[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Snt,—It is impossible not to question the motive of your correspondent, " J. C. T.," in a recent letter, stating that religious animosity is almost unknown in the West of Ireland. Nor was the cause of truth advanced thereby, as the girls are still
housed in Plymouth who were rescued and got away in boats from the Galway Protestant Orphanage which the Republicans burnt to the ground. The boys, it will be re- called, were taken pro tem. by the Barnardo Homes, and are to-day (though all Irish born) beneath the Southern Cross, having been adopted and provided for by one of Britain's daughters—Australia. Besides that case, the refugees from South and West, in co. Dublin, are numberless.
That your correspondent received more kindness from his Roman Catholic neighbours than his co-religionists is due to either of two things, what is personal or regional. His remarks that the Irish Independent does its best to promote religious bitterness were unjust, as that paper is one of the greatest commercial concerns of the capital and run upon business lines. It is contributed to by all creeds, in pictures, prose and poetry, rather in American fashion. It, of course, supports the Government of the Free State, like every other worthy newspaper in it, and has suffered for doing so.
Your readers will have an idea of the difficulties, even of Nationalist papers, at present, when it is stated that a large body of people are resolutely determined to make Free State Government impossible and are led by many of their clergy. Only a week ago a Galway Bishop, just after his consecration in Cathedral, told the people assembled that he had ever been for Sinn Fein, and that they would very soon have the Republic he stood for.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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