Ireland as it is, and as it would be under Home Rule — John Shaqi
Ireland as it is, and as it would be under Home RuleBuckley, Robert John
History
Ireland as it is, and as it would be under Home Rule
Buckley, Robert John
Home rule -- Ireland; Ireland -- Politics and government -- 1837-1901; Irish question
"The Belfast riots of 1886 were terrible. Forty people were killed in
the streets, and what I saw in my capacity of magistrate was dreadful
in the extreme. The injuries from gun-shot wounds were almost
innumerable, and many a local doctor gained experience in this line
which is unknown to many an army surgeon. The riots began with the
ruffian class, from which this great city is not entirely free, and
gradually rose upwards to the shipbuilding yards. All this disturbance
and awful loss of life were entirely due to the production of Mr.
Gladstone's first bill. And now they tell us that a worse bill--for it
is a worse bill--might become law without any inconvenience. I submit
to any reasonable man that if the mere menace of a bill cost forty
lives in Belfast alone, the loss of life all over Ireland, once the
bill were passed, would be enormous. And all this will be attributable
to the action of Mr. Gladstone, who has never been in Ulster."
Walking down Royal Avenue I met Colonel Saunderson, radiant after the
great demonstration of two days ago, wearing a big bunch of violets in
place of Tuesday's bouquet of primroses. He stopped to express good
wishes to the _Gazette_, and said that the Belfasters were proud of
Birmingham, which city he regarded as being the most advanced and
enlightened in the world. While he so spake, up came the mighty Dr.
Kane, idol of the Ulsterites, towering over the gallant Colonel's
paltry six feet one, and looking down smilingly from his altitude in
infinite space on my own discreditable five feet ten. He agreed with
the Colonel as to the merits of Birmingham, and added that every
Unionist in Belfast cherished a deep sentiment of gratitude to the
hardware city, requesting me to explode the misleading statements of
the Separatist press, which asserts that Tuesday's procession
consisted of Orangemen. "The first two hours," said the Reverend
Doctor, "consisted of bodies who do not processionise, and who never
perform in public, in or out of Belfast, Methodists, Presbyterians,
and the like, while the 25,000 or 30,000 Orangemen who came in at the
tail of the show were a mere fraction of the whole. Colonel
Saunderson, the Earl of Erne, and myself stood up in our carriage and
cheered the Radical Reform Club, a thing we certainly have never done
before." Here the Colonel laughed, and said--
"The union of hearts, Doctor."
"Yes, the union of hearts and no mistake, as the Grand Old Man will
find--to his cost. All classes are united against the common enemy"
(Mr. Gladstone). "But tell me something--How is it that the English
people are deceived by that arch-professor of cant? Tell me that!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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