At this day all are agreed, whatever be their
religious or political opinions, on the advocacy of this form of
exclusive dealing at which economists may scowl as at a deliberate
attempt to fly in the face of the regular play of the forces of supply
and demand, but the success which has so far attended the concerted
policy of insisting upon being supplied with Irish produce, and the fact
that it is, after all, the only mode of restoring to their natural
functions the economic forces in a country where industrial conditions
were, by artificial means, thrown out of their natural course, is the
justification for its employment.

If for no other reason, the activity displayed by "religious" in Ireland
in the encouragement and development of local industries as a check on
emigration should protect them from the attacks which have been made
upon them, as tending to encourage the uneconomic aspect of the
situation in Ireland. To name only a few that come into one's mind, the
nuns' co-operative factories, which have revived Irish point lace at
Youghal, Kenmare, Gort, Carrick-on-Suir, Carrickmacross, and Galway, are
instances. Father Dooley, in Galway, has started a woollen factory, with
a capital of L10,000, in which nearly two hundred girls are employed, of
whom many earn L1 10s. a week. Father Quin, at Ballina, has founded a
co-operative shoe factory, and at Castlebar Father Lyons has established
an electric power station. The work of the Sisters of Charity at Foxford
is well known, and stands in need of no praise, and at Kiltimagh, in
Mayo, they employ a hundred and twenty girls at dress and lace making;
while Father Maguire, at Dromore, in Tyrone, has established a lace and
crochet factory on co-operative principles, which has over a hundred
employees; and at Lough Glynn, in Connacht, a carpet and cheese making
industry has been built up solely through the efforts of a religious
order of nuns. These are random examples, and I do not claim that they
are typical. They are, on the other hand, not exceptional.

It is impossible to exaggerate the effect of the English commercial
policy towards Ireland in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Wool, cotton, sailcloth, sugar refining, shipping, glass, the cattle and
provision trade, were all deliberately strangled. And besides the loss
of wealth to Ireland which was the consequence, one must take into
account the fact that traditions of commercial enterprise perished
through d