be more industrious than the more pastoral population of Munster:-the land is poorer, and demands more diligent labour. In the South, or even in the same Munster county, let us say of Limerick or Tipperary, those who live in mountainous or poor land are, as a matter of fact and as a matter of necessity, more industrious than those who dwell in the fertile districts of the plain where they can leisurely look on as the grass grows and the cattle fatten.

A few years ago I heard a well-known priest, given to making economics without facts, say, that "what we want in Ireland is, to have a number of Scotch farmers brought over and placed here and there through the country, as models from whom Irish farmers could learn how to farm their lands with profit." "Yes," replied a distinguished Ecclesiastic who was present, and who thought that facts should govern economics, "I remember a number of them who did come over. They held fine farms, farmed them after your more perfect way, and got 'broken.' There is not one of them left. Every Irish farmer knows, from his experience and from the tradition of his father before him, what every field of his farm can do. His difficulty is, not want of knowledge which of course may be improved-but want of capital, and want of security."

Stanley wrote in 1833 of the state of things amongst the cottiers of the North:-"People cannot think of cleanliness and order, who for the most part have not habitations fit for human beings, or sufficient food. Some reviewers of Ireland have supposed that the Roman Catholic religion is the cause of these habits; as in the North, the working classes professing other religions are in a more comfortable condition. The difference there has no doubt arisen from the religious influences which obtained advantages for the few not extended to the many. Almost all the cottiers in the

North professing the reformed religions, got with their cottages a small quantity of ground, and were weavers. While the cottiers professing the Catholic religion were for the most part field labourers. This made all the difference in their condition."

*

Let us now turn from agriculture to manufactures. I have already related that Crommelin, one of the linen manufacturers who were brought over to Ulster from France in 1700, agreed to promote his industry in the South, if his patent were extended; but Government refused the condition. An Act of Parliament made in 1706, speaks as follows:-" Forasmuch as the Protestant interest in Her Majesty's kingdom of Ireland ought to be supported by giving the utmost encouragement to the linen manufactures of that kingdom, Her Majesty is graciously pleased in tender regard to her good Protestant subjects of her said kingdom, and for the further encouragement of the linen manufactures thereof, to allow Irish manufactured linen to be shipped to the English colonies." In 1742, Parliament granted a bounty on British and Irish linens. That is how Belfast was made, how "the strenuous qualities" of Protestantism were brought out, and how "the civic virtues and efficiencies" came to be found in the North. The economic changes of the past half century have depressed agricultural industry, have destroyed those home industries which in the past generation prevailed over Ireland, and have turned the people towards those industrial centres which, when machinery came into play, had already grown strong enough to take advantage of it. Hence the rapid growth of Belfast during the nineteenth century; and the introduction of ship-building has helped to expand it more. Now, let me introduce the following facts as jewels into the setting I have just made. They *Commentaries on Ireland The Cloncurry Prize Essay, page 313.

are twelve years old, but that does not lessen their value as evidence :-Of 29,798 males employed in the linen factories of Belfast, only 8,120 are Catholics; of 57,262 females, 20,773 are Catholics. The number of persons employed in the ship-building industry is 3,331, of whom only 443 are Catholics. The Local Government of Ulster has in its service 1,192 male and 230 female officials; and of these only 199 males and 56 females are Catholics. But, in spite of evictions and Protestant Colonisation Schemes, old and new, out of 154,876 farmers in Ulster, 87,453, or over 56 per cent. are Catholics. There are in all 314,372 persons engaged in agricultural industry in Ulster, and of these 179,684, or 57 per cent. are Catholics.

But, setting all consideration of these Catholic disabilities aside, and looking at actual facts as to thrift, prosperity, industry, culture, and the other civic virtues which, we are told by Sir Horace, find their home in the North, let us see how matters stand. Taking the Income-tax paid as a basis of comparison, the following table made from the Income-tax assessment used by the Home Office, and presented to Parliament in 1882, shows: :

Leinster pays per head of the population ... £10 6 9

That comparison shows how things were before the rest of Ireland began to benefit by tenant-right which the Protestants of Ulster had been enjoying for three centuries. Comparing Dublin and Belfast, the former was charged £102,609, and the latter only £40,736 Incometax. Comparing Londonderry and Waterford, which have about an equal population, the former was assessed at £3,981, and the latter at £6,253.

The following Table shows the Income-tax on profits

made in professions and trades:

And Mr. "There is

Again, at a conference of flax-growers and flax-spinners held in Belfast on June 7th, 1900, Mr. R. H. Reade, D.L., who presided, said in the course of his speech, that "the growth of flax will be an extinct branch of agriculture in this country unless means are taken to arrest its downward progress," and he recommended the Belgian methods of flax culture, in order to improve the quality to the proper degree of fineness. Anderson, Secretary of the I.A.O.S., said: no need for me to point out that the flax industry is declining; one has only to take the statistics showing that the area under flax has diminished from 200,000 acres to 34,000 or 35,000 acres.” The growers, the scutchers, and the spinners assign different causes for the decline of the industry, and in general they blame one another. But the fact, at any rate, is, that the spinners of Belfast spend £3,000,000 a year in the purchase of foreign flax. Mr. Anderson agrees with Mr. Reade that the strenuous industrialists of Ulster would do wisely to go and learn flax culture from the industrialists of Catholic Belgium.

The Protestants of Ireland are at present paying the natural penalty of past monopoly, in their want of industrial efficiency. Competition is the life of trade, and they had no competitor in Ireland. But, as competition comes on them from at home or from abroad, it finds them lying fallow. In relation to their Catholic fellowcountrymen they are trying to live on their reputation

*Statistics taken from A Word for Ireland, by T. M. Healy, M.P., pages 155, et seq.

for business ability, as their colleges used to live on their educational prestige till the Catholic colleges, having got an opportunity of measuring merits with them, made the bubble burst. Their industrialism was a growth forced by favouritism; and their reputation had not an absolute value, but only shone out on the industrial apathy of the Catholics, who for generations put out little energy because they were left little hope. Let us take two illustrations which have come before the public during these days. The Provincial Bank is almost exclusively managed by Protestants, and all its Directors except one are English or Scotch; yet during the past halfyear, its profits have fallen by £8,000, and its deposits by £92,000, whilst the business of the Munster and Leinster Bank, which is managed mostly by Catholics, has improved. The Midland Railway which is managed in the same manner, shows similar signs of mismanagement. On the other hand, the County Councils have gained much praise from many and high quarters for the administrative and constructive ability they have shown. I have seen it stated somewhere that Lord Dunraven has given the Limerick County Council credit for a keener and clearer insight into their work than the London County Council. The Great Southern and Western Railway is also notoriously managed by Protestants, and yet the value of its stock has fallen to an alarming degree. But how did they meet the difficulties and criticisms which aggrieved shareholders set before them at their recent meeting? They parried them with "We have come here to do business; we are men of business and we cannot waste time over those trifles." They parry appeals for proportionate Catholic representation on the Directorate with-" This is a non-sectarian meeting; we cannot allow religious matters to be discussed." That is, their spirit of sectarianism having manned the directorate with their own,