an alliance with France; for whatever objects were stated in public, the real guiding spirits of the United Irish Society from the beginning (as of other societies of a later date with equally innocent names) were ardent republicans, who joined the society in order to further those views; it is absurd to suggest that men who were actually in correspondence with the leaders of the Directory and were trying to bring about an invasion from France in order to aid them in establishing a Republic on Jacobin lines would have been deterred by the passing of a Bill making it lawful for Roman Catholics to sit in Parliament.  Nor again is it reasonable to contend that earnest-minded Roman Catholics would, in consequence of the failure of such a Bill to become law, have rebelled against a Government under which they were able to exercise their religion in peace and which was at that moment founding and endowing a College for the training of candidates for the priesthood, in favour of one which had confiscated the seminaries and was sending the priests to the guillotine.  The fact seems to have been that the society was formed by Presbyterians, for political reasons; they tried to get the Roman Catholics to join them, but the lower class Roman Catholics cared very little about seats in Parliament; so the founders of the society cleverly added abolition of tithes and taxes, and reduction of rents, to their original programme; this drew in numbers of Roman Catholics, whose principles were really the very antithesis of Jacobinism.

It is a fair instance of the confusion which has always reigned throughout Irish politics, that after the Relief Act of 1793 had been passed, the Catholic Committee expressed their jubilation by voting L2,000 for a statue to the King, and presenting a gold medal to their Secretary, Wolfe Tone, who was at that moment scheming to set up a Jacobin Republic.

This celebrated man, Wolfe Tone, was not unlike many others who have posed as Irish patriots.  Hating the very name of England, he schemed to get one appointment after another from the English Government—­at one time seeking to be put in command of a filibustering expedition to raid the towns of South America, at another time trying for a post in India; hating the Pope and the priests, he acted as Secretary to the Catholic Committee; then hating Grattan and the Irish Parliament and everything to say to it, he showed his patriotism by devoting his energies to trying to persuade the French Republican Government to invade Ireland.

On the 21st of September, 1795, an incident occurred which, though apparently trivial at the time, was destined to be of great historical importance.  Ulster had now for some time been in a state bordering on anarchy; not only were the secret societies constantly at war, but marauding bands, pretending to belong to one or other of the societies, were ravishing the country.  Something like a pitched battle was fought between the Protestants and the Defenders, in