llion,
mostly of high quality. Numbers of great London houses have their
works at Derry. Welch, Margeston and Co. among others. The Derry
partner, Mr. Robert Greer, an Englishman forty years resident in the
town, favoured me with his views _re_ Home Rule, thus:--

"The bill would be ruinous to Ireland, but not to the same extent as
to England. Being an Englishman, I may be regarded as free from the
sectarian animosity which actuates the opposing parties, but I cannot
close my eyes to the results of the bill, results of which no sane
person, in a position to give an opinion, can have any doubt. We are
so convinced that the bill would render our business difficult, not to
say impracticable, that our London partners say they will remove the
works, plant, machinery, and all, to the West of Scotland or
elsewhere.

"About 1,200 girls are employed in the mill, and 3,000 to 4,000 women
at their own homes all over the surrounding country.

"Mr. Gladstone may think he knows best, but here the unanimous opinion
is that trade will be fatally injured. Ireland is no mean market for
English goods, and the market will be closed because Ireland will have
no money to spend. Go outside the manufacturing towns and what do you
see? Chronic poverty. Manufacturers will remove to the Continent, to
America--anywhere else--leaving the peasantry only. The prospective
taxes are alarming. We know what would be one of the very first acts
of a Dublin Parliament. They would curry favour with the poor, the
lazy districts, by an equalisation of the poor rate. In Derry, where
everybody works for his bread, the rate is about sixpence in the
pound. There are districts where it runs to ten shillings in the
pound. The wealthy traders, the capitalists, the manufacturers of the
North will have to pay for the loafers of the South. The big men would
gather up their goods and chattels and clear out. There are other
reasons for this course."

Here Mr. Greer made the inevitable statement that Englishmen out of
Ireland did not understand the question; and another large
manufacturer chipped in with:--

"Leave us alone, and we get on admirably. There is no intolerance;
everybody lives comfortably with his neighbour. But pass the bill and
what happens? The Catholic employes would become unmanageable, would
begin to kick over the traces, would want to dictate terms, would
attempt to dominate the Protestant section, which would rebel, and
trouble would ensue. They