IRELAND’S PART IN THE WAR

New Zealand Tablet, 22 July 1915, Page 11

IRELAND’S PART IN THE WAR

STIRRING APPEAL BY CAPTAIN REDMOND. At a recruiting meeting in the South of Ireland on May 23, Captain W. H. K. Redmond, M.P., was the principal speaker. After a few introductory remarks, he said that the people of Ireland had a guarantee from the British people of the restoration of their own Parliament. And just as they were at the accomplishment of their highest hope, just as they were all hoping to see the dawn of the day in the immediate future when, under a good and wise and , tolerant Government, Protestant and Catholic, rich' and poor, high and low, would be united for the welfare of Ireland—just as that day seemed to dawn this terrible war, which had involved the whole wide world, broka out. Of course, the accomplishment of any political change had to be postponed. They entered into an agreement with the British people. They said to them, with the authority of their constituents, with the approval of their race in every part of the world, if the right to rule themselves were restored to them and fair treatment they would live in peace, in good will, unity, and amity with the population of Great Britain and the Empire, which was just as much Ireland as it was England. Well, the Act was now the law of the land. ". His Majesty the King gave his assent. Their part of this public bargain was being kept, and he said, as far as he was concerned that he would consider himself dishonored, if he did not advise the Irish people to keep their part of the bargain as well. This was not a war of England. The war was our war as. much. No man in Ireland could be neutral in this war. - The whole world was involved in it. They might if they liked to take sides with the men, who had destroyed Belgium, who had burned God's House, who hadslaughtered in cold blood the men and the women, who as priests and nuns, wore the livery of God. ' , Could Not be Neutral. They might support them if they liked, but they could not be neutral. There was really no neutral nation in the world to-day. It was for the German tyrant or against him, and he said that they, the de--scendants of men who suffered. for their faith and for their freedom : they the descendants of the men who on many a battlefield stood side by side with the brave French nation —they, as the descendants of men, who in the dark days received comfort and education and learning from the schools and universities of Belgium—if they were to take the German side and oppose the whole world struggling for civilisation, they would be unworthy of their history and their nation. No man would desire to live in peace, in quiet in his home, more than he would for the remainder of his days, but he would tell them, men and women, and young people with the future before them, that it would be a cursed and ruinous day for Ireland if the people believed that a German invasion of this country would be of no ill consequences to Ireland. 11 ow strongly did he hold that opinion ? lie held that opinion so strongly : that even at his age, not so very far now off sixty years, he had not hesitated to leave his home, to leave his family to go down into the camp and stand shoulder to shoulder with 12,000 brave men who form the Irish Brigade, when they went in a few weeks, when the time is appointed, he would go with a proud heart, and with a ready step, and advance to the front, and with his body stand by his countrymen and friends, and show to the world that the Irish Brigade of to-day was not

.' going to skulk in the background, whilst : civilisation and religion, and the very home of God were being attacked by the Germans. Some said to him long ago,' why didn't he.attend meetings and ask young men to join their comrades, to keep up the name of Ireland,, and to show that in this crisis Ireland was on the side of the Allies. He would never do it, and why There were lots of people who might differ from him in politics,. and in religion, and everything else. He was not going to ask them to agree With him in all or any of these. ' things, but he asked them to believe him when, he said that from the time he entered Parliament, as a boy led 'by the hand of Mr. Parnell, he made one golden rule, for himself in public life, and that was that he never under any circumstances would ask any man, no matter how humble lie might be, to do anything that he was not prepared to do himself. Follow Me. He had never said, and would not say, to any young Irishman, ' Go and join the ranks. Go where I wouldn't go myself.' He would be returning to his camp in Fermoy in the morning, and what he would say "to the young men who believed in the honesty of his counsel, not go, but to fall in, if they have yet the soldiers' blood in their veins, to fall in with their political leaders, who had always led them right, and were leading them right, : - he would say to them not to go, but 'to fall in and follow me, and I will go before them in every charge they may happen to be in on the battlefield.' And when this war is over-—God grant it might be soon— how would Ireland stand? Belgium and Italy, and the vast majority of the people in America would rejoice that the military tyranny of Germany had been broken, and bow would Ireland stand? Why, they would point the finger of scorn at them, and say that whilst civilisation and religion were fighting for their existence ancient Ireland stood on one side. But after the war was over no such finger could .be pointed at them. To-dav there were enrolled tens of thousands of the best troops in the army from Ireland. To-day, in every hard-fought battle it "was Irishmen whom they saw. figurim; most in the casualty list of the dead and wounded. When tin, war was over Ireland would be able to 100 1 the world in the face, and to look across the Channel to England, Scotland, and Wales, and they would be able to say to them, ' We have stood by the bargain we made with you. You showed you trusted us. We shall show your trust was well founded, and Irish self-government and Irish respect is as staunch a link in the chain of the British Empire-as Canada and Australia, or any portion of it.' The Colonies and Ireland. There was one other point .he would like to mention. Australia, Canada, "New Zealand. Parliament and statesmen of those great lauds gave their help to Ireland, and the very existence and prosperity of the rights of the people of these land.- were a I stake to-day. Were they to send a message to their gallant friends who fought for and helped, them that thev would not help them? A thousand times no. Tin •.- would show that Ireland, at any rate, was not behind South Africa. General Botha and the other leaders were at one period in arms against the Empire, but when they received their constitution they were • to-day bulwarks of the cause of this country. Their position in Ireland was much the same. In God's name, therefore, let them not be deterred by old wrongs and memories of a bitter past from doing their duty to-day. England was absolutely right in this war. No man was readier to admit that in many cases she had been, in the opinion of Ireland, absolutely wrong. If she had been wrong in the past, was that any reason why they should stand aside now when she was right. His motto was support the right, wherever the} found, it,'and no matter whose hand upheld the banner upon which right was written. As far as he was concerned, he appealed to those who might be able to do so to fall in and follow

him." He did not say that the life- of a soldier was a bed of roses, but he never left his spirit higher, nor his heart lighter than x when as an Irish Catholic he found himself swinging along shoulder to, shoulder with the Royal Irish, the Ministers, the Connaught Rangers, and the Leinsters, men like themselves »in religion and -politics, who believed, as he did, .that Ireland had - got to show the way to bar the path of the onrush of the German- tyrant at the present time;