One Irish Summer

by William Eleroy Curtis

“‘You’ll find no meetings in hell, sir!’ said the doctor, solemnly.

“‘It’ll not be for the lack of the ministers!’, was Harry’s reply.”

And the genial old gentleman smiled grimly and passed on.

At least two of the public monuments in Belfast have been erected in honor of Presbyterian divines,—Rev. Dr. Cooke, of whom the above story is told, and Rev. Hugh Hanna; and one of the largest and most beautiful buildings in the city is the Presbyterian House, where there is an assembly hall that will seat twenty-five hundred people, smaller halls, and committee rooms, and the offices of the various missionary societies and other organizations belonging to that denomination. It was erected by private subscription and dedicated with great ceremony two years ago. It is the headquarters of Presbyterianism in the north of Ireland and its noble tower can be seen for a long distance.

On the second floor of the building are clubrooms, reading-rooms, and amusement halls, and other attractions for the young men of Presbyterian families, a sort of denominational Y.M.C.A.; and, strange to say, the amusement-room is fitted up with two billiard tables, which I am told are in great demand every evening. The janitor in charge admitted that some of the stricter members of the sect had made urgent objections against this form of entertainment, but the committee “was not willing to let the devil have all the fun.”

The general assembly of the Presbyterian church holds its annual sessions in the big hall of the new Presbyterian building, and all the other denominational gatherings are held there. At the last assembly Rev. Dr. McIlveen, the moderator, reviewed the progress of that denomination during the last forty years. It was true, he said, that its numbers, as reported by the official census, had not increased. In common with other religious denominations, the Presbyterians had lost largely by emigration. Many of their members, especially the young and vigorous, had gone forth to seek homes in the colonies of the empire, or the great republic of the West. In the period to which he was referring the population of Ireland had decreased more than a million, and while in comparison with the other large denominations the Presbyterians had suffered less proportional loss, yet their membership had decreased fifty-five thousand. Yet they had four thousand more families than they had forty years ago and six thousand more contributors to the stipend fund. The givings of the people to various objects had more than doubled. There had been an annual increase of $100,000 in the stipend fund; $75,000 in the ordinary Sabbath offerings, and more than $90,000 annually to missions. During the same time there had been invested more than $5,250,000 in the erection and repair of churches, manses, and other Presbyterian buildings; the Church House at Belfast had been erected at a cost of $400,000, and $5,250,000 had accumulated in the hands of the boards of trustees of different benevolences as capital.

In addition to the seventy-two Presbyterian churches in Belfast, the directory notes thirty-seven under the care of the Church of Ireland, thirty Methodist, eighteen Roman Catholic, seven Congregationalist, six Baptist, two Moravians, one Friends’ meeting-house, one Jewish synagogue and two societies called Plymouth Brethren, who announce “breaking of bread at 11:30 A.M. and gospel at 7 P.M.”—making a total of one hundred and seventy-six houses of worship.

The working people of Belfast do not live in tenement houses as is the custom throughout the rest of Europe, but every family has its own separate cottage, and there are long streets of neat brick, two-story, five-room houses very similar to those that you find in Philadelphia, only the rents are very much lower there. For ten dollars a month a Belfast mechanic can get a neat and comfortable six-room dwelling, 20 feet front and 36 feet deep, with a garden 100 feet in depth. For five dollars and seven dollars and fifty cents a month he can get four or five roomed cottages that are equally comfortable. And the mechanics there take a great deal more interest in their homes than those in the rest of Ireland. If you will look through the windows as you pass through the streets you will see them draped with neat Nottingham lace curtains and linen shades. There are shelves of books and pictures, neat carpets and center-tables with a family Bible and photograph album and religious newspapers and periodicals. There are often books on theology,—more than anything else,—commentaries on the Bible and other denominational works, for the well-to-do Belfast mechanic is a Presbyterian and always prepared to defend the doctrines of that faith. The manufacturers, the merchants, and the middle classes generally are Presbyterians. The land owners, the professional men, the nobility, and the aristocracy are nearly all members of the Church of Ireland, while the common laborers are Roman Catholics.