In my experience I have generally found that the men who have taken the lead in most places have been professional men rather than traders.  This was true of Birmingham as well as elsewhere.  There were no men who did better service than Hugh Heinrick, an able journalist (who afterwards became editor of the “United Irishman,” the organ of our Confederation), and Professor Bertram Windle.  I was glad to see in the newspapers the announcement of such a genuine Irishman as Dr. Windle being appointed President of the University College, Cork.

Professor Windle is an honour to his new position, and is as devoted to the cause of creed and country as he was when one of the Professors of the Queen’s University, Birmingham.

During the years when I was organiser for the League in Birmingham; I became intimately acquainted with him.  I found him not only a man of great learning, but an earnest Catholic and devoted Irish Nationalist.  No man in our organisation did better service, and he was always ready to go at a moment’s notice to speak or lecture wherever required.

As a further illustration of what I have said about the aid given to the cause by professional men, I ought to mention Dr. James Mullin, of Cardiff.  He was a leading and active man in his district when I travelled in South Wales as an organiser.  His talent as a poet has made him well known in Wales, and his accounts of travels in many lands have found many admiring readers.  His heart is as warm as his brain is active, which is saying much.

CHAPTER XIV.

BIGGAR AND PARNELL—­THE “UNITED IRISHMAN “—­THE O’CONNELL CENTENARY.

The General Election of 1874 was remarkable as the first since the Union which had clearly and distinctly returned a majority of Irish members of Parliament as Home Rulers.  Previously most of them had been returned as Liberals or Tories.  It is memorable in my eyes, as it was the occasion when two of my personal friends, Alexander Martin Sullivan and Joseph Gillis Biggar, first entered Parliament.  It was in the year after he was elected that Mr. Biggar made his debut as an “obstructionist.”

Charles Stewart Parnell having been, in the spring of 1875, elected as successor in the representation of Meath to “honest John Martin,” it was not long before the famous “Biggar and Parnell” combination, which was destined to revolutionize the whole system of Parliamentary procedure, was created.

Feeling the necessity for a newspaper representing the views of the Home Rule Confederation and chronicling its work from week to week, the Executive promoted the formation of a limited liability company for the purpose, and the outcome was the issue of the “United Irishman,” the first number of which appeared on June 4th, 1875.  I was appointed manager, and was also the publisher, the paper being produced at my place of business, 68 Byrom Street, Liverpool.  The following were the Directors—­Andrew Commins, LL.D., Chairman; and John Barry, Joseph Gillis Biggar, M.P., John Ferguson, Richard Mangan, Bernard MacAnulty, and Peter McKinley.  William John Oliver was Honorary Secretary, with Hugh Heinrick as Editor at the commencement, and Daniel Crilly afterwards.