ere prevails.

In Belfast the interdependence of the linen and the ship-building
trades--in one of which the men, while in the other the women, of many
families are employed--is one of the most powerful instruments of social
progress. The narrow sea which separates it from Scotland and the
geographical conformation of Belfast Lough have, moreover, a great
bearing on its prosperity. Independence of Irish railways with their
excessive freights, crippling by their incidence all export trade, in a
town like Belfast, nine-tenths of the industrial output of which goes
across the sea, and the advantage which it has over all other Irish
towns in its proximity, again independently of Irish railways, to the
Lanarkshire, Ayrshire, and Cumberland coalfields, are very important
considerations in view of the obstacle which the scarcity of coal is to
all commercial enterprises in the island.

Finally, it must not be forgotten, in reference to the greatest of the
industries of the North of Ireland, that a very exceptional impetus was
given to the development of the commercial enterprise of Belfast at a
time which might otherwise have proved a critical period in her
industrial career, by the fact that the American Civil War caused a
slump in cotton which resulted in the failure of a very large number of
Lancashire cotton mills, the place of which was taken by the linen mills
of Belfast, which have profited ever since from the advantage gained in
that crisis and the growth of their trade which it effected.

I have said enough, I think, to show that the attempt to foist the blame
for the backwardness--in an industrial sense--of the rest of the country
as compared with the North-East corner, on the difference of religion,
is to close one's eyes to half a dozen other factors which must in truth
also be appreciated in order that one may arrive at a proper estimate of
the real reason for the disparity which undoubtedly exists. The facts
which I have mentioned serve to show the unwarrantable nature of the
assumption which accounts for the prosperity of North-East Ulster by
considerations of race and religion alone. That several generations of
progress in the industrial field have had a great effect on the
character of the people of Belfast in respect of thrift, energy, and
industry I am not concerned to deny, but on what ground in this light is
to be explained the decrease in population of Antrim and Down which has
gone on concurrently with