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streets possesses more of animation than it has done. The movement ends
always in a knot of people, and folk go from group to group vainly
seeking information, and quite content if the rumour they presently
gather differs even a little from the one they have just communicated.
The first statement I heard was that the Green had been taken by the
military; the second that it had been re-taken; the third that it had
not been taken at all. The facts at last emerged that the Green had not
been occupied by the soldiers, but that the Volunteers had retreated
from it into a house which commanded it. This was found to be the
College of Surgeons, and from the windows and roof of this College they
were sniping. A machine gun was mounted on the roof; other machine guns,
however, opposed them from the roofs of the Shelbourne Hotel, the United
Service Club, and the Alexandra Club. Thus a triangular duel opened
between these positions across the trees of the Park.
Through the railings of the Green some rifles and bandoliers could be
seen lying on the ground, as also the deserted trenches and snipers'
holes. Small boys bolted in to see these sights and bolted out again
with bullets quickening their feet. Small boys do not believe that
people will really kill them, but small boys were killed.
The dead horse was still lying stiff and lamentable on the footpath.
This morning a gunboat came up the Liffey and helped to bombard Liberty
Hall. The Hall is breeched and useless. Rumour says that it was empty at
the time, and that Connolly with his men had marched long before to the
Post Office and the Green. The same source of information relates that
three thousand Volunteers came from Belfast on an excursion train and
that they marched into the Post Office.
On this day only one of my men came in. He said that he had gone on the
roof and had been shot at, consequently that the Volunteers held some of
the covering houses. I went to the roof and remained there for half an
hour. There were no shots, but the firing from the direction of
Sackville Street was continuous and at times exceedingly heavy.
To-day the _Irish Times_ was published. It contained a new military
proclamation, and a statement that the country was peaceful, and told
that in Sackville Street some houses were burned to the ground.
On the outside railings a bill proclaiming Martial Law was posted.
Into the newspaper statement that peace reigned in the country one wa
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