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Show I THE CITIZEN 14 tural development in another country; no romantic visionaries could have built up one of the great export trades of the world. The Irish have done these things. Their creameries have been accepted in Denmark as the standard of excellence to be aimed at and accomplished; their exports of farm produce to , England are equalled only by those of America; indeed it is probable that in these days of war we actually get more food from unpractical Ireland than from any other countrp. The present prosperity in farming is not, however, the result of conditions, so much as the gradual evolution of the years. There is the Irish Agricultural Organization Society, the one body in Ireland which is so infinitely wise in its working that it brings all classes and creers togeth- er in proud, ambitious enterprise; there is the enlightened Department of Agriculture, with ample means at its disposal. Both these bodies have helped powerfully in the making of the hew rural Ireland now rich and contented. Excepting the linen mills in Belfast and the breweries in Dublin, Ireland has practically no industrial life. She has put all her energy and enthusiasm and hard common sense into her agricultural life, and the result is surely very excellent. But all Ireland is not like the golden valley of the south. Much of it is unpromising rockland, making tillage a task of increasing toil. Is there a more savagely beautiful lovely stretch of country than western Donegal? You war-tim- e . would not hope to find it peoples; it is desolate, treeless, but for the coming of the autumn heather, which softens the damp bogfields in violet warmth, it is very comfortless and cold. Sea winds whistle round about the hills and beat against the white homesteads, and the beasts of the fields do not know where to turn for shelter. Yet it is not today an unhappy land, for rocks have been blasted out of the earth, potatoes put into the soil, and enough produce forced from the ground to give sustenance to the people for at least eight months of the year. Such a miracle you would not find in England, the Donegal peasant, untaught, often speaking no English, devout in his religion, saw in dreams the unpoetic vision of pigs and poultrp and a tilled little garden, and those many years ago he resolved no further to seek adventure across the seas, but to make his beloved land yield nourishment in due season and in suffiI ciency. So it has come about that in west- ern Donegal today you find a people not compelled to emigrate unwillingly to allow their daughters to work in the Scotch potato fields. methods, begun by a Donegal peasant himself, have changed the face of the countryside. These very small farmers are able ot sell their pigs or poultry or eggs on the best possible terms, while in Dungloe, in an amazing knitting factory, the girls of the scattering villages adjoining find happy, well paid work. Whatever England may do for Ireland Co-operati- ve well-manag- ve er in the future, she can never do more than Ireland has already done for herself in Donegal. Beyond the limited possibilities of their own country, the Irish have done superlatively well. Irish genius for organization and initiative has had the fullest possible play in the great romance of American commerce. I have heard Americans laughingly say, Were governed by the Irish in New In almost any big movement York. in politics or social reform or administrative work you find Irishmen as leaders, clear visioned, enthusiastic, but mmensely practical. You cannot say this of the Latin races that go to the making of America. The Italian, with all his warmth of temperament and susceptible emotions, is not an idealist in the sense that the Irishman is. The Italian feels rather than sees; he is The more receptive than creative. history of the Irish in America abundantly proves that Irish sentiment is clean and strong, like a great north wind, sweeping away the sultry airs of hothouse emotionalism, brave in vision, as equally brave in construction. In a lesser degree the practical wisdom of the Irish has been and is still quietly working in our dominions, building up nationhood as it could not be built up in their own country, suffering as is does most continually under the imposition of ideas manufactured in England. . And how would you find traces of unreal sentiment in a nation that produces the finest soldiers in the world? Swift to obey, with a delicate sense of pprecision in discipline, ready to follow a leader to the very gates of hell, always merry and cheerful, the Irish soldier is indeed a prince of fighting men. He has the initiative and reckless fearlessness of the Colonial troops who have won honor immortal on our battlefields, but he possesses what is possibly even more valuable, and that is the . unquestioning sense of obedience. In modern warfare it is harder, but it may be better soldiery to stand still than to dash forward; the Irish soldier can do both. No sudden glow of Tomantic enthusiasm makes him lose his head; he is not swept away by an Impulsive but mistaken heroism, as were the Anzacs on an historic occasion in Gallipoli. Because he is practical he is a good workman, and a good workman, be he soldier or artisan, knows h'is job and the job comes first. If it be true that the play is more than the player of the game, it is equally true that military strategy is more than. the private soldier and 'the Irishman knows it. He knows that wars are won by men of action rather than by mdn of dreams; yet, when the moment comes, he is with the first in the glory of a great advance. These revolutions in Ireland, which have made Englishmen feel so uncomfortable from time to time, have been proofs of the practical spirit. To the intensely English Englishman the idea of an Irish republic, whose independence should be guaranteed by America, seems wildly unreal and absurd. I do not think that such a thing will ever come to pass; devoutly I hope not. But I do know that the very details of this improbable sounding scheme have been worked out bp the Sinn Fein politicians of the extreme type in an utterly businesslike way. And I remember how in Ireland 1 was told by a Sinn Feiner that the Revolution of Easter, 1916, was planned chiefly as a great advertisement. These ardent reformers felt that Ireland was getting a little too comfortable; there was too much 'of the Sunday after dinner feeling in the land. Sinn Fein thought was not progressing as The most swiftly as . they wished. practical awakening' of national consciousness could come only through some great and stirring event hence those mad, bad days of Easter, 1916. Who will say that in this dreadful, pitiful revolution the Irish failed to show themselves as stem and savage realists? Even in speech there is something ' utterly unsentimental about .the Irish. If they think your epes are like jewels in the crowd of the Blessed Virgin they will tell you so, but in unashamed candor they would as readily comment on the coming of your gray hairs or the pallor of your complexion. If the Irish have won a reputation as insincere flatterers, it is simply because they have the happy anxiety to please, which is, after all, the characteristic of a child. Yet, living in their land for more than a few days, you find that, also in childlike fashion, the Irish are not conscious of impo- liteness in criticising little points you would be glad to have forgotten. And if you wonder why, in these days when English .politicians are holding out eagerly the hand of friend- ship across the narrow sea, the Irish do not immediately respond, it is because they are not sentimentalists. They have ever before them the flaming memory of the wrongs of the past year; they ask some practical proof of Englands good will. They want something more than the opportunism of the politician. Soothing syrup will not assuage the hungry pangs of men asking for the real righting of real wrongs. And the Irish problem will not be solved until here in England we come to know the Irish, not as sentimentalists, but as realists, strong and English Review, uncompromising. MY WOLVES Three gaunt, grim wolves that hunt me, Three gaunt, grim wolves there y And one is Hunger, and one is And one is Misery. f I sit and think till my heart is While the wolf of the wind keeps ing the door, Or peers at his prey through the dow pane Till his ravenous eyes burn into brain. . March, 1918. WHAT'S IN A NAME? And I cry to myself: If the wolft Sin, . He shall not come in he shall come in; But if the wplf be Hunger or Woe, He will come to all men, whether For out in the twilight, stern and gn o A destiny weaves mans life for As the spider weaves his web for & im And the three grim wolves, Sin, Hi ger, and Woe, oa A man must fight them, whether ori SGc Though oft in the struggle the '& nc i 3 fife ie fighi- Let me see! Whats your nc nc Tonight I cry to God for bread, Tomorrow night I shall be dead; For the fancies are strange and scaitfvjut ly sane That flit like spectres through brain; H ha And I dream of the times long, k ago, When I knew not Sin, and Hunger, There are three wolves that :V: men, ie And I have met the three, nt And one is Hunger, and one is Sin, And one is Misery; Three pairs of eyes at the wiiuk jfVlJ :xt pane Are burned and branded into my bn tt Like signal lights at sea. iva Francis Gerry Fairchil ' na - o WAS WELL PAID. Once upon a time there was an dian named Big Smoke, employed a missionary to his fellow Smokes. A white man, encoutnering Smoke , asked him what he did for living. said Big Smoke, t Umph! I i That so? What do you set suit! poor preacher. NEW AT THE GAME. Ashley What makes you think the man who held up the taxi last night was an amateur? Seymour Why, ho robbed the passenger instead of the driver. he i,:as1& hunt Minnie, mum. Mistress Well, Minnimum, if youll only do the maximum of work, youll Tit-Bit- s. 3 t Woe. preaching? Met git ten dollars a year. Well, said the white mar damn poor pay. Umph! said Big Smoke, i Maid - dies. preach. Mistress name? as no!" t 4,tW' ie h' ONE WAY OUT. Father, I need a new rfdim Cant afford it, he growl c But, father, what am I to out a riding habit? Get the walking habit. habi ?hi .:n . o 'jn |