Dublin Notes.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXII, Issue 22, 27 September 1895, Page 23

Dublin Notes .

(From contemporariep.) The executive committee of tbe Ulster Liberal-Uoionist Association in Belfast issued an address congratulating the country on the result of the recent elections and recognising the splendid efforts put forth by both wings of the Unionist party in Ulster. In the opinion of the association it would be expedient to pass duiing the ensuing session a short Bill providing that judicial rents which might come up for revision on and after tbe Ist November should not be dealt with nntil the promised legislation on the land question passes into law. It is unders'ood that soon after tbe reassembling of Parliament changes will be made in the personnel of tbe law officers of the Crown. It is understood that although Mr Oareon, Q.C., was apparently left ont of the Administration, to the dissatisfaction of the Irish loyalists, the circumstance was due to impending changes upon the judicial bench. The rearrangement proposed will enable the Prime Minister to place an important position at tbe disposal of the distinguished Irish barrister. During Mr Morley's stay in Dublin Castle as Chief Becretary for the past three years he ppent many an hour going through the vast collection of State papers of the Union period in the Birmingham Tower, with the object, it is believed, of writing a book about that most fateful and intereßtirg epoch of Irish history. These papers, which deal with affairs between 1795 and 1805, were for sisty ytars deposited in two very large cases in the tower, carefully fastened down with the Government seal, and with the inscription, " Secret and confidential. Not to be opened." But under the Bccords (Ireland) Act of 1867 the cases were opened and their contents classified and arranged in sixty-eight boxes by Sir Bernard Burke, the late Ulster King of Arms. Mr Lecky, wbo has had access to the papers, says they are of the highest historical interest. Home Rule is said to be dead. There is a majority of 150, members of Parliament against it. But what preponderance of opinion does the majority actually represent? The Westminster Gazette gives an answer to this interesting question. Analysing the returns, and allowing for uncontested geats, it finds that the Home Rule vote for the whole United Kingdom is 2,369,917 ; and the Unionist vote 2,406,898. A majority of 36,891 voterß, equal to about five constituencies, gives a majority of 150 members. This is what sweeping tbe country means. What is the u?e of gabbling about the over-representation of Ireland when under tbe present system of election the friends of Ireland are so scandalously under-represented ? Meantime the conversion of 36,891 voters is not an overwhelming task. It has already begun. The Rev Mother at Laurel Hill Convent, Limerick, died on Monday August, 15, owing to tbe shock ehe received at the time of the melancholy event by which three of the Sisters lost their lives. For years past the deceased lady wa? in delicate health, and this accounted for her not partaking of the dinner which contained the poison. Mother Mary Anne Collins had been an invalid for more than three years, Buffering from the heart, and it was only by great care that her life was so long preserved. Mr Knox, who formerly represented West Cavan, and is now M.P. for Derry city, is a Protestant, and the son of an Irish Proteßtant Bishop. Specially remarkable, therefore, is the testimony he bears to the more than tolerant spirit of tbe Irish Catholic clergy, who are so often and so falsely accused of bigotry. In bidding adieu to his West Cavan constituency Mr Knox says : '■ A young Proteßtant, knowing the record of his Catholic fellow-countrymen, might have expected tolerance, but I do not believe there is any country in tha world whers a politician would receive from the clergy of a Church to which he did not belong the Bame unquestioning support and constant warmth of welcome which I have received frcm the Catholic clergy and people of Cavan, from the Bishop downwards. I trust that many of the friends I have made there will remain my friends throughout life." Irishmen will rejoice in the midet of all the defeats of the Liberal party in England that one trua friend of Ireland has secured his triumph. The return of Mr C. P. Scott for the Leigh division of Lancashire is a thing to be sincerely glad of, for it is not too much to say that Ireland has had no stauncher or more intelligently sympathetic friend in all Great Britain than Mr Scott. He is tbe editor of the Manchetter Guardian, the very first of the great provincial journals, and in his paper, in rough weather as in smooth, tbe cause

of Ireland has bad an able, consistent, and fearless champion. Other papero, even of the friendliest, mi(?ht vary in their friendship, misunderstand the exact bearing of events in Ireland, and, with the best intentions in the world, form and present to their readers inaccurate judgments of our cause and oar people. Bat the Manchester Guardian has been as s'eady as a rock, always kindly with the kindliness born of respect, and invariably sane and helpfal. When its editor has bad any criticismo to offer on the Irish movement they have been pat forward without offence, and have always merited attention. Ireland, happily, has more than one, more than a score, of good friends among the journalists of Great Rritain. Not one of them is more loyal or more valuable than Mr C. P. Scott, whose victory we warmly welcome, and whose Parliamentary career will be watched on this side of tb» Irish Sea with grateful interest. For Archbishop Croke's Espiecopal Silver Jnbilte every house in Thurles wae, on the 18th July, decorated. Over the streets and roads were suspended streamers bearing words suggestive of the sentiments of the people, from all parts of Ireland came hundreds of people anxious to testify by tbeir presence their affeotion for the great Archbishop . The.hierarchy was represented by its most distinguished prelates, headed by his Eminence Cardinal Logue. His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin, and priests not alone from Tipperary and the immediate dioc«se but from every quarter of the land lent the influence of their presence to an occasion which was unique in the life of Catholic Ireland, and the importance and significance of which it were impossible to exaggerate. Archbishop Walsh was the celebrant of the High Mass in St Patrick's Cathedral, and Cardinal Logue was the preacher. Afterwards the Archbishop of Cashel, the Cardinal, tbe prelates who assisted at the ceremonies, and gnests to the number of 300, were entertained at a banquet in St Patrick's College. The health of the Archbishop of Cashel an 3 Emly was eloquently proposed by Mgr O'Riordan, Archbishop of San Francisco. His Grace of Cashel in his reply said : For once in my life I cannot avoid being egotistical. My lords and gentlemen, I have never broken with a friend nor turned my back in fear upon an enemy. A pledged f Independent of over forty years' standing, I have never courted the smiles of the great nor Bought favours from the Government. In religious matters I have never questioned the conscientious convictions of any one nor the absolute right to uphold them. Brought up, though not bred, for tbe most part among free peoples, I have imbibed the love of liberty from my earliest years, and have ever been in heart end fact, I own, a rebel against every species of tyranny, and thoroughly in sympathy with the poor, the afflicted, and the oppressed. Such being my natural tendencies it was to be expected that when occasion offered I should take sides with the downtrodden tenants of Ireland and strive, as far as one man conld do it, to loose the landlord's grip on their throats, and secure for them the right to live and thrive in their native land. I joined the National party at once, accordingly, in 79, having first convinced myself that the cause they advocated was a just and righteous one and that the men who headed the movement were made of the proper metal. This brought down on me the maledictions of not a few, but the blessings of many ; and if I suffered, as I did, in consequence, and had to pay the penalty, in various ways, of my advanced views and determined action, as an Irish Nationalist, I have been at all times rewarded a hundredfold by the affectionate regard of tha people and the Bteady support of the great majority of the Irish ptießts and bishops. In proof of this, if proof were needed, I have but to appeal to the celebration and high festivities of this day. My lords and gentlemen, there is a hypocrisy in patriotism, just as there may be a hypocrisy in religion. Were I a sham and a fraud, now that I have retired from the arena, and put up my shutter as an active politician, the world would take no heed of my rttirement and my past activities would be either absolutely forgotten or rated at their proper value, But because I have been " unchanged and unchangeable," because I preferred the smiles of the poor to the blandishments of tbe rich and powerful, because I was for emancipating the serf, and assorting the just rights of labour, for lifting up this o'd land generally and making it, as it might be, tbe fairest island in tbe tea, with her ports teeming with trade and her ships sailing on every ocean— because I was all this, and because my countrymen knew all this and believed it, my humble name has been honoured by my native land, and the crowning glory of my life is the groat celebration of to-day. I have detained you longer than I should, al bough I am not ÜBUilly given to a vain display of words. But bow can I tell or rightly appraiße what friendship has done for me on this memorable [occasion 7 My brother bishops from the

Giant's Oasseway to Cape Clear, my young and gifted suffragans, on all but one of whom I have laid consecrating hands, tbe beloved bishop and priests of my native diocese, the faithful, generous, and devoted clergy of Oashel and Emly, ecclesiastics and laymen from near and Us have thronged around me to-d«y, and bidden me length of years in health and happiness. I heartily reciprocate such good wisheß, aod am justly proud of the recognition thus given of my small services in the cause of Irish progress, Iriah prosperity, and Irish independence.