ds
wherewith to carry on the conflict. The prudence of thus publishing the
date which he had fixed for the outbreak of the insurrection was very
generally questioned, but however great might be his error in this
respect, many believed that he would endeavour to make good his words.
The British government believed it, and prepared for the threatened
rising by hurrying troops and munitions of war across to Ireland, and
putting the various forts and barracks in a state of thorough defence.
As the last days and nights of 1866 wore away, both the government and
the people expected every moment to hear the first crash of the
struggle. But it came not. The year 3867 came in and still all was
quiet. What had become of James Stephens? The astonished and irate
Fenians of New York investigated the matter, and found that he was
peacefully and very privately living at lodgings in some part of that
city, afraid to face the wrath of the men whom he had so egregiously
deceived. We need not describe the outburst of rage and indignation
which followed on the discovery; suffice it to say that the once popular
and powerful Fenian leader soon found it prudent to quit the United
States and take up his abode in a part of the world where there were no
Fenian circles and no settlements of the swarming Irish race.

Amongst the men who had rallied round James Stephens in America there
were many whose honesty was untainted, and who had responded to his call
with the full intention of committing themselves, without regard to
consequences, to the struggle which he promised to initiate. They
believed his representations respecting the prospects of an insurrection
in Ireland, and they pledged themselves to fight by his side and perish,
if necessary, in the good old cause, in defence of which their fathers
had bled. They scorned to violate their engagements; they spurned the
idea of shrinking from the difficulty they had pledged themselves to
face, and resolved that come what may the reproach of cowardice and bad
faith should never be uttered against them. Accordingly, in January,
'67, they began to fend in scattered parties at Queenstown, and spread
themselves through the country, taking every precaution to escape the
suspicion of the police. They set to work diligently and energetically
to organize an insurrectionary outbreak; they found innumerable
difficulties in their path; they found the people almost wholly unarmed;
they found the wisest of the