Page:The Irish in Australia.djvu/51

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GREATER BRITAIN'S METROPOLIS.
37

orderly, and industrious element in the general population, not a "residuum of poverty and filth," as Mr. Anthony Trollope insinuates, with lying and unblushing effrontery. There are nearly a dozen local governing bodies within a circle drawn five miles around the Melbourne general post-office, and there is not one of these municipal councils that has not two, three, or more Irish members, elected by their fellow-citizens in that particular neighbourhood. What does this prove? Beyond all question it proves that the Irish in Melbourne are not to be found herding together, like the Chinese, within a limited space or quarter. It proves that in each of the municipal districts there is a strong contingent of independent Irish ratepayers, men with a stake in the country, freeholders qualified to vote, and good citizens in every respect. Of course, some suburbs will be more representatively Irish than others. For instance. North and West Melbourne, from their proximity to the central terminus of the Victorian railway system, where many hundreds of Irishmen are regularly employed as porters, guards, points-men, engine-drivers, &c., have necessarily a larger Celtic population than South or East Melbourne. Naturally they settle down where they have obtained permanent employment, and here it may be observed that no finer or more patriotic body of Irishmen can be met with than those of North and West Melbourne. Their pastor, the Very Rev. Dean England, is a nephew of the illustrious Bishop England, who occupies so large a space in John Francis Maguire's account of the Irish in America. For many years they regularly returned, as one of their representatives in parliament. Sir Charles MacMahon, the son of the late Right Hon. Sir William MacMahon, at one time Master of the Rolls in Ireland. More recently they twice elected the late Prime