The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1906-02-10

fed and groomed than you or I, said
to myself it's not for nothing the New
York Herald is damning this man.
There's little sign of starvation under
his skin. But. when the other man.
poor Dillon, came along with hunger
written in every line of his face,
said: 'Ah, that's different PROPOSE
ton; there's the Irish famine right
there-and my 800 bill wouldn't wait
in my pocket
In casting sidelights upon Fenian
times, OBrien shows how the British
forces in the country were honey
combed with sedition. I'm the harvest
Of '65 there were twenty regiments Of
militia and, at the least, eight regi-
ments of regulars at the call OF any
daring spirit who should seize the
Pigeon-House, Cork and Clonlnel bar
racks, where the garrison were sworn
friends. There were about $780, 900 men
in the country painting for the arms
that would thus have been placed in
their hands" The rising proper did
not come off-there were plenty of
men, but no guns. 1t is sad picture
which Mr.. O'Brien draws of the gall
liant men who did turn out in their
thousands upon that awful March
|night-turned out upon the 1lillsides
to defy England, her arms and arna-
ments of regulars at the call of any
eve of the rising, William O'Brien's
brother Jim, who was one of the
"boys" borrowed from him a couple
Of shillings to set free from pawn the
captains topcoat!
OF O'Donovan Rosa, who has come
back from America to fill a post under
the Cork City Council, O'Brien re-
counts how, while he was felon in an
English Jail, his hands chained behind
his back, and he for thirty-three days
obliged to lap up his food with his
tongue like dog, they elected him for
Tipperary against the combined power
Of wings, tories, parsons and priests.
The clergy ran Catholic Sergeant
Heron for the county. A Flying
Brigade" Of the Fenians, under cover
perary men. The wings and clergy
supplied cars to bring the Tipperary
farmers into the hustings in Clonmel,
where Sergeant Heron (the favorite)
strode about wearing flaming green
necktie. They laughed at the candi-
dature of the Fenian convict, taking it
as clumsy joke. The farmers were
mustered in long professions by the
priests under escorts of lancers, to vote
for the whig candidate. They were
met outside the town by bands of en-
thusiastic men at whose signal the
pollers jumped off the cars and, with
a whoop, rushed to the polling booths
to give their votes for O'Donovan
Rosa, and the long file of empty cars
were left with their escorts of lancers,
to make their foolish entry through
the jeering crowds. When the poll
closed, the grand total of ten votes
had been recorded for the candidate
in the green cravat. The convict who
was chained like a dog and consuming
his food like one in an English prison.
was the chosen Of Tipperary.
Election anecdotes are apropos just
now, and the "Recollections" supply
us with some very readable ones.
The great John Mitchell, ex-felon,
elected for Tipperary over thirty years
ago when he was still in the United
States, was disqualified by the govern
ment on the ground that he was an
unpardoned political prisoner. OBrien
says that, even If he had been disquali-
fed, "he would never have presented
himself at Westminster, except to de-
liver some message of defiance, full
gurant as the magnificent prose cam
nonade with which he had shaken the
towers of Dublin Castle to their base in
'4s. The people who sent him to the
House Of Parliament, indeed, demanded
nothing better of their representative
than that he should go there to break
its windows-if he could do no more