MR. DISRAELI'S "MELANCHOLY OCEAN." [TO THE EDITOR OF THE SPEOTATOE.1
SIII,—The Irish Protestant, especially if he be a landlord, seldom comes off well at your hands. Your article on "Mr. Disraeli's 'Melancholy Ocean" lays one more sin to their charge. They have no reverence for and therefore neglect the old ruins that happen to be on their estates. 0 Justice! 0 Truth ! Of course the Catholic Celt reveres them (the ruins), but at a distance. He may not tend them, nor preserve them from insult, nor clear their precincts of nettles and of sheep I How many of your readers, at least such as know anything of Ireland, do you imagine, Sir, will swallow all this,—not, certainly, said by you in so many words, but more than implied? Only this year, during the celebrated Galway election, the Catholic Celts of Athenry kindled a great bonfire on the top of their fine old abbey, and a Saxon tourist related to me the sad effect of the smoke on the walls and ivy, I fear much more touched by it than the old crone who led him through the ruins was. 0 Sir ! do be just, if you cannot be generous to us ! I assure you, a Protestant would as soon think of injuring or altering an old ruin, as he would of evicting a tenant in Westmeath. He would catch a Tartar if he did.—I am, Sir, &c., R. W. A. HOLMES.
[Our correspondent is very likely right in his fact, but not in his criticism. We said nothing whatever of the Catholic Celts' reverence for their ruins, because the writer happened to have no knowledge on the subject. What he did say, was what he did happen to know, that the English proprietors of similar ruins show far more reverence and care for them than the Irish ; and it is certain that the motive of the neglect, in some instances, is a bigoted Pro- testantism.—En. Spectator.]
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