The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1865-03-24

upon us for zoo years-British tyranny. on,
were we but free, then We would truly be good,
for there are In the Irish people, the ttmbers 20
build the finest vessel of state that ever foated.
Now, what are we abroad? According -
the influences, to which we are subjected, are
favorable or contrary to the development of the
are we more or less virtuous. Alas often it
can be said, we are better people at home than
abroad. Religion in general Is benefited by
the expatriatiOn of the Irish: wherever we 20,
we carry with the shamrock the cross of our
Saviour. But to many of the Irish themselves,
it is positive loss, that they should ever have
been Obliged to leave the old land. 1t has been
said that this expatration is Proyidential
eyent-not 90, that 1t is directly brought
around by Providence-but in this, that from
evil God draws good, and in view of this good,
tolerates for awhile evil The Improvement
of Ireland Is the cause that sends US adrift on
the wide sea of the world, and from my heart
do sigh for the happy day when my country
men may remain at home. Nowhere does
flower bloom so well as IN its native soil. In
Ireland we tread o sacred soil, we breathe an
atmosphere of piety: we must needs be good.
For the exile the scene changes, and here
again, if talk of the faults of the Irish, must
add, they are the results of their sad position,
rather than the effects of their own inherent
dispositions. See the dangers to which they
are exposed: they cross the ocean In crowded
emigrant ship; they arrive in strange land,
friendless and penniless. Our poor girls must
60 from door to door, asking # their help y
needed, and often rudely pushed away, because
tiers Of princes and saints. Our young men are
reduced to work on rivers, railroads and canals
they, who, had they but served the Invaders
cause, would have retained their princely cas-.
ties and wide demesnes. They remain desti-
tute, without means of instruction, without
friends to advise them, often without priests to
encourage them, sacraments to f0rtify them,
surrounded by the most malign Influences.
Hence some fall, and when they do fall, they
fall low they despair, after the c0mmittal Of
acts which others would take as slight occur
rences, and they seek in excess partial solace.
No doubt the reports Of Irish degeneracy,
which we sometimes read in public print, are
exaggerated. s.i.1 2.
DR.. Mayhem, an English writer, has exam
ined the police reports of London; many of
the guilty were marked down as Irish. What
were the offences? "Heaving stones, stealing
trifes, drinking, quarrelling, or making noise"
And the same may be said of the reports of
any city where Irish names figure. OF all peo-
pies, we certainly come in for the largest share
of Justice, and the smallest of mercy. Our
faults are all visible; we are punished for all
of them. Crimes more hideous, we are innoA
cent Of others, who are guilty Of such, do not
show them in public. Hence we are put down
as beneath them in the moral scale. Crimes,
that the reports seem to ignore, to which the
world gives credit, are worse in their effects
than thousand minor offences. Forget not,
too, that even in the courts of justice, there is
by times favored class, and the poor are not
omong the favored. And those who speak so
scornfully of the faults Of the Irish, are those
very ones, perhaps, who have spread the trap
to ensnare us, the bait to entice us, who enjoy
the wages of crime, while we have the misery
and the shame
As a people, however. even on foreign
strands we are good; we possess the same
virtues with which we were adorned at home
lively faith, generosity, purity of morals, &c,
! &c. Where will you find class so pure, so
| virtuous, so charitable as our Irish girls. Our
Irishmen, living in country places especially,
| are good; for they are removed from the
| causes, which so freqently degrade US in large
cities. Not few of our people are better thar
they were at home, for besides their primitive
virtues, they have here, what they did moi
have there, liberty, and an open field to
their ambition. In conclusion we might
ask, if fyou take Irishmen as they are, with
their virtues and faults, who would blush
| to have for brothers and sisters the sons and
daughters of Erin? faT -
The speaker flashed by an earnest appeal to
his hearers to be good, to avoid the causes
| which lead to their degradation, and to follow
| the path, which elevates them. "IfI forget
thee, o Erin, let my right hand be forgotten,
Let my tongue cleave to my joys, if do not
| make my Erin the beginning of my joy Erin
mavOurnin, Erin 90 braghG, s ..