The traveler from the south or west enters a zone of prosperity when he comes within forty miles of Belfast. The northern counties look like an entirely different world. The beautiful rolling landscape, with an occasional grove and flowering hedges, is similar to the rest of the east coast of the island, but the farms are larger and more thoroughly cultivated; very little of the land is given up to grazing, few cattle are seen, but fields of grain, flax, potatoes, turnips, and other vegetables take the place of pastures, and the large farmhouses are surrounded by well-kept gardens and big barns. There are no more filthy one-room cabins, with manure piles in front of the doors, and few signs of poverty or neglect. The people live in two-story houses and sleep in beds instead of on the mud floors; they have cook stoves and ranges instead of boiling their food in pots over a peat fire out of doors. There are no barefooted women; none with blankets over their heads. Every one seems to be well dressed and to have a pride of appearance as well as habits of neatness and bears evidences of comfortable circumstances. Tall chimneys rise from the centers of the towns. We see large factories in every village and square miles of linen cloth spread out upon the turf to bleach.

The north of Ireland is as different from the rest of the country as New England is from Alabama, and there is a corresponding difference in the character of the people. They are not so genial and gentle and obliging in the North; they are not so poetic, but are more practical, and they are looking out for themselves. The manners of the people of Belfast are said to be the worst in the world. They are often offensive in their brusqueness and abruptness, and a stranger is sometimes repelled by their gruff replies. The Belfasters make no pretensions to politeness, and speak their minds with a plainness and directness that are sometimes disagreeable. But they have a reputation for honesty, enterprise, industry, and morality, which they consider virtues of greater importance and of a higher value than the art of politeness.

There is a series of beautiful villages and towns along the coast south of Belfast, and one of them is called Rosstrevor because a gentleman by the name of Ross married an heiress by the name of Trevor, a younger daughter of the Viscount of Dungan. It is situated upon a height, with a background of wooded hills, plentifully sprinkled with villas. The village shows evidence of the fostering care of its late owner, Sir David Ross, and its present owner, Sir John Ross-of-Bladensburg, who is commissioner of police for Ireland, and is a person of great importance in his own estimation as well as that of others. He takes an active part in political and ecclesiastical affairs and is always occupying a front seat when anything is going on. He signs himself John Ross of Bladensburg, because his grandfather, Major General Ross, commanded the British troops at the battle of Bladensburg, and after one of the most bloody and important conflicts in the history of human warfare he led them triumphantly into the capital of the United States and destroyed the palace of the President, the parliament house, and the navy yard! All this and more appears in the much published biographies of the Ross family, and because of the glory thus acquired they added the word “Bladensburg” to their name when they were elevated to a baronetcy.

The Ross family have erected an obelisk to the memory of their famous ancestor upon a promontory above the sea at Rosstrevor, and have inscribed upon it the following epitaph:

The Officers of a Grateful Army,
Which, Under the Command of the Lamented

MAJOR GENERAL ROBERT ROSS,

Attacked and Defeated the American Forces
at Bladensburg on the 24th of August, 1814,
And on the Same Day
Victoriously Entered Washington,
The Capital of the United States,
Inscribe Upon This Tablet
Their Admiration of His Professional Skill
And Their Esteem for His Amiable
Private Character.

There are three other inscriptions of similar purport, one on each face of the pedestal. General Ross, it appears, is buried in Halifax.

Belfast is the center of a great manufacturing district. Each factory is surrounded by groups of neat two-story brick cottages, with gardens, churches, schoolhouses, and shops, which are very different from the rest of Ireland, and are similar to those in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Belfast ranks high among the manufacturing cities of the world. It is proud of the title of “The Chicago of Ireland.” The people are as boastful of their progress, their wealth, and their prosperity as those of its namesake. But for the strong Scotch accent one might imagine himself in Kansas City, Seattle, or Los Angeles because of their civic pride. Every man you meet tells you that a hundred years ago Belfast had only fifteen thousand population, while to-day it has nearly four hundred thousand; that its wealth has doubled six times in the last twenty-five years; that it has the largest shipyards, the largest tobacco factory, the largest spinning mills, and the largest rope walk in the world. When they take you up on the side of a high mountain and show you a view of the city spread out on both sides of the River Lagan, they defy you to count the chimneys and the church spires, which are as numerous as the domes of Moscow. Belfast is the most prosperous place in Ireland and an example of matchless concentration of power, industry, and ability.

The people have good ground for their vanity, and while their claims are somewhat exaggerated, few cities have so much to boast of. One of the shipyards has produced more than four hundred ocean steamers, another built the first turbine that ever floated on the ocean, and together they employ fifteen thousand hands. The machine shops of Belfast are also famous. They provide spinning and weaving machines for all the linen mills in the world, and ship them even to the United States. The engines, boilers, and other machinery that is turned out from the shops of Belfast are shipped to every corner of the world, and the product of the linen factories’ trade now amounts to more than sixty million dollars a year. The largest mill covers five acres, with 60,000 spindles, 1,000 looms, and more than 4,000 hands. A single tobacco firm pays $4,000,000 in taxes every year and a distillery has an annual output of $7,500,000.

Belfast has sixteen factories for the production of ginger ale, lemonade, soda, and other aËrated waters, which are famous the world over. It manufactures agricultural implements and machinery for every kind of industry, and much of the machinery is the invention of its own citizens.

Belfast is no relation to the rest of Ireland. It is a Scottish town, and most of the people are of Scotch ancestry—all except the lowest class of labor, which has drifted in from the neighboring counties. The city lies at the head of a bay, or lough, as they call it there, nine miles long. The headlands at the mouth of the bay are only eighteen miles from the shores of Scotland, which may be seen very plainly on a clear morning.

The shortest distance between Ireland and Scotland is only twelve and three-quarter miles—between Torrhead and the Mull of Kintyre. The shortest practicable crossing, between Larne, a few miles north of Belfast, and Stranraer, Scotland, is thirty-nine miles, and is made in two hours by steamer. The crossing from Belfast is sixty-four miles, and it is five hours to Glasgow. There are steamers several times a day—in the morning, afternoon, and at night—and the largest part of the business as well as the sympathies of the people are with the Scots. Since the tunnel under the Hudson River has been completed between New York and Hoboken, the plan for an “under sea railway” between Larne and Port Patrick has been revived. The engineers have reported that they can make a tunnel from Ireland to Scotland, less than forty-five miles, one hundred and fifty feet below the sea level, at a cost of $60,000,000, and some day, perhaps, it will be possible to cross by train under the Irish Channel, rather than by boat over it.

The racial, religious, and political antagonisms between the north and south of Ireland are well known, and can never be removed. Three-fourths of the population in this section of the island are Protestants, mostly Calvinists of the sternest kind, and the portraits of John Knox and Oliver Cromwell hang on the walls of the houses rather than those of the popes. The religious feeling, however, is not so intense as formerly. A generation ago, the 12th of July (the anniversary of the battle of the Boyne, in which the Protestant army of William of Orange overcame and dispersed the Roman Catholic forces under James II.) never used to pass without a riot and many broken heads, but of recent years there have been very few collisions. Formerly, the Roman Catholics used to lie in wait at a certain bridge to attack the procession of Orange societies as it passed over, with shillalahs and stones. The Orangemen, who are mostly mechanics from the shipyards and machine-shops, always armed themselves with iron bolts and nuts for the fray, and missiles flew freely, leaving many unconscious and sometimes dead men on the ground. And on other holidays, whenever the representatives of either religious faith came out in force, the other usually attempted to interfere with them. But those days have passed. The rival religionists glare at and taunt each other now, but do not strike.

One cannot blame the Roman Catholics for their bitterness. In the middle of the sixteenth century, in consequence of the rebellion of the earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnell, the heads of the great clans of O’Neill and O’Donnell, against the authority of Queen Elizabeth, the territory belonging to them and their followers was confiscated by the crown and sold to Protestants, chiefly from Scotland, just as the southern counties were distributed among the “undertakers” from England, but with a difference. The “undertakers” who were granted the estates of the rebellious earls in southern Ireland were mostly adventurers and speculators. Many of them never came to Ireland at all. Few of them settled permanently upon their grants, while nearly all of those who undertook to carry out the contract of colonization were indifferent to the class of settlers they brought in. In Ulster Province, however, which is the northern third of Ireland, after the “flight of the earls,” their confiscated lands were taken up in small parcels by actual settlers from Scotland, whose descendants have occupied them until this day—a sturdy, thrifty, industrious, and prosperous race, and the children of these “Scotch-Irish” Protestants have borne as important a part in the settlement and development of the United States as the children of the Pilgrims have done.

The “planters,” who came over from Scotland, brought with them their morals and their religion, and most of them were Presbyterians. In 1637 the surveyor-general of the Ulster plantations reported to the king that there were forty Scots to one English, and fifteen Presbyterians to one of all the other sects combined. And the Presbyterians have ever since been the leading religious body in the north of Ireland. They are a stern, stolid, conservative race, stubborn of opinion, persistent of purpose, and fully conscious of their own rectitude. When William, Prince of Orange, invaded Ireland in 1689, after James II. abdicated his throne and fled from England, he landed at the little town of Carrickfergus, about six miles below Belfast, where he was received with great rejoicing. Here he unfurled his flag and displayed his motto, “The Protestant Religion and the Liberties of England I will maintain,” and the people of Belfast have endeavored to maintain them with vigor ever since. The term “Orangemen” has ever since been applied to organizations of Protestants of a political character, and they have received more or less support from the church. Most of them are semi-benevolent, like the Hibernian societies among the Catholic population of southern Ireland, and they are found in every town and village in the province of Ulster. There are Orange halls in every parish of Belfast and the surrounding country. They embrace in their membership representatives of all the Protestant denominations, the Church of Ireland and the Methodists as well as the Presbyterians—but the latter are most numerous and in some districts you will find none but Presbyterians.

The O’Neills were kings of Ulster in ancient times and their coat of arms was a red hand, whereby hangs a startling tale. According to tradition, the original O’Neill came over from Scotland with a party of invaders, among whom it was agreed that he should be king whose hand first touched the soil of Ireland. The boats were all stranded on the beach, and the captains and the crews were striving desperately to make the shore, when “The O’Neill,” with the nerve that has always distinguished his clan, drew his sword, chopped off his own left hand at the wrist, threw it upon the beach and claimed the throne, which was accorded him. Hence a red hand or “Lamh dearg” is on the coat of arms of Ulster, being placed upon a small shield in the center of a large shield, upon which appears the red cross of St. George, thus signifying England’s domination over Ulster.

Neill of the Nine Hostages, who reigned from A.D. 379 to 405, was the most warlike and adventurous of all the pagan kings, and, with two exceptions, all the overkings of Ireland, from the time that Red O’Neill tossed his amputated hand upon the shore, to the accession of Brian Boru, belonged to this illustrious family. And they gave England a great deal of trouble. In 1551, Conn O’Neill was created Earl of Tyrone, and Mathew, who claimed to be his son, was given the right of succession. “Shane, the Proud,” the legitimate son and heir, was a mere boy at that time, but when he grew to manhood he disputed his half-brother’s parentage and apologized for his father’s conduct with the remark that, “Being a gentleman, he never refused a child that any woman named to be his.”

After the death of Henry VIII. Shane O’Neill inaugurated a rebellion which cost England more men and more money than any struggle that has ever occurred in Ireland; an expenditure equal to $10,000,000 of our present money, besides tens of thousands of lives and millions of private property destroyed. After peace was restored in 1558, Shane was elected “The O’Neill,” in accordance with the ancient Irish custom, and in 1561 he accepted the olive branch from Queen Elizabeth and went to London at her invitation, followed by his gallowglasses in their strange native attire—loose, wide-sleeved, saffron-colored tunics, reaching to their knees, with shaggy mantles of sheepskin over their shoulders, their heads bare, their long hair curling down on their shoulders and clipped short in front, just above the eyes.

The last of the earls of Tyrone was Hugh O’Neill, a son of Shane, who organized another rebellion in 1584, and, being defeated, fled to his castle in the dense woods of Glenconkeine, and there awaited anxiously for Philip of Spain or Clement VIII., the reigning pope, to succor him. One by one O’Neill was deserted by all the Irish chieftains except Rory O’Donnell, Earl of Tyrconnell, and as they saw no hope of relief they made peace with England. Several years later, in 1607, being accused of a plot, they fled from the shores of Ireland with a party of ninety-four kinsfolk and retainers. They finally found their way to Rome, where Paul V., the reigning pontiff, gave them shelter and expressed his deep sympathy with the Irish exiles. The following year Rory O’Donnell, Earl of Tyrconnell, died of Roman fever, and in 1616 the last of the Irish kings bearing the name of O’Neill was laid to rest in the Church of San Pietro on the Janiculum, the same which claims the dust of St. Peter.

The misfortunes which always followed Hugh O’Neill’s footsteps continued to pursue his sons. Henry, the eldest, died in command of an Irish regiment in the Netherlands; John, his next brother, succeeded him and died in battle in Catalonia; Bernard was assassinated when but seventeen years old; Hugh died of Roman fever, and Conn, the youngest, who, for some unaccountable reason, was left in Ireland in the hurry of his father’s flight, was arrested, taken to London, and imprisoned in the Tower, where he was lost sight of, and the male line of the O’Neills became extinct. The living representative of the family, Baron Edward O’Neill of Shane’s Castle, Antrim, is descended in the female line. His name was Chichester until he was created baron in 1868, when he assumed that of his ancestors. He lives in the old castle, about fourteen miles north of Belfast.

The lord of the county, however, is the young Earl of Shaftesbury, grandson of the famous philanthropist, who inherits many of his grandfather’s traits and takes an active part in religious, philanthropic, political, and municipal affairs. He is very public-spirited, is always willing to do his part in charitable movements, has served as alderman and lord mayor of Belfast with great credit, and has held several other important positions. He was educated at Eton and Sandhurst Military School, was elected alderman in Belfast in 1905 and lord mayor in 1907. In 1899 he married Lady Constance Grosvenor, granddaughter of the late Duke of Westminster. He inherited Belfast Castle, the former seat of the Donegal family, which they have occupied ever since. It is about three miles from Belfast, and entirely modern. The state apartments and picture galleries on the main floor are very fine. A short distance from the castle is a beautiful little private mortuary chapel erected by the late Marquis of Donegal, as a burial place for the family.

On the opposite side of Belfast Lough is the seat of the late Lord Dufferin and Ava, one of the ablest and most useful men in the British empire for many years. His figure in bronze under a marble canopy in the City Hall Park reminds the people of Belfast of his ability, his patriotism, and his public services. He was Viceroy of India, Governor-General of Canada, ambassador to France, Italy, and Turkey, and held other important positions and received unusual honors, but he died here in 1902 broken hearted because his reputation had been used by a swindler, named Wright, in promoting an enterprise that seemed to him proper and promising, but turned out to be the worst kind of a fraud. His situation was similar to that of General Grant after the Grant-Ward failure in New York. Lord Dufferin gave up all his property as restitution to the victims of the scheme and retired to the seclusion of his ancestral home here. Wright was convicted and sentenced to twenty years in prison, but committed suicide before he was sent to the penitentiary. The dowager marchioness still occupies the family mansion with her younger children and is actively engaged in charitable work.

The young earl occupies an important position in the foreign office at London. He was born in 1866, and in 1903 married an American girl, Miss Florence Davis, daughter of John H. Davis, 24 Washington Square, New York City.

Upon the loftiest eminence overlooking Belfast Lough is a tall, round structure known as Ellen’s Tower, which the late marquis erected in memory of his late mother, Ellen Sheridan, a granddaughter of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the dramatist. She was a woman of great ability and exercised a wide influence. She wrote books and poetry and songs and was the author of the old-fashioned ballad that was very popular in your grandmother’s time: “I’m Sitting on the Stile, Mary.”

On the north side of the Bay of Belfast, about six miles below the city, is the ancient town of Carrickfergus, which is of peculiar interest to Americans, because the father of Andrew Jackson was born there and from there emigrated in 1765 and found a farm in the wilderness of North Carolina.

It was there also that John Paul Jones, with the Ranger, fought the Drake, a British sloop of war, April 24, 1778. The Drake was in the harbor near the Castle of Carrickfergus, when the Ranger came in sight, and coaxed her out for an engagement, which occurred promptly in midchannel, and for a while there was very lively action on both sides. The Drake carried twenty 4-pound guns and 142 seamen. The Ranger carried eighteen 6-pound guns and 155 seamen, several of whom were Irishmen from Belfast and one from Carrickfergus. The Drake was the larger vessel, but was not handled as easily as the Ranger. The fight lasted an hour and fifteen minutes when the Drake struck her colors. Her captain, Burder, by name, was killed; Lieutenant Dobbs, the next in command, was mortally wounded, and her deck was covered with the dead and the dying. The Ranger had only three killed and five wounded. Captain Jones remained in the bay for several days, making repairs, and sent all the wounded ashore to Carrickfergus. Lieutenant Dobbs died the morning after the battle and is buried in the churchyard of the little village of Lisburn near by, where he lies beside the great and good Jeremy Taylor, Bishop of Armagh, who died in 1667.

It was on the day before the battle that Captain Jones made his raid upon the castle of Lord Selkirk at Kirkcudbright, Scotland, across the Irish Channel, and carried away with him the family plate, which was surrendered by Lady Selkirk to avoid a mutiny among the crew. But Captain Jones, after five years of persistent work, recovered the entire collection and restored it safely to its original owners, even paying for its carriage to Scotland. Captain Stockton, the American military attachÉ at London, sent to the Navy Department at Washington, copies of several characteristic letters written by John Paul Jones to Lady Selkirk and to Lord Selkirk, concerning the matter.

Belfast has had many distinguished sons in addition to those whom I have already named, but none more eminent and useful than James Bryce, British ambassador to Washington, who was born there May 10, 1838, and shares with Lord Kelvin the honor of being the most famous of all Belfasters. He went from there a young man to the University of Glasgow and there developed his extraordinary mental and physical energy. From Glasgow he went to Oxford, where he took his degree in 1862, and then to Heidelberg to perfect himself in German, of which he is a thorough scholar. We next find him studying law in London where he was called to the Bar in 1867 and immediately was recognized for his legal ability and learning. Only three years later he was invited to accept the Regius professorship of law at Oxford, which he held from 1870 to 1893. In the meantime he was the busiest man in England and engaged in the greatest variety of activities. He was writing history, exploring Iceland, climbing Mount Ararat, making records in the Alpine Club, studying Ireland, running for parliament, serving as parliamentary secretary for foreign affairs, and afterward as chief secretary for Ireland in the British cabinet and chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

And all this time, when he was not doing anything else, he was writing books, and almost all of his works are regarded as the best books ever written upon the subjects of which they treat. “The American Commonwealth” is acknowledged to be the best account of our institutions ever penned by a foreigner. “The Holy Roman Empire” is a model of historical literature, while Mr. Bryce’s other books, on a variety of subjects, are of equal rank in scholarship and in literary merit.

The late Rev. Dr. John Hall, in his day the most eminent Presbyterian divine in America, was born at Armagh, where Cardinal Logue, the Roman Catholic Primate of Ireland, presides over the ancient see of St. Patrick. Dr. Hall was born in 1829, entered Belfast College when he was only thirteen years old, and although the youngest in his class, ranked first in scholarship and took the largest number of prizes. He studied theology at the Presbyterian Seminary here, and when he was only twenty-two years old became pastor of the First Church at Armagh, his native town. In 1856 he was called to Dublin as pastor of the Rutland Presbyterian Church, and was appointed commissioner of education for Ireland. In 1867 he was sent to the United States as a delegate to the general assembly, and created such a favorable impression that he immediately received a call to the pulpit of the Fifth Avenue Church, Presbyterian, of New York, which he accepted and occupied the rest of his life.