Correspondence.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXII, Issue 14, 2 August 1895, Page 25

Correspondence.

[We «re not responsible for the opinions expressed by our Correspondents. ] -* MR MAOGREGOR AND THE CONFESSIONAL. TO THE EDITOB OF THE NEW ZEALAND TABLET. Blß,— Mr O'Rogan, M.H.R., has directed my attention to yoar article on tbis subjtct, and I must BBk to be allowed a few words by way of explanation ; and in order to make that explanation clear I send you a copy of my Bill to amend the law of evidence. As you will see, it contains not one word on the above subject. It is true, however, that the Bill as draftsd by me contained a clause dealing with the subject, and I eend you a copy of that clause, from which you wilj see that I did not propose to alter the law regarding confessions i made to pricßts in the manner indicated. The only change I proposed was Intended to a j amend the law as to prevent miscarriages of jasticu such as occurred in a criminal c cc in Wellington in 1893 in consequence of a medical man bung prevented from giving certain

evidence. My reason for not printing the clause was th*t I found that a Bill introduced by the Government contained a cUusa dealing with the subject. It is much to be regretted that yon could not wri'e on saoh a subject without indulging in sneers and personal abus9 at my expense, and 1 trust yon will admit jour mistake and make the amende honorable — I am, etc., J. MACGBEGOR. Wellington, 25rd July. [Our informant, as we stated, was tbe Sessional correspondent at Welhng'on of the Otago Daily Timet. whose words we quoted. The mistake, therefore, was bis cot ours. Under tbe circumstance?, and seeing no reason to doubt tbe statement made, we do not think tbat our criticism exceeded what was juit and fair. We are, nevertheless, pleased to learn that our correspondent had been misrepresented. It is clear tbat each was tbe case in a very unusual degree. — Ed. N.Z. Tablet ]

passing of the Home Rale Bill through the British House of Oommom. It would appear that a vast multitude of the people of Great Britain gave to Gladstone the honourable post which Sergeant Bignet in •' Barnaby Budge " gave to his jewel of a wife, viz, that of thinking for him and expressing his opinion on every subject of discussion. 'When Gladstone was convinced, they were convinced. When Glad■tone retired they fell at once into disorder. Gladstone's successor has proved a political muddler, and by his inexplicable conduct in retiring when be sbonld have dissolved Parliament he haoded the key of the situation to the wary Conservatives. A distinguished Protestant writer has said that if Leo XIII were twenty years younger be would reform the world. Is it too much to say that if Gladstone were twenty years younger he would force the Liberal programme through all the opposing barriers of old fogeyism, vested interests, and blue blood, till the British Empire would stand out freed from the stains of hereditary injustice, and appear amongst the nations of the earth respectable and respected 1 Amongst the Irish Parliamentary Party who have done yoeman service for their country the name of Michael Davitt justly occupies an honoured place. The son of an Iriah tenant farmer evicted from his holding when Michael was still a child, he tasted the bitter draught of land, lord tyranny and injustice almost at his entrance into this world of to moil. Forced by straitened circumstances to work in a factory for his living while still a boy, he met with the accident that deprived him of his right arm. Rsverses had upon his indomitable nature the effect of spurring him on to renewed efforts to master the problem of life. Tbe memory of the ruthless act of injustice by which he and his family had been hurled on the roadside for non-payment of an impossible rent, burned its way into his soul, and his fixed resolve to labour with all hie powers for the extirpation of landlordism, root and branch, out of Ireland, waß made with an intensity and earnestness that never knew relaxation in all his after career. Ever longing to be of service to the island home of his love, he joined that movement which in the sixties filled the young generation in Ireland with hopes of the dawn of a brighter day, and which at the same time spread dismay and terror amongst the hereditary enemies of his native land. They were the men of whom it was said " They loved their country, not wisely but too well." Davitt paid a heavy penalty for the crime of loving the land of his fathers, as the gloomy portals and frowning walls of England's penal prisons can well testify. But the long and weary years spent in the convict's garb, and in association with the vilest specimens of British humanity, had upon the refined and sensitive nature of Davitt the effect of drawing out all tbe latent philosophy with which nature bad lavishly endowed him. No book in modern times has created such a sensation as Michael Davitt's " Leaves from a Prison Diary." It raised the ex-convict to a position amongst contemporary litterateurs only equalled by the status he at once attained amongst the philanthropists and Bocial reformers of the nineteenth century. And this book was one of the results of the catas'rophe that deprived Davitt of his liberty but could not chain the noble intellect that God had given him. No man in this world who has succeeded in winning the appiause and honour of his fellows, whether for literary, military, forensic, political, or mercantile success, takes more pride in his laurels than does vlichael Divitt tn the memory of his chains and servitude endured for the unfiltcriug love of his | lative land, With him the words of the pojt are something more ' th»n mere inane sentiment where he says—

" Far dearer the grave or the prison, Illnmed by one patriot name, Than the trophies of all who have risen On liberty's ruin to fame. 1 ' Since his entry in-o public life at Home, Davitt has distinguished himself by his devotion to the cause of the Irish tenant farmers. For their benefit he fouaded the Land League which proved so effectual in combining all denominations of the farming class in the Old Land, and no man has yet seriously charged Mr Davitt with mercenary motives in giving his brilliant services to the cause of his faith and fatherland. I say advisedly faitb, for the two are inseparably bound up in the hearts of Irishmen, and no better Catholic or more devoted son of Holy Church has drawn in with his mother's milk that abiding and ineradicable affection for the faith of St Patrick which mark his spiritual children all the world over. If proof were wanting of the esteem in wbich Irish ecclesiastics hold Davitt, it was abundantly given in the Southwark division of London in several of the large towns of England aud Scotland and by not a few in various parts of Ireland quite recently. Now that Davitt is about to hooout our adopted land with a visit, is it not a foregone conclusion that his countrymen here and all who respect honour, consistency, and talent will rise to give him such a welcome as will leave pleas int memories of the land of loveliness in the southern seaa to cheer him on tbe time to come in the hard up-hill work that he and his cjlleagues have before them 1 To doubt for a moment that the Irishmen in New Zaaland will give Michael Davitt a hearty aud a glorioas " ceud milefailte " would be to insult their intelligence and discredit their patriotism. — I am, etc, James O'Neill. Catholic Presbytery, Milton.