"THE IDOL OF CLARE"

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 65, 10 December 1917, Page 6

"THE IDOL OF CLARE"

SINN FEIN LEADER IN IRELAND

DE VALERA'S ORGANISATION

("Daily Mail's" Speoial Correspondent.)

West of Ireland, October 8. All this week De , Valera, hailed everywhere as "the Idol of Clare," has been rounding up his constituents. He has had a strenuous time: there seems to be no limit to his energy. It is ostensibly a political campaign, but it is worked on military lines. The idol is, do factor, the general. The general's army of young Sinn Feiners, capable, well-equipped, and most skilfully trained, has been "playing at soldiers" with intense earnestness.

I have seen this week Sinn Feiu dispatch riders, wearing the rebel brassard on their arms, galloping along the country roads intent on bueiness, carrying messages to and from De Valera's headquarters in Ennis, meeting tho incoming trains, and keeping the lines of communication with a thoroughness which suggests that actual war is in progress. But Peace reigns —though it is a very busy peace and a little distracted here and there. There are no disturbances anywhere in Clare or Limerick. Extra police drafted into certain areas are kicking their heels in complete idleness. In Clare, which is solidly Sinn Fein, the "rebels" are doing their own police work and marshalling their own meetings, insisting upon the observance of law and order. They are the chartered governors of the country. It is very remarkable how the young priests have come into the movement. They make not tho slightest disguise of it; they aro avowedly and openly Sinn Fein, and tho organising work they are doing for De Valera is of inestimable value to him. One stalwart young priest who marched with tlie students in the great demonstration at Ennis last Sunday and sunported Do Valera on his platform is presently going out to France as an Army chaplain. (His photograph appeared in tho "Daily Mail" on Wednesday). His military exercises in tho Sinn Fein army_ will Ho doubt be of great value to him. . Yesterday's Rally.

Tho first week of de Valera's campaign finishes to-morrow (Sunday) at Kilrush, the .last town of importance on the northern bank of the mouth of the_ jiiannou. Here a great rally is anticipated and arrangements arelbeing mSJe for a.huge crowd. In a motorcar, accompanied by his staff, the Dalcassian chief has toured this week the whole of the Clare coast, speaking at Ballyvaugfiiin, Lisdoonvarna, Ennistimon, Milltown Malbay, and other places, iUβ has made speeches in Irish and English, aud the theme of his eloquence has ovor been "an absolutely independent Ireland." Complete orderliness and very groat enthusiasm have marked all his nioetings. He is the epitome of restless energy. Ilis organising committee allows him little rost, nor dees he seem to wish for it. At his touch the pulse of Clare is throbbing high, and timid people are asking one another, quite naturally, what all this busy organisation means. "Is £hero another risin' in the air, fatneri"' I heard one old farmer ask a priest in de Valera's train.

"God forbid, Pat," replied the priest with great seriousness—"God forbid! We want no more bloodshed an' we won't have it."

The Sinn Fein priests declare that they have flocked to the movement not to brandish the flaming sword but to work whole-heartedly for peace. Some of C?em Ea?e been forbidden by their bisliop to take any active part in Sinn Fein organisation. But this notwithstanding, you can see them at work everywhere. They have very great power hero. In Distant Klllaloe. Killaloe, famous for its beauty, and for tho gentleman renowned in song as boing'born "contagious" to it, was bathed in a wonderful glow of sunset as tho boys from Clare crossed the historic bridge into Tipperary, met the Tipperary contingent of the rebel army with drums beating aud fifes playing, and went roaring through the town. Fifteen hundred more loyal and trusty rebels wore oxpected from elsewhore to swell tho demonstration, but they were eithor lost on tho way or diverted elsewhere at the last moment. They—or the most rampageous of them —may have been found at Listowei races, where there was a "fine" shindy of cracked crowns, a baton charge, and somo revolver shooting to wind up the day's sport. These little affaire pass as nothing—in Ireland.

There was peace at Killaloo; nobody's "faytures" were scattered. An "ammunition column" of curs, driven at battery speed up the hill, was the main feature of the procession. It was headed by two tiny boys wearing the full uniform of the Irish Volunteers and riding long-tailed ponies. They knocked an old woman over in the mud, and left her lying there, -and that's all the physical damage that was done at Killaloo. Valora, with a priest at his side in the staff motor-car, was more damaging. He told the which pressed around him to be prepared day and night for battle. And they chcored. He told ohem that the dread shadow of conscription in Ireland still gloomed over them with a sinister threat. It was not dead but sleeping. At any momont it might come. The Sinn Fein crowd murmured. I stood by the churchyard wall and' watched their faces. Thoy were long faces, greatly troubled. Even the red sunset could not dye their pallor.

Pikos. "Anyway," said the valiant . commandant, "if they do come to fetch us, they won't get me—H)e V. is oi military age and Class A, I should imagine, by the look of him]—and you must see to it that they don't get you. (Cheers.) If they come to fetch you- it will be your bodies they will drag away, and maybe some of tho es-

•■on will be currier l off in the same litter. If you have got to fight it is not England you will be fighting for. (Cheers.) If you have got to go into tho trenches it isn't the trenches in Flanders you'll be in, but tho trenches in Ireland I (Again cheers.) If you have got to meet bayonet charges— and you will havo to —there's something better than the bayontet to meet them with. There are still the famous ten-foot pikes your fathers fought the enemy with in earlier days. Get them. ' ("We have got them I") Then get moro of them! A row of ten-foot pikes will beat a row of bayonets any day. With them in your hands they can't reach you with the bayonet."

Thsjt wSs tho prescription made up and served out by De Valera to the simple lads of Killaloo. It was hot gospel to them. I saw their fnces twingo at the mention of the word "bayonet"; I watched them clear again when De Valora gripped an imaginary piko and showed them how to use it.

Now to what earthly—or to what hellish—end is this hnwk-oyed young firebrand shaping? What; in tho name of everything thnt is human, does ho mean by ft? Why, in the name of everything that is human, is he foaming up and down the country in this way? Cannot sonic wise head, some firm hnnd, stop him before it is too late? Now and again you ran laupli nt his fireworks and write lightly of his amazing autumn manoeuvres,

Bβ I havo done in the columns of the "Daily Mail." But the Killaloo speech (an out-of-the-way place is Killaloe) has opened my eyes to the very grave danger of this comic-opera soldiery. I can boo quite plainly what is at the back of Dβ Valera's mutinous mind. Hβ is out to Binash the Convention. Ho says he can do it and that he will do it. Why? Because if the Convontion strikes a fair road to settlement there will be no more use for Sinn Fein ns it now exists- with all its machinations and its military flair.