y beside my fork on the dinner-table, either in
my own or in anybody else's house, as I spread my napkin on my knees.

And yet it is strangely difficult to see any other cause than Mr.
Gladstone's Acts for such ill-feeling.

As my sworn evidence, on which I was cross-examined in the Parnell
Commission, showed, I had only ten evictions in six years among two
thousand tenants.

I should like to ask, in what class of life is there not more than one
in twelve hundred that gets into financial troubles in a year?

In the insurance world such a ratio of claims to premiums would make a
perfect fortune to the companies.

The tenants were not associated with the Fenian movement at all, the
outbreak being solely confined to the townsfolk, which, in Ireland,
helped to make it a feeble affair. I did not know one _bona fide_ farmer
that was connected with the movement, and though the arms were mainly
smuggled in from America, mighty little hard cash came to the pockets of
any but the leaders.

Stephens was the original 'Number One,' and he was let out of Kilmainham
by the chief warder's wife. No one knew where he was to be found, but
the police, who were well aware that he was devoted to his own wife,
kept a strict watch on her, and eventually caught him through his
opening communications with her.

When the hue and cry was loudest, it was reported he had come to Cork to
foster the Fenian movement, and that he was disguised in feminine garb.

One day my wife found her steps dogged by a man in the most aggravating
way, for he followed her into three shops without attempting to speak to
her, his only desire being to shadow her, which he was doing in the most
clumsy manner.

I was away at Dingle for the day, so my wife went into the establishment
of the leading linen-draper, and sending for the head of the firm, asked
him to speak to the man, who was then pretending to buy some tape.

It turned out that he was a detective fresh from Dublin, who had taken
it into his head that she was Stephens, and was most apologetic, as well
as crestfallen, at his error.

Some time after this Fenian fizzle, my coachman saw a number of people
being chased by the police for drilling; and about two years later, when
I sent him to the Cork barracks on private business, he told me that he
there noticed some of the very people who had been routed by the
constabulary, but this time they were being drilled by the Government as
militia.

I have a