even those who dissented most widely from his opinions
admired his "grit." But politicians had to think of the Irish vote,
and the proprietors of newspapers could not ignore their Catholic
subscribers. The priests worked against him with such effect that
Mr. Peabody's servants in Boston, who were Irish Catholics,
threatened to leave their places if Froude remained as a guest in
their master's house. Father Burke, who had begun politely enough,
became obstreperous and abusive. Froude's life was in danger, and he
was put under the special protection of the police. The English
newspapers, except The Pall Mall Gazette, gave him no support, and
The Times treated his enterprise as Quixotic. A preposterous rumour
that he received payment from the British Ministry obtained
circulation among respectable persons in New York. He had intended
to visit the Western States, but the project was abandoned in
consequence of growing Irish hostility which made him feel that
further effort would be useless. It was not that he thought his
arguments refuted, or capable of refutation. He had considered them
too long, and too carefully, for that. But the well had been
poisoned. The malicious imputation of bribery was caught up by the
more credulous Irish, and their priests warned them that they would
do wrong in listening to a heretic. As for the American people, they
had no mind to take up the quarrel. It was no business of theirs.

Some extracts from Froude's letters to his wife will show how much
he enjoyed American hospitality, and how far he appreciated American
character. "I was received on Saturday," he wrote from New York on
the 4th of October, 1872, "as a member of the Lotus Club--the wits
and journalists of New York. It was the strangest scene I ever was
present at. They were very clever--very witty at each other's
expense, very complimentary to me; and, believe me, they worked the
publishers who were present for the profit they were making out of
me." He was agreeably surprised by the merchant princes of New York.
"There is absolutely no vulgarity about them. They are immensely
rich, but simple, and rather elaborately 'religious' in the forms of
their lives. A very long grace is always said before dinner. In this
and many ways they are totally unlike what I expected." Again, after
a description of Cornell's University, he says, "There is Mr.
Cornell, who has made all this, living in a little poky house in a
street with a couple of m