The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-08-24 00:00:00

WHAT IS IT ALL FOR?

(Frrm The Time,: of Wednesday.)
"Civil War still rages In Belfast." Such is our summary I
of intelligence from the most prosperous City in Ireland. 1
Oar Correspor dent may well say that it is hard for persous at !
a aistance so understand the state of things be describes. A
weee ago Belfast was like an) other busy manufacturing
city in Great Britain. Thousands of hand. were profitably ,
emploved hi nines and wareheuses, ship carpenters were
earning good wages, the shops were thriving, and there were
no signs of anything but the peace and prosperity of a
very yrospero. season. Since Thursday the city has been
divided between two frantic mobs, eater to fail upon each
other with ten times the fury of enemies in ordinary warfare,
and only kept asunder by a cunaiderable (emelt dragoons, foot
soldiers, and police. The Mayor proclaims to all peaceable in-
habitants that they most keep within their house.. The mill
hands and warehousemen are unable to go to their employ-
ment ; the 'ship carpetters are forbidden to go in a body, and
dare test go singly ; no man's life %safe in the streets, and the
spirit of wholesale plunder is let loose. All this, too, it will be
observed, is nat like an English Election tight- a 'roe', ' and
notbieg more, however rough for the moment; it is grim
reality. The two parties &stark eaeh. other in deaoly
earnest, and consider they have all the sanctions of religion
for mutual hatred. Separated in one place, they gather in
another arid s dew the battle, an 1 there are daily returns of
the killed and wounded by bullets, sword, and bludgeons.
Oar Coirespendent gives a Let of souse thirty casualties
admitted into the General Hospital alone fluting two
days, and other cases have, of cosine, been treated
at home. It reads like a retuns of the wounded ii se
stetson, except in respect of tee sufferers. There are
buint wounds, sword wounds, amputations, extractions
but there are women and children I.lllollg the manned.
And no wonder, for the sternest are among the fiercest
of the rioters. While the two hostile rtl9/13 meet on their
battle-ground, the women on each ride provide supplies
of ammunition by piling stones, and excite thr ir champions
try taunts, ehnek.• and imprecations. Even when the
soldiers separate tee combatants, scenes are thrown over
the beads of the intervening force. Sometimes—a singular
re fl.ctien of Irish history—the foes make commen cause to
get rid of the defenders of the peace, and thee fall
upon each other again with renew ed energy. When
they can do nothing else, they take to wrecking the
houses it the adverse party. The public houses are
closed by order of the Mayor hut the mob break Into them
at pleasure and obtain as much liquor as they like; and
" alcoholic poisoning" is returned from the Hospitals as
one of the casualties. In short, Belfast is not merely in a
state of war, it is the scene o. a prolonged pitched battle.
What is the occasion for all this fury, ruin, and blood-
shed 1 roperly speaking, nothing at all. Belted is, indeed,
a city of te o camps. The Protestants dwell in one quarter,
and the Roman Catholics in another, and their line, are
as clearly defined as de German and French frontier.
When war has broken out, as la this instance, an
miict of expuldon is passed against the Protestants
' in the Catholic district, or against the Catholics in
, the Protestant camp, and the enemies are warned to remove
, on pain of lideroing their propeity, if not their lives. But
, nothing had actssally been done, or for that matter, could be
. done, by cue side to the injury of the other, tip to last
' Thum say Ihe two were living mad working side by aide, males
their profit out of the same trade, es Ting the protem
' Hon of the same lawn If a Protestant Injured
• ROM= Catholic or a Catholic a Protestant, justice would be

done between the two with undoubted Impartiality.
There wat 10 Parliamentary or Municipal contest In I ro-
terms ; there was nothing to fight for, nothing to win or lose.
There was not even the excuse of resisting an illegal deume•
stration. The Legislature thought the other day it would
try the experiment of allowing each party to relieve its
tuppressed emotions by unrestricted demonstration. The
Protestants, it was thought, might shout Cod save
the Queen" and "No Shreendi.r " one day until thi ir
hiyalty WAS cittifted or exhausted and the Roman
Catholics might flaunt disloyal emblems and sing F Ithim
songs the next day until they, too, had let off their steam.
Bic it provi 'that neither party is contented with licence for
Itself on'ese it can refuse It to the r ther, and the Proterants
are the more intolerant of the two. They hat their proees
aionson the lamella itth, and the Apprentica Rots nt Derry
were capable of ree the corresponding right of the
Catholics on the 15th. But at Belfast the histility ot the
tno factions Is too intense to he sutoresred hy atiyilting
short of for,. The Romoi ea.holies sh swe.i thermeavie iii
proorosion, their old to, a at Ore, Et.tiCked the., E.
hsttle heels, • gonna I il,r9 I. tons nothing ell atiev
account fr this °utter st of civ 1 war except no chron-c
amouldeeing haired of the two buil on: Etch is always
ready and eager to spring at tho olh• ru throat, 1,1
nanexcuee Is welcome. What v-e se, revealed In these
its is not an exceptional excitement, bat the permanent
and ordinary conlition of I WI soctety wherever Cathollos
and Protestants encounter each ot er oil anything file equal
terms Sea-interest, the rove:My 1.1 thrir commnitity.
object., at, go for nothing. Tit, dominant minion
the lireget of It ish me!. of a 1 foe tonal,lstood GI all others,
and delLltt In cowing to bt.ws anti them
.•

This, err eople whom we are imitei to Wwdhe by
"legislation according to le: h Ideas," by surrende,ing their
destinina Into their own hands, and only interfering so far as
to Any op their railways f, them, 4.r lend them any Mb r
smell rums of annoy their local wis Corn may think wont I
profit them Iridi ideals are unfortunately, conir.sed of two
directly contradictory conceptions. Ore idea is that all
Roman Catholics ahould be extirpated ; the other, that all
Protestants should Intake themselves to the Proteatant
parts of the Etupire, and love the Catholic peasant, farther,
and landlwd alone with their priests. 'the i lea that the two
factions should live together in at le.t p il peace is
purely English, and in totally beyond trial apprehension.
Our Statesmen have been perplexing themselves for at tact
a hundred years with the problem of establishing
harmony in Ireland. In old uaya we, too, had tried the
Sri h plan of extirpating an obnoxious faction. We gave eta
sufficiently severe trial, and we found it hnpractie ilde. At
last we fairly recognised the necessity of Protestants
and Roman Catholics living together, and we set ourselves
in earnest to render such common life peaceable. Gradually
we have placed the two parties on a perfect equality, and
we have endeavoured to remove front the Government and
Constitution event ring that could recall old drvi,ions
But we no sooner abrogate a restrictive law than the old
animosity hunts out again as fieroely as ever. What is the
, lesson 10 1* drown? By no means that the equal legislati.m we
have lately pursued h a mistake. Colesa hy means of it we put
ourselves r.ght between the too parties, we can never act
with impartial retro,s towards each. But we may be use.
fully warned against the temptation ot perpattrally inventing
• new legislative remedier. When one concession hair failed
we try another, and are always in search of the true and
final Irish idea. But it is vain to expect different fruit so
long as tie tree remains the same. Having made up our
nitride what is really just and expedient for Ireland, we must
be content to stand by it, and be aatiated to uphold order and
law while the people are growing out of their evil traditions
It needs the lapse of generations to cradle de such #llliMo9i-
ties as those of Belfast. Time is our only safe ally and all
we can do is to see that time is not lmt by such mischievous
revivals of the old mal cdv an the present outhreAk. They or
any other riots should be put down at ma% at all coats nut
they will have done some send,o if they remind our states-
men that the one thing Ireland now nerds Ins strong hand
steadily and patiently applied.