!" arose in every quarter of the world; the
echo reached the ears of the promoters of the movement; and the force of
public opinion succeeded in suppressing the futile attempt.

The influence of Irish emigrants in America was already beginning to be
felt. Large sums of money poured in from that country to swell the
Catholic rent, and a considerable portion of the funds were employed by
O'Connell in providing for men who had been ejected by their landlords,
for refusing either to believe a creed, or to give a vote contrary to
their conscience. He even threatened to buy up the incumbrances on some
of these gentlemen's estates, to foreclose their mortgages, and to sell
them out. His threat, added to his well-known determination, was not
without its effect.

The whole subject of Irish emigration may be safely predicted to be the
key which will unlock the future fate of Great Britain. It is true that,
at this moment, every effort is being made by the English nation to
conciliate America; it remains to be seen how Americans will be disposed
to accept present flattery as a compensation for past injustice, and
scarcely past contempt. A better knowledge of Irish history might
prevent some fatal mistakes on both sides of the Atlantic. I have,
therefore, felt it a duty to devote the concluding pages of this
_History_ to this important subject.

The great tide of western emigration was undoubtedly caused, in part, by
the sufferings of the famine year; but these sufferings were in
themselves an effect, rather than a cause; and we must look to more
remote history for the origin of the momentous exodus. It has, indeed,
been well observed, that "when a man leaves his country for one subject
to foreign rule, it must, in general, be that he does not care for it,
or that it does not care for him; it must either be that he is so little
attached to the institutions of his own country, that he is willing to
submit to those of another; or that he despises the latter sufficiently
to look forward to replacing them by those of his own."[585] No
unprejudiced person can for a moment doubt which of these causes has
been most active in producing Irish emigration. The Irishman's love of
home and of his native land, is a fact beyond all dispute: his
emigration, then, can have no other cause than this, that his country,
or the country which governs his native land, does not care for him; and
when we find noble lords and honorable members suggesting "