"The country will be saved mem, now; when the Coercion Bill has passed
the country will be saved," said the old man.
"There's a great deal too much fuss made about everything," remarked the
good-wife. "Look at that boy ten years old taken up, bless us all! for
whistling at a man."
"Did you take notice, mem, that the whistling was derisive, was
derisive, it was derisive. That is where it is, you see," said the old
man with a slow, sagacious roll of his head.
"I would not care what a wee boy could put into a whistle: it was
awfully childish for a man and a gentleman to take up just a wean for a
whistle."
"You see mem, they have to be strict and keep everything down. The
Government have ways of finding out things; they know all though, they
don't let on. There will be a bloody time, in my opinion."
Oh, the wisdom with which the old man shook his head as he said this,
adding in a penetrating whisper, "The times of '98 over again or worse."
IV.
LOYALTY IN THE "BLACK NORTH" - GENTLEMEN'S RESIDENCES - A MODEL IRISH
ESTATE - A GOOD MAN AND HIS WIFE - VISITING THE POOR.
Down in the North the loyalty is intense and loud. An opinion favorable
to the principles of the Land League it would be hardly prudent to
express. Any dissatisfaction with anything at all is seldom expressed
for fear of being classed with these troublers of Ireland.
The weather is very inclement, and has been ever since I landed. Snow,
rain, hail, sleet, hard frost, mud, have alternated. Some days have been
one continuous storm of either snow or sleet.
The roads through Antrim are beautifully clean and neat, not only on the
line of rail but along the country roads inland. The land is surely
beautiful, exceedingly, and kept like a garden. The number of houses of
some, nay of great, pretensions, is most astonishing. Houses set in
spacious and well-kept grounds, with porter lodges, terraced lawns,
conservatories, &c., abound. They succeed one another so constantly that
one wonders how the land is able to bear them all, or by what means such
universal grandeur is supported. There is an outcry of want, of very
terrible hard times, but certainly the country shows no signs thereof.
The great wonder to me is where the laborers who produce all this
neatness and beauty live? Where are the small farmers on whom the high
rent presses so heavily? Few houses, where such could by any possibility
be housed, are to be seen from the roadside. There are so very few
cottages and so very many gentlemen's houses that I am forced to believe
that the peasantry have almost entirely disappeared.
