"I had hoped to get some more reviews... in case a second edition ever comes out, I think you might utilise the annexed extract from the review made in the Mid-Ulster mail:

Mr Johnston goes into considerable detail as to the prospects of a forcible resistance to Home Rule, but he must pardon us for saying that his opinions are worthless. So far as we are aware no man has ever yet accurately forecasted the result of a civil war. Should Mr Redmond be able to retain the control of his followers, in spite of Captain White and the extremists, we do not think there will be civil war, but if it should unfortunately break out, it will not be confined to Ulster, but will certainly spread to Great Britain, and produce a state of things which a Bismark would terminate by precipitating a foreign invasion. Should there be merely armed resistance to the Government, we have no doubt that a judiciously selected army could quickly put it down. But what then? Of what benefit would it be to the Empire to have the forces of the Crown firing on its own flag and treating as rebels a community which asks for nothing more than to remain in full citizenship as British subjects?

James continued: "The writer with the delightful ingenuousness of the Ulster politician unconsciously admits the two main points of the book, namely that the whole object of the movement is to make martyrs, and that they care nothing for England any more than they do for Germany or any other Protestant power except as a means of keeping down the rest of the country.

"I also enclose an article from that well-known religious paper, the Referee, in which the writer, whom I suspect to be Mr Arnold White, has stated the three chief props of the Unionist party in the same terms as you have done, and finding the landed interest is taken up entirely with the trivialities of society, and the Church with its own petty squabbles, has proposed in all possible seriousness a campaign throughout all the public houses of the British Isles for the purpose of averting a civil war. I also enclose a cutting about the Kikiyu controversy, a reference to which if the text is revised might with advantage be worked in as to the question of whether the Church of England is protestant or not.

"I fear that things are going from bad to worse, and that unless both parties display some common sense and a more accommodating spirit, there will have to be more or less shooting. I have written to Captain Donelan and tried to impress on him that these people really mean business, and that if they are prepared to pay the price, they are quite likely to succeed in their object, though that object would be injurious to themselves and to the rest of the country.

"At any rate we have done a good deal more than out duty, and whatever happens we can console ourselves with the reflection that if we had been listened to, most of the trouble might have been avoided.

"Have any steps been taken to bring the book to the notice of the English papers such as the Westminster Gazette, the Daily Chronicle, and Truth? I still think the book is over the heads of the average Irish newspaper writer and that to be properly appreciated you have to get it under the observation of the people at the very top of the profession..."

Regrettably the other enclosures from James' letter are lost.

This excellent pamphlet comes from an interesting source; it is written by an Ulsterman, a Protestant, the youngest Fellow of Trinity College, and one of the most brilliant of that distinguished body. It indicates the new outlook of the younger generation that is now knocking at the door - the generation among whom history is at last penetrating to disperse old fictions, while a larger national outlook brings with it common sense and business considerations.

The reader who desires to ascertain the true facts as to the effect of the Union in lessening Roman Catholic influences on government, in increasing Irish manufactures, commerce and prosperity, in inaugurating industrial equality of opportunity between the two islands, will find most useful historical summaries of events and tendencies in chapters devoted to historical discussion.

Those who are now mainly concerned with actual politics, with the possibilities of establishment of a Provisional Government or the chances of its administration, will study Mr Johnston's detailed account of the situation, financial, military and political, as it is set out in Chapter V, where the financial question is examined, and in Chapter VI, on the probable course of events; along with occasional suggestions throughout the historical chapters, such as that on p108. No doubt many of these reflections are exercising the militant Protestants of Ulster. It is to be wished that Mr Johnston could use his abilities to add an account of the financial and business relations of the northeast counties to their hinterland, and how far their fate is necessarily linked with Ireland.

In a little volume of two hundred pages, selling for sixpence, there is to be found the complete and searching anatomy of what is called -"The Ulster Problem" - and it is an Ulsterman who holds the scalpel. Mr. Joseph Johnston completed an examination career of almost unexampled brilliancy by becoming Fellow of Trinity College Dublin, younger than any man for the past fifty years and he writes, therefore, as a member of that highly conservative corporation, but also as an Irish Protestant....

"whose home happens to be in a district which is likely to be a centre of whatever disturbance there may be, and who has hitherto managed to live in peace and harmony with his neighbours, without regard to their religion or politics, as have most of his relatives, some of whom are now being supplied with arms, and instigated to kill or get killed in whatever manner may seem most conducive to bringing about a change of ministry."

The Unionist Crime against Ulster

That sentence gives the keynote to the whole, first in its grave irony, and then in its final suggestion. Mr. Johnston, after drastically examining the supposed danger to Protestantism, in the light of Irish history and of contemporary facts throughout Europe, proceeds to investigate the record of those who incite Ulster to resist, and finds in it no evidence of any special tenderness for Protestantism. He concludes, then, that Ulster is urged to rebel in the hope that the Government, in punishing Ulster's rebellion, may incur electoral disaster; and he regards this as a possible result. But, he asks, when a huntsman ties up a goat to attract a tiger into point-blank range, will it console the goat that has been killed or mauled to know that the tiger has been shot? What are the chances, not for Unionists, but for Ulster? Are they worth taking? These are the questions which the writer discusses in great detail for the benefit of his fellow-Ustermen.

One detail concerns armament. Of what use is an Italian rifle to the man who has never practiced with it at range? Even assuming, which is not by any means certain, that he can get a cartridge to fit it, will it be as effective an a common fowling-piece? Secondly, about taxation. Mr Johnston has no difficulty in showing that the taxes which the Provisional Government can hope to collect will be somewhat exiguous. But a more serious question is presented by the case of those Ulstermen who are not in sympathy with the Covenant:

"What is it going to do in regard to them? Is it going to ignore them? If so, and it is only its own supporters who have to pay taxes, while other people pay none, the grim determination of Ulster will be exposed to one of the most insidious attacks it had yet had to undergo, and the desertions among its followers are likely to be so considered as to cause very serious difficulties, both military and financial. Is it going to disregard all its own conditions about the rights of minorities, and attempt to compel obedience on the part of those who will not recognise its authority?

"If it attempts to do so, will they not have as good a moral right to resist as Ulster Unionists say they have to resist the decrees, and refuse to pay the taxes of, an Irish Parliament, since the impositions of the latter would be at least legal, while those of the former would not?"

And if the Provisional Government seek to collect by force, their agents may be guilty of robbery or murder and the forces of the Crown will certainly be upheld by public opinion in using force to prevent such acts.

Ulster's History

Obviously, then, Ulster runs a grave risk, enhanced by the certain injury to commerce and business. In whose defence must the danger be faced? Mr Johnston goes into a long and masterly analysis of Ireland's history from the Union onwards, with a view to ascertaining what advantage the Union has conferred on Ireland, or even upon Ulster, as apart from the privileged landlord class. He finds very little; and, what is more serious, his examination shows that practically no one defends the existing order. Everyone, even Sir Edward Carson is prepared to go at least as far as extension of the powers of local government. Why, then, encourage fighting? The Unionist leaders profess to deprecate strife, but say that Ulstermen are such terrible fellows that there is no holding them. Mr Johnston's comment and his final conclusion deserve to be quoted in full:

"They conveniently overlook the fact that the British working man, or the people of Dublin, or Johannesburg, or Cawnpore, would be equally terrible fellows if they likewise found kindhearted individuals willing to supply them for nothing with as many rifles as they cared to accept, and subscribe a million pounds to pay all their lawyers' and doctors' bills, at the same time assuring them that all the principal commanders on the other side had been gained over, and it any case they would soon be the Government themselves and would make it all right for them, so that there was really no danger unless through carelessness in handling their unaccustomed, and in the case or the Italian rifles and the Sniders, I must admit, rather clumsy weapons, they accidentally shot themselves or each other.

"The policy of the Unionist party in general, and the Ulster section in particular, is thus neither statesmanlike nor patriotic. On the off-chance of being returned to power on a wave of anti-Nationalist feeling, they are desirous of lighting the fires of civil war, not only in Ireland but in Great Britain and the rest of the Empire, and they regard the disaster which would ensue in the very improbable event of their success as an evil of lesser magnitude than that the present Home Rule Bill should become law, and they should be debarred the chance of themselves introducing the 'large and even generous reforms' in the government of Ireland, or the considerable extension of local government which Sir Edward Carson himself says he favours, and which would only be Home Rule under another name."

Mr. Johnston's deduction is that Ulster will have too much sense to go into civil war without better cause shown. That must he as Ulster chooses. But the volume may be commanded to English readers as a masterly demonstration that Ulster has no just reason to take up arms against her fellow-citizens or against the forces of the Crown.