The Irish standard., 1916-06-03
The IRISH CRISIS

the due of every civilized nation in the
world.
The Imperial authorities alarmed
at the existing conditions and
the stubborn resistance shown by the
people to arbitrary measures realized
that it was time to take action to pro-
vide a remedy"
That is not from a Dublin despatch
concerning Asquith's visit to Dublin in
1916 1t is but an extract from
Boyds remarkably able study of 1887.
One is impelled to ask:
But will Asquith find another Dur
ham,"
If he does-then just as Padraic
Pearse, the poet-souled rebel, the pas
sionate lover of liberty, was another
and more spiritual Papineau-and as
ltoin MacNeil is another LaFontaine,
avoiding revolution-then the REPLICA
OF Sir George Etienne Cartier, the man
who will do for Ireland what Cartier
did to unity and strengthen Canada,
is---! But l will not share the in.
spiration farther than to say he is
not to be found on the benches of
Westminster. Like Cartier, he stood
among the Sim Fcins.
inc Canadian dailies Of May II, re.
produce Sheehy Sketlington's letter in
the New Statesman Cecil Chesterton's
weekly in London. The writer was
one OF the Sim Feins, who held to
their original doctrine, and opposed
this Easter revolt lie wrote on April
Z:
THE situation in Ireland is extreme.
~ grave. Thanks to the silence of
the daily press, the military authorl-
ties are pursuing their Prussian plans
III Ireland unobserved by the British
public, and when the explosion which
they have provoked occurs they will
endeavor to dcludc the British public
as to where the responsibility lies. |
write in the hope that despite the war
common sense left to restrain the mill
tarists while there is still time"
Poor Skcilngtons warning to the
Castle was as futile as his efforts to
restrain the insurrcctionist wing of
the Sim Fcns in the end, as his
tory will note. Skcflington was seizeo
and shot without Il trial by the very
MllltariSts against whom he had pro-
tested
A German intcrludc comes into this
drama OF Irish politics and rebellion
at the close. but it was as vague and
negligible as the French role in '9S, or
as the Russian part would be decades
hence IL Russia were contesting with
England Tor empire and Ireland were
still without responsible government.
FOR the passionate, reckless lovers of
liberty have appeared in every gener-
alton of Irish history down to the pres.
cnt, and will doubtless continue.
And ii is as true of the insurrection-
list wing Of lreland's Sim Feins in 1916
as it was of the Sim Fcins of Canada
in 1887: There are hundreds of brave
men today reduced to misery, whose
only crime was to place confidence in
tho land they loved" (Wolfred Mel
son. himself a Canadian patriot of
1881, speaking in the Assembly of
Lower Canada, of which he was
| moln1nr 1ftnr tbn rf
Which our Irish boys must soon get.
consider it Il most interesting
chance that | have met some of the
"cowardly Williams" held up to our
scorn by the Toronto lady.
did not go to Ireland looking for
Sim Feins (for ] knew as little of
them then as she does now, but with
few exceptions wherever ! met men of
outstanding brains-powcr and educa-
ton and independence of thought in
dublin met Sim Fem Just as
Chestcrton. Belloc, Shaw and their fol-
lowers, found to be the Sim Fein
intellcctuals Of LONDON. These last in
their war on party government, capital
and underpaid labor were more revo.
lutionary in their words and methods
than the Dublin and Belfast Sim
Feins
AS in London, there were women in
Ireland among the Sim Feins. They
were, like the men, by blood of old
Celtic stock, Anglo-lrish from the Pale,
Scotch-Irish from the North. They
were Catholic and Anglican, a few
Prcsbytcrians and Free-thinkers in re.
ligion. They came alike from old de-
mcsnes and cottages. But whatever
their Origin-men and women-they
We're one in race-feeling, as no other
group in the world is one. They were
advocates of temperance and the up
building of Irish industries "An Irish
Ireland" was their slogan-a homeland
in which the Irish tongue, laws and
customs should dominate in a bi-lin.
quail Ireland.
They were the most unselfish peo-
pie it has ever been my luck to meet
and the poorer ones would steadfastly
resist the lure of improved incomes in