The Irish Race in the Past and the Present Part 52

Yet it was the same English Government and people which, feeling, let us hope, some compa.s.sion at the sight of this new woe of the "Niobe of nations," determined to try and save her children, as, if they must cast them out, at least it should he alive and full of health on a foreign sh.o.r.e.

Laws, therefore, were pa.s.sed, regulating the quant.i.ty and quality of provisions, particularly of drinkable water, the number of the crew and working-men, the ventilation of the vessel, the number of pa.s.sengers to be received, etc.

Still, these first attempts at humanity seem to have been rather faint-hearted, as the following pa.s.sage from Mr. Maguire's "Irish in America," showing how they were carried out, and how inadequate was the remedy applied in 1848, will explain:

"The ships, of which such glowing accounts were read on Sunday by the Irish peasant near the chapel-gate, were but too often old and unseaworthy, insufficient in accommodation, not having even an adequate supply of water for a long voyage, and, to render matters worse, they, as a rule, were shamefully underhanded. True, the provisions and the crew must have pa.s.sed muster in Liverpool; . . . but there were tenders and lighters to follow the vessel out to sea; and over the sides of that vessel several of the mustered men would pa.s.s, and casks, and boxes, and sacks would be expeditiously hoisted, to the amazement of the simple people who looked on at the strange and unaccountable operation. And, thus, the great ship, with its living freight, would turn her prow toward the West, depending on her male pa.s.sengers, as on so many impressed seamen, to handle her ropes or to work her pumps in case of accident. What with bad or scanty provisions, scarcity of water, severe hardship, and long confinement in a foul den, ship-fever reaped yet a glorious harvest between-decks, as frequent splashes of shot-weighted corpses into the deep but too terribly testified.

Whatever the cause, the deaths on board the British ships enormously exceeded the mortality on the ships of any other country. According to the records of the Commissioners of Emigration for the State of New York, the quota of sick per thousand stood thus in 1848 British vessels, 30; American, 9 3/5; German, 8 3/5. It was yet no unusual occurrence for the survivor of a family of ten or twelve to land alone, bewildered and broken- hearted, on the wharf at New York; the rest, the family, parents, and children, had been swallowed in the sea, their bodies marking the course of the ship to the New World."

It would seem, then, that those first English regulations, by which British ships were to pa.s.s muster at Liverpool before sailing, were not very efficient; the figures of mortality quoted by Mr. Maguire are too eloquent; and it would be a pleasure to us to be able to say with certainty that the more stringent and better executed laws afterward enforced did not proceed from the Commission of Emigration, which originated in New York with some generous-hearted Irish-Americans.

Our readers will have noticed that, even in 1848, with all the apparent desire on the part of England to save the remnants of the Irish nation, the mortality on board British ships was more than three times that on board American vessels, and nearly four times greater than that on board German ships. Why this difference? And why should it be so enormous?

It is possible that to the Legislature of New York State chiefly, and soon after to the Congress of the United States at Washington, which enacted stringent laws for the protection of immigrants at sea, belong the chief honor of saving hundreds of thousands of Irish lives, and that England, whether urged by the effects of good example, or for very shame, soon followed in their wake.

But, whatever the cause may have been, it is a heart-felt pleasure to record the fact that from 1849, when an act of Parliament, ent.i.tled the "Pa.s.sengers Act," imposed on ship- owners and captains of vessels strict conditions for the welfare of emigrants, government control on this subject became every year more immediate and severe.

Not only were the vessels, provisions, water, medicine chests, etc., more carefully examined, but the pa.s.sengers themselves were compelled to undergo a careful inspection as to their health and wardrobe.

And, a thing which had never been done before, the s.p.a.ce allotted to each emigrant on deck and between-decks was determined and subjected to serious control, so that no overcrowding of pa.s.sengers should take place. The penalties, also, on delinquents became even severe; heavy fines were imposed, and in some cases transportation to a penal settlement was decreed against the more offensive outrages on humanity.

If all abuses failed to be corrected by such laws, it is because the most stringent enactments can, to a greater or less extent, always be evaded by those desirous of evading them; but there is every reason to believe that the legislators were honest in their intent of remedying the glaring evils which previously obtained, and, to a great extent, their efforts met with success, as is evidenced by the fact that the mortality on board of British vessels has shown yearly a remarkable diminution since that time. According to the "Twenty-fourth General Report," the mortality was: In 1854, 0.74 per cent., already a very remarkable diminution on previous averages; in 1860, it was reduced to 0.15 per cent. This was the percentage for vessels going to North America only.

The first operation of the missionary people was to plant the living tree of Catholicism in the United States, and so powerfully forward its growth, that other spiritual plants of a noxious kind, and weeds that go by the name of creeds, should gradually be choked up; finally, let us hope, to disappear.

While speaking on this subject, and laying before the reader the necessary details, we desire not to be held forgetful of the efforts made in a like direction by Catholic immigrants of other nationalities. A word has already been said of the early influence of the French in the North and of the Spaniards in the South, in establishing the Church in North America. The German children of the true Church, though at first not so conspicuous, have for a long time taken, and are now particularly taking, an active part in the dissemination of the faith, and there can be no doubt that, with the daily increase of German immigration, their large numbers must in course of time make a lasting impression on the territory where they settle. But the French, the Spaniards, and the Germans, must forget their language before they become widely useful in the great work before them; and thus the Irish form the only English-speaking people on whom the brunt of the battle must fall. Moreover, we treat only of the Irish race.

The wonderful history of the spread of Catholicity in North America by the Irish, in the northern part of the United States particularly, would call for an array of details which it would be impossible to furnish here in extenso. An imperfect sketch must suffice.

First comes the consideration that, when the wave of immigration touched the continent, it might have been feared that, by its absorption into a dry and parched soil, the aggregate loss would have reduced to a mere nothing the ultimate gain. There were no churches for the new worshippers, no priests to administer to them the sacraments of Christ, no Catholic school-teachers to train their children. That is to say, these means of preservation and of propagation were so few and so far between, that many of the newly-arrived immigrants were forced to establish themselves in places where they could find none of those, to them, priceless advantages.

The spiritual dearth was not indeed so great as that previously described. The zeal of bishops and priests, and teachers from regular orders, had been so active in its labors, that, aided by the liberty which the inst.i.tutions of the country afforded, results, astonishing indeed, had already rewarded their efforts.

But, after all, what were these compared with the demands so suddenly laid upon them by such a rapid increase of numbers? It might be said with truth of mult.i.tudes of immigrants, that the position in which they then found themselves was very little different from that of their predecessors at the beginning of the century.

As late as 1834, Archbishop Purcell, of Cincinnati, wrote: "There are places in which there are Catholics of twenty years of age, who have not yet had an opportunity of performing one single public act of their religion. How many fall sick and die without the sacraments! How many children are brought up in ignorance and vice! How many persons marry out of the Church, and thus weaken the bonds that held them to it!"-- (Annals of the Propagation of Faith, Vol. viii.)

To the same annals, three years later, Dr. England, of Charleston, sent the long letter in which he detailed the innumerable losses sustained by the Church in America in consequence of the want of spiritual a.s.sistance. The letter was, in fact, a cry of anguish wrung from him by the sight he witnessed.

Such was the universal feeling among those who could rightly appreciate the fatal consequences of the rush of Catholics to the New World without any provision prepared for their reception.

And yet all these laments and apprehensions preceded the vast inpouring of immigrants subsequent to the year 1846. What must have been the consequent losses then? Yet, looking now, in 1872, at the present state of the Church in the Union, who can say that this inpouring and rush, unprepared as the country was for its reception, was not one of the greatest means devised by Providence, not only for establishing the Catholic Church in this country for all time, but likewise as a preparation for further developments, not only on this continent, but on the part of many a nation now sitting in "the shadow of death!"

Deplorable, indeed, were the losses, but permanent and wonderful the gain.

The first effect of the great calamity which occurred along the St. Lawrence and its tributaries, in 1847, was to reduce the immigration to Canada to insignificant numbers, and, proportionately increase that to the United States in a quadruple ratio. Ma.s.sachusetts and Connecticut, in New England, and the great States of New York and Pennsylvania, were now the chief places of resort for the new-comers; and from New York, princ.i.p.ally, they began to pour, in a long, steady stream, away by the Erie Ca.n.a.l, westward to the great lakes.

All along these lines, congregations were, providentially, already formed; and, in the pa.s.sage of the stream, they were immediately, as by magic, increased in some instances, to a tenfold proportion. The labors of the clergy were correspondingly multiplied, and efforts were immediately made to obtain new recruits for its ranks. Then appeared a very strange fact, which, at the time, was remarked upon by everybody, but has never been satisfactorily explained. Wherever the number of worshippers in a church induced the chief pastors to have another constructed in the neighborhood, upon the completion of the new edifice, the old one seemed to suffer no diminution in attendance, and the congregation attending the new one gave no evidence of having hitherto been uncared for. This very remarkable fact was of such frequent occurrence that it could not be a delusion, or an exceptional case having its origin in some extraordinary cause; it was evidently a providential dispensation, akin, in a spiritual sense, to the miraculous multiplication of loaves, twice mentioned in the Gospel.

There have certainly been numerous examples of this, in the city of New York particularly, for more than twenty years; and probably the same thing is occurring at the time of the present writing.

Then, another fact occurred, deplored by many, chiefly by Mr.

Maguire, in the interesting work already quoted from, yet, evidently of a providential character also, and consequently eminently fruitful, and, it may be said, adorable in its depth.

The Catholic immigrants, although in their own country agriculturists for the most part, forgot the tilling of the soil as soon as they reached their new home, and settled down in great numbers in all the large cities, on the line they pursued toward the West. Many special evils resulted from this, detailed at length by those whose wonder it excited, and who strove, for excellent motives, to thwart this providential movement. But the immense good which immediately followed from it, and which, within a short time, was to be greatly increased, was never mentioned in reply to the reasons advanced by these well-meaning complainants. The first result of it was the sudden and necessary creation of many new episcopal sees in all large cities, where churches were being rapidly built, or had already been erected in astonishing numbers.

Suppose the Catholics had, following the old bent, turned themselves chiefly to the tillage of the soil, and buried themselves away in scattered country villages and farms, how long would the creation of those new sees have been delayed? Who is ignorant of the effect of a new see on the propagation of Catholicity? Cities which otherwise would have numbered among their population only a few hundred Catholics, scarcely sufficient for the filling of one small edifice, saw at once one- third, one-half, or even the larger portion of their population clamoring for a Catholic bishop, and all the inst.i.tutions a bishopric brings in its train. It is unnecessary to furnish examples of this; they are around us.

Yet one difficulty seems to cast some doubt on this view of the subject, and strengthen the opposition of those who ardently advocated the country as the true home for Irish Catholics; and, as the point involves a universal interest, it is better to discuss it at once in its chief bearings.

At the time when those wonderful events were being enacted, any one opening a copy of those general State Directories, with which New England is particularly blessed, wherein not only the great commercial and industrial enterprises of each State are enrolled, but also correct lists of the educational establishments and various churches of all cities, towns, and villages, are given --a cursory glance, even, would show him the striking fact that, as far as the great centres of population were concerned, Catholic churches, educational establishments, and primary schools were found in respectable numbers; but many a page had to be turned when the reader came to places of lesser importance, to rural populations chiefly, before he met with any indication of the Catholic Church entering yet upon that large country domain. This experience was encountered by the writer at the time, and caused him a moment of doubt.

But beyond the reflection that, in matters of this kind (of the propagation of a doctrine or a creed), the first thing to be looked to is the centre, and that this, once mastered, will in course of time draw under its influence the outer circles; that all things cannot be effected at once, and the best thing to be done is to begin with the most important; that, moreover, those statistics are often incorrect with respect to Catholic matters, whether from malicious design, or inadvertence, or want of knowledge, on subjects to which the compilers attached very little importance, so that, if their statements be compared with Catholic official intelligence with regard to the same places, it will be found that many towns and villages which, according to the State Directories would seem to have been altogether forgotten by the Church, were actually in her possession, at least by periodical or occasional visits; apart from all these considerations, there is one more important remark to be made, which includes in its bearing not only the present point of consideration, but, it may be said, the whole life of the Church from the beginning; so that it is really a law of her birth, existence, and propagation.

To ill.u.s.trate our meaning, let us see how the Christian religion first forced its way in heathen lands, throughout the whole Roman Empire, whether in its Oriental division where Greek was spoken, or among its Western, Latin-speaking populations.

All the apostles fixed their sees in the largest or most important cities of the ancient world; St. Peter, under the special guidance of G.o.d, taking possession of the capital and mistress of the whole. All the bishops ordained by the first apostles did the same by their direction; and it is needless to add that the like law has been followed down to our own times whenever the Church has had to spread herself in a new country.

In accordance with this plan, the cities of the Roman world were the first to be evangelized, and their populations were converted with greater or less difficulty, according to the dispositions of the inhabitants, before almost an effort had been made for the conversion of the rural populations, except as they happened to come in the way of the "laborers in the vineyard." Hence the result, so well known: heathenism remained rooted in the country for a much longer time than in the cities, so that the heathen were generally called pagans--pagani--as if it were enough, when desiring to convey the intimation that a man was a worshipper of idols, to designate him as a dweller in the country. 1 (1 Another meaning is given to the word paga.n.u.s by some writers; but the old and common interpretation is the surest, and is confirmed by the best authorities.) And if the word "pagans" became synonymous with heathens in all European countries, it is a proof that the fact underlying the name was universal wherever Christianity spread. It is known, moreover, that the dissemination of the Gospel in those rural districts was a work of centuries, and that, for nearly a thousand years after Christ, pagans were to be found in villages of countries already Christian.

The fundamental reason which governs and regulates these strange facts is that already given, namely, that Christianity-- that is, Catholicity--is a growth, and follows the laws of every thing that grows. True, its first increase is from without, by the conversion of infidels or erring men; but even in that first stage of its existence, its growth is the faster where the numbers are greater; hence its establishment invariably in large cities. But when it has pa.s.sed beyond this first stage, it increases from within, like all growths, and the work is accomplished by the increase of families agglomerated in the same large towns.

How true is it that the Church, once firmly planted in the midst of one of those agglomerations of men called cities, is sure in the end to invade the whole as "the yeast that leavens the whole!

"How easy is it to see that in the course of time those cities of the Union, among which a large proportion of Catholics is found, will belong almost exclusively to the true Church, if for no other reason by the births in families, even supposing that the flow of immigration should finally cease! If any one entertains some doubt on this point, he has only to consult the records containing the number of children baptized in her bosom, and compare it with the corresponding number in families still outside her.

Hence the really astonishing fact, whose truth is recognized to- day in all the Northern States along the Atlantic coast, that suddenly almost in the cities of New England, for instance, where the number of Catholics was simply insignificant, they took an apparently unaccountable prominence, and in the course of a few years, increasing steadily by birth as well as by immigration, the fact became the most curious though evident of the times, completely changing the moral and social aspect of the country, and foretelling still greater changes to come. For, in the face of this wonderful increase to the ranks of Catholicity, appears another significant fact, but very different as to direction and energy-- the gradual disappearance of names once prominent in those parts, and the daily narrowing area of Protestantism in the numerous sects of which it is composed.

At the same time a great danger was averted (or at least wonderfully lessened and modified), from the whole country, by the settlement of those immigrants in the large centres of population. The manufacturing enterprises, which at that time a.s.sumed such vast developments in North America, received among their workers, men and women, a large proportion of Catholics, and the fear of future political and social peril to the peace and security of society at large could never, on this continent, reach the extreme point witnessed in Europe to-day. The great danger of the European future nestles princ.i.p.ally in those vast hives of industry with which that continent abounds. Our eyes have witnessed, our ears have been affrighted at those stupendous plans and projects in which, not only the great questions of capital and labor are involved, but the whole fabric of society is threatened with downfall. Religion, government, property, the family, the state--all those great principles and facts on which the security of mankind depends, enter now into the programme of artisans and laborers enlisted in gigantic and many-ramified secret societies, while the whole world trembles at the awful aspect of this unwelcome phantom, that no government, however powerful, can lay.

Suppose that on this continent the numerous bands of workingmen, so actively engaged everywhere in developing the resources of the country, should aim at extending their solicitude beyond their immediate and material welfare to the reformation and reorganization of mankind on a new basis; and suppose that, with this aim in view, they should combine with those of Europe, and enter into an unholy compact with them, what hope or refuge would remain in the whole world for harmony, peace, justice, and happiness? And when the great upheaval, so generally expected in Europe, and which sooner or later must take place, shall come to pa.s.s, where could those men fly, who cannot but look upon those satanic schemes with horror? Where on this earth would be found a spot consecrated to the acknowledgment of the only social principles which can secure the real good of mankind, by rendering safe the stability of society?

It is our firm belief that the vast number of true children of the Church, occupied honestly and actively in the many factories of the North, will, when the contest commences, even before it commences, when the question of connecting the "unions" of this country in a band of brotherhood with those of Europe shall be gravely mooted, make their voices loudly and unmistakably heard on the right side.

Enough has now been said on the locality chosen by preference as the dwelling- place of the Irish immigrants at the period under consideration. Let us now see those armies of new-comers at work.

They have been called a missionary people; let us see how they understand their "mission."

In this new country every thing had to be done for the establishment of religion, education, help for the poor, the aged, the infirm, on a lasting and sufficiently broad basis. And, strange to remark, it was found that the previous persecutions they had undergone fitted them admirably for their work, not only by giving them a strong faith, the true foundation of Christian energy, but in a manner more curious, if not more effective. It fitted them to give money freely and abundantly, poor as they were! One may smile incredulously at the conceit; but it has become a most powerful and incontestable fact.

Suppose the Irish never to have been persecuted in their own country: suppose that they had found there a benevolent government to supply them with churches, schools, hospitals-- homes for the poor--every thing that they, as Catholics, could desire. Suppose them to have been in a similar position with the Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Italians, of those days, how bitterly would they have felt the inconvenience of building all these things up for themselves in their new homes with the labor of their own hands, by their own individual efforts, unaided by the government! Their ardor would have been damped, their energy cramped, their inclination to give would have fallen far below the necessities of the time: for money was sorely needed--no n.i.g.g.ard offerings, but immense sums.

But happily--happily in the result, not in the fact--not only had the British Government never done any thing of the kind for them in their old home; not only, on the contrary, had it been particularly careful to rob them of all the buildings and estates left by their ancestors for those great objects; but, until very recently, the pa.s.sing of the Emanc.i.p.ation Act of 1829, it had studiously and most persistently hindered them from doing voluntarily for themselves what it refused to do for them.

There were numerous penal statutes enacted, in the course of two centuries, to prevent them from building churches, opening schools, erecting asylums and hospitals of their own, nay, from possessing consecrated graveyards for their dead. Thus did fanatic hatred pursue them even to the grave, and, as far as it could, beyond the gates of death. Every one had to surrender the mortal remains of his relatives to the Protestant minister for burial; as though what the government called its religion would s.n.a.t.c.h from them whatever it could lay hands on--the body at least since the soul had escaped and pa.s.sed beyond its reach.

But in their new country they found every thing altered. Not only was prohibition of this kind utterly unknown, but there existed there the greatest amount of liberty ever enjoyed by man for acting in concert with a religious, educational, or charitable object in view. No law devised by the old Greek republics, by the Roman fisc, by modern European intermeddling was ever attempted in the country which with justice boasted of being the "asylum of the oppressed." Thus as the liberty so long denied to the Irish was at last opened up, as no barrier existed to cramp and confine the natural generosity of their hearts, no sooner did they find that they might contribute as they chose to those great and holy objects, than they rushed at the chances offered them with what looked like recklessness.

We hope that the reader may understand, from this, our meaning in saying that persecution had admirably fitted them for the mighty work that lay before them. It was the first time for centuries that they were allowed to give for such sacred purposes.

Another thing which disposed than toward it was, the lingering fondness for the old customs of clanship, still harbored in their inmost soul, never entirely dead and ready to revive whenever an opportunity presented itself. There can be no doubt of this; the great adjuration of the clansman to his chieftain-- "Spend me, but defend me"--tended wonderfully to consecrate in their eyes the act of giving and giving constantly, as though their purse could never be exhausted. The chieftain has been replaced by the bishop, the priest, the educator; the n.o.bility has gone, but these have come; and unconsciously perhaps, but none the less really, does this feeling lie at the bottom of their hearts, which are ever ready to burst out with the old expression, though in other form: "Spend me, eat me out, but help my soul, and save my children."

This feeling has always run in the blood of the race. St. Paul long ago detected it in the Galatians, a branch of the Celtic tribes, when he wrote to them: "You received me as an angel of G.o.d, even as Christ Jesus. . . . I bear you witness that, if it could be done, you would have plucked out your own eyes, and given them to me."--Epistle to the Galatians, iv. 15.

Few, perhaps, have reflected seriously on the large sums required for the establishment of the Catholic Church in so vast a country, with all her adjunct inst.i.tutions; therefore the stupendous result has scarcely struck those who have witnessed and lived in the midst of it. The same is the case, though on a much smaller scale, with respect to the money sent back to Ireland by newly-arrived immigrants. People were aware that the Irish, women as well as men, were in the habit of forwarding drafts of one, two, or three pounds to their relatives and friends, but in such small amounts that the whole could not reach a very high figure. But when it came to be discovered that many banking a.s.sociations were drawing large dividends from the operation, that new banks were continually being opened which looked to the profit to be derived from such transmission as their chief means of support, some curious people set to work collecting information on the subject and inst.i.tuting inquiries, when it was found that the aggregate sum amounted to millions, and would have become a serious item in the specie exports of the country, if what was transmitted did not in the main come back with those to whom it had been forwarded.

So was it, but in much larger proportions with respect to the amounts annually spent in the purchase of real estate, the building of churches, schools, asylums, hospitals, for the support of clergymen, school-teachers, clerks, officials, servants, which were called for all at once, over the surface of an extensive territory, for the service of hundreds of thousands of Catholics arriving yearly with the intention of settling permanently in the country. Could the full statistics be furnished, they would excite the surprise of all; the few details which we would be enabled to gather from directories, newspapers, the reports of witnesses, and other sources, could give but a faint idea of the whole, and are consequently better omitted.