WHERE IRELAND HEATS THE WORLD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIV, Issue 38, 15 January 1897, Page 27

WHERE IRELAND HEATS THE WORLD.

IMPORTANT FACTS r'OR EVERYONE TO KNOW. Most Englishmen are under the impression that the only thing in which Ireland beats them is in bogs and the number of its emigrants. _ And even among Irishman themselves the belief prevails that in industry and commerce they take a very back seat. As a matter of fact, considering the dearth of capital and the political unrest under which the Emerald Isle labours, she has GOOD REASON TO BK I'HIILD or HERsEM'. Handicapped as Ireland is, she can boast of the largest shipbuilding and the largest brewery concerns in the world, of supplying half the people of these islands with their linen collars, tablecloths, handkerchiefs and shirts, of placing on their breakfast table the choicest bacon and butter — although these generally masquerade as products ot Wiltshire and Dorset — and of beating the Scotch hollow with her famous '• John Jameson." There is nothing of which England and Scotland are more proud than their skill in buildihg ships. But neither the Tyne, the Clyde, nor the Mersey can show anything equal to the shipbuilding yard of Harland and Wolff, of Belfast. For four successive years this firm held the highest place in the world as regards the amount of tonnage launched. Only -10 years ago the factory was so small that its total of employes amounted to less than 100 men At present it employs 11,000, whioh probably means that it is the life and support of some 25,000 men, women and children— the population of a good-sized town. The works cover 80 acres, and include such a host of carpenters' and joiners' shops, painters' shops, cabinet-makers' shops, upholsterers' shops, boat-building s'ieds, drying-kilns, engine works, etc., that the visitor thinks he is in

A LARGE MANUFACTURING TOWN rather than in a single factory. All the ships of the White Star line were built here, including the famous Teutonic and Majestic. The largest vessel for commercial purposes afloat was completed at, Belfast last year. She is now engaged in the cattle trade, and carries the enormous burden of 10,100 tons. Several gunboats and torpedo-boats have also been built by Messrs. llarland and Wolff for the navy ; and cruisers and battleships have been engined by them. And we do not hear of that accident so common in the English a«et — the breakdown of machinery — ever occurring in those ships which have got their machinery in Belfast. Nothing in the nature of " shoddy" comes from Ireland, in fact. That is why the Canadian, in his Irish freise coat and Donegal stockings, defies the winter ; why " Belbriggan " hose— a dozen pairs of which would wear as long as the Queen's reign— are imitated by not only English, but German manufacturers ; why IRISH TWEEDS FIND THEIR WAY ALL OVER THE CONTINENT, and why Irish stout has a foreign export greater than the total export from England, Scotland and Wales. Guinness's brewery hardly needs description. It is probably the best existing proof that all Ireland needs to make her a great industrial nation is a few dozen men of capital and energy. No commercial company in the world can show such a record as that of Guinness's during the past ten years. The enormous trade of this firm may be understood from the fact that their products pay half a million pounds excise every .year Although only one out of the 13,000 British breweries, they produce one barrel in 20 of the total British brew. It takes 67 000 acres to grow the 2,500,000 bushels of barley (one-third of the whole produce of Ireland) which they use annually. They have storage for 1,000.000 bushels of malt and 20,000 " pockets " of hops They have nine miles of water mains and 150 horses ; employ 450* hands to make barrels alone, 2500 hands altogether and have a printing press that turns out 100,000,000 labels annually. And they '• lick creation " in making stout. Another industry in which Ireland excels is linen-making. A London outfitter told the writer that every high-class linen shirt collar and handkerchief in the London shops comes from the north of Ireland. France has a reputation for tnrning out a finer quality than Belfast, but the best "French" goods are really Irish, and that amusing story is true of the Belfast manufacturer's wife who brought home some beautiful handkerchiefs from Paris, and asked her husband why he could not make goods like them. On examination he found they were part of a lot he had recently exported. The annual produce of linen must be worth little short of C1."),000,000, and the size of the factories may be known from the fact that two of the chief Belfast concerns employ 9000 hands between them. Paraphrasing the saying that '• whatever is is best." we may truly say that whatever is Irish is good. Its Limerick and Watertord bacon has one rival— Wiltshire, and the quantities of the Irish article consumed in England are the be*t proof of how it is appreciated. Unfortunately, some English provision merchants are intentionally or otherwise, leagued together to defame Irish produce : and they sell the best Irish bacon under the name of Wiltshire. just as they sell thousands of tons of the choicest Irish butter as Dorset and Danish, while to the inferior grades, and no doubt, to American products they give the name " Irish." ' Why do not the Irish dairies combine with the bacon factories and o^Kiblish shops all over London .' Something in the way of co-operation is being done by the Hon. Horace Plunket. 1 know ; but it the nuneiiient were universal we should soon have half the population of the British Islands breakfasting on WAIi:UI'OKD BACON AVI) TII'PEUARY BUTTER, lunching off Mattorson's sausages— of which 2oz. are equal to lib of London bread and fat— and dining off Limerick hams. There is one Irish product which Englishmen certainly appreciate, even under its own patronymic. England drinks :S.(HK).ooo gallon* ot Irish whisky annually. Even Scotland — and Scotchmen are epicures in alcohol — takes .".00,000 gallons from across the water. And this is one of the things in which all Irishmen agree with their English neighbours, for they practically drink nothing but their own distilling, getting only (io.ooo "•allons altogether from England and Scotland. Probably .Jameson's whisky is the best distilled on the whole t-lobe. It is tlie highest priced in the market, anyhow, and commands as much as 10s. a gallon in bond. The production of this article m Ireland, however, does not quite equal that of Scotland chiefly because the Irishman drinks only about two-thirds as much whisky as the Scotsman. Then 1 are 27 distilleries in Ireland, which manufacture nearly 5.000.000 gallons annually. Four millions they drink at home • they send :i.000.000 gallons to England, over half a million to Scotland, and about a quarter of a million direct to the colonies and foreign countries. In the eight years past Ireland has contributed no less than CH1.000.000 to the excise. Ireland has twice as many horses as Scotland, and one- fourth of the total in the United Kingdom. Her horses are the best in the world, too. and are entrerly sought by army agents of all nations. One last product let me mention. You may go to Carrara for marble, but il you want the most beautiful green serpentine in the world, you will find it in Gal way : if you want (SLACK MA HULL: THAT CANNOT BE EQUALLED, you can get it from the shores of Lough Corrib ; and nowhere will you find an yi lnn- to be.v the beautiful red marble of Donegal the blur an.l ;\,.]l<m marbles oi Vrni.uli. the purple and white of Cork and the variegated marble found m Kerry, near Tralee. '

It is admitted that the most beautiful stones in the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park are the four specimens of Irish granite : while the Thames embankment is a perpetual illustration of the excellence of Dalkey (near Dublin) granite. — English paper.