Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: PART I. POLITICAL AND SOCIAL CONDITIONS1 ' CHAPTER I.—THE TWO IRELANDS: THE ENGLISH COLONY History, as we have seen, has created two Ireiands in Ireland. These exist, indeed, two opposed nations, the one super-imposed on the other, the one subject, the other master. Above is the British colony or garrison— that is to say, the newcomers, the latest planters in Ireland, the feudatories of England, the privileged class, the outlanders of Ireland, or the English in Ireland, asFroude, who wrote their history under this title, called them. Below are the people, the conquered, the helots, the confused and mingled mass of the former occupants of the soil, be they of Gaelic or Danish, of Norman or Anglo-Norman, or even of English blood. For division does not really arise from race differences—races are merged and mixed—nor even from religious differences— Protestants may be found in the popular party, and Catholics in the English party. The line of demarcation is chiefly social and political. Interests, prejudices, national aspirations, separate the two Irelands far more than do race or religion. Thus it would not seem that the breach which history has created is definitive and impassable. The two sections are without doubt mutually hostile ; shall we say that they are irreducible and refractory, one to the other, by their very definition ? Are they, as has been said, like oil and water, or like mercury and lead ? England, without doubt, has done everything, and still does everything, to separate the two nations. She excites the prejudices of the one and the appetites of the other, knowing well that her strength lies in their division, and that her power would be in danger were Ireland one and united. But in former days did not Ireland always conquer her conquerors one after the... --This text refers to the Paperback edition.