SIX MONTHS IN IRELAND.

Hokitika Guardian, 12 February 1921, Page 4

SIX MONTHS IN IRELAND.

(By James Dunn in Daily Mail). DUBLIN, Dec. 14. The past six months have provided the most exciting period in my lifeNo film play has ever supplied the sensations that go to make everyday life in Ireland. Thrilling experiences, the glamour of romance, the novelty of the abnormal, colour the work of a special correspondent in this island of adventure. Within the past six months 1 have seen men shot dead in’Derry, Belfast, and vvork. _ , . 1 have attended a Sinn Fein examination of a spy, and 1 have talked with men who knew their days were numbered. . . 1 have been held up by Sinn Fcmers and by “Black-and-Tans.” I have slept in a room 50 yards from an exi oUnt iitvGfl Vinlf il stlcct. I

plosion that shattered nan a *■**«*• * have seen a whole town distracted by terror and 1 have heard the pistol shots that killed a man with whom I had been sitting at a table a few hours , before. ] have seen two of my best friends , sent to gaol. UK*#* But Ireland is not all horror. ! This wonderful people so mingle tragedy with comedy that it is possible ' to keep normal amid the abnormal. ! Ireland is not a problem ;itis a para--5! dox. Following the shadow of death is - the sunlight of humour, and while there l . , , ...... I.nno for Ireland.

IS limbin'-! ~ ‘ Since last July I have seen a great change in the social and political situation hero. In midusmmer the country was dominated by Sinn Fein extremists; now it is directed by the “Black-ami

Six months ago the majority was espousing resistance; to-day the majority is preaching peace. But this is not to say that peace is imminent. 1 merely record the change in the popular feeling, hi -July, Ireland was prosperous; in December, heland is rapidly drifting to rum.

In Ireland to-day we go to bed early. The curfew has given up country habits. We have to be indoors by ten o’clock, and one of the nightly thrills is dodging the cordons and heating the curfew.

A familiar sight in Dublin from nine till ten is that of elderly stout gentlemen sprinting for the last tramwa\car. or heating even time in a desperate dash down a suburban street. Another thrill we got here is that we never know where we shall spend the

night. If you are caught in a cordon at 9.1.5, von will spend the night either in gaol or in the house of some hospitable stranger. People are beginning to know each other in Dublin. *»**■* Irish children have invented a new game, and they are all playing it. They call it “ambush,” and with pieces of wood for revolvers and handkorchie 1 for masks they hold up any unfortunate child who cannot give the password. Alter the “ambush” they have reprisals, making bonfires in the street, and improvising armoured ears out ot soap boxes. «***•* One of the things 'that worry you after six months in Ireland is noises. The slamming of |i door in the hotel at six o’clock in the morning will pioduee that tense listening attitude beloved by sensational novelists, while ti, L hack-tiring of a motor-car invariably creates a stampede. Having once been held up in your bed at the point of a revolver in the middle of the night the dropping of hoots outside your bedroom door is sufficient to make you sit up ancl take notice. We who live in Ireland have one great joy, one wonderful com pen sat ion, and that is to welcome newly arrived visitors from England. Their dread is our delight.