which the Corporation, with unexampled moderation, accepted. The compromise is brought before the Duke of Westminster's Committee in the Lords. It was advocated by the Dublin Corporation and by the Coercion Government, and, incredible as it may seem, it was summarily rejected. The Duke of Westminster, who knows nothing about Dublin, and, if possible, cares less, has determined that tbe Dublin citizens shall not have tbe improvements and alterations they desire, and he is not to be ehaken in his resolve. Under the present delightful system bis voice is omnipotent. His veto is a block which there is no getting over. The Dublin Corporation have spent over £7000 of the ratepayers' money to purchase his Grace's veto, and in the end they are no better than when they began. Now, we ask tbe honest and intelligent British Unionists, to whom the foregoing observations are presumed to be addressed, is it so wonderful that Irishmen are anxious to have the control of their own affairs in their own country ? Is it so very strange that they prefer Home Rule to the rule of which his Grace of Westminster — ignorant, prejudiced, and overbearing — is a "Very fitting exponent ? Whenever some glaring outrage of personal liberty in Ireland under the Coercion Administra'ion is brought under the notice of Mr. Balfour in Parliament, his answer if always the same. "If wrong has bee q committed, the person aggrieved has his legal remedy." We have had some singular instances lately of what this means, and how the Government holds the balance between the wronged and the wrong-doer in Ireland when tie wronged is a Nationalist and the wrong-doer a Coercion Official. Two respectable Nationalists, Faby and Morrissy, were arrested in Portumna by a brace of drunken policemen, whose conduct was so outrageous that even Pether tbe

Packer himself felt constrained to confirm the decrees for damages against them with costs. Thereupon the indulgent Balfour s'eps in and declares that the public must pay costs and damages for his interesting^™^*. A Dublin special jury, mainly Coercioniata , find —in spite of the warning of Mr. Carson, that they would be thereby "scoring a point against the Government "—a verdict for £100 damages against truculeut police-sergeant Hyd<* and his confederates. But the Government still continues to harass the unfortunate priest, whom they began by declaring a pauper, with vexation litigation on behalf of the police. District- inspector Concannon and his sergeaats were clearly convicted in the minds of the two judges who tried the case of attempted murder. They fired their revolvers, without provocation, at an unoffending crowd. " They fired," to borrow the emphatic language of the Chief Baron, " out into the darkness, careless of whom they might kill." They are not to be punished, of course. On the contrary, Mr. Balfour decrees their coßts and expenses shall be paid by the public. Constable Palmer is caught in the act of moonlighting by his intended victim and brought straight to the police barrack. But the authorities allow him to slip away through their finßers to America, and, doubtless, supplied him with fund° for his vojage. Constable Palmer might make unpleasant disclosures on the question of ontrage manufacture if he were compelled to stand his trial.

The naval and military forces of the Empire are engaged in what Mr. Balfour calls " the protection of the weak " in Ireland. Now a detachment of soldiers, armed to the teeth, are dispatched to aid and abet the emergencymen of Olphert or Clanricarde. pulling down the houses of the wretched tenants about their ears. Again, her Majesty's gun boat the Britomart steams out to Blasket Island with sheriff and agent and a cargo of bailiffs on board, to seize and carry away seven isbing-boatß. the sole suppoi tof the poor fishermen, and leaves them and their families to starve. These are fa;r samples of how the law is strained and the forces of the Empire exhausted to protect the weak under the benign administration of Mr. Balfour. Lord Clanricarde and Loid Cork are the weaklings whom Balfour's Government protects. Glorious triumphs these fjr the army and navy of Great Britain. The soldiers and sailors, to do them justice, are as much ashamed of the degrading evictian " duty " as if they were caught picking pockets.

Even the shameless Mr. Balfour himself seams half ashamed or afraid of thus mixing up the military and naval forces with the squalid details of his eviction-cum-coercioa policy in Ireland. The forces of the Crown are not used, be is accustomed to explain, in carrying out evictions and seizures ; they are used in carrying out the law. But then the two things happen to mean precisely thj same thing in Ireland. The law iv Ireland is administered with one sole object ; the aggrandisement of the rack-renters. The extortion of rack-rents, the encouraging of evictions, and the vain effort io make eviction profitable by the promotion of land-grabbing, these are the sole objects for which an Irish Government exists at present. It is enough to drive men mad with impotent rage and pity to read the curt announcement that the Clanncarde extermination is to be resumed. The evictii n gang which he has collected at Portumna—worthy tools of such a master— think as little of going out for a day's evicting as for a day's shooting and enjoy a good bag. What is it to them th 3 broken hearts, the miserable men and women, the wailing children, whom they leave behind them when their day's work is over 1 The callous bankrupt, Tener, J.P., as he confessed to at Tullamore, has completely lostcjuut of the number of humaa beings— men, women, and children— he has made miserable by the command of his master. A thousand would be probably under the mark. The next detachment ot rifty-one-evictions will bring the number well over a thousand. This is the district which the amiable Judge Harrison would subject to Lynch-law because the tenants refuse to abandon thcii comrades and their combination, and refuse to associate with emergencymen. Truly the hiw i f ihe crowbar and petroleum-can and the battering-ram is little, if anything, better tban the law of the revolver and the bowie-knife, which Judge Harrison is anxious to establish in the district. Ihe marvel is tnat the people have borne this inhuman persecution with buch more than human patience so long.

We waut the infamy of Mr. Smith-Barry's latest attempt on New Tipperary to be clearly understood. Th-j public are aware that by a Chancery suit he has aaked the wooden-headed, stony-hearted ViceCharicellor to pull down the grand new Mart in Tipperary and put back the great hill that stood there before. The Three Kingdoms have beard and laughed at this outrageous application. But in the absurdity ot the pioceeding we are apt to oveilook the malignity that inspires it. The es'a'e committee bought the interest in a long leat>e of the lands on which the O'Brien Mart is erected. Mr. Smith-Barry, tor no other purpose that flattery cm suggest, except wanton malevolence, purchased a reversion of this lease fur a tew months. That is to say, at the expiration of the lease Mr. SmithBarry will for a few months, and a few months only, be entitled to the possession of the land. On the strength a this contingent remainder, Mr. Smith-Barry asks tne Vice-Chancellor for an order that the new inaiket niiy be pulled down, on the monstrous pretence that the rough, bleak hill is m »re valuable without it. Mr. SmithBarry would prefer tho place, without the great buildiug that adorns it, during the few months that tae premises will be in his hands! on the expiration of ihe le^se. Toe Vice-Chaocellor is expected to gratify bis whim by dirtctiug the premises to be removed. How do toe aamirers of Mr. Smith-Bany explain or justify this interference, as cruel and wanion as it is absurd ? The tenants suirendered with admirable telf-devo ion their splendid business premises rather than take part against the evicted Pon^onby tenants Sm th-Barry gets more thun he is entitled to. He has been given up nis land, its value more|a hundredfold by the tenants' buildings and improvements. But this aoes not content him. The malignant evictor expends his money and ingenuity in securing some means of harrassing the evicted tenants in the place of refuge they have secured. When the merits of this heroic struggle are discussed this 1 ist piece of wanton malignity on the part of the champion exterminator will not, be sure, be

forgotten. It will help «n indienant public to form & correct estimate of bis character and conduct.