IRELAND PAST AND PRESENT.

Inangahua Times, Volume II, Issue II, 25 March 1881, Page 2

IRELAND PAST AND PRESENT.

— ♦— rs r[COBBESPONDEKT OF T?S SCOTSMAN^ ; MOn earth peace."— Kuke ii 'They say it is the fatal destiny of Ireland that no purposes whatever are meant for her good will prosper or tale good effect, which whether: it proceed* from the ?ery genious of the soil, or from the influence of the stars, or (bat AU mighty God hath not yet appointed the time of her reformation, or that he re serveth her in this unquiet state still for sonje secret scourge which shall by her come unto England, it is hard to be known bnt yet much to be feared.^* Spencer, 1596. (In 1870) — • English prejudice end English ignorance were busy with the reputation of the unfortunate country, and clamorous with despair of its amend* mejt.' *If the soil is fo be again adequately tillid by the Celtic race, it will be by sub division and not otherwise. The valleys of Kerry would auprort, if properly tilled, at least twice their present population with ease..— Fronde, 1870. Irish discontent 'is a question of nationality as truly as is Hungary or in Potand. "Special grievances or anomalies may aggravate but do not catfte it.' . . . 1 The three requisites for good government for Ireland are— that it should be strong, that it should be jast, and that it should fee national.'— Lecky, 1871* In conversation now«a»days the his* tory of Ireland is treated with impatience —people declare thai it has nothing to do with the present state of things— that the present population of Ireland are not concerned or influenced by the history of their race— and they speak of ft>e presi ent movement as if it was something new which the natural disposition of the peo* pie of Ireland had developed as a consequence of that disposition. I have chosen a seasonable motto sog« gestefl to me by Dean Montgomery, of Edinburgh, as one of the congregation whp listened to him on the first Sunday after Christmas, and three extracts from thoughtful writers upon Ireland as a heading for this article, to show bow similar the condition of English sentiment about Ireland remains after Ire» land remains after the lapse of nearly three centuries of time. it is a piece of melancholy wrong to know that Mr Spenser was in himself an innance of one of 'the purposes', meabt for Ireland's good, and that he bad two grants from the English Crown of forleited lands in Ireland, one of which he sold to a second party, who resold it to a third, while he occupied the other, a property of 3C30 acres in County Cork, (or which he paid the Crown a rent of £17 a«year. Jn following up Mr Lecky's assertion that Irish discontent proceeds from deepseated national feeling, we are forced io the same melancholy conclusion arrived at by Spenser, that Ireland has been reserved, by contumacious proceedings similar to those which placed him there, in an unquiet spirit to be the scourge of England . The history of Ireland is little taught and little known in England, and it is poisoned in its ?ery fountain. We gather much of it from the writings of the in*

raders and spoilers of the country, and their evidence, except so far as it sets forth their own deeds, is not trustworthy. It is the object of this and subsequent papers to note from various sources the facts of English domination over Ireland, and from them to form some idea of the national feeling which that domination was likely to engender. The present paper will deal with that period of Irish history between the time of the first English intrusion to the treaty of Limerick. In the year 1171, Henry 11. of Eng« land invaded Ireliod, nominally torestore the fugitire King of Leinsttr to hist throne, actually to assume the sovereignty for his own family by creating hfs sort John Lord of Ireland. The country, however, showed no signs of true sunju* * galion until the time of Queen Elizabeth, whose father, Henry VIII., first *•« somed the title of Ting of Ireland. In her eventful reign, the last great straggle for separate nationality took place. The people of Ireland, led by the O'JNeft, Etrl of Tyrone, rose against tbeir op* jgftftaat* in *«in. Still, ■ - so late ai 1801, the memory of that eal«* ' lant but unfortunate chief was cherished in Ireland, and it is said by a pampleteer of that date, that to him mrght be ap< lied the words which the Scotch Pitcairo ad Iressed to the romantic Dundee-* Toque r»?e, gratis quondam fortiwime doctor. Ultimo Scotorom, atqae ultimo Granamo, rale* One of Queen Elizabeth's officers, a Captain Thomas Lee, who was engaged in her successful campaign against Tyrone, addressed a memorial to Her Majesty In the year 1594. in which he showed how desperate adventurers came over front - England to Ireland to make their for* tunes ; bow they robbed, imprisoned, • . and murdered, without the slightest <. regard to public faith, or show of justice, and without let or hindrance. He accused ; , the English: Government of Ireland of _^ connivance in judicial borders of peace* j able and inoffensive men, whose only ' crime was their property ; and be speaks' .[ of l>rone at an enemy, but also at an * oppressed and injured man. In tbe reign of James 1., of England; v another ' good , purpose ' was aecom* pliehed. That monarch confiscated 600, ' 000 acres of the best land in Ulster, and so, in addition to Queen Elizabeth** knight -errant s and freebooters, an im* migration of Scotch and English took place, amongst whom these fertile land* were psrcelled out. The cup was not yet r full. At the time of the first English; revolution* Ireland became, the seat of: war. The Stuart dynasty involved is then, as it did too fatally in after years, . and Cromwell's soldiers received, like Woman legionaries, settlements in Ire/ I lancT. It must be noted, however, in the I words of Sir William Petty, that 'the I old Protestants of Queen Eliitbeth and I fcnq James's plantation did not love the I English who came over in 1641/ I In 1691. the total defeat of the Iris^l and French soldiers of James 11. and the. I Treaty of Limerick brings the first form ■ of English rule in Ireland to a lamentable M close. Of Ireland it may be said in I Scripture phrase that many of her best I and bravest, despairing for ever, then ■ * forsook her and fled/ In other conn- ■ tries they found peace, employment, and ■ honours, which they never could hopefl for in their native land. What were the ■ reasons for tbeie continual uprisings, m and that inveterate hate of English rule I* ■ They seem plain enough from the basal facts ; but if it is necessary to show that ■ these facts and their influence werafl acknowledged, then we must refer to con- fl temporaneous writing. In 1613, Sit ■ John Davis was the English Attorney- ■ General of Ireland, and wrote a treatise ■ palled ' A discovery of the eames why ■ Ireland was never entirely subdued and ■ brought under the obedience of thefl Crown of England until the beginning ■ of His Majesty's (King James I t ) reign/ ■ Mr Froude says, in a * Fortnight inS Kerry ' (1870), that during the last cen- ■ tury Ireland was one of tbe most licen* ■ tious countries in Europe, but that atfl present, in proportion to its population, ■ it is tbe i Brest in the world. Sir .fohnH Davis writes of the Irish people in 1613. H ' There is no nation of people under the^J sun that doth love equal and indiffcrentH justice better than tbe Irish/ He states H that they bad williroily submitted, andH would, gladly continue to submit, to the-H jSnglish Crown ro long as they wer&H 1 protected and justly governed, withoutH oppression on the one hand or impunity^! on the other.' He shows that they btdM repeatedly besought the Sings of Rng-^l land, from the dm of Edward HI. toH those of- Honry VIII ♦ that they mightH be enabled to use and enjoy the laws of^H England. But he goes on with terrible^f significance to say that the laws of Eng~^H land were not commnrieated to tbe Irish^H though they earnestly desired an^H sought the name, for. so long as they^M were without the protection of these latos^M any Englishman might oppress, ancl^H snoil, and kill them without control^H How, he asks, cnnld things be otherwise^! than that they should be outlaws an^H enemies to the Crown of England whet^H they could not converse or commcrc^H nor enter ft town or city but at peril o^H tbeir lives ? and whither should they fiy^H be ; pathetically exclaim", bat into th^H woods and the mountains P He aver^H that no people were naturally more law^H abiding, and he declares they are mor^H fearful to offend the law than the Eng^H lish themselves, or any other nation^H He adds, moreover, that if William th^H Conqueror had treated the Saxou popu^H lation of England in like manner, th^H Normans might Ita7e spent as much titn^H in the conquest of Ireland. He poin^H ont that Wales was treated in a ver^^| different manner, and with the happie^H rcsuUs ; that Kine: Henry VIII. cou^H plctrd the work of Edward I , creat^^| boroughs with Parliamentary lvpr^eqt^H

i\on, and gare tbeni i|ajea judicial ad. ministration of tjbe li^ff of England, wbereby the disorders eaiwed by the wars of the Ro§«i were cleared away, and Wales, wliic!}, )»ad wlapwd into bir« barism, was aecnrtV w ttled m obedience, plenty, and peace* . (To OT C9KTIUOBD )