THE GRAND MISUNDERSTANDING.
fTo ins Enema or ras " SPILM708."1 Suh—In the Spetfator of November 17th " M. T. II." says that in the spring of 1911 he saw reports in the Belfast newspapers of remarks made publicly at Unionist meetings in Portadown and other places that if Great Britain should throe' over the Ulster Protestants they intended to call in the German Emperor as the chantpion of Protestant liberties. I should be very glad if he *Mild give-the references to the Belied newspapers. Nationalists- have often made- the same charge, but I have never seen a reference given, nor have I succeeded in finding out where, when, Or by when) the alleged remarke were made.
If the Ulster Unionists really intended to obtain German aid, they were very slow about doing so, and allotted their opponents to'get before theta. So long ago as 1909 Captain Condon came from America to tour in Ireland as the guest of Mr. Redmond. He explained to delighted audiences that the Irish in America bad already made a compact with the Germans there, and that in the event of a war between England and Germany the Irish and Germans in America would be united in opposing England. In January, 1916, Mrs Sheehy Skeffington reported at a large meeting in Diffilin that the Germans in America were not much in touch with the Irish before the' war, but since it began they had profited so' much by Irish assistance and advice that their opinion of the Irish was very high. Again, some time before the war, Major McBride at a public meeting expressed a hope that the Germareewould disembark one hundred thousand rifles in Ireland before they attacked England. It was shown by the evidence given before the Royal Commission on the Rebellion that the guns which were landed at Howth in July, 1914, were German guns; and that German guns and expanding bullets were used by the rebels. When the war began,. the Government not only revoked the Order forbidding the importation of arms into Ire- land, but instruoted the British Minister at the Hague to facilitate the Irish National Volunteers in obtaining possession of the guns they had stored- there. The evidence given before the Commission also showed that many of the rifles and much of the ammunition captured from the rebel's were German; and that German money had been supplied through the Clan-na-Gael and other Irish societies in Germany. So, whilst allegations are being made that the Ulstermen intended to call in aid from. Germany, the one fact that is proved is that their opponents did so.—I em, Sir, &c., Umottutr.
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