THE ORGY OF MURDER.
(To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."3
SIE,—The same day (May 21st) that I read this article in your columns, I read in Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry (1830), by William Carleton—a most patriotic Irishman and a delightful critic and admirer of his countrymen—by the mouth of the Rev. Mr. O'Brien, the Catholic priest : "They are cer- tainly a strange people, almost an anomaly in the history of the human race. They are the only people who can rush out from the very virtues of private life to the perpetration of crimes at which we shudder." (From The Poor Scholar, p. 618, in the edition illustrated by Maelise.) Anyone who wants to understand the Irish character as interpreted by Irish men and women should (1) read this book, (2) see The White-Headed Boy, now playing at a London theatre. The latter, without a word of Irish politics, throws much light on them.—I am, Sir,
IL C.
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