AMERICA AND IRELAND.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR."] Sra,—May I call to your notice the great injury that is being done to the building up and cementing of an era of good feeling between the people of the United States and the Mother Country by the hostile attacks made by Englishmen of various stations in life against the handling of the present reign of assassination in Ireland by the Government? These attacks which appear in our papers are almost entirely against the sc- rolled reprisals, which are made to represent the Government of the day employing an army of ruffians to deliberately carry on a war of murder, arson, and pillage against the unoffending, down-trodden Irish peasantry who have been driven by des- peration to carry on a war of assassination. Very little, if any, mention is made of the abominable deeds of the Sinn Fein organization, and when English bishops, Labour Unions, and some of the English Press put themselves out to make these charges, which are copied in every paper in the States, one cannot estimate the damage that is being done. In January I wrote a letter of protest to my church newspaper, the Witness, against the tone of the correspondence sent it by the Rev. A. Manby Loyd, of London,-which letter you will find on p. 8 of the January 22nd edition. In my letter I made the statement that I intended forwarding a few numbers of the Witness to the London Spectator as specimens of what is going on, but I neglected doing so. However, the issue of the Witness for March 5th prints a letter in reply from the Rev. A. Manby Loyd, which I am sending you, thinking that you would learn
from it the kind of dangerous trash our Press is flooded with I have, through the kindness of a friend, had the pleasure of reading the Spectator for a number. of years,. and have at the same time read the Times, whose editorials and .leftera on the Government's handling of Ireland have, as quoted by the Press over here, done much to gain sympathy for Sinn Fein amongst the populace of the country, who do not-understand the political differences between the Times and the head of the .English Government. The love for England is heavily dig. counted by the pro-German and Irish Press and the longing of each political party to gain the Irish and German vote, and it seems criminal .for Englishmen to strengthen this feeling for some petty end of their own. I am sending a few copies of the Witness with marked specimens of the variety of Irish news sent ne.—I am, Sir, dr,o., Annum R.,GOODW/N. Minneapolis, Kansas, U.S.A.
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