He had been tried once and acquitted. He and his friend had been lodged in the guard-room. There was a struggle, and bombs, and the dead and mutilated body of his friend was carried out. The story was set about that the two of them had thrown the bombs at the troops. The bombs were lying loose in the guard-room. Nobody believed a story so thin. The pacific reputation of the two men was well known. Everybody asked why live bombs were left lying about in such a place. Were they put there to furnish an excuse for premeditated crime? Some believed this. Nothing is clear. In the subsequent inquiry before a Military Court composed of young and ignorant officers with a natural prepossession in favour of their profession and caste, it was denied that Clun’s body was mutilated. But a reliable witness told me that he had counted thirteen bayonet wounds.
The first thing which impressed me about the Sinn Feiners I met was their culture, then their courage, finally their spirituality. I speak now of those I met in the city—probably two hundred. Many of them would have been shot at sight if they had been seen coming out of their hiding-places to meet me. At the moment of writing more than one of those with whom I talked lies in a dark and dismal prison cell, notably Desmond Fitzgerald, head of the Republican Propaganda Department.
What amazed me continually was the entire absence of bitterness in the speech of most of these people. Bitterness they must have felt, and yet so sure are they of the goodness of their cause and of its ultimate triumph, that they can talk with calmness and even humour of the tragic events of which so many of them are the central figures.
“They say in England that this is first and foremost and all the time a religious quarrel; that the domination of Irish politics by the Pope is to be greatly feared if Ireland gets self-government. What have you to say to that?” I asked the handsome youth whose effective propaganda has filtered through to every country in Europe. It is one of the important facts of the present situation that the conduct of England towards Ireland is breeding a cynical contempt for England throughout the world.
“I have to say of the first statement that it is not true, and of the question that the fear is groundless. The Irish priests have tried in vain to stop the ambush. They have denounced it from their pulpits. But they have protested in vain. This defiance is the symbol of a conviction that the place of the priest is at the altar. When he leaves that to meddle with matters which are not his concern, he is thrust aside. I am myself a devout Catholic. But I would not tolerate for a moment the interference of the priest with my politics. Young Ireland will not. Our movement is spiritual, deeply spiritual. But with the methods by which we shall, under God, win this battle with our foes neither priest nor pacifist must interfere.”
Subsequent experience confirmed the impression that this is true; that the power of the priest in politics, if it ever seriously existed in Ireland, is rapidly on the wane. True also I found was the loathing of the priests for murder. I talked with several in different parts of the country. “Murder is murder by whomsoever committed,” was the invariable comment on the killing by both sides.
CHAPTER XVI
MORE ABOUT IRELAND
It is, of course, as difficult as most such things to measure, but in the course of my travels and talks, I received the impression that there is less of religious intolerance amongst the Catholics than amongst the Protestants; at any rate in the South. The faith of the minority there appears to be treated with greater respect than the faith of the minority in Ulster. I came across numerous instances in the country between Dublin and Cork of a violent distaste for the provocative behaviour of bigoted religionists.
I spoke with a Tipperary man about the cruel treatment in the Belfast shipyards of the Catholic workmen by the Protestants. It will be remembered that the decline in shipbuilding necessitated a reduction in the staff in the shipyards, and that Catholic workmen were selected to be the victims of the labour depression, and were driven with violence from the yards. It was told me that they were forced into the sea and stoned as they struggled to regain the land.
“Serves them roight,” said this Catholic workman of Tipperary unperturbed, “they be always trailin’ thurr coats.”