RUSSIAN AND ENGLISH ATROCITIES.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2853, 6 April 1878, Page 3

RUSSIAN AND ENGLISH ATROCITIES.

(To Hie Editor of tho Erening Star.) Siß,~For the past few months a great deal of clamour and vehement rhetoric has been mado in clubs, meetings public and private, in tho columns of the newspapers, in pamphlets, in lectures, &c, •bout tho wicked and atrocious treatment of the Turks, by Iluasia; the .Polos aro, for tho occasion, included with the suffering Turks, and, for the nonce, Eussia is denounced by many nations; but by none more so than by the boastful land of liberty, of course, England. It was thought doubtful at first sight that ltussia, the tyrants of the Christians in Poland, was altogether sincere in her taking up of the cause of those persecuted in Bulgaria, Montenegro, Ac.; and now that the Bulgarians, &0., aro freed and tho yoke of Turkey is broken, it is plain that [Russia was not and is not, Biocere in making tho cause of the Bulgarians her war-cry,; and instead of oeing punished with whips it is not very unlikely that some of those people will yefc find themselves punished with scor»pions, and this by Bussia herself. Libertyloving England is, of course, madly indignant against the infliction of terrible cruelties upon the Turks and tho Poles by the frosty tyrant of the North, and what •he will not do to him for the cause of Buffering humanity, and to protect British ; interests it would bo very difficult, judging by the long talking, and speech-mak-ing, and writings that one hears or reads •very where, to make even a good guess at what she will do to cruel and cunning Bussia. Who can blame hcrP She is highly incensed by motives of justice, of liberty, of philanthropy, and she cannot restrain these laudable feelings—not she —until the Gznr is mado to behave himaelf better in his cruel treatment of tho Turks, Poles; &c. "Doctor* cure thyself !" She would not be mean enough to listen to, neither how nor at any time since she began to practise her merciful rule four or five centuries ago in Ireland. It might be irritating to many of your readers to read a lengthened proof for the following strange assertion—" That the greatest crimes that have ever been, committed by one nation against another hare been those of England against Ireland ; that there is no one country in the world which ever inflicted so much

tyranny and oppression as England has committed against Ireland." No doubt many will think what I have just asserted to be very wide of the truth, but if anyone calls for its proof, your readers must not blame me to give it, unpleasant and disgusting though be my task. Of late years the " periodic

butchering " and the rigorous oppression of Ireland hare not been so bad as in former times/ but so much might safely be said to be owing to the weakness and decline of national life and spirit—where now is Emmet, O'Connell, or Gayan Puffy—gust similar to the apparent quietness and slumbering of Poland under the heel of Bussia. Without going back very far, take the puerile insurrection of the Fenians in 1865-6, and what Russian or Turkish tyrant might riot be edified by the example of England in the matter. Some few simple-minded Irishmen were involved in a dwarfish rebellion by a dozen American ex-officers and soldiers •gainst paying for the support of a religion which they did not. believe in; against a still more horrible tyranny of despotic absentee landlords and their bailiffs; and against many other strong injustices which are unnecessary to be related. The incipient rebellion was crushed in a day; some of the Fenians were captured and arraigned for treasonfelony; many were sentenced to death,and others to long periods of imprisonment Mark the sequel—none of the Americans were executed, no, not one; but after a short term of imprisonment they were all liberated, while the Irishmen —the dupes and the less guilty—were, some executed and others kept in gaol until death freed them; others exiled to Western Australia, while the half dead remnant that have been lately liberated enkindle both pity and indignation in the heart of everyone who has any feeling for his fellow-man. Can Bussia show a more horrifying example than the late death within a week after his liberation of one of the Fenians •— remember — after undergoing -twelve long weary years of his life in the dismal cell of a convict prison ? Could Bussia or Turkey parallel the mock-jnry trial in Manchester, where nearly everyone brought to trial was sentenced to be hanged, drawn, and quartered ; so reckless were these liberty-loving, fair-play jury, that the reporters of the press were so keenly affected at the mockery of justice that they petitioned the Queen and Sot one of those sentenced to death, oth reprieved and set free ? Can Russian atrocity exceed this P For the last five or six years the friends of the Fenians in Parliament had, time after time, session after session, urged on the Governments of the day, the cause of the liberation ; petitions for the same purpose, most numerously signed, were presented to Her Gracious Majesty, and. what was the result ? Mr Gladstone and Earl Beaconsfield, knowing the bitter and cruel feeling in the country against mercy to the Fenians, could not, from motives of political prudence, no doubt, grant them their liberty, and now when a serious war is imminent they are mercifully set free, to pacify Ireland a little perhaps. Talk as you may about atrocities in foreign countries, and no one is fairer than the average Englishman : he is fond of freedom and fair play to all men; but mention mercy and fair play for the Fenians,—his tone and style of reasoning become at once altered, and ten to one if you will be inclined to continue the conversation much longer with him. Take the English newspaper press —when was a fair article seen in one of them regarding the Fenians P Never. And after all, what were the Fenians guilty of that men should shut up a sense of fair play and mercy against them ? They were not low thieves, they wero not robbers or murderers. Had they not as much cause to rebel as George Washington had against paying the sugar duty? Yet Washington did rebel. Had they not as much cause to rebel as John Hampden had against paying the ship-money. Yet Hampden did rebel. For anything that the Fenians did what is there so very bad in the eyes of Englishmen, whose ancestors for less causes than the Fenians had, out off one king's head, chased another out.of the country and brought over a foreigner from the dykes of Holland to rule over them—him who gloriously violated the treaty of Limerick, and piously ordered the massacre of Glencoe. Ought Feniani to rebel for any cause P Yet one thing more is certain, that were it not for the Czar and his atrocities (as we hear), I could not easily understand,

otherwise the late clemency of the Jloyal heart after being hard and unfeeling sinco ISGS-G, and it is very doubtful whether tho Sullnn of Turkey, the Czar of .Russia, or any olht-r ruler that I could think of, for similar causes would showsuch a tender hcan as that of Queen Victoria, who is no desp >t, but the head of a constitutional monarchy, mid whose action in the caso or the Fenians is purely and only tho reflection of the feeling of the people of England. Yet those j aro the very people who strongly denounce tho late doings of Eussia; but until " the dpcter cures himself" I for ono have, despite the blustering and tho noise about atrocities, but little confidence in the purity or mercy of English intervention on the behalf of the suffering Turks or Bulgarians.—l am, &c, A. Loveb of Fair Play.

April 6,1878.