proposed and insisted upon it, that whatever was necessary to be done ought to be done with, and through, the bishops.”  Of this there is ample proof in the earlier letters, and the proposal which he made was that the four archbishops and one bishop for every province should be summoned to Rome to “prepare and settle things.”  Writing on the Feast of the Epiphany in 1888, he said to Manning:—­“I agree fully with your Eminence that the true Nunciatura for England and Ireland is the Episcopate.  If the bishops do not know the state of the country they are not fit to be bishops.  If they do, what more can una persona ufficiosa o ufficiale do for the Holy See?” And again—­“I fully understand what your Eminence adds, the English people tolerate the Catholic Church as a spiritual body.  The first sign of a political action on the Government would rekindle all the old fears, suspicions, and hostility.  It is a great pity they do not realise this in Rome.  And it is also a great pity that English Catholics do not understand all this.  I am sure that His Holiness understands it well, but I share your fears that those about him may harass him with the fickle and vain glory that would accrue to the Holy See by having an accredited representative from England also.”

It is impossible not to infer from this that the English Catholics were engaged in an attempt to secure diplomatic recognition by Great Britain of the Holy See, and that their anxiety to secure this was in some measure connected with their desire to override the feelings and opinions of the Irish Episcopate, but the overtures of Lord Salisbury were as fruitless as those of Russell forty years before.

The last letter from Mgr.  Persico to the English Cardinal, which has been reprinted, reiterates the disclaimer of responsibility for the action of the Vatican, in these words:—­

“I had no idea that anything had been done about Irish affairs much less thought that some questions had been referred to the Holy Office, and the first knowledge I had of the decree was on the morning of the 28th April, when I received the bare circular sent me by Propaganda.  I must add that had I known of such a thing I would have felt it my duty to make proper representations to the Holy See.”

In view of this it is interesting to read the naive record in the Tablet of those who signed the address to Persico on the totally wrong assumption that he and his report were the causa causans of the decree.  “The signatures,” says the Tablet, “comprise those of all the Catholic peers in Ireland (14 in number), four Privy Councillors, ten honourables, two Lords Lieutenants of counties, nineteen baronets, fifty-four deputy-lieutenants, two hundred and ninety-seven magistrates, and a large number of the learned and military professions.”  The remarkable thing about this memorial was the absence of the names of any clerics, regular or secular, parish priests or prelates.