done, and generous hearts on all sides having recognised how right and wise it was to do it, I am persuaded there are some of them who wish they had. The stale and stupid lie that all these men of Irish blood and feeling who left a prosperous country which offers a career to every one, for what was plainly a forlorn hope, are merely robbers in pursuit of plunder outraged common sense. We would not believe it of Italians, Hungarians, or Poles, and nobody did believe it of the Fenians, however solemnly it was enunciated. But when what is true of the best of them is admitted (as you admitted it in the case of Mackay), multitudes who would shut their minds fast against an admonition heralded by a falsehood will be ready to admit in return that Fenianism cannot possibly accomplish its purpose, and that it is wicked to foster a hopeless insurrection. And we have been effectually taught by spies, informers, and assassinations (like the murder of poor M'Gee) that the Fenians are not all Mackays.
"Next to your charge the thing which gave me most satisfaction in connection with Irish affairs, since my return, was Mr. Gladstone's admission that Fenianism prepared the way for disestablishing the Irish Church. It required high courage to say this in the face of the prevailing cant of English newspapers; but it was true, and when it was once said there was a chorus of assent. Disestablish the Church by all means, but there will be no tranquillity in Ireland till you give the farmer a secure tenure, and forbid the landlord to kill or banish him for non-payment of an exorbitant rent.
"I have read with a great deal of amusement Mr. Mitchel's lectures to the Fenians. The folly of going to war with England when she is at peace with the world; the childishness of trying to frighten her with exaggerated estimates of Irish resources; the wickedness of misleading the people with hopes that cannot be realised; and the madness of arraying a people without arms or discipline against regular armies, are texts upon which Mr. Mitchel may claim to speak with authority. But as the man in the Critic says, 'I think I have heard all that before'—when Mr. Stephens was not the delinquent."
