[To THE EDITOR Or THR "SPECTATOR...
Sin,—I was greatly interested by the letter of your "Lanca- shire Reader" in last week's issue, and quite admit the truth of the points he makes. There is, however, one great difficulty which I fear will prevent the exclusion of the six counties from being regarded in Ulster as honourable terms of peace. The Covenant which we all signed binds us to stand by our fellow-Unionists throughout the whole province, and we should be infamous for all time if, after encouraging the Covenanters of Cavan, Monaghan, and Donegal to throw in their lot with us and stand by us, even if the result was civil war, we were to betray them as the price of our own safety. It is perfectly true that we "surrender our whole moral position." I will go further, and say that no thinking Ulsterman wants these counties excluded, for they would be a source of weakness and a perpetual embarrassment to us, but until our brother Volunteers there give us permission to make peace on the terms of "six counties' exclusion" we simply cannot abandon them. It is not a matter of expediency or even of "moral position." Our honour is at stake and the oath which we took together before God. I admit it is possible that six months ago we might have made peace on these terms, for the reason that we were not then strong enough to give any effective help to the Covenanters in the outlying counties. "Don't ask for what you can't take" has been a guiding principle in the Ulster movement, and our diplomacy has of necessity lagged when our preparations were back- ward. But the events of last spring have shown us our strength and given us the necessary confidence in ourselves and our leaders, while our effectiveness, both as regards equipment and training, has at least doubled. We earnestly desire a peaceful settlement of our troubles, but, as Sir Edward Carson says, it must be "Peace with honour," and now that we are strong enough we must stretch out a pro- tecting arm over our outposts. If they could only be induced to settle in Protestant Ulster we should welcome the exclusion of the six counties as a settlement. As it is, I fear the out- look is gloomy in the extreme.—I am, Sir, &c.,
AN ULSTER VOLUNTEER.
[Our correspondent writes in an admirable spirit, but we trust that he is too pessimistic. If the Covenant forbids the compromise of the exclusion of the six counties— which, however, we do not admit—then we cannot help thinking that the Unionists of Donegal, Monaghan, and Cavan will be content to make the sacrifice required to render the policy of exclusion effective. That the Unionists of the six counties will be able to give complete protection to their fellow-Protestants over the border we have no doubt whatever. ED. Spectator.]
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