EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS OF IRISH HISTORY.'
Ma. O'NEIL DAUNTS Eighty-five Years of Irish History is in effect a history of the Union from an ultra-Nationalist point of view. He desires nothing so much as the repeal of the Union, which, like many another Irishman, he thinks has brought on. Ireland untold evils, evils that nothing less than the restoration of her legislative independence can possibly remove. His book has therefore been written to support a foregone conolueion ; and though we are unable to accept his opinions, we bear willing. testimony to his earnestness and sincerity, the industry with which he has collected his facts, and the vigorous and incisive English in which he has set them forth. It is worthy of note, too, that he believes a separate Legislature in the sister-country would be quite compatible "with the most devoted loyalty to the Crown ;" and that he does not approve of the methods adopted by Mr. Parnell for the attainment of the object for which they are both so ardently striving. Mr. O'Neil Daunt thinks that if the "uncrowned king" had refrained from attacking landowners as a class, he might have rallied the entire nation to the Nationalist cause. It is, however, conceivable that Mr. Parnell is wiser in his generation than his censor; for has not the former gentleman said that he only took up the land question as a means to an end, that end being the independence of Ireland;. and is it not as palpable as noonday that if there were no land question, there would be no Irish Question P Men like our author are animated by patriotic and sentimental motives; but the motive which chiefly influences the Irish farmers is a desire to better their condition. If it were possible, by the stroke of an enchanter's wand, to bestow on every Irish peasant; and every Irish labourer three acres and a cow, the present agitation would collapse like a pricked bladder. Nobody knows. this better than Mr. Parnell ; and Mr. Daunt's protest against- his leader's methods shows that he does not fully understand the subject which he has studied so deeply, and about which he writes so eloquently. He quotes with warm approval a passage from a work by Robert Holmes :—" The powers of independent. existence seemed to be marked in such bold characters by Nature that it required the unceasing efforts of an active and malignant policy to defeat the obvious purposes of the Creation [sk]" This is of a piece with many Nationalist arguments ; and, though it may tickle the ears of the groundhogs, nothing can well be more absurd. What were Mr. Holmes's qualifications for discerning "the obvious purposes of Creation P" It might quite as plausibly be argued that the disastrous failure of every attempt hitherto made to separate England and Ireland, proves that Providence is on the side of the Union.
If Mr. Daunt will consider for a moment, he can hardly fail to see that the sole solid basis of unity among peoples is neither race, language, nor geographical position, but community of interest. France has assimilated half-a-dozen different nationalities, Russia a score. Austria is a very Babel of tongue)), and Italian Switzerland, though it lies south of the
• . Biebts'fice Years of Irish History, 1800.1815. By. William. Joseph O'Neil Daunt. London: Ward and Downey. Alps, is as loyal to the Confederation, and as little disposed to throw in its lot with the Italian Kingdom, as Uri or Unterwalden ; while Vaud, which was torn from Savoy by the Lords of Berne, would fight to the death rather than accept the dominion of its ancient Princes. It is quite true that during a great part of the eighty-five years over which our author's survey extends, Ireland was shamefully misgoverned, and that her people had every reason in the world to desire a severance of the English con- nection. On the other hand, this does not show that Union in itself is a bad thing; it shows only that in times past English statesmen have been blind, bigoted, and incompetent. It should, moreover, be borne in mind that during a considerable part of the period in question, England was almost as ill-governed as Ireland, and from a like canse,—the predominance of a territorial aristocracy which believed that the supremacy of its class was essential to the welfare of the realm. The hands of Sidmouth and Castlereagh were as heavy on English Radicals as on Irish malcontents; Reform meetings were dispersed by charges of Dragoons ; journalists like Leigh Hunt suffered imprisonment for speaking lightly of a disreputable Prince ; and working men like Samuel Bamford were sent from gaol to gaol for protesting against unjust laws and demanding the right to vote. Mr. Daunt has much to say about past oppression, of the evils wrought by English rale early in the century, and at a time still more remote; but to advocate Repeal on this ground, is about as reasonable as it would be to propose the deposi- tion of Queen Victoria because George III. lost us the American Colonies. The present generation are no more responsible for the one than the Queen is for the other ; the disposition to treat Ireland fairly has developed pari paean with the evolu- tion of democracy, and no measure compatible with the in- tegrity of the Kingdom and the principles of justice which her representatives might unite in demanding, could be denied to them. From suppliants they have become dictators, and the sweeping reforms which have been adopted during the last few years prove to what lengths the Imperial Legislature will go in its endeavour to remove every cause of discontent and recon- cile Ireland to the Union. Much, doubtless, still remains to be done ; but there is no reason to believe that it can be better done by an Irish than by the present Imperial Parliament. Take, for instance, the evils of absenteeism. Mr. Daunt reckons that absentee landowners draw four millions a year from Ireland, with- out giving anything in return. This ie probably an exaggerated estimate ; but be the amount great or small, the drain can be stopped only in one way,—by the extinction of great landlords and the creation of occupying owners, a measure which would require a large outlay of money, for our author is no advocate of confiscation. Now, is it not evident that this money can be raised, and the transaction effected on much better terms, by the Union Parliament than by a local Legislature, even granting, which is by no means certain, that a local Legislature could do it at all? Mr. Daunt's capacity to treat the economic side of the question may be gauged by two facts,—he advocates protection for Irish manufactures, and makes it a complaint against England that English capitalists have lent money to Irish borrowers, thereby causing a drain of Irish resources ! He does not seem to have learnt the A B C of political science. If Irishmen take English money, it is because they can turn it to good account, and because they are able to borrow it on better terms from English than from native capi- talists. As for Protection, bow on earth can it profit the agricultural population of Ireland, three-fourths of the whole, to pay higher prices for English manufactures in order that a few Irish manufacturers may increase their gains, and (possibly) provide employment for a few hundred or a few thousand operatives P Irish agriculturists would, moreover, suffer in another way. Nearly everything they export comes to this country, and the surest way of diminishing exports is to lessen imports. It is conceivable, too, that the English democracy would demand the levying of retaliatory duties on Irish produce, and in the unhappy event of a war of tariffs between the two countries, the smaller would be the more likely to come off second-best.
Yet, albeit Mr. Daunt is at fault with his political economy, and a too-fervent patriotism makes him sometimes unfair, he has written a capital book,—a book that no Englishman can read without both profit and pain, for if we of this generation cannot justly be held responsible for deeds that were done before we came into being, there is no denying that English mis- government is the cause of Irish discontent. Though we may
be innocent in intention and in foot, it lies in the nature of things that the eine of the fathers should be visited on the children, and it behoves us to treat with all possible patience and indulgence a country which has suffered so much in times past at the hands of our ancestors. Of the brutal tyranny with which Ireland was ruled less than a hundred years ago—within the lifetime, and almost within the memories of men who are still with us in fact—Mr. Daunt gives many instances, of which the following, taken at random, is a sample :—
" Among the more zealous and prominent Orangemen whose deeds are recorded by Byrne, Mr. Hunter Gorvan, of Mount Nebo, and Captain Beaumont, of Hyde Park, hold a principal place. Of the former, Byrne gives the following anecdote := Hunter Gorvan, Justice of the Peace, captain of a corps of Yeoman Cavalry, knowing that Patrick Bruslann, a near neighbour of his, and with whom he had always lived on friendly terms, was confined to bed with a wound, rode to Bruslaun's house, knocked at the door, and asked Mrs. Bruslann in the kindest manner after her husband's health. "You see," he said, pointing to his troops drawn up at a distance from the house, "I would not let my men approach, lest they might do any mischief. Conduct me to your husband's room ; I want to have a chat with poor Pat." She, not having the least suspicion of what was to follow, ushered Gorvan to her husband's bedside. He put out his hand, and after exchanging some words with poor Brnslann, deliberately took out his pistol and shot him through the heart. Turning round on his heel, he said to the unfortunate woman, —"Yon will now be saved the trouble of nursing your damned rebel Popish husband." These details I had from Mrs. Braslann's lips; and how many more of the same kind could I not add to them, were it of any use now to look back to that awful epoch of English tyranny and slaughter in Ireland !' " This happened in 1798, and there can be no more doubt that the rebellion of that year was provoked by the grossest cruelty and oppression, than there can be that the Irish people were fully justified in rising against their oppressors. Thirty years later, Catholic Emancipation was conceded by a Tory Government, not as a measure of justice, but under threats of violence, and to avoid civil war. And still that odious badge of ascendency, an alien Church, was upheld, and that system of land-tenure maintained which divorced the people from the soil they tilled, and placed the masses at the mercy of a caste who wrung from the wretched peasants all, save a bare subsistence that their labour produced. It is only since the downfall of the old Toryism that Ireland has been dealt with on the principles of justice. No wonder the process of reconciliation is slow and difficult, and that the end seems still far off ; but if we persist in treating Ireland justly, and even more than justly, if, above all we create that system of land-tenure which the economic situation of the country and the genius of her people alike require, the time must come when the sister-Kingdoms will be able to live together in unity and peace. We do not think Mr. Daunt's book is likely to promote this object. He is a partisan of disruption, and we believe that dis- ruption would bring upon Ireland greater evils than those which he so much deplores. Nevertheless, his work is a timely and valuable addition to the literature of contemporary history and Irish politics, and is almost essential to a right comprehension of the Irish Question. He is, moreover, a capital raconteur, and readers who do not like his opinions can hardly fail to be instructed by his facts and amused by his stories.
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