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EDITED. BY EOIN MAC NEILL. ~
Vol. 2.
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No. 31
(New-- s.e·rie•)· .
N<)TES.
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The war and its rumours :ire discussed by everybody . There is anxious talk about the Coalition Government and the plight of Home Rule. · Party claims and party services and party interests and party apologetics keep politicians occup ied. There are State prosecutions , imprisonments 7 fines, dismissals, deport~tions, showing how strenuously the Realm is defended in Ireland-and these things are warmly discussed. All the time, newspapers and politicians and the man in the street are playing mum about 0ne thing of gi~antic .importance to Ireland,. the economic, mdustnal, and financial prospect immediately in front of us.
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SATURDAY, J:ULY 10, 1915. Burglar. I warned my fello\v-countrymen months ago, in the early weeks of the war, as soon as I read of the formation of the Committee of Imperial Defence apd of the act:lon of certain Imperial statesmen-the Rulers, as Churchill calls them- within that Committee, who formed tltemselves into an inner· Committee and allowed the· fact to ibe made public : I warned them that a Coalition was establishing itself in total disregard of Ireland's claims and rights. I repeated that warning from time to time. It has been fully verified. I was not an alarmist then. I am not .ill1 alarmist now. I say again, Ireland at this moment is threatened with a completion of her economic ruin , a ruin that ,will involve all parties and dasses alike, if it be not warded off.
Price One Penny. the dolls that say "Mamma " and " Papa" when they are suitably squee~e d . They were manufactured to do it, and they ·do it until they are worn out. They are Products, and serve the purposes of the Producer.
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The Ulster Presbyterians a.re, mentally and physically, a. fl,Jie people. Before the L.:nion they we re.fr~ men. Since the Union, by dint of a careful and constant moulding process, they have become for the most part Products. There are, of course, very numerous excep- . tions. One of .the chief instruments in mal1i- / pulating ai1d moulding them in the Imperial, interest is the Belfast "Northern W·hi g. " I say in the Imperial interest, because only .for the glorious' lmpeiial Peace, the Pax Britannica, imposed on Ulster, the Ulster Presby* * * The most powerful class in this country are terians would be twice as numerous and twice the farmers. Next to them come the capitalists as prosperous as they . are. The "~orth e rn and the business men. I fear that most of Whig " is itself a manipulated and mou.lcled * * * Product, though the editor no dotiibt sincerely Time and again, since the war began, I have these are blinded to the coming danger by the imagines otherwise. . It cla ims to be the produced by artificial .and temporary conditions tried to draw attention to Ireland's dangerous "organ " of a certain section of Irish opinion: economic position. I have IO<(ke.d arqund in the war. Farmers ar~ get.ting good prices for A horse that never saw its d:river .might possib.ly They wiU,,_ pay dearly for this their prodtJCe. vain for any sign that the danger is generally . imagine that the reins, 'bit, br idle, and blinkers realised. I do not complain of being ignored . advantage before Jong. Monied men and :busi- were part of its.;;;, own organism. The The Pope will not be listened to in these times ness men are able to proteCt .themselves for a "Northern Whig ·1'. was not always the Prodt1ct It will not be long till the strain breaks time. if he speaks his mind; and I am not even an it now is. It is tlie--R1ost bitter champion of infallible politician--! am a No'body, a Sore- 'through all their means of protection. If theyc sectarian hatred in• Irelan d. The reason why do not look ahead they will run upon disaster .hea d, a ~r:ank, a F actionist. National econoit is the most bitte·r js becfatse the Ulster Dismics a.re not my_ particular business. Why unawares. Now is the time to examine the senters , as their history sho1~s, required special and take the measures that alone can dan"'er should I concern myself_ with them? My only manipulating and moulding in that directionanswer is that I am an Irishman, that the def;at ·.it. Wfien the danger is examined, the in the Imperial interest. They needed spec ial 1rny to defeat it will becom~ plain. general silence and heedlessness makes it all machi11ery. the more necessary for me to speak out, and * * * '* * * An English tourist was one day sta.lking up with the help of God I will ~o_ on sp.e~kin.g A special sort of~ memory ha.cl to be worked out until the rrravity of the national pos1t1on IS and down the platform o'f a French railway into them, a memor/ in water,tight COmp<Lrt-. driven into the most unwilling intelligence . station. His manner and his rig-out were ap- rnents. They had to forget their Gaelic origin, The ·1>osition in a word is this, that Ireland. is parenily intended to be a complete and defiant . and to remember the Solemn League and Covenow threatened with an increase of Impenal challenge to the urbanity and good tast:e of nant; to forget Wallace and Bruce , and to burdens thaf promises to be more ruinous to the natives. In those- days the French and remember St. Bartholomew's D ay; to forget everv class in the country than any part of the Italians were not "our brave and honoura~le Strafford, and to remember William III..; tu opp~ession and injustice the country has a llies " ; they were " the decadent Latin for&et the persecutions that drove their kindred ~uffered since the linioI1. The menace over- peoples " of British journalism i11 general, to America, an.cl to remember DoUy's Brae ; to hangs us all, Nationalists, Union ists, land- " the murder races " of the Anglo-Saxon forget how under W ash.ington their brothers lords, tenants, freeh0lders, purchase holders, "Review of Reviews." T)vo Frenchmen stood fought for liberty; to forget Orr, M'Cracken , business men, employers, employes, profes- talking on the platform. A friend of mirie Munro, Russell, Hope, and to identify themsional men, rich men, and the poorest. of t~e stood near them. As the portent strutted past, selves with the party of Castlereagh; to forget poor. If we submit to it, our population. \~Ill the Frenchmen pa used in their chat to take :a. the Irish Volunteers, a11d to remember Scul!abe again reduced by half, and ~he remammg view of him. Then one of them turned to the bogue; to forget their welcome to .the Catholic other and. s::ticl quietly, " Que! prod.uit !" half will be little better than chamed slaves . Emancipation delegates, and their celebration in arms of the opening of . the first Catholic * * * * * "What ~ product !'' The express ion con- Church in Belfast, and to remember Dr. Cooke I hope nobody will imagine that I am using strained and exaggerated language. I am not stantly comes to•mind when I look around here and Dr. Hanna; to forget how they were freed an alarmist. I ' have warned my fellow- in Ireland. . There are so many persous, so from landlord oppression, and to remember countrymen, especially those of .my native. pi;o- many agencies, that take themselves· seriously, the British Constitution. All that, and a great vince . Gf the existence of an Impenahst and imagine their words and acts to be free, deal more of the same kind , requi red ca reful Pogr~m Plot. fo giving that warning, I had spontaneous, and autonomous, 'when all 'the manipul ation, and there could be · no better to incur 'the risk, especiaUy repugn~nt to me, time they are simply Products - -the manufac- .machinery than the ")iortbern Whig " .to turn of inoreasinrr the tension of feeling 111 parts of tured :uticles of the Imperial Exploitation Co. out the finished Product, British Imperial Irel and. Against that risk. I set the counter- Ltd. I hear things said every day; :tnd rea d manufactme. But t he "Whig " itself required things in J ri sh newspape rs, th at remi.nd me of a turn or two in the machine. w~rning-Do not mistake the Tools for the
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