But still Ireland's wrongs are England's. We
have the same oppressors. We must make common cause against the tyrants."
"I wish to Heaven they would just have stayed at home, and ranted on the
other side of the water; they had their own way there, and no Mammonite
middle-class to keep them down; and yet they never did an atom of good.
Their eloquence is all bombast, and what's more, Crossthwaite, though there
are some fine fellows among them, nine-tenths are liars--liars in grain,
and you know it--"
Crossthwaite turned angrily to me. "Why, you are getting as reactionary as
old Mackaye himself!"
"I am not--and he is not. I am ready to die on a barricade to-morrow, if
it comes to that. I haven't six months' lease of life--I am going into
consumption; and a bullet is as easy a death as spitting up my lungs
piecemeal. But I despise these Irish, because I can't trust them--they
can't trust each other--they can't trust themselves. You know as well as I
that you can't get common justice done in Ireland, because you can depend
upon no man's oath. You know as well as I, that in Parliament or out, nine
out of ten of them will stick at no lie, even if it has been exposed and
refuted fifty times over, provided it serves the purpose of the moment; and
I often think that, after all, Mackaye's right, and what's the matter with
Ireland is just that and nothing else--that from the nobleman in his
castle to the beggar on his dunghill, they are a nation of liars, John
Crossthwaite!"
"Sandy's a prejudiced old Scotchman.
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