the breast of infancy the thrill which must have vibrated sternly and strongly in the heart of manhood.  Without exalting into classical grandeur the simple and affectionate devotion of a simple and unsophisticated people, we might compare this spectacle to that which ancient Rome witnessed, when the ashes of Germanicus were borne in solemn state within her portals.  There were there the attendant crowd of female mourners, and the bowed heads and sorrowing hearts of strong men.  If the Irish throngs had no hero to lament, who sustained their glory in the field, and gained for them fresh laurels of victory, theirs was at least a more disinterested tribute of grief, since it was paid to the unpretending merit which laid down, life with the simple prayer of ‘God save Ireland!’ Amidst all the numerous thousands who proceeded to Glasnevin, there was not, probably, one who would have sympathised with any criminal offence, much less with the hideous one of murder.  And yet these thousands honoured and revered the memory of the men condemned in England as assassins, and ignominiously buried in felons’ graves.

This mighty demonstration—­at once so unique, so solemn, so impressive, so portentous—­was an event which the rulers of Ireland felt to be of critical importance.  Following upon the Requiem Masses and the other processions, it amounted to a great public verdict which changed beyond all resistance the moral character of the Manchester trial and execution.  If the procession could only have been called a “Fenian” demonstration, then indeed the government might hope to detract from its significance and importance.  The sympathy of “co-conspirators” with fallen companions could not well be claimed as an index of general public opinion.  But here was a demonstration notoriously apart from Fenianism, and it showed that a moral, a peaceable, a virtuous, a religious people, moved by the most virtuous and religious instincts, felt themselves coerced to execrate as a cowardly and revolting crime the act of state policy consummated on the Manchester gibbet.  In fine, the country was up in moral revolt against a deed which the perpetrators themselves already felt to be of evil character, and one which they fain would blot for ever from public recollection.

What was to be done?  For the next ensuing Sunday similar demonstrations were announced in Killarney, Kilkenny, Drogheda, Ennis, Clonmel, Queenstown, Youghal, and Fermoy—­the preparations in the first named town being under the direction of, and the procession about to be led by, a member of parliament, one of the most distinguished and influential of the Irish popular representatives—­The O’Donoghue.  What was to be done?  Obviously, as the men had been hanged, there could be no halting halfway now.  Having gone so far, the government seemed to feel that it must need go the whole way, and choke off, at all hazards, these inconvenient, these damnatory public protests.  No man must be allowed to speak