GENERAL NEWS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 45, 7 March 1874, Page 11

GENERAL NEWS.

(Compiled from our exchangee.) leeiand.

TflE "melancholy tatk of ruling Ireland " .-—The ' Times ' is not usually regarded as a propagator of sedition .or treason in Ireland among Irishmen, and yet it sometimes, without knowing it, gives aid, hope, and counsel to Irish nationalists, or " irreconcilable, " as it profers to call them. Reviewing a portion of the Wellington Despatches [which appeared some time ago in our columns], relating to "Catholic Emancipation, it points out, without meaning to do so, to Irish rationalists what to do and what to avoid. It shows that the success of the leaders of the Cathoiic Association, in procuring the emancipation of their co-religionists, was owing to the fact that their organisation was so perfect as to compel the minstry of the day to grant all their demands fioni \ery fear of it, and it in effect tells the chiefs of the Home Rule organisation of tho present day that untii they can do the seme they can never hope to achieve their end. The teaching ot the 'Times' is literally that England will never give to Ireland anything that she is not compelled to give, or fears to withhold. We eincerly regret to chronicle the decease of Lord Annaly, who died at the ripe age of eighty-four yeins. Judged by his own times— tho Ireland of forty or fifty years ago— lie was a man worthy of honor, respect, and acclaim, as one who, ni the public life of his era, bore a courageous, i.n upiight, aud an honorable part. His name will bo for ever associated with the gigantic struggle for Catholic Emancipation, tj the parliamentary contests iv which he freely dovotoJ a princely fortune. The Homo Kule movement is now making rapid strides. The Clergy are joining it m groat number?. Those in the deanery of Ballinrobe, in conference assembled, have unanimously resolved to enrol their nnmes as members of tho association, and the clergy of tho deanery of Mill S p.et, Kerry, have followed their example.

It is difficult to understand what satisfaction can be derived by any class of journalists from the fact that a Urge number of Irishmen languish in English prisons for having participated in a political movemeat on behalf of their country. Yet such is the case, and those who take delight in the circumstance lose no opportunity of manifesting their feelings and assisting in rivetting more securely and firmly the fetters by which those unfortunate men, the political prisoners, are held in bondage. Irish Lace for Russia — One of the "principal branches of Irish industry has again been favored with royal patronage, and'it'is gratifying to find that notwithstanding 'the unlimited 'resources possessed by Brussels and other Continental cities, we are able to produce in this country an article which rivals the finest of foreign productions— we refer to Irish point lace, now so well known. Messrs. James Forrest and Sons have had the honor of executing an order from His Royal Highness, the Duke of Edinburgh. Irish lace will now be seen in the Russian capital, and we hope that ladies of the Court of St. Petersburg will be induced to order their train trimmings from Ireland. Like the Marchioness of Q.ueensbury the Baroness Burdett Coutte has extended a helping hand to the poor people of Ireland Tho firstnamed lady sent £20 towards the movement for obtaining Home Rule, the last-named lady has sent the sum of £200 for the fund for providing better boats and fishing gear for the distressed fishermen of the Baffin and Shark Islands, in county Gal way ; and also £50 towards the fund •r. quired to defray a portion of the expenses of building a boat-slip on Shurk and a pier on Baffin Island. On the occasion of the dedication of the Catholic Cathedral in Armagh, on the 24th of August, Mr P. M. Haverty, the New York publisher, was a collector. In the accounts of the ceremony publisned in some newspapers it was said that a gentleman hailing from America decamped with £t6O of the collection. Holding that this could only refer to himself, Mr Haverty has taken actions against tho ' Belfast News Letter ' and other papers to recover damages for libel. Longevity is not uncommon at Limerick, if we may judge from the fact that the four persons who died and were buried there in one week, div ided among them 376 years of existence, being an average of 94 years a-piece. The eldest veteran had reached the age of 105, while the most juvenile was midway between 80 and 90. In a late number of the new magazine, called "Catholic Ireland," there is a remarkable article, entitled " Some results of the Irish Exodus," in which the statistical and politico-economical consequences of the national education are broadly set forth. The writer says that, driving recently through Meath, with a landed proprietor of that county, that gentleman expressed himself in melancholy terms regarding the depopulation of that rich and fertile district of Ireland, which wus, he declared, fast degenerating into a solitude, and becoming, in fact, a practical realisation of that time predicted by Lord Carlisle, when Ireland should be the " fruitful mother of flocks and herds." The writer's friend condemued the system of pasturage, which had almost superseded agriculture throughout the county, contending that the former pursuit encouraged idlenesß and drinking, insomuch that those whose lands were all under grass had rarely any other employment for their time than limiting and attending fairs, the latter practice being " about as straight a road to intemperance as a man ca» take." In the article cited in the foregoing paragraph, Edmund Spenser's dictum is quoted in support of the argument. The poet, writing in Elizabeth's time, in his " Views of the State of Ireland," earnestly recommends that the people be compelled to till the land. He, too, it seems recognised the tendency of grazing pursuits to beget idle habits, and with them all the evils of their train. '* Cattlekeepiug is a fit nursery for a thief," said the author of the " Fairy Queen," a dictum which would rather startle the respectable and by no means indolent etook-breeders and dealers of our day. The present writer's friend further argued that pasturage as compared with tillage returned much inferior profits. The profits of five agricultural counties in Ireland were found to be £6 l©s per acre, as against £4 the acre calculated to be the return from five grazing oouubies. It is estimated, in this article, that the item of loss, per heart by emigration, is correctly represented at £10, which would give a total of £800,000 on 80,000, the number of emigrants in 1872 Last week we gave a description of the monster meeting in Dec. last, at Philsborough, (Dublin) the last of the series of amnesty meetings began in December last. The following is a compact and forcible deacriptiou of the first meeting of the series, that at Clontaif : — " It is difficult accurately to estimate the numbers who took part in this marvello.is demonstration. In the field in which this meeting was actually held — a field of moro than six aorcs crowded to excess — there were certainly, on a moderate calculation, not less than 60,000 persons. But the persons who stood at any one time in that field did not constitute one-third of those who re illy formed the mighty gathering of human beings v, ho thronged not only that field and the avenue* leading to it, but all (he road from the Custom House to St. Anrie's — a distance of more than three miles. When the chairman was voted to the chair, those on the platform could see the banners of thu coming bodies and the long line oi dense masses of men defiling more than a mile awa) from the shore. When ahe meeting was going on some of the latest arrivals were making their way into the field to replace the crowds whom tho intense pressure was driving out. On the lowest computution no less than 200,000 persons made their pilgrimage to the •e^ot where Brian Boru fell in glorious victory to testify their devotion to t lie sacred c iuso of freedom and fatherland in. which the glorious oil Monarch died. " Weeding out Irishmen." — Mr Andrews, the Secretary of the Waterford and Limerick Railway, has been summoned before the Limerick magistrates, to shew cause why he should not be ordered to give a wrilten character to an engine driver who has recently been dismissed from the employment of tho company, in pursuance of a determination to reduce the staff. Mr Andrews did not attend, but his solicitor explained that th » practice since he has had charge of the line has beeu not to give characters to servants leaving the emplqyme its but te permit a reference, and it was submitted that the naagis-

tratet had no power to order. him to; do otherwise. ;V the Mayor remarked that this practice .might do Telry well in England, where Mr Andrews ..came. from,,, but that would not , answer in Ireland, and^ referred to a rumour that Mr Andrews had threatened to weed every Irishman out of the staff. The case wai adjourned to give the defendant an opportunity of appearing to explain the grounds of his refusal to give the character.. -• , - „,■> ~.. ; , -, „ „« „V- % \ : \ The moving bog at Danmore, county GWway, - Ireland, is. thus spoken of by a correspondent »— ".ln the first instance, there was no warning symptom of the outbieak, nor did the bog differ in appearance from.undrained peat mosses which abound in this county. The farmersm the threatened parts were compelled to retire .before the inundation, whicn at once consumed every foot of tbe holdings. The life of Samuel .Lorer, on which Mr Bayle Bernard^as been working for upwards of two years, is now announced aa being near, completion. Mr Bernard being an enthusiastic student of Irish poetry, we may anticipate a very good result from his labors. «t.- £? ahl }» of the -New Tork World 'says :— I don't think the millennium has exactly arrived— but never has there been, m the memory of this generation, to happy and peaceful » rttate of tauigs in Ireland, and such an almost universal immunity, from crime, as now exist* in this - melancholy isle." Speaking upon this subject lo a Dublin merchant last night— a merchant whose name is well known in Hew lork, and who is as famous for his devotion to his religion as for his enterprise in business— he somewhat astonished me by describing the present happy state of things to a cause of which I had not thought. «A few months ago," said he, "the Catholics of Ireland dedicated themselves and their country, by a solemn act, to the fcaered Heart of Jeras j and the blessings which have followed that consecration have been simply. incalculable." Inspected the sincere faith of this gentleman, and did not wound him by suggesting other ani more mundane reasons for the chorus of judicial congratulations at the peace and moral condition ,of the, lrish people which we have jurt heard from all the judges. . v , . • ; „ ** the great Home Rule Conference; in Dublin, Sir Jos. Neaie. McKenna proposed, « That the federal arrangement does not involve' any change in the existing constitution of the Imperial Parliament, -. or any mterfererfce with the prerogatives of the Crown, or disturbance, of the pnnciples of the constitution.?' He drew a parallel between the case of Ireland and that of Poland and Hungary despoiled of their independence by Russia and Austria. Mr McCarthy Downing seconded the resolution, which was adoptedMr John Nicholas Murphy, of Clifton-park, who is known to be the author of ' Terra Incognita,' to which the Holy Father has granted lus special approval, has been nominated to be a Knight of the Order St. Gregory the Great. Mr Cashel Hoey.— The Pope has conferred on Mr Cashel Hoey the decoration of Knight of his own Order, that of Pius, in a very complimentary brief, • A hint to organizers in New Zealand.— -It is true of the Irish emigrant to any land, that if from the moment of landing he avoids strong drink, he, as a rule, becomes a pillar of the commonwealth, a prosperous, respected, useful citizen, a credit to the old country, and an acquisition to the new one. If, on th* ether hand, he sinks into intemperate habits, he swells the ranks of the rowdies and loafers, and is soon a danger to his adopted country, and a disgrace to Ireland. The Temperance Convention of New York has determined to meet the dangers aforesaid which beset the Irish emigrant by a practical course Tlrty despatched to Ireland a special envoy, Mr J. J. O'Mahony, who hes just arrived there, and who is provided with letters from the Very Rev. Dean Byrnf, President of the Catholic Total Abstinence Society of America, to the leaders of the temperance movement in Ireland, ©ferine from the American Temperance Societies all possible aid to properly accredited Irish emigrants having cards of membership from irisli -parochial temperance associations, such cards to be endorsed by ■ the parish priest. The envoy from the American Temperance .Convention, in short, proposes to make arrangements by which Irishmen on landing in the New Wovld will be received, not at the lowest of Edging-houses, but by their brethren in the various Irish temperance associations with which New York swarms. Lord O'Hagan presided at a meeting of tlie Law Students' Debating Society, at wliich Lend Legislation in Ireland was the subject of discussion. After a debate. Lord O'Hagan observed ' that .theie ought not to be on the land question too great precipitancy of action Having had a great deal to do with the construction of the act, he believed it would be hard to say whether any act going further than it did could have passed at the time. He did not deny that it wa9 capable of improvement and revision, but thought as it stood it had done enormous good to Ireland, and ought to be accepted as a measure entitled to the fullest and fairest trial before any other proceedings were t km. Cork has certainly contributed largely to the national gallery of genius. The names of its sons are inscribed on the pages of the book of Fame in characters that; are as brilliant as they are imperishable. Cork can proudly point to the noblest, representatives in every department "of Art, and Literature, and Science j men who have left footprints in the Sands of Time that are Bure to last while the sky o'ercauopies earth and ocean. It would bo untrue to say that we do not rejoice in their achievemen»s and their reputation, for Irishmen are never insensible to the lustre which the wit and worth, and might and m»'d o*'their brethren reflect upon their land and their notion, but they donor ulvvays pay tothememory of the illustrious dead thetiibute which intensifies, while it pcrpetnates the memory of their work, and their fame and name. Yet Ibi* so intellectual a city, and one possessing so many gloriuiis recollections as Cork, it is singularly b irren of public romuinents to departed worth. Dublin can point* with pride to the stamps of many great Inahmen, erected by the people in the most •itholic spirit— O'Coniiell, Burke, Moore, Goldsmith, Pi unkett, O'Briin, Dnigtirij efc. Where are their, compeer* in Cork ? Beit very few of tlir> «*.n whom Dublin delights to honor wcro born within her qonfine*; nc-. • >Uu-i»\- c , n the inrereat of nationality, she perpetuates tho mep> r\ o! i)i- dta-i. Cork lus ImmJ many sons lo whom the tribute that

will «>eatto PW»P«n«7,« richly due. Let uptake, oiie instance; X lie f would .be entitled to,. the honor and affectionate "regard of every" workman, no matter; how far exiled from hiif, birthplace; ;, Why it there japt,a publip statue to commemorate the mil and learning that reflect «o much honpron Cork P'< * ','"'' .'.-"•'' .' „"' " JJubMn OasUe as therfociM of Irish leorrapticm :— Dublin "Castle- « ■ li *«?; b * n >^c headrquarteri '„ of Irish, poEtical intrigue.; The office mutt be worked to as to serve the party in power. Every wire-^ sft*' 9 i»T^ir* ni^? '-« dßoHpn, every pseudo-patriot with •' following », to^sell, every professional man who had gained enough °'***!P*,M make him, worth purchasing, was drawn thither as to a **?•* of ?°**Wtum. ' There were ' places for some, maipstraciet for XK?J I? 7 ta *SP M A - din / iep for a > th^ ■*'' Wo P?wpnal integrity on. me, part of* Lord-Lieutemnt wm proof against the necessities of the posibon. , ,Tta word !« Castlehack < was Coined forlrish use. To be 3S fwTft »«npaired one's respectabmty. Those .whose station raised them above suspicion did, not eire to form part of the Venal obsequious, throng. Th"c people viewed with sullen icorn the progres' sire demoralisation of the upper middle claw, and the Imperial GoteMmiS? Bhared , in *&« discredit of its looal agency; There; should be uo reason why, the Catholic Union should not' quintuple its numbers. We believe that nothing is required but thtt invaluable adjunct and correlative; of organisation, propagandism, and recruitiog The changes which have been, introduced into the oonstitution of the Union during the present year ,all tend towards increasing its efficacy and expansive power. These emendations and enactments ought to give the Union * place in the good wishes of every catholic, be his political creed or complexion what it may. The rigorous, exclusion of part/ politics especially should give every Catholic to^ understand that no party move whatever can be concealed under the mask of religion in this case. ' r^«*n?«of Clare.—BetWee n 1841 and 1871, the. population decreased from 286,394 t0 \U7,864, or 48, per cent., or by 1&.580 .persons; being two to three times the population of the county Car- **!£'. VlBV 181 * 0 most;Ca l tholic county in Ireland, and with the, leatt^ admixture of Anglo-Norman, Crpmwellian, or Planter blood. : These land its isolated situation account for the large number, 4,432, who ytfiifi^ °* /y> * Ka ? >713 fl P eak both Irißll d English," *o that/ 58,145 persons, or 40 per cent of the whole population; are bi-lingnal. The population in 1871 was ,148,000, of which Catholics constituted^ nearly 98 per cent. The Catholic population is still nearly 98 per " cent, of the people, and all others little orer two per cent., and these 3324 Protestants, of all creeds, chiefly in a fow towns. In fact, th« two towns of Ennis and Kilrush contain 1150 Protestants, or mor» than one-third of all the Protestants io the whole county Clare. Catholics are less now, in the general population, by only one in 100* than they were in 1861. What a canWure this oo a scheme of mixed education for the people of Clare, where there are no element* to mix ! Of eighty parishes, or parts of parishes, in the county, ten contain no Protestant whatever ; whiie if the 3324 Protestant* were equally distributed over the county they would yield only 41 persons, or less than 8 families, to each parish, so that the number of «choolattending Protestant children in each parish would be two or three daily ! That the odd feeling of affectionate regard with which Insane* generally looked upon John Bright has not quite died out, despite his becoming a member of the Coercion Government, is proved by the kindly comments of the Press upon thoae portions of his brilliant address at Birmingham, which referred to matters merely political — that speech which evoked from his constituents a display of almost passionate enthusiasm, especially where it pleaded for national'educa* tion on the principles of the league. With reference to his unfortunate views on that great question, the Cork 'Examiner' says: "There is only one topic in the whole of Mr Bright's Bpeech the treatment of which has caused us regret. We cannot but be sorry that he should allow his large mind to be dwarfed down to the proportions necessary for association with the Nonconformists on the education question. He confesses, indeed, that they are the minority, yet he holds that their views should regulate the country. Nearly every group which arrives in Qaeenstown has for Us nucleus some Irish-American, who, having spent years in the Republic came with fu'l pockets to visit his poor friends, and never failed to express astonishment to find them still poor, backward, and penniless. * ' He never fails to repeat : • the labor which barely keeps you alive here would secure you independence and fortune in America. Bundle up your- traps and come with me.' These Irish-Americans are the recruiting sergeants of the Yankee labor market. Upon the Home Rule ques' ion the ' Times' is suddenly become almost fair. It actually admits that England may be compelled | seriously to consider whether it ought to be conceded. It says : Hlf 1 the demand for Home Rule proves really to be tho demand of the Irish people, we shall be compelled seriously to consider in what way it may be yielded to them with the least possible mischief." We all know that Home Rule is the demand of the Irish people, but this pronouncement of the Times U a challenge thrown down to the Home ftulera to place it beyond all doubt that Ireland is united upon this question. We cannot imagine anylhing'more eminently calculated to give a stimulus to the Home Rule movement than this. It is dig* tinctly stated that Ireland has only to ask for self-government to get it ; nud Ireland will do so in such a way as to remove even the doubts of the ' Times ' that the people are in earuest, united, and determined to have this instalment of justice. A movement is on foot in Ireland to present a national testimonial to Sinter Mary Francis Clare

Tiie Empresj of Austria, like a tru« Cdthclii princess, never for* getting tho respect winch * Christian lady owes to horaolf, places an equ il esteem on the royal libertines of Italy and Persia. She. refused to see either.