Irish News.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8, 22 February 1900, Page 9

Irish News.

ANTRIM.— The Uitlanders of Belfast.— A correspondent of the Tasmanian Monitor, writing on the grievances of the T T itlanders in the Transvaal points out how Catholics are treated in Belfast He Bays : — How do the Nationalists fare in Belfast ? Corporation, 40 members, all Protestants ; 111 officials, of various grades, the Town Clerk receiving £2.500 a year, a pum just £100 more than twice the salary of the Town Clerk of Dublin ; of the officials, 2 are Catholic?, receiving a combined yearly sura of £2(53. Harbour CommisHioiierß, 22 members, all Protestants ; 37 official*, all Protestants. Water Commissioners, 16 members, 1 Catholic ; 7 officials, all Protestants. Poor Law Board, 22 elected members, all Protestants; 22 ex offieio members, 1 Catholic ; 1)4 officials, of these, 2 of the 5 work-house teachers and lof the 41 nurses Catholics. Asylum Board, 22 governors, 3 Catholics ; 73 official*, of whom 8, oat of the 68 attendants, are Catholics ; 6 petty session clerks, all Protestants ; 2 clerks of the peace for the borough and county, Protestants ; recorder, coroner, sub-sheriff, Protestants. (Minutes of evidence, 9th May, 1892, before the select committee on the Belfast Corporation, Lunatic Asylums, etc., Bill ) The committee, consisting of 2 Irish Unionists, 2 Nationalists, 2 Conservative, 1 Liberal, 1 English Unionist, struck out of the Bill the clauses giving to the Belfast Corporation the same powers, in respect nf reformatories and industrial schools, as the Corporations of Dublin, Cork, and Limerick actually exercise. The evidence clearly convinoed the committee that their exclusive dealings towards their Catholic fellow-citizens rendered the Belfast corporators unfit to exercise powers that are, with safety, entrusted to Catholic corporations. ARMAGH.— A Valuable Present from the Holy Father. — Signor Tanfani (writes a Roman correspondent, January 6) has executed a tasteful work for his Holiness the Pope. This is a set of Mass vestments in cloth of gold, with rich ornaments in silver and gold. The chasuble is in the Roman shape. The three divisions of the back are filled with richly-embossed symbols of the Blessed Eucharist, and the lowest part of the middle division bears the arms of the Pope. The lines if separation are filled with Bhamrocks, as are also the borders around the nejk and elsewhere on the several pieces. The gift is to be sent to his Eminence Cardinal Logue, Archbishop of Armagh, for the benefit of the fund which is being raised for the completion of St. Patrick's Cathedral in the primatial city. DERRY- — Alleged Ritualistic Innovations— On the Saturday before Christmas the members of the Goovah Select Vestry went into the church and finding it decorated for Christmay Day, they removed the decorations from the communion rails, from behind the communion table, and from the reading desk, they being nailed to the latter, contrary to a resolution of the Vestry prohibiting the driving of nails into the church walls and furniture. They also found a large red banner or cloth, with a white cross, on the second reading desk, which they also removed. The few decorations in the body of the church they allowed to remain. At the service on Sunday morning the curate, the Rev. S. H. Orr, by direction, it is understood, of the rector, Rev. W. A. Smyly, alluded to this matter, deprecating the removal of the decorations, which, he said, had been the same as for many years past and had the approval of the respectable portion of the congregation. This latter remark led to a trampling of feet on the part of some members of the congregation. DOWN.— A Successful Egg Exhibitor— it might interest some of our lady readers in this Colony to know that at the Birmingham Fat Stock Show there was a special class set apart for preserved eggs, and that out of 22 competitors, an Irish exhibitor, Mr M. Braddell, of Gilford, County Down, got the second prize with a collection which had been painted over with lard and then packed in peat mould. The collection to which the first prize was awarded was preserved by being painted with a solution of starch water and ram and packed in bran, with the large end upwards. DUBLIN.— Death of the Parish Priest of Skerries.The death is announced of the Rev. James K. Walsh, parish priest of Skerries, Dublin. The deceased clergyman had been in feeble health for some time, and being in the 79th year of his age death was not unexpected. Ho was of an old and esteemed family in the parish of Athy, County Kildare. He was elder brother of the late Rev. Michael Walsh, P.P., Saggarth, and uncle of the Rev. James Cnllen, C.C., Bullymun, County Dublin. For 18 years he laboured for the spiritual and temporal welfare of his beloved parishioners in Skerries, how zealously the fruits of his labours testify. His previous mission, where he was equally beloved, was Glencullen, in the parish of Sandy ford. Belleek Pottery-— The Belleek pottery (says Mr. T. D. Sullivan in the Dublin Nat toil) has not, like the porcelain manufacture in other countries, a long history ; it is a product of our own time ; but it will have a long-continued existence if the classes of our countrymen who have means, who are not devoid of artistic taste, and who profess to be imbued with a feeling of ' practical patriotism,' will only give it a fair share of support. The founder of the industry and the first proprietor of the works was Mr. David Mcßirney, a wealthy merchant of Dublin, who died so reoently as 1882. After his death the business was acquired by a company, consisting mainly of local gentleman of Fermanagh and Donegal, who are carrying on the work in a spirited and successful manner, but who could turn out a much larger supply of goods if they only got the demand for them. In Chambers'* Journal of October last there is an interesting article on the Irish industry, from which I take the following passages : — ' The glory of Belleek and its speciality is this exquisite Parian and ivory china, on which

the stamp of approval has been set by many nations. It is to be found in all the cities and large towns in England, Ireland, and Scotland, and also in Paris and the chief cities of America. . . . Besides this fancy china, which includes dinner, breakfast, and tea services, and toilet sets, commoner wares are produced for household and sanitary purposes. All requisites for kitchen, pantry, and dairy ude are included in this household ware, while the sanitary is well known and recommended by the most eminent sanitary engineers in the United Kingdom. Many tons of this ware go to Paris annually. 1 The writer of the article from which the foregoing extract is taken quotes the following passage from a paper which appeared in the Art Journal some time before • — The chief peculiarities of Belleek ornamental ware are in its lightness of body, its rich, delicate, cream-like, or ivory tint, and the glittering iredeccence of its glaze. Although the principal productions hitherto have been found of this white ware, local clays have been found which yield jet, red, and cane-coloured wares, and fac-similes of sea-shells and of branches of coral are shown by some of the agents which might well be sup* posed to be natural. The iredeaoent effect produced is somewhat similar to the ruby lustre of Gubbio majolica, that famous Italian enamelled ware of which an unrivalled collection is to be seen at the South Kensington Mueseum. Mr- Chamberlain'B Visit —The Morning Leader, London, referring to the honorary degree conferred upon the Secretary for the Colonies by Trinity College, Dublin, Bays : — ' Somehow one finds it difficult to associate Mr. Chamberlain with the idea of a University degree. One does not think of culture and the Colonial Secretary in the same connection. It is not very long either since Trinity College, Dublin, would as soon have thought of asking Mr. Chamberlain to dinner as of inviting itself, long spoon in hand, to aup with — well, not the Czar.' Christmas Day in the City-— Christmas Day was observed in Dublin with the true Christian spirit. There were no throngs in the street, no disorder or noise The churches were filled with devout worshippers at the several Masses in the early part of the day. The evening devotions were also well attended, and in the interval numbers of people made the visitations of the different churches and went through devotions before the Cribs. In all the churches Mass was celebrated at 5 a.m., and there were Masses every halfhour until 12 o'clock, when High Mass was sung. Large congregations assisted at all the Masses, and the greater number of the people received the Holy Eucharist. The Catholic sentiment of the metropolis was represented in the presence at the Pro-Cathedral of the Lord Mayor, the High Sheriff, and members of the Corporation, who attended in State at the High Mass at 12 o'clock, at which his Grace the Archbishop presided. This was the first civic function of the day. In the afternoon the Lord Mayor entertained the members of the Corporation and a number of guests, invited to meet them, at luncheon in the Mansion House. Death of a Popular Soldier- — The name of CoiourSergeant Magee, of the Dublin Fusiliers, appears among the list of men killed at tne Tugela River. The deceased, who was widely known in Dublin and popular with all who were acquainted with him, was a young man of much promise. Physically he was a splendid specimen, and one of the duties which he discharged for some time before going abroad was that of instructor in athletics. He was well educated and of a refined disposition. It is little more than three months since he was married. KILDARE— Death of aProminentNationalist— An active figure in the Nationalist movement in County Kildare has parsed away in the person of Mr. Thomas Timmins. He was an ardent and unflinching patriot, who rendered conspicuous pervice to his county under the Land League and National League agitations. LIMERICK.— The Freedom of the City.— The crowning honour of an Irish practising surgeon was attained by Dr. Thomas Myles, of Limerick, when he was appointed to the presidency of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. His fellow -citizens, in celebration of the event, have voted him the freedom of the city. The only other freemen declared within the past three-quarters of a century were Danieli O'Connell and Marshal MacMahon. Dr. Myles is a staunch Home Ruler. His brother, who is also a doctor, was for some years practising on the West Coast of New Zealand. WATERFORD — Death of a Sub-Sheriff.— Much regret was felt in Waterford on the announcement of the death of Mr. Hanrahan, Sub-Sheriff and petty sessions' clerk for the city. For some time past Mr. Hanrahan had been in failing health. He wai extremely popular in the city, where his quiet, unobtrusive disposition made him hosts of friends. GENERAL. Fleecing the Foolish- — In commenting on a circular issued by the Irish Church Missions Society in England for the purpose of gathering funds for the disseminating of proselytising literature in Ireland, the Daily Nation Bays: — 'It is worthy of note that the special appeal now referred to contains nothing in the nature of a balance-sheet or statement of accounts showing the revenue of the Society or how it is expended We have repeatedly charged, and we now again reiterate the accusation, that the Society for Irish Church Missions is an organisation maintained primarily for the for the pecuniary benefit of its large body of officials, and that the funds so employed are obtained from credulous aud victimised folk across the Channel, by the circulation of statements which those who are responsible for their formulation must know are romantic and absurd. It cannot be amiss that we should mention, in this connection, that we have applied in vain at the offices of the Society, both in Dublin and London, for copies of the annual reports and balance-sheets As might have been expected, the publication which is now being circulated in Great Britain with a view to obtaining contributions from the deluded British Protestants, oon-

tains very little tangible evidence as to the amount of the actual revenue of the Irish Church Mission Society, or as to the manner in which it is being expended. We are told that " The committee are much concerned that the ordinary income, apart from the uncertain revenue from legacies, falls short of the expenditure by nearly £i>,ooo a year." We are heartily glad of the fact, and we 1 trust that the announcement made in the words just quoted may be regarded as evidence of the growth of common-sense and of ordinary i discrimination amongst the class who have been for fully half a j century fleeced by the Society. Later on, we are. however, afforded ■ another glimpse of the financial methods of the Society, when we < are told that its ''expenditure is, in round fi^ure^, Clo.dOO per i annum, and the ordinary income, exclusive of legacies, is under H 12,000." Assuming that the figures quoted mnv be regarded as representing the average expenditure of the Society, it follows that a sum of, at least, £200,000 has been expended, during the last ten years, on the work of securing the •■ conversion " of benighted Irish Papists I We shall, probably, not be far wrong if we assume that fully half of the Society's expenditure of £200,000 has been employed in Dublin. It would, therefore, appear that the 24t> "convert " families secured during the last ten years have cost the Society no less than £4fi() apiece. We doubt if the article purchased was worth the cost.' A New Zealand Colonist's Experience of Castle Rule. — A 'Returned Colonist' has contributed a series of interesting articleS'to the Tuapeka Times- on what he saw in Ireland during a recent visit. Hehadanunpleasantexperienceduringa visit toa town in Connaught, where a public meeting, which was to have been held, had been ' proclaimed.' He says : — True enough the meeting was held in the centre of the little town, but before two sentences had been spoken there was a rush of about two hundred police armed with batons throngh the assemblage of people, and then followed the most unmitigated piece of brutality I have ever witnessed or almost read of. Men and women, many of them not improbably attracted by a feeling of curiosity to the gathering, were felled to the ground Btunned and bleeding, whilst the speaker and his friends were hustled and struck and carried away in the rush, battered and dishevelled but still protesting and unyielding. The writer, who was present as a spectator on the fringe of the crowd, was viciously struck at once or twice, but managed xo escape without carrying away any more serious memento of the incident than a feeling of contempt for the statesmanship that makes such things possible at the close of the nineteenth century. It all recurred many times to me when I read of the parallel brutality of the Boers in suppressing meetings of the Uitlandera when they attempted to give public expression to their grievances at Johannesburg. One of the chief complaints of the Uitlanders was that they were bludgeoned and maltreated when they attempted to ventilate their grievances, and this formed one of the charges in the bill of indictment which the Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain formulatad against the tyrannical Boer oligarchy. Well, personally I would much rather be a Uitlander citizen of the Boer Republic than a citizen of Conuaught under the rule of Lord Salisbury's Government. The Irish Parliamentary Party.— A cable message received last week states that Mr. J. K. Hedmond has i«sued a manifesto appealing for funds to conduct the Irish campaign and combat in the House of Commons. The manifesto indicates that Home Rule and compulsory land purchase will be the chief issues of the campaign. The message does not say whether Mr. Hedmond is acting on behalf of the whole of the Nationalists, or only that j arty of which he has been the leader for borne years. The St. Vincent de Paul Society— At the beginning of last year there were in Ireland I .">."> relieving branches, or 'conferences' as they are called, of the St Vincent de I'aul Society, with 2500 active members. These conferences meet weekly, they are spread over every county in Ireland, and several exist in each of the large cities and towns. In fact, there are no les-, than .i 5 conferences in Dublin city and county. In Cork there are four such branches, in Limerick city four, 111 Waterford city three, in Gal way city two, in Belfast 14, in Derry city three. Besides these, H2 conferences flourish in other Irish towns, too numerous to particularise here. The families visited and relieved at their abod< hby the members were, in lS'.tS, 1 ">,()! s . number of indniduals comprised in those families, of) S'.»4 ; number of visits by the members, 7.*\2Kl>. The society aims at assisting chiefly, not chionic mendicants, but persons in temporary distress, whose condition there 1-, t,ume hope of permanently improving by timely .assistance. The cost ot relief in kind given to the poor in their homes amounted to i>7'.i'.i ; relief in money, £l."i7S ; total expenditure in relief of the poor in their homes, £1(),.'H7 ; pensions paid for children placed in orphanages, £l!2H; total cost of relief, ISiIS, £11,4 1"), Conspicuous among the | auxiliaries to the relief work of the conferences is the Orphanage of St. Vincent de Paul at Glasnevin, where 120 boys were maintained last year at a cost ot C2.V>2. Several patronages and night schools for boys and adults are carried on in Dublin, Belfast, and Cork. With stinted funds the society is doing most valuable work for Church and State, without making the least parade or ostentation. for such would be a violation of one of its primary rules The Late Captain Connor— Her Majesty the (.Hiecn has written to Mrs Connor, whose son. Captain 11. B. Connor, of the Ist Royal Irish Fusiliers, died from wounds received at Glencoe, expressing sympathy with her in her bereavement. Her Majesty also said she would like to have a photograph of dpta'tn Connor.