racteristic of Ulstermen "in moments of
emotion," was certainly displayed conspicuously on Ulster Day. Ceremony
at large public functions is naturally cast in a military
mould--marching men, bands of music, display of flags, guards of honour,
and so forth--and although on this occasion there was, it is true, more
than mere decorative significance in the military frame to the picture,
it was an admirably designed and effective spectacle. It is but a few
hundred yards from the Ulster Hall to the City Hall, where the signing
of the Covenant was to take place. When the religious service ended,
about noon, Sir Edward Carson and his colleagues proceeded from one hall
to the other on foot. The Boyne standard, which had been presented to
the leader the previous evening, was borne before him to the City Hall.
He was escorted by a guard consisting of a hundred men from the Orange
Lodges of Belfast and a like number representing the Unionist clubs of
the city. These clubs had also provided a force of 2,500 men, whose
duty, admirably performed throughout the day, was to protect the gardens
and statuary surrounding the City Hall from injury by the crowd, and to
keep a clear way to the Hall for the endless stream of men entering to
sign the Covenant.

The City Hall in Belfast is a building of which Ulster is justly proud.
It is, indeed, one of the few modern public buildings in the British
Islands in which the most exacting critic of architecture finds nothing
to condemn. Standing in the central site of the city with ample garden
space in front, its noble proportions and beautiful facade and dome fill
the view from the broad thoroughfare of Donegal Place. The main entrance
hall, leading to a fine marble stairway, is circular in shape,
surrounded by a marble colonnade carrying the dome, to which the hall is
open through the full height of the building. It was in this central
space beneath the dome that a round table covered with the Union Jack
was placed for the signing of the Covenant by the Ulster leaders and the
most prominent of their supporters.

To those Englishmen who have never been able to grasp the Ulster point
of view, and who have, therefore, persisted in regarding the Ulster
Movement as a phase of party politics in the ordinary sense, it must
appear strange and even improper that the City Hall, the official
quarters of the Corporation, should have been put to the use for which
it was lent on Ulster Day, 1912. The vast ma