Yet this fact is disputed. One well known newspaper writer of Boston, an Irishman, too, declares: “It is quite safe to say that there were no Irish at that time (1630) among the settlers.” Now that assertion may or may not be true. But I would say in reply to it that if the Irish were not here as early as 1630 there was at least one representative of the race in the colony in 1632[4] and another in 1634[5], both prominent, too, by the way, and Irish have been here ever since. Footnote 4: John Cogan, already alluded to. Footnote 5: William Hibbens. The gentleman referred to also says: “Up to that time (1647) there was practically no infusion of Irish blood in New England.” In reply to that I would answer that if the other large centers of New England had as many Kelts as did Boston up to and including 1647—and I would not be surprised if they had—this gentleman’s statement would stand disproved. Under Cromwell’s government many Irish people were sent to New England. On their arrival they were sold as servants or slaves by those at whose charge they were brought here. This slavery, however, was only temporary, and generally for a period of four years. It was distinctly understood that this service of the Irish was to be in direct payment for the trouble and expense of transporting them. The men of Irish blood were not prominent in the early story of the colony, with a few exceptions. But that was neither their fault nor to their discredit. The reasons for this were in brief the racial antipathy on the part of the colonists; their hatred of the religion professed by the mass of the Kelts; the social ostracism of the English toward the children of Erin; the legislation in Ireland which forced the natives into, and kept them in, ignorance from an educational standpoint; their poverty, another heritage of England’s misrule of their country and the smallness of their numbers in comparison with the English settlers. But time works wonders and brings its revenges! The erstwhile tiny English and Puritan colony has become a great city, one of the greatest in America, in fact, and the stronghold of the Catholic and Kelt. Only the other day it was governed by a man of that faith and blood, and he was the successor of four other mayors born in Ireland or descended from Irish people, while the majority of the leading city officials were of the same class. In the professions and business life also men of Irish blood are making a good showing here. And as to religion, our clergy of Keltic blood outnumber those of all other nationalities and so do they all the non-Catholic ministers combined.