New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1882-11-21
THO PLANS FOR IRISH RELIEF

In Mondays issue of The TRIBUNE appeared
communication from Mr.. We're Foster asking
sympathy, cooperation and aid for the work in
which he has been engaged for the last thirty
one years, of relieving the dIstresses of the
Irish people by promoting emigration from the
overcrowded districts of the West of Ireland
to the United States and Canada. In conse-
quence of the poverty and distress prevailing
there, he says, there is an intense desire,
amounting almost to a mania, for transatlantic
emigration, but that the people are without
the means to crafty their desires. lie has re-
ceived applications from $50 Roman Catholic
cleIgymen and from more than 200 Protestant
clergymen in behalf of 10000 girls, members
OF their congregations, between the ages Of
eighteen and thirty, the average being under
twentv-One, who desire to emigrate TO this
country or Canada. A very large number of
assisted passage tickets have been issued on
their account, but money is still needed. Mr..
Foster having expended upward of $l50,000 in
the cause, finds his own means nearly exhausted.
He accordingly appeals to "the numerous
"Irish-Americans who have realized positions
" of afiluence in the United States and in the
"Dominion Of Canada, for funds to enable him
"to crafty the desires of all poor girls of good
character and industrious habits who may
"wish to emigrate to America from the
Especially distressed districts of the West Of
Ireland" This is one plan for the re-
lief of ireland. There is no dynamite
in it, and it makes very little noise, but there
seems to be something quite practical in it. 1t
reaches people and actually helps them.
In the same issue of THE TRIBUNE appeared
the report of a meeting of persons who are
also anxious to do something for the relief of
distressed Ireland; men who are no doubt
quite in earnest in their professions of love
for their native land, since they have given
proof of it by contributing of their means to
carrying out the peculiar plans by which alone
they say the permanent welfare and prosperity
of the country can be secured. These
persons are subscribers to what is known
as the L" Skirmishing Fund.-" and are
known as the " Irish Skirmishcrs." They
met on Sunday in Third-ave. shirt
factory where they have been holding weekly
meetings for several months past. These
patriots are not now engaged in raising money
to carry out their plans. They have been
chiefly occupied during the past two or three
months in very earnest endeavor to find out
what has become of the money already raised.
The sklrmishing plan for the relief of Ireland
il much more ambitious than the one above
referred to, IN which Mr.. Foster is engaged.
1t occupies itself with the political woes of
the nation instead of the ply steal distress of
individuals its instrumentalities are warlike
and not charitable. The sum of $4,000,
or thereabOuts, is said to have been
raised to carry out the diminishing
programme. That programme, in brief,
is to carry on war against Great Britain in
nagging way, by stealthy and underhand
methods, by worrying and teasing by the use
OF dynamite bombs and internal machines, and
any and all appliances that carry destruction
and terror into communities at peace and by
tins means compel the British Government to
concede Irish independence. The practic-
ability of such programme hardly need DO