A Boycotted Baby.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 195, 19 March 1887, Page 3

A Boycotted Baby.

Agencies which chape our lives otten begin their work long before we ourselves appear on the ecene. Even so the life of thiß baby was affeoted by what took place two years before life birth. In the winter of 188 -a body of tenantry in one of the southern counties of Ireland appeared before their landlord and deniaadtd a reduction of rent all round. The landlord refuaad to yield to organised menace, but at the same time offered to consider each case on its merits, and grant a generous abatement where the tenant was badly off. The poorer men were ready to accept this offer; but the richer ones, the leader ot the Land League in ihe parish, rejected it, and bade no one pay any rent at all. The tenants turned to go, having made a virtual declaration of war. Aa they moved away from the house, however, argument waxed hot and voices rose loud among them Finally, a tall gaunt form detached itself from the main body, and James Doonegan was seen walking resolutely back to the house. " I'm come wid me rint," said he to his landlord. "I've got it ready in me pocket, and I'll pay me honest dobt, for all them. ' Bub I hope yell stan by mo, sorr, an* see me sately through. v The response was an instant pledge to do so, and the two men shook hands upon a friendship which had been their support through a hard and weary while. Thia was the first of James Doonegan's offending. About twelve months later, a man who had a couple of grazing-fields, upon which ho speculated in sheep, refused to pay his rent— which was some years in arrear — unless a large reduction were granted to him. He was notoriously well able to pay the rent ; but he was the right-hand man of the local Land League chief, aiad so, strong in the promise of Land League support, he resolved to stand by his refusal. Oa the other hand, the landlord, who has never evicted a poor man, felt bound to accept the challenge and turn him out. That is to turn him out technically. The grazier should not be turned out of his home, since he did not live on the land ; he dwelt under the roof of hia employer, the Land League chief aforesaid. In the fulness of time and of legal proceedings the grazier was evicted. Immediately the fiat of the League went forth that the 'and should be boycotted. No one was I to take it, the fences were to be pulled I down, aud cattle were *o roam over the I fields aa if the land were a common. Then | came James Doonegan to his landlord, sayi ing, " That bit o' land o' John Drover's just ' fits in wid me own farm, an' I'll take the I fields an' be thankful to you if yell give 'em to me " The astonished landlord warned him that if he took the land he would be boycotted "aa sure as there is a sun in the sky." "I knows that well enough," replied Doone1 gan, looking at his broad, bony hands. " Perhaps they won't stop at boycotting, either," suggested the landlord. "Oh, I don't think as they'll be after doing anything very fevere agin' me," was the reply. " Stand by me, and I'll take the land " The bargain was naade, and this was the second offending of Jamea Docnegan. Ha wa3 in &tantly bovcotled Fis name was published in the weekly " Black Liet,'' and from that day he was shunned by everybody about him aa if he had a plague But no, there was one person who still treated him with Christian friendliness ; and this was perhaps the one least likely to do k. It was no other than old Mrs Drover, the mother of the evicted grazier, whose land Doonegan was punished for taking. Shti lived in a little cottage close by, and was at this juncture in flourishing circumstance?, In her character of mother of an evicted man she was valuable fcr politica purposes. The Land League dubbed her "a victim," patriots declaimed about her wrongs, aod the poor law guardians voted her £1 a week cut door relief. She was nearly SO >ears of age, and had been in receipt of 3s per week for some yea' 8 past. But when her son was evicted she got 17a more ; and this, although her pon had not contributed anything towards her support for years. Moreover, she waa given some light work by a neighbouring Land League potentate, for which she was well paid. The day was now very near at hand when the baby, the hero of my story, was expected to make his appearance. After some difficulty, Mr Doonegan had secured the services of the local midwife. At first this worthy person refused to attend the boycotted woman ; so Doonegan consulted his landlord, who immediately aaked of a wellknown association whether it could supply emergency women as well as emergency men. " Certainly," replied the well known association, Now, when the parish midwife heard of this, &he took counsel with herself, and offered to attend Mrs Doonegan for the customary fee. One stormy night in Novembor Mrs Doonegan was taken ill, and her husband went in search of the midwife. In vain did he hammer at the door, and in the name of all the eaints implore the woman to remember her promise and come to his suffering wife. Nob a soul in tho house would answer to his summons ; and Doonegan then learned to his sorrow that the League was unscrupulous enough to boycott a woman in the pangs of childbirth, and that women could be found to obey the decree. He retutned home in helpless anger and anxiety, not knowing what to do ; fox the doctor lived 20 miles off. His poor wife had au idea. "Go and ask Mrs Drover fur to come," she said : " Mrs Drover '11 come to me, in spite o' thim Laguors." This , was the mother of the evicted man, the victim of the patriot platform, the pet pauper of the poor-law guardians. Nevertheless, old Mrs Drover went to her neighbour's assistance, and in the small houra of the morning a boycotted baby was ushered into this disjointed world of ours. The news soon spread abroad. Mrs Drovers no less, had beon midwife to a boycotted woman. Tbo Nationalist potentate dismissed her from his employment with contumely : such as she was not fife to tend his patriotic poultry and feed hi 3 Celticswine. The incensed poo 1 -law guardians instantly stopped her outdoor relief. Not only did they stop the 17s which they had granted to her in her character of " victim," but they likewise cut off the 3s a week that for years she had received in the character of an aged and infirm woman. Her blood, chilled by eighty years of a hard life, boiled with anger ; and she was heard to say of these good guardians, "Is it divils intirely they are, wid their Lagues and Branches?" The landlord and his wife paid frequent visits to the lonely cottage, bringing comfort to the parents and woollen socks lor the j boycotted toes of the new-born child. The hand of the League proesed hard upon the i little family?; but they were supported by i friendly aid from several sources, co that at , length it appeared to .the rulers of the Land League that Doonegan did not suffer keenly enough under his punishment,, and more vigorous measures were adopted. Oneevening, as the 'little'- family' were seated around thej^hearth^he^ajbyu agleep in its cot, a euddea crash- of -noise seemea to engulf themw 'AThe^himafey^aUinV' crted Mrs^ Doonegan,'/ a^rfogiog up uin. : alarm. " Keep stiff, "nmfct hen Uueban^. ,,' V It> worse nor that, Betty ; it's a shot."

Through all that night the wretched family' cowered in misery awaiting what ' neifr might happen. So shuttered were Doonegan's nerves by these hours of terrified watching that next morning, when he came down to the Big House to tell the master, he trembled so much that he could scarcely make himself understood. Nor need we wonder at that. Think of it ! A man unanntd, sitting with his wife and four little o >es in hit* cottage, his door without a lick, his window without) a ehutter, awaiting aesas&inatijn for others besides himself, perhaps The police canoe, took the buckshot fromoutt he rafters and thatch, inspected the place, reported the outrage, and made no arrests. An iron hut next made its appearance, and the tiny kitchen was often enlivened by the presence of the men quartered there on protection duty. The winter wore on ; the boycotted baby throve satisfactorily j it gurgled at the flash of the policemen's bayonets, and stretched its aimless fingers towards the attractive brightness of their rifles. Whan ploughing came Doonegan was perplexed, Where should he hire a second ploughhorse, or where, supposing be had two horses, should he turn for a man to lead the team ? In the dilemma he appeared to his friend the landlord, who not only gave himone of his own horaes, butdrove thejteam for him. Doonegan ploughed all day, ud his landlord led the horees up and down the furrows until the field was done. While they worked two armed police stood at the end of the furrow, lest some patriot or other should fire at them as they turned to plough on the headland. The Doonegans passed safely through the summer and the winter. Our boycotted baby, a person now of wide reputation, had reached the age of eighteen months— a little toddling mite who had never seen any faces except those of its parents, the constabulary, Mrs Drover, and the landlord's family, To him the world was all but uninhabited, and yet many neighbours dwelt near by. It chanced that about this time the landlord went away to England, for* a couple of months. The baby soon after fell ill of dysentery, aggravated, it was believed, by an unsuitable diet of yellow meal, It was of grave importance that the child should get white bread, and that immediately ; but the master was away, and the market-cart of the big house no longer made its weekly trip to bring provisions from the town of X . In his distress Doonegan applied to the shops in the neighbourhood. Would they give him bread ? Not for himself— he did not ask that— but for hie child. In the name of God, would they let him have a loaf of bread for his sick baby? No one would sell him or give him a crnmb ; he was boycotted, he and his wife and children. A few loaves were obtained irregularly from the police and other friends at a distance, but the supply fell short and the child sickened again and died. The farther went to a distant town for the tiny coffin. Not a soul came to the wake, nor was there a neighbour to bear a hand at the funeral. So the sorrowing man walked down from his mountain home, two miles and a half ro the chapel, carrying, all alone, the sad burden of his baby's little corpse, No one would dig its grave in the buryingground, where if in any earthly spot there might be peace. The father himself dug the grave, and with hia kind-hearted priest standing beside him, thtew in the earth an*l raised up the grass-covered mound over his child. And here ends the story of an innocent baby who was boycotted before hia birth, boycotted out of this life, and boycotted after death in the chilly safety of the grave. But perhaps it may be supposed that this little histoiiette is an invention. Thatj however, it is not ; neither is it merely " founded on fact." It is strictly true in every particular, this story of the unfortunate little Doonegan. — " St. James's Gazette."