Dublin Notes.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XX, Issue 43, 12 August 1892, Page 11

Dublin Notes.

(Dublin Freeman, June 25.) A meeting of Ulster farmers was held at Portadoirn on Monday in sapport of compulsory land purchase. The scheme for the purchase by the evicted tenants of their holdings on the Tottenham estate has been sanctioned bj the Land Commissioners, and notification thereof has been conveyed to the tenants, who have held a meeting to consider what steps they should take in the matter. Afterwards a public meeting of the Tottenham Tenants' Indemnity Committee was held in Oampile village, near the estate, for the purpose of raising an indemnity fund to compeDi&te the Tottenham tenants for the fight they made. Mr John Redmond, M.P., before sailing for England on Saturday, June 18, aaid :— « My reception by the people of New York strengthens my determination to fijrht Home Rule on the lines of oar dead leader. The money subscribed here, though far from enough, will be used in. the coming elections, and we hope to obtain much more from America. A reconciliation with the McCarthyites c«n only be secured by the latter accepting our proposals. The effect of the demonstration here may have the desired effect on the other side, and Tim Healy may be brushed aside."— Mr Redmond took with him a sum of five thousand dollars. The only point about the Ulster Convention that has attracted any attention in London is the Rev Dr Kane's statement that Lord Wolseley had pledged himself to lead the rebellion against an Irish Parliament— or words to that effect. In 1886, when the Home Bnlt Bill was under discussion, a report reached London from a trust, worthy qnarter that Lord Wolseley had said that nothing would give him greater pleasure than to head an army against a Dublin Parlia ment. The statement attracted widespread attention, and notice wai about to be taken of it in Parliament when Lord Wolseley denied it. At that time Lord Wolseley had not altogether broken with lh« Liberals, as they moat considerately took on their shoulders the blame for his disastrous failure to relieve Gordon— a catastrophe which inflioted more injury on the Liberal party than anything during the present generation. The foundation-stone of the Bingsend Technical and Fishery Schools was laid on Monday by Lord Pembroke, who exercised one of those long disused and almost forgotten functions of Irish landlordism—the performance of an act for the benefit of the people. Bingsead showed that it appreciated the revival, and we hope Lord Ptmbroke reliehed for once " the luxury of doing good." There is no chariness about the popular acknowledgment of his generosity on this occasion. The fishermen of Bingsend will shortly owe to him the opportunity of improving their position, and their wives the chance of adding to the limited means at present at their disposal. Lord Pembroke insisted in his address on the importance of the instruction to be given in navigation by the teachers of the school. Lord Pembroke looks to the sailor lads of Ringsend to realise his hopes. He asks for the school a f iir trial, and that too much should not be expected of it all at once. The best resalts of such institutions are always slow in beiag gathered, and tbere may be too much impatience at first among those for whose benefit they are intended. Knowledge is no load, however, and the sailor boys of Biogsend who pasa through these schools will find, sooner or later, that it is good, sound capital, from which profit comes. A remarkable letter on the subjsct of the Convention has been addressed to the Belfast Morning News by the Rev J. H. Wright, rector of Portglenone, County Antrim. In the couise of his communication the rev gentleman analyses what he calls the " red hot resolutions " to be proposed at the Convention, not one of which, he says, could hold water for five minutes. He adds: "I am really sorry and ashamed that the venerable primate of the Irish Church would pray (vainly, I am certain) for Heaven's blessing on this wild chaos of confusion and ask the sanction of Heaven for a proceeding which I have already i n your columns indispntably proved to be opposed to the teaching of Holy Scripture. The chief pastor of our Church should be, I will be bold to state, foremost in counselling peace, not surely, if the Christian religion be a verity, first in opening the proceedings of an assembly of which one of the avowed and published mottoes contains the words, " We must shed blood," which reminds one far more forcibly of the sanguinary watchword of the red Indian on the war-path than of what should be the peaceful, loving words of any civilised Christian gathering. If blood must be shed, whose blood, might I ask, is it to be ? None other than the blood of our fellow-Christians and fellow-citizans. Oh, how blinded and degraded even good and wise men become under the accursed glamour of passion, bigotry, and popular outcry 1 lam only the incumbent of a small country parish, and yet I would not take the primacy of Armagh to-morrow and offer the opening prayer amidst the historic multitude whiob, besides other evils, raises in thoughtless hands the banner of civil war." The Rev Mr Wright states that since his last letter he has received many threats of violence; It is

stated on authority that all the speeches to be delivered have been committed to writing by order, and referred to the well-known Mr Fionegan, the Unionist election agent, for his approval, and thit he has carefully sub-editei them. The proceedings at the Belfast Convention practically commenced by Sir William Kwart, Bart, moviDg the first resolution, which expressed loyalty to Crown and Constitution, and resolving to have nothing to do with " a Parliament controlled by men responsible for the crime and outrage of the Land League, the dishonesty of the Plan of Campaign, and the cruelty of boycotting." The speaker preBented a most funereal aspect. He delivered his speech with a most melancholy and long drawn out method. Then Mr Sinclair spoke, and his Bpeech excited mora attention and drew forth greater cheers than anybody olse's, especially when he observed tha*, cost what it might, they would have nothing to do with a Dublin Parliament. If such a Parliament were ever set up, they would simply ignore its existence. Its acta would be as waste paper. There were renewed cheers at this, and the speaker added : The police, if such a Parliament were set up, " would find our police barracks preoccupied with our own constabulary, its iudges would sit in empty courthouses — that they made no threat of blood or arms, but merely allowed those who desired the luxury of Home Bale to pay for it themselves." There were then speeches by the Rev Oliver M'Cutcheon, D.D., who made a very dreary addrsss ; Mr Thomas Andrews, Mr Frank Johnston, a " labouring man ;" and the Bey James Creegan, It was funny when the chairman put the resolution to the meeting, the usual appeal — " As many, etc, as are for the resolution will kindly say, aye — was greeted with loud cries of " Aye," and when he said, "As many as are against kindly say no," almost an equally large number said in the most lamb-like fashion, " No," an incident which naturally provoked some laughter. No better indication can be given of the weariness of the meeting than the fact that after the first resolution the audience rose believing and hoping, one would think, that the whole thing was over, and proceeded to sing " God save the Qaeen." In this well-intentioned effort they had to be called to order and informed that there waa more to follow. Then the Rev Dr Lyred proposed the second resolution, and be was followed by the Rev R. B. Kane. It was somewhat amusing in his, as in some other cases, that the ringing of a bell had the effect of bringing to an abrupt conclusion a speech which would otherwise have doubtless extended to an almost unlimited extent. A good deal of amazement, not to say amusement, was created by the bewildering fact that during the pro* ceedings copies of the Belfast Evening 'Jelegrapli were circulated through the pavilion containing a report of over six columns of an open air meeting which was to take place 6ome hours subsequently in the Botanic gardens. The report was headed — " Enormous gathering," " Important speeches," " Stirring scenes." These formidable captions possibly were quite accurate, but their effect was, to say the leasr, somewhat minimised by the fact that the proceedings to which they referred, including of course the speeches, did not ccme off for hours after the paper which published them was in circulation. It simply showed the activity and anxiety of the orators to get publicity,