to a priest, but he said, 'When we have a Parliament
of our own we'll not need to borrow money, for we'll have more than we
know what to do with. Did not Mr. Gladstone say we should have a
chronic plethora of money? John Bull certainly sends some money over
here, but he had it from here to begin with. He stole it from Ireland,
and he is only like a thief whose conscience urges him to restore a
portion, a very small portion, of the stolen goods. When we get
Independence--he used the word Independence--we shall be in a position
to lend money instead of needing to borrow!' The person who said all
this is the most influential politician of this district. His word to
his flock is law. Not one of them dare for his life vote otherwise
than as he tells them. They do not think this a hardship. They have no
political convictions, and would just as soon vote any one way as any
other."

A Donegal Home Ruler said that the poor folks were quite right in
following the priests, and wanted to know if they would be right in
following the Tories. He said:--"They are no more ignorant than the
British working men, and not less independent. Don't the working
classes follow their leaders, voting in heaps, just as they are told,
without any notion of the Empire's greatness, and entirely with a view
to their own interests? Could anybody be more stupid, more totally
incapable of giving a valid reason for his action than your vaunted
British workman? Why, if the specimens we get over here are any guide,
if the samples are anything like the bulk, you might as well poll a
flock of sheep as a crowd of British working men. I say the Irish
peasantry are superior in intellect, conduct, and chayracther, and
that in following the priest they are acting as reasonable as your
British working-man, who follows his strike leaders and trade
agitators, and is perpetually cutting off his nose to spite his face.
No, we shall not get Home Rule now, but we must have it later on. Then
we shall demand more. Every time we have to ask we shall want more
and more. We shall wring it from England, and we shall make her pay
for the trouble she gives. She must be charged a sort of war
indemnity."

The Dundalk press is on my track. I heard of this in Newry, but the
Dundalk papers do not reach the next town to Dundalk, and not a sheet
could be had for love or money. A friend having told me that the
_Gazette_ was reviled, great efforts were made to obtain the reviling
prin