New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1886-06-28
a STRANGE DLFENCE or RIOT.

|
The other day portion Of a sermon preached
at Belfast the Late riots in that city cabled
to The TRIBUNE. The preacher, the Rev. DR..
| Hugh Hanna, appears 10 have taken view Of
the disturbances which could only be justified
ON the suppostion that all the accounts Of the
Belfast riots hitherto given to .he world have
been deliberate falsifcatons. DR.. Hanna is re-
ported as saying: "The loyal celebration of
victory enraged the Government, which,
"traiiorous TO its trust, has slaughtered our
"peope." Now, according to all the reports
which have appeared, what Dr. Hanna here
styles a loyal celebration Of victory y" was a
ferocous assault upon :averns and houses kept
a0d occupied by Catholics All attack whicn
went the length of arson. pillage, and assault TO
murder; an attack made, as has been cy-
pressly and repeatedly stated, not by the decent
people of Belfast bat by the criminal and law
less element" the scum of the city," in fact,
as the reporters and correspondents rut It,.
This scum, infamed by liquor, with which the
kennels were flowing. proceeded to the most
abominable excuses, aud it was only after the
police had battled with the furious mob for
hours, aud when danger Of general incendiarism
was imminent, that recourse WAS had TO the
rigorous measures which al last succeeded.
| Considering that Oy er one hundred houses are
said to have been destroyed or sacked, or bDih
during the not, that scores Of policemen were
seiionly if not fatally iDj ured, that but for the
gallant perseverance of the authorities the
Whole city would apparently have been at the
mercy of frantic gang Of desperadoes, nothing
more astonishing than the version of the affair
advanced by Dr. Hanna can well be conceived
Hp Is " Inn of
"victims who succumbed last "Wednesday under
the murdcrous fire of Mr.. Morley's militia pre-
scented higher and hober type of character
than Mr. Morley" Now what manLer of men
were these victims Y According to the re-
ports, they belonged to a mob of OraD geincn Who
we're so little representatives of the order that
a local Orange leader offered to take thousand
law abiding Orangemen aud put down the rot
ers. Also according to the reports the police
authorities were so reluctant to fire upon the
mob that the latter was permitted to attain
threatening proportions before buckshot was
resorted to- These loyal celebrations had
wrecked a hundred houses, DESTROYED quanti-
ties Ut property, burned three taverns, besieged
the police barracks, burned Gladstone and
Parneli in etiigy. filled the streets with shouts
of To Hell with the Pope" battered the police
with paving stones, and spread terror and de-
vasiation throughout Belfast.
The victims" were part and parcel of this
bowling savage, reckless. lawless mob YET "A
clergyman gets up i'll his pulpit and dcnounces
the Government which, in the performance OF
the plalnest duty, and for tue protection of the
whole community, caused measures to be taken
which resulted in their death. 1t must be SAID
that If it could be- believed that The Rev. ID.
Hanna fairly represented The educated people
OF the North of Ireland. the prospect OF settling
the Ulster question peaceaby and ratlnnaily
would be less hopeful than We hold il To be Ia
realty. AS the case stauds, the OIangemen have
been seriously compromised by the element
which they cannot control. That kind OF thing
is liable to happen to all org Mutations, but
when 1t does happen right minded men at once
clear their skirts by repudiaiIng the wrong
done. The only possible way of accounting Ion
DR.. Hannas wild and whlrlng words " is by
assuming that the ecent excitement prov ed loo
much for him. Bat the people of Ulster GER
iainly cannot afford TO have the world cOncl ude
that they sympathize with the late atrocious
outbreak ut Belfast, or that they are fifty repre-