What was to be done?  What was most needed to give force and power to the insurrectionary uprising in Ireland?  They knew the answer.  Arms and officers were wanted.  To supply them, at least in some measure, was, therefore, the great object that now presented itself to their minds.  How they sought to accomplish it is known to the public—­if the Attorney-General and his witnesses, at the opening of the Commission in Dublin, in November, 1867, told a true story.

Any references we shall here make to that particular subject, that is, to the alleged voyage of a Fenian cruiser conveying men and arms from New York to Ireland, shall be derived entirely from the statements made in open court on that occasion, with an extract or two from a document otherwise published.  We shall add nothing to them, neither shall we vouch for the authenticity of all or any of them, for, at the time of our writing, “the Crown,” as the government lawyers call themselves, are not yet done with some of the cases arising out of this alleged expedition.  But, taking the narrative as we find it in the newspaper reports of the trials of Colonel John Warren and Augustine E. Costello, and in the lecture delivered in America, under the auspices of the Fenian Brotherhood, by Colonel S.R.  Tresilian, John Savage, Esq., C.E.F.B. in the chair, reported in the Irish People, New York, and in other journals, we summarise briefly, as follows, its chief particulars.

It appears, then, that at the time to which we have referred, when the necessity of transmitting a quantity of arms, and sending a number of military leaders to Ireland for the sustainment of the insurrectionary movement had impressed itself on the minds of the Fenian leaders in America, they resolved on an attempt to supply, to some extent, those requirements.  Two ways were open to them of setting about this difficult and hazardous undertaking.  One was to avail of the ordinary mail steamers and trading ships between the two countries, send the men across as ordinary passengers, and ship the arms as goods of different kinds.  Much had been done in that way during the previous three or four years, but it was plainly too slow and uncertain a process to adopt on the present occasion.  The other course was to procure a vessel for this special purpose, freight her with the men and arms, place her under the command of a skilful and experienced captain, and trust to his skill and luck for landing the entire in safety somewhere on the west coast of Ireland.

This was the course adopted.  How it was carried out, the Attorney-General, with whatever degree of authority may attach to his words in such a case, has thus described:—­