ty of the
north is vital to the fiscal and general interests of Ireland, just as
the far more wealthy mining interests of the Rand are vital to the
stability and prosperity of the Transvaal, and were regarded as such and
treated as such by the farmer majority of the Transvaal after the grant
of Home Rule. Those interests have prospered amazingly since, and in
that country, be it remembered, volunteer British corps raised on the
Rand had been the toughest of all the British foes which the peasant
commandos had to meet in a war ended only four years before.

If the fears of Ulster took any concrete form, it would be easier to
combat them; but they are unformulated, nebulous. Meanwhile, it is hard
to imagine what measure of oppression could possibly be invented by the
most malignant Irish Government which would not recoil like a boomerang
upon those in whose supposed interests it was framed. I shall have to
deal with this point again in discussing taxation, and need here only
remind the reader that Ulster is not a Province, any part of which could
possibly be injured by any form of taxation which did not hit other
Provinces equally.

It is the belief of Ulster Unionists that their prosperity depends on
the maintenance of the Union, but the belief rests on no sound
foundation. Rural emigration from Ulster, even from the Protestant
parts, has been as great as from the rest of Ireland.[72] It is easy to
point to a fall in stocks when the Home Rule issue is uppermost, but
such phenomena occur in the case of big changes of government in any
country. They merely reflect the fact that certain moneyed interests do,
in fact, fear a change of government, and whether those fears are
irrational or not, the effect is the same. It is an historical fact, on
the other hand, that political freedom in a white country, in the long
run invariably promotes industrial expansion and financial confidence.
Canada is one remarkable example, Australia is another. The Balkan
States are others. Not that I wish to push the colonial example to
extremes. Vast undeveloped territories impair the analogy to Ireland;
but it is none the less true that when a country with a separate
economic life of its own obtains rulers of its own choice, and gains a
national pride and responsibility, it goes ahead, not backward.

Intense, indeed, must be the racial prejudice which can cause Ulstermen
to forget the only really glorious memories of their past. Orange
memor