Irish History Lessons

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XLIX, Issue 41, 19 October 1922, Page 21

Irish History Lessons

. (ID - , THE INDUSTRIAL REVIVAL. A great many years ago a fierce old Irish genius was invited to a banquet. He was a queer old man, as vain as a peacock, and madder than most hatters, but his tongue was; straight find witty. One of the guests arose and, to honor the old Irishman, said “I propose the toast of Irish trade!” Quick and bitter came the answer —“I drink no memories, sir!” Dean Swift was right. The banquet'- ’took place in the days of Anne. William, who reigned just before her had killed Irish trade by restrictive laws. Never perhaps has the history of any country shown such a code of laws! A similar code was drawn, up for Scotland, but it was soon lifted. Ireland on the other hand was stifled. One cannot help wondering how any people could fail to realise the selfishness and iniquity of such laws, but in those days as in these the mass of the people were content to leave legislation to a governing knot whom they humbly but unwisely deemed more proficient. V Irish trade then was stifled. “Ah, but the Irish are lazy! They are a thriftless people! They will not work!” said their traducers. Listen, children, what was there to work for? The land was hungry after two famines, the land laws were so framed that if a tenant improved his patch his rent was raised immediately. Was not that a fine reward for his labor? The land laws it is true were much improved later by the combined effort of noble souls in both countries. The trade, however, still languished. “But,” you will say, *; “Ireland could have coal-mines, and potteries, and electric works like other nations.” Undoubtedly she could. The water-power of the Shannon alone would be an asset to any nation. Why then is Ireland so backward? At a debate about five years ago I heard an English Protestant who had just returned to New Zealand discuss this very question. She said, “I went to Ireland with an open mind, slightly prejudiced if anything against the Irish thriftlessness. At Cork I saw one instance where a small branch railway would have saved much money and much labor. I said this to the proprietor, an intelligent man. .‘ Yes,’ he said, ‘but -we have to apply for permission. I did it once and the legal fees cost me just what it would cost to build the railway. I could not afford it.’ ” All this while however Ireland was waking. Men like Sir Horace Plunkett and Arthur Griffith and George Russell were keeping their eyes on the Continent. They saw how Denmark, tottering after the war of 1863, became, through the organisation of her dairying industry one of the most prosperous of agricultural powers. They noted the example of Norway’s shipping fleets, and they said — “Ireland, too, shall make her wealth of ships and cows.” ' There were many obstacles in their way, not least of them, the gombeen man, the middle man, the usurer, who was the Prince of Shoneens, and the slave of Lords. Nothing is more pitiful than the story of how Plunkett labored to persuade the farmers to try his system of cooperation or working on shares. So hard-won was the peasant’s money that they hated to lose sight of it. I think it is Kettle who tells the story of the Irishman who owed a debt and who raised a loan on 'his land sooner than take the money from the bank to pay it. That was not meanness —it was caution. He had earned it so hard, so hard! Soon the movement spread all over Ireland. “Buy Irish goods! Buy only Irish goods!” became the cry of young Ireland.' Irish tweeds, Irish lace, Irish linen were insisted on. Some foreign manufacturers even went to the extent of putting Irish trade marks on their goods to attract custom. This trickery was checked by an authoritative trade-mark —“Made in Ireland” —being decided on, and almost every industry in Ireland has profited. V: Further, in the midst of all the horrors of the last few years, Ireland has kept an ideal. She has seen what progress has meant to the worldfor some the palace, but for most the attic, “Free me, oh God, from such progress!” says Young Ireland. “Let me go back to the Brehon State, to the ways of my fathers!” She sets her

face against great towns full of the sweated poor. “Let my towns be all equal'’—she says“in honor and in wealth!” Nor is that an idle dream! For an agricultural polity such as she purposes would be a collection of small towns like the city-states of Old Greece without their blind and fatal selfishness. ~~ While other countries have waved the reed of socialism, Ireland has quietly plucked ,out its pith and Ireland today is one of the largest of the world’s co-operative systems. Whither she will tend now we know not, but in this as in all else —“Greater than all telling is the destiny God has in mind for Ireland.” —E. D.