fighting on both sides. Admiral Duncan
thereby became Lord Camperdown and the Batavian Republic dropped all
ideas of a naval expedition against England. Meanwhile the gallant
General Hoche had died, and Wolfe Tone lost a true friend, with whom,
from the beginning of their acquaintance, he had been in thorough
sympathy.

[Sidenote: 1798--The brink of an Irish rebellion]

All this time the condition of things in Ireland was becoming
desperate. After the appearance of the fleet in Bantry Bay, and the
hopes which it created on the one side and the alarms on the other, the
ruling powers in Dublin Castle, and indeed at Westminster, had no other
idea but that of crushing out the rebellious spirit of the Irish people
by Coercion Acts and by military law. The national sentiment of
Ireland counted for nothing with them. It may be safely laid down as
an axiom in political history that the men who are not able to take
account of the force of what they would call a mere national sentiment
in public affairs are not and never can be fit to carry on the great
work of government. Ireland was overrun by militia regiments, sent
over from England and Scotland, who had no sympathy whatever with the
Irish people, and regarded them simply as revolted slaves to be
scourged back into submission or shot down if they persevered in
refusing to submit. Other forces representing law and order were found
in the yeomanry, who were chiefly Orangemen and officered by Orangemen,
and who regarded the Catholic peasantry as their born enemies. A state
of tumult raged {319} through the greater part of the unhappy island,
and there cannot be the slightest doubt that the floggings, hangings,
and shootings inflicted by the militia and by the yeomen were in many
cases done not so much in punishment as in anticipation of rebellious
movements on the part of the Catholics. In the mean time preparations
were unquestionably going on in many Irish counties, more especially in
Ulster, for an outbreak of rebellion. The organization of United
Irishmen was adding to its numbers of sworn-in members every day, and
the making of pikes was a busy manufacture all over many of the
counties. Grattan and some of his friends made many efforts in the
Irish House of Commons to induce the Government to devise some means
for the pacification of Ireland other than Coercion Acts, the scourge,
the bullet, and the gallows. Finding their efforts wholly in vain,
Grattan, Arth