Correspondence
A LETTER FROM DUBLIN.
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Rather let me say, A chara, as now is the fashion. This Gaelic phrase means, " 0 friend," and it is used habitually by Free State officials. " 0 friend, I am instructed to advise you that if you do not pay the current instalment of your Income Tax by next week . . ." " 0 friend, I have received your dastardly communication of the 5th inst." They might omit that sardonic apostrophe and use the real Gaelic for " Dear Sir," viz., A dhuine choir.
I have read recently two works that I would recommend to everyone who is interested in the new Ireland. One is the late Donn Byrne's Hangman's House, which he wrote after his return to Ireland, and described as the last romantic Irish novel. He declared his wish to set on record, ere the memory died, his vision of the Ireland that is gone, with its hunts and its races, its half-feudal life, and its romantic Fenian tradition running like a contrasting thread through the web. Right well he did it, in a happy, wholesome book, which yet has wistful notes. The other work is Mr. Lennox Robinson's play The Big House, just published by Macmillan's. This depicts the passing of half-feudal, Anglo-Irish houses with all the 'poignancy of intense personal feeling.
• Not all that these two Writers lament, the one in romantic, the other in tragic, vein, is gone for ever. Dan Russell still goes to his death with ceremonial retinue, and the caravans Of side-cars still thread their way along the country roads to the race meetings. Still, the Big House never again will pour forth its cornucopia of hospitality in the fashion that the Anglo-Irish gentry took over from the great Gaelic captains, the O'Dwyers of the Glen and the like. The houses that nursed the heady life and the wasteful virtues (and vices) now are passing to the Church. Ireland is becoming another Thebaid.
There was an interesting debate at University College, Dublin, recently, which was attended by leading represen- tatives of the two Nationalist groups. Here the mind of the young intellectuals was revealed. The chief speaker addressed himself very pointedly to the eminent politicians present, and told them that the young men of his generation were sick of the gun. They had grown up during the recent struggles.
The murder of Mr. Kevin O'Higgins a year ago completely quenched all taste for revolutionary methods. As far ahead as we can see Ireland will be the most sober of nations. The young men of the debate made clear that they were earnest for a virile and intensive national life ; but they sought it in letters, the drama, industry, scholarship.
Irish progress, then, is steering towards a new goal. The young men may not produce for years to come leaders who will move the masses ; but they are preparing themselves. The excellent Celtic scholarship of the universities is enriching Irish life with matter for pride and interest. This is seen in Dr. Macalister's new book on Irish archaeology (which summarizes what an enthusiastic school studies in detail), and in Dr. O'Rahilly and Miss Knott's recently published and most humanistic books on Irish letters.
Among the young creative writers there has arisen a revolt against the masters called the Yeatsian School, who have ruled Irish criticism so long. A flash of this was seen in the recent O'Casey controversy, although Mr. O'Casey stands in a class by himself. Mr. Daniel Corkery is the prophet of the younger men. These young men bring to their writings on Celtic themes a more exact knowledge—they do not confound all tradition in a vague twilight—but they owe to the older writers more than they usually admit.
While thus the country is groping for a new vision to fill the place of the lost romanticism of the Big Houses, in the more tangible world strange developments are taking place. These are best seen at Limerick, where the great Shannon works are nearing completion. Excursions are run from all parts of the country to enable people to view the tremendous turbines before (in a few months) the waters are admitted to the race. Never was anything so like the work of fabulous giants seen in Ireland as this terrific remoulding of a river basin and a countryside. All over the country, too, the suspended cables are running in lines as straight as Roman roads, over hill and glen, giving a strange new air of human conquest to the scenery. Still more, in a way, is the change concentrated in the recurring sight of a German liner in Galway Bay. From the ancient, city, with its crumbling Spanish walls and its Gaelic-speaking folk in their old-world attire, you see the modern world floating in, between you and the curving hills of Clare. Galway once more is on the map.
People are beginning to talk of German economic pene- tration. Besides the Shannon works and the calling of a German liner and the air link- forged by Baron von Huenefeld; there are many signs of German enterprise in the country. Recently a resident of Killarney, needing a house, -imported one—a spacious, handsome building—from Hamburg, and it now stands beside the Kenmare road, the admiration of all. German enterprise is good in so far as it gives to an economic- ally backward country something that it never before pos- sessed ; and true it is that the German character is the precise complement of the more imaginative and less materially practical Irish nature. On the other hand, young Ireland has no desire to play the part of a mere labour reservoir for foreign exploitation. The trouble is that the race still fails to produce men with the gifts of the economic entrepreneur, able to grapple with hard matter and money. The young men's pleasant dreams will wither, if they do not find some among themselves to take the lead in commercial and industrial affairs.
Hope, however, for the uprise of what I may call a sense of the practical is excited when we contemplate the work done by some of the Government departments—especially those of agriculture and local government. The achievement of the latter department in the matter of the roads, through en- lightened direction and earnest, loyal service, is prodigious. I have driven over almost the whole of the country, and everywhere I have found roads worthy of the most advanced modern State, although three years ago we had what were called (with Irish relish) " the worst in Europe." FroM Enniscorthy to Wexford lies a new road, recently opened, Which is said to be the longest piece of concrete highway in the British Isles. The present road system of the Free State is almost disproportionately good ; for, although . omnibus services have sprung into being that link all corners of the country together, the actual volume of transport is small.
We are expecting in the second week of August a " record " Horse Show. This is an event that brings romantic Ireland to life. After the Horse Show, the Tailteann Games open for the second time. They were celebrated in 1924 for the first time since the twelfth century. It was a happy notion to settle on the revival of a festival of sport and letters as the emblem of the renaissance of the race ; for the Irishman is not born, of any creed or stock, to whom these do not appeal. Ireland is seen at her best in- this guise. For myself, I look forward with special interest to the boat-racing that is to be held on the Shannon above Athlone. It is not generally known that at Athlone some of the fastest motor boats in these islands are built. With the Horse Show and the Games, and with capital roads to beckon the motorist over bogland and moor to the mountainy West, Ireland will be a good place to live in or to visit this August season.—I am, Sir, &c., YOUR DUBLIN CORRESPONDENT.
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