The
grassy beach-promenade is half-a-mile long, and an open tramcar runs
along the shore for three miles. The residents are alive to the
importance of catering for visitors, and the Town Commissioners, a
mixed body, have provided bathing accommodation for both sexes.
Galway, with thrice the population, a fine promenade, good sands, and
a grand bay, has no such arrangements; and Westport has very little
accommodation for tourists. The contrast between the North of Ireland
and the South and West comes out in everything.

The Methodists and Presbyterians are strong in the town, to say
nothing of the two Protestant Churches, one in Warrenpoint and another
in the Clonallon suburb. The Catholic Chapel is counterbalanced by the
Masonic Hall. Wherefore it is not surprising to learn that the bulk of
the townsmen are staunch Unionists. The Nationalist papers have little
sale hereabouts, the _Belfast News Letter_ and the _Irish Times_
having the pull. A business man, who has lived here for forty years,
said:--

"We are fairly matched in numbers but the Conservatives have the
wealth and respectability. The fishermen and labourers are nearly all
Home Rulers, simply because they are Catholics. They are quite
incapable of saying _why_ they are Home Rulers, and some of them even
profess to regard the proposed change with alarm, and say they prefer
that things should remain as they are. But although they speak so
fairly, yet when the time comes to vote, they vote as the priest tells
them. They have no option, with their belief. I don't blame the poor
fellows one bit. I followed the report of the South Meath election
petition very closely, and I know that the same kind of pressure was
exerted here. At Castlejordan Chapel Father O'Connell commanded the
people, in a sermon, to go to a Nationalist meeting, and said he would
be there, and that their parish priest expected them to go. He said
that if any were absent he would expect them to give a good and
sufficient reason for their absence. On another occasion a priest met
a number of men who were going to an opposition meeting, and turned
them back with threats. These priests not only threatened to refuse
extreme unction to persons who voted against the clerical party, but
they also threatened personal violence, and then said, 'Don't hit
back, for I have the holy sacrament on me.' Father John Fay, parish
priest of Summerhill, County Meath, told his people that they must not
look on him