Ireland During the Past Year.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXI, Issue 7, 12 February 1903, Page 3

Ireland During the Past Year.

Mr T. W. Rnraell, M.P., has contributed another article to the 1 Manchester Guardian ' on the Irish outlook, from whioh we take the following extracts :—: — The death of Mr William Johnston, of Ballykilbeg— one of the moat pathetio figures in modern Irish life—may be said to have closed one era in the history of the Orange Institution. Whilst Mr Johnston lived the Orangemen were in leading strings— the institu* tion was a mere Protestant organisation for the defence of Irish landlordism. But since the death ol the grind old man of the Orange party— or rather since his smashing defeat in East Down— the scales hare been falling from the eyeaof the brethren. The defeat of Lord Londonderry's candidate in East Down was followed by the rejection of his nominee in South Belfast, and the Demo* oratio Orangemen, feeling the ground underneath them for the first time in their lives, have strnok out on their own acoount. Colonel Saunderson cannot now speak in Belfast. In North Armagh he speaks to his own constituents amid constant interruption. The new Orange leaders tell him plainly and truthfully that he and his class ' joined the Orange organisation after the passing of the Land Act in 1881 in order that they might use the Order as a means of defence.' That they 'supported the Local Government Aot only after the Government had undertaken to pay their poor rate.' This plain language shows at least an intelligent reading of the actual history of the thing. And, the foundation laid, the soperstruotion is rapidly being built. But there, as things stand, is the position. These toiling thousands, drunk with party Bpirit, fierce with the views of the sixteenth century, are beginning to see things political darkly as through a glass. They see men as trees walking. They are coming into the light, staggering somewhat as they emerge from the darkneM. Bat they begin to feel the breath of freedom. The old gang will doubtless die hard. The Protestant religion plus raokrents is, and will be for many a day, a potent cry. The Pope— even although, as John Mitohel onoe said, he serves no ejectment notices— is still a potent personage in Ulster. But the great fact stands out dear and distinct that a breach has been made in the walls of the landlord Jericho. At church soirees and distriot lodges the landlords and the agents may still sing patriotio Bongs and toast the immortal memory of Macaulay's great Whig king, but they oannot save the situation. The agricultural Orangeman is gradually finding ont that the frightful bogey of ' Rnesellistt ' does not mean repeal of the Union— means, in fact, a new Land Bill under whioh he is to became a freeholder instead of a slave ; and, like a horse trained to pass a traction engine, he begins to make light of the landlords' sham fears about the Union— beginß to doubt even his heroics about Protestantism. And thus very slowly but equally surely, this great wall of partition between classes in Ireland is being broken down. Men hardly realise it. There is no beating of drums, no waving of flags to herald the change. It is the still, small voice of common cense and reason triumphing over ignorance and folly. There will be a good many heads broken before the Ulster Orangeman stands out emancipated, disenthralled, and free. Another, and perhaps the most promising, feature in the Ireland of to-day is the triumph of Mr Horace Plunkett over hie enemies of every kind and degree. What may be called the agricultural revival is now, happily a great fact. Agricultural instructors and agricultural teaching are now spread all over the land. And the old difficulty — that any improvement means an increase of rent — is as potent to-day as it was in the fifties. Still, and in spite of all these obstacles, progress is being made. Almost for the first time science is being applied to Irish agrionlture. The old plan of butter-making, for example, has all but disappeared. Co-opera-tive creameries are now universal. The Bmall farmer now gets a better price for the milk of his cowb than he got in the old days for the butter he produoed. And Irish creamery butter, like the Irish soldier, can go anywhere and do anything. Again, it has been reserved for a Scottish agriculturist to discover that the Irish farmer, by scientific culture, can put early potatoes on the London market so as to compete with those of the Channel Islands. ' Bee farming,' as it is called, is now becoming a great industry, and thousands of tons of honey are produced where the produce in past years could be counted by the pound. Poultry rearing is being seen to— not in the old haphazard way, when the eggs were the perquisite of the farmer's wife. It iB now becoming a part of the working of the farm. Old things are, in faot, passing away. Technical and scientific education iB transforming the faoe of the country ; men of every creed and of every class are co-operating for a common end. There is no room for party spirit where such work is going on. Of course the prophet of all this work has been stoned. This goes almost without saying. To-day in respectable Dublin society Mr. Horace Plunkett' s name is anathema. ' A oonvert on the way,' was the title applied to the right hon. gentleman not so long ago. Cursed by ill-health, broken in spirit by neglect, and tempted often to give up in despair, Mr Plunkett toiled man* fully on. Daily his Department grows in influence and in usefulness. Daily men gather round him to bear up his hands. He is even now reaping the fruit of his labors, and those who snarled at his heels are being everywhere assessed at their true value. Apart altogether from the actual work done by the Agricultural Department in the improvement of Agriculture, Mr Plunkett has helped on the great reoonoiliation between classes in Ireland— has helped on this essential work by isolating the bigots who imagine that Ireland stands where she stood when O'Connell died.