Books: Irish Race in the Past and the Present

A >> Aug. J. Thebaud >> Irish Race in the Past and the Present

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III. The result arrived at by his inquiries among liquor-dealers
in that part of London inhabited by about equal numbers of both
nationalities, Mr. Mayhew gives us as twenty to one in favor of
the Irish with respect to the consumption of liquor. In most
"independent," that is to say, "not impoverished" Irish families,
water is the only beverage at dinner, with punch afterward; and
estimating the number of teetotallers, among the English at
three hundred, there are six hundred among the Irish, who
constitute, it may be remembered, only one-third of the whole
costermonger class, and those Irish teetotallers, having taken
the pledge under the sanction of their priests, look upon it as
a religious observance and keep it rigidly. The number of Irish
teetotallers has been considerably increased since Mr. Mayhew
made his returns, in consequence of the energetic crusade
entered upon against drink by the zealous London clergy, under
the powerful lead of Archbishop Manning.

It is true that an innkeeper told Mr. Mayhew that "he would
rather have twenty poor Englishmen drunk in his tap-room than a
couple of poor Irishmen, who will quarrel with anybody, and
sometimes clear the room." But this remark, if it shows any
thing, shows only how and why the Irish have obtained that
reputation of being a nation of drunkards, which is slanderous
and false.

IV. Yet another, and perhaps as surprising a result as any, is
the contrast between both classes of people with respect to
economy and foresight: The English street-sellers are found
everywhere spending all their income in the satisfaction often
of brutish appetites; the Irish, on the contrary, save their
money, either for the purpose of transmitting it to their poor
relatives in Ireland, or bringing up their children properly, or-
-if they are young--to provide for their marriage-expenses and
home. Such cares as these never seem to afflict the English
costermonger. So strongly did Mr. Mayhew find these
characteristics marked among the Irish, that he is at times
inclined to accuse them of carrying them too far, even to the
display of a sordid and parsimonious spirit. According to him,
they apply to the various "unions," or to the parish, even when
they have money, or sometimes go with wretched food, dwelling,
or clothing, in order to have a small fund laid by, in case of
any emergency arising.

But the general result of his observations is clear: that the
Irish are most provident and far-seeing; a surprising statement,
doubtless, to the generality of Mr. Mayhew's readers, but one
which, after all, only accords with the testimony of many
unexceptionable witnesses of their life in other countries. And,
if in England, in London especially, they at times appear sordid
in their economy, is not this the very natural result of the
misery they had previously endured in their own impoverished
land, and therefore a proof that, at least, they have profited
by the terrible ordeals through which they were compelled to
pass?

We have spoken only of the Irish in London; the same facts are
most probably true of them in all the large cities of Great
Britain. Unfortunately, Mr. Mayhew's most interesting work has
found no imitators in other parts of the kingdom. F. Perraud's
remarks, however, in his "Ireland under English Rule," extend
almost over the whole country.

After giving his own experience, and that of many others whom he
had consulted, or whose works he had read; after having set
forth the dangers which beset the Irish in that (to them) "most
foreign country"--England--and also the success which had
attended the labors of many proselytizing agents among them, and
even in some cases the progress of immorality in their midst
resulting from the innumerable seductions to which they were
exposed, a success and a progress which Mr. Mayhew's personal
observation would lead us to think the good father has
exaggerated, he concludes as follows:

"We must not overlook the fact that the Irish emigration to
England and Scotland produces in many individual cases results
which cannot be too deeply deplored.

"But there, also, as well as in America and Australia, through
the economy of an admirable providence, God makes use of those
Irish immigrants for the propagation and extension of the
Catholic faith in the midst of English and Scotch Protestantism.
What progress has not the Catholic religion made within the last
thirty years in England? And might not the Catholics say to
their separated brethren what Tertullian said to the Caesars of
the third century: 'Our religion is but of yesterday; and behold,
we fill your towns, your councils, your camps, your tribes,
your decuriae, the palace, the senate, the forum . . . . You
have persecuted us during centuries, and behold, we spring up
afresh from the blood of martyrs!'

"At the beginning of the reign of George III., England and
Scotland scarcely contained sixty thousand Catholics who had
remained true to the faith of their fathers. Their number in
1821 was, according to the official census, five hundred
thousand. In 1842, they were estimated at from two million to
two million five hundred thousand. At present (1864) they number
nearly four million, and of this total amount the single city of
London figures for more than two hundred and fifty thousand."

In a note he adds the following figures, furnished him by Dr.
Grant, the late Bishop of Southwark:

Total No. of Catholics. No. of Irish.
Manchester . . . . . . . . . . . 80,000 . . . . . . 60,000
Liverpool . . . . . . . . . . 130,000 . . . . . . 85,000
Birmingham . . . . . . . . . . . 30,000 . . . . . . 20,000
Preston . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24,000 . . . . . . 4,300
Wigan . . . . . . . . . . . 18,000 . . . . . . 6,000
Bolton . . . . . . . . . . . 12,000 . . . . . . 4,000
St. Helen's (Lancashire) . . . . 10,000 . . . . . . 6,000
Edinburgh . . . . . . . . . . . 50,000 . . . . . . 35,000
Glasgow . . . . . . . . . . 127,000 . . . . . . 90,000

"Finally, we must not forget that about one-half the army and
navy is composed of Irish Catholics.

"In 1792 England and Wales counted no more than thirty-five
chapels; in 1840 the number amounted to five hundred, among
which were vast and splendid churches, such as St. George's,
Southwark, and the Birmingham Cathedral. At present (1864) the
number is nearly one thousand.

"In connection with the movement of individual conversions,
which yearly brings within our ranks from those of Protestantism
the most upright, the sincerest, the best-disposed souls, the
Irish immigration in England is then destined to play an
important part in the so desirable return of that great island
to the faith which she received in the sixth century from St.
Gregory the Great and St. Austin of Canterbury," and, let us add,
from Aidan and his Irish monks of Lindisfarne and Iona, as
Montalembert has shown.

If we examine closely the figures just furnished by F. Perraud,
and consider that the number of Catholics in Great Britain was
only five hundred thousand in 1821, which, following his
calculation, mounted to four million in 1864, if we look closely
into the gradations of the increase marked in the various
censuses taken between those dates, we shall find that the Irish
immigration has indeed played a most important part in the
return of England toward Catholicity. We are surprised to find
that he seems to estimate the number of Irish in England at only
one million; there can be no doubt that they and their offspring
compose the majority of Catholics there, and that many of the
Englishmen who come back to the true faith are induced by their
example and influence, particularly among the lower orders, and
that the real work of the conversion of the English nation rests
in the hands of the Irish immigrants. Mr. Mayhew has informed us
of the disposition of the English costermongers on religious matters.

We have now examined the three great waves which bore the Irish
to foreign countries; the lesser streamlets, which wandered away
into other English colonies, may be dismissed, as to trace and
follow up their course would involve more time and trouble than
they really call for. We now see the Irish race disseminated in
large groups over many and vast territories; and, although the
home population has been considerably diminished by that great
exodus, and is now reduced to about five millions, nevertheless,
to count them as they are dispersed throughout the world, their
number is far higher than it has ever been before; and we now
proceed to offer some considerations tending to show the effects
of that vast emigration on the resurrection of the race, and on
the future progress of the country from which the race comes.

First, then, emigration has given Ireland and Irishmen an
importance in the eyes of the world which they and it would
never have acquired unless that emigration had taken place; so
that England, on whom in a great measure their future fate
depends, is now compelled to respect and render them justice;
and justice is all that is wanting to bring about their complete
resurrection.

In order to form a true idea on this point, it is necessary to
consider them in their twofold aspect, as emigrants to the
United States, residing under and citizens of a government
distinct from that of England; and, secondly, in countries which
are under the control of Great Britain, one of these being
England itself.

In the Union they become for the greater part citizens of the
country which they have made their home, and the first condition
necessary for the obtaining of this right of citizenship is the
renunciation of all allegiance to their former English rulers.
The readiness and joy even with which they perform this task
need no mention. But, as Christians, the new obligations under
which they bind themselves involve something more than the mere
oath of allegiance; the spirit no less than the letter of the
oath prescribes that they acknowledge no other country as theirs
than that which offered them a refuge, and consequently, by the
very fact of becoming American citizens, they cease to be
Irishmen.

But their oath does not bind them to forget their former country,
as little as it forbids them to benefit it as far as lawfully
lies in their power. Far otherwise. Their new allegiance would
indeed be a poor thing if, in its very conception, it could only
bind hearts so cold as to renounce at once all affection for the
land of their birth, and banish in a day memories that the day
before were sacred. This is not required of them; and, were it,
they could never so understand their allegiance. They remain,
and justly, firmly attached to Ireland, and look anxiously for
any lawful occasion on which they may manifest their affection
by their acts.

Meanwhile, in their new country, position, influence, wealth,
consideration, often fall to their lot; their numbers swell, and
they become an important factor in the republic. Something of
the power wielded by the great nation of which they are now
citizens attaches to them, and shows them to the astonished gaze
of England under a totally new and unexpected aspect. In war,
the effect is most telling, and, even so far back as 1812, the
part played by "saucy Jack" Barry, for instance, already gave
rise to very grave considerations and forebodings on the part of
British statesmen. But, even in time of peace, the high position
held by many Irishmen in the United States, and the aggregate
voice of a powerful party, where every tongue has a vote, cannot
fail to tell advantageously on questions referring to their
former country.

Can it be imagined that this exercises no influence on the
treatment of Ireland by the ruling power? To afford a true
conception of the alteration brought about by Irish emigration,
suppose for an instant the ruling power using again its old
recklessness in abusing Ireland--not that we imagine the English
statesmen of to-day capable of such a thing and anxious to
restore what, happily, has passed away forever--but merely to
show the utter impossibility of such a contingency again arising,
suppose one of the old penal laws to be again enacted and
sanctioned by a British sovereign, what would the effect be on
the multitude of Irishmen now living in America? What,
independently of the Irish, would be the effect on all the
organs, worthy of the name, of public opinion in America? How
would the great majority of the members, not of Congress only,
but of the Legislature of each State, speak? Public opanion is
now the ruler of the world, and when public opinion declares
against a flagrant and crying injustice, its voice must be heard,
its mandate obeyed, and lawlessness cease. This extreme and, as
we believe, impossible example, is merely adduced as a proof of
the advantage which Ireland has reaped from the dispersion of
her scattered children--an advantage falling back on her own
head, in return, perhaps, for the mission they are working.

But, over and above the supposition of such an extreme case,
there is surely a silent power in the mere standing of millions
of free men who would resent, as done to themselves, a
recurrence of an attack on their old country. And there are,
beyond question, three millions of former Irishmen, citizens to-
day of the United States, on whom the glance of many an English
statesman, with any just pretension to the name, must fall.
Therefore do we say that now England must respect Ireland.

That respect is daily heightened by the greater comfort and
easier circumstances, though still far too wretched on the whole,
of the Irish at home, which have been mainly brought about by
the help received from their exiled countrymen. As was seen, the
old policy of their oppressors had for chief object the
pauperization of the country, and, as was also seen, that policy
was eminently successful. We know how deeply the effects of that
former policy are still felt, and how far from completion still
is justice in that regard; how they still complain, and with
only too much reason, of many laws which are as so many gyves
still binding them down in their old degradation; but, of this,
the following chapter will speak.

Yet, it is undeniable that their situation is considerably
improved, and that the excessive sufferings which formerly
seemed their privilege, are scarcely possible in our days. This
change in their circumstances for the better may be ascribed to
a variety of causes, one of which, we acknowledge, has been the
repairing of many previous injustices. But we must acknowledge
also that the main lever in a nation's resurrection, once the
ground is cleared round about--her treasury--has, as far as
Ireland is concerned, been chiefly replenished from abroad.
Absentee landlords still drain the country; but the money which
has gone into it has been certainly owing greatly to the immense
sums transmitted yearly from America by the exiles, all of which
has certainly not returned to the place from which it went out.
It is impossible to estimate the amount which was kept in
Ireland and that which floated back, but the balance must be
considerably on the side of what remained, as the distress at
home was so great, and in millions of instances immediate relief
came from the distant friends who had acquired a competency in
their new country, and, knowing the dire distress of their
relatives at home, sent generally what they could spare, by the
speediest means at their command.

There is no doubt that thousands of families have thus been
benefited by that first sad emigration of their friends, and
that the visible improvement in the condition of the Irish at
home is in a great measure due to it. We hear, moreover, that
the working of the new "Encumbered Estates Court " has already
placed in the hands of native Irishmen many parcels of the lands
of their fathers, and probably many of the ample estates
belonging to what was the Irish Church Establishment, which are
to be sold, will find their way back in the same manner.

The Irish are thus being slowly reinstated in possession of
their own soil, and, that once accomplished, the respect of
England is secured--respectability in England being in its
essence equivalent to real estate.

Thus is the uprising of the nation being gradually, silently,
but surely brought about by the emigration to the United States;
and this effect is considerably heightened when the emigration
to countries under English control is taken into consideration--
Canada, Australia, England itself.

In those places the same results followed which we have just
witnessed in the United States, but another and far greater
result remains for them. Not only did they slowly aid in
awakening the respect for their countrymen at home in the
English breast by their own rising importance and improved
condition, but in Canada and Australia they possess a privilege
which, in the British Isles, is theirs only in theory, but
abroad becomes a very powerful fact.

Ever since the Union of 1800, the Irish are supposed to form a
part and parcel of the empire at home, and to have fair
representation of their native country in the members they
return to the Imperial Parliament. But it is well known that the
Irish influence in that Parliament is almost null, and that
their presence there frequently is productive of no other result
than to countenance laws injurious to their own country. Does,
can Ireland hope to derive any political or social benefit from
her representatives in London beyond whatever may accrue to her
from their vain remonstrances and ineffective speeches? But in
the colonial Parliaments the case is very different.

It is not our desire to be understood as saying that Irishmen,
by meddling with politics, can effect a certain improvement in
their condition and that of their country, beyond giving tokens
of the life which is in them. We believe, on the contrary, that
too great an eagerness in such pursuits has injured them on many
occasions; and they ought to beware of flattering themselves
that they are rising because their votes are clamored for, and
they themselves exhorted to enter into the contest as fierce
partisans. This, too often, leads them into making themselves
the mere tools of shrewd men.

But, in the colonies, they muster in considerable force, and,
with prudence and sagacity, may have their desires and measures
fairly considered and conceded; for, unfortunately, the style of
measures fair and favorable to them as Irishmen and Catholics,
is completely at variance with that of those opposed to them,
whom, go where they will, they encounter, and always in the same
form. In Ireland, they are at liberty, apparently, to do the
same by reason of their superiority in point of numbers; the
result of the late Galway elections proves what a farce is this
show of liberty, and even the members whom they would and do
sometimes elect possess a very feeble influence, or none, in
what is called the Imperial Parliament. But, in the colonies, if
they, as electors, outnumber their political opponents, they can
and must return the majority to the House of Representatives and
of officers to the various departments of the colonial
administration. Such is the law of election in really
representative governments which are truly free; the majority of
electors returns the majority to the government; and rightly so.
Of course, there is room here, particularly where the majority
happens to be Irish, for a vast quantity of frothy bluster about
drilled and intimidated voters, and all that sort of thing. With
that we have no concern at present, and merely remark en passant
that it is a pity a little more of it was not wasted on the
recent Galway elections, already alluded to, on both sides; and
for the rest, that the world has not yet been apprised of Irish
majorities in the Australian Parliament abusing their power by
either accidental or systematic misrule; and it may, therefore,
be safely conceded that, on the whole, the government has rested
in safe hands. However, what concerns us at present is the state
of Canada and Australia, where, among the highest public
dignitaries, are found men who are Irish, not simply by birth,
but in feeling and in truth. And the conclusion which we wish to
draw from that fact is, that Ireland is greatly benefited by the
high positions which her sons assume in those distant colonies;
and probably no one will be rash enough to deny or controvert in
any way this point.

The truth is, that by emigration Ireland has suddenly expanded
into vast regions formerly ignorant of her name; regions which
swell the power and wealth of England, and which are destined to
play a very important part in her future history. In these
districts Irishmen have found a new country; something of the
ubiquity of the English belongs to them, and the influence,
power, and weight, thus thrown into their hands, need no further
comment. To show this in extenso would be only to travel over
ground already trodden in previous pages, enumerating the
various countries they have touched upon in their Exodus. Thus
have our seemingly long digressions had a very direct object in
view, and served powerfully to solve our original question. We
may now see that the resurrection of Ireland was intimately
involved in the emigration of her children; that much of what
has already taken place to aid in that resurrection may be
ascribed to this emigration, and that much brighter days are yet
in store for the nation, resulting mainly from this constant and
powerful cause. Let no one, then, lament the perseverance of
those hardy wanderers who, though their country has already been
depleted by millions, still leave her to the figure of seventy
thousand annually. It seems that in Ireland much surprise is
expressed at the movement never ceasing. Providence will end it
in its own good time; if God still allows it, it is surely for
the accomplishment of his own mighty and benevolent designs.

To conclude, then, this long chapter, there is only one question
to be put, which demands a few words, but words, in our opinion
at least, of vast importance, and which we would give all that
is ours to give, to see promptly and energetically attended to:
Has Ireland profited by this so-often mentioned emigration to
the extent she should have profited? And what ought Irishmen to
do in order to increase the advantages derived from it?

We must confess that, up to the present, the benefit is far from
what it ought to have been, and the cause of this lies in want
of organization and association. They have seemed to let God
work for them without any cooperation on their part; for God's,
as we saw, was the plan, and he forced them, as it were, to
carry out his design. They went at the work blindly, merely
following the impulse of circumstances, with no preparatory
organization, and less still of association. And even now, when
they are spread out over such vast territories in such mighty
multitudes, as yet they have given no sign of the least desire
of attempting even something like a combined effort to
accelerate the work of Providence. The only signs of life so far
given have been violent and spasmodic, directly opposed to the
genius of the race, which, as we have endeavored to prove, has
nothing revolutionary in its character, and is not given to dark
plots and godless conspiracies.

Unfortunately, also, they do not seem naturally adapted to a
spirit of steady and long-continued or systematic association.
In this, chiefly, does their race differ from the Scandinavian
stock, which is grafted on system, combination, and steadiness,
in pursuit of the object in hand.

But why not begin, at least, to make an effort in that
direction? The Latin races, in which runs so much Celtic blood,
are powerful to organize, as the Romans of old, and the French
and Spaniards of to-day, have so often proved. The Irish have
been infused with plenty of foreign blood, after their many
national catastrophes, although we believe that their primitive
characteristics have always overcome all foreign elements
introduced among them; and, what the race could scarcely attempt
ages ado, is possible now. Moreover, there is nothing in the
leanings of race which may not be overcome, and sure without any
radical change a nation can adapt itself to the necessities of
the time, and to altered circumstances. Let the Irish see what
they might effect toward the resurrection of their native
country, if they only seriously began at last to organize and
associate for that purpose. They would thus turn the immense
forces of their nation, now scattered over the world, to the
real advantage of their birthplace. In union is strength; but
union can only be promoted by association, particularly when the
elements to be united are so far apart.